Thread: Grid can go 75% renewable

Originally Posted by JDNSW

Absolutely correct. Just illustrating that a blanket figure for life of panels of 25 years or "it's exactly the same with panels, degrade to 80% (from memory) at 25 years" is simply disinformation, either said carelessly or perhaps deliberately.

Hi John and not having a shot at you, but you are making up standards based on just your experience.

The industry as a whole, apparently does have standards based on all types of panels so the results are measurable.

It still comes back to panels needing to be replaced at twice the rate an OLD type coal fired power station needs to be replaced, and as such, that make the panels twice as dear as they try to make out they are.

The "deliberate disinformation" is definitely coming from the renewables camp more so than the other way around.

The original 3kw of 10 year old panels on our house were tested and found to be at near-new efficiency when we added panels to go to 6.8kw.
But they are a good quality brand. I'm sure there are dodgy panels around.

We'll have to agree to disagree.
There's nothing unproven about pumped hydro, solar, wind, hydrogen or batteries, they are all mature technologies with a long history.

Originally Posted by drivesafe

Hi Mick, every single one of the above proposals/projects are unproven and whether they work or not, and most will not, are going to cost a fortune which we the tax payers and electricity bill payers will have to cover.

Hydrogen has a huge future but it is incredibly expensive to produce.

For every unit of hydrogen energy you need at least 1.5 units of some other form of energy to produce that 1 unit of hydrogen energy.

Thats is an insane waste of other forms of energy, right at the time when we are supposed to be saving energy.

All these “GREEN” projects are just ways for specific groups of people to make money, at everybody else’s expense.

Gas is going to be a big supplier of power over coal because it is cleaner, but it is only cleaner than coal because no one other than the Japanese are trying to clean up coal fired power supplies.

Any breakthrough in cleaning up coal use and it will remain the major supplier of electricity for the next century and further.

Originally Posted by DiscoMick

We'll have to agree to disagree.
There's nothing unproven about pumped hydro, solar, wind, hydrogen or batteries, they are all mature technologies with a long history.

Long history yes, but few have a successful history.

Again, just look at the UK’s disastrous “experiment” with wind farming.

As I posted, just wait till we get into a major drought and see which power source gets us out of trouble.

There's nothing unproven about pumped hydro, solar, wind, hydrogen or batteries, they are all mature technologies with a long history.

Surely the use of hydrogen in motor vehicles is experimental and at High cost. maybe hydrogen genration is mature but not at a moderate cost and not "green"

Surely solar is now acknowleged to be only part of a solution as solar power is generated when few want or need it. It therefore requires an equal amount of alternative power to cover rain periods or simply night. It will be mature when solar farms are required to provide power 24 hours a day. I would like to see the cost then.

Wind. The average wind farm does not produce over 25-30% of its nameplate capacity.

Really hydro is really the only proven and reliable renewable energy and it also fails during droughts.

Batteries . how many Trillion dollars would it cost to have a day's network support? Isn't it around 400trillion?

Regards PhilipA

Solar, wind and hydro are well know for the reliability and period of time they can provide power Its solar about 25%, Wind about 50% and Hydro about 90% plus IF rainfall and snow is sufficient as proven by historic low levels of the USA's Hoover Dam!

The "ABOUT" is clearly missing the point that 100% of the time some of us must have 100% reliable power. (PS Coal is not 100% nor is GAS) Vaccines, Life support, Butcher, Industry and business....... are not intermittent!

The repeated claims that renewables can cover all our power needs is green washing not factual or science based here and now reality. C02 free can only if Nuclear is included. Not here of course we are to smart!

Northern Territory is currently NOT taking solar farm power with out guarantee of supply. The Solar farm developer wants to supply part time at times and NT is not allowing that! Who pays the cost for part time power. It should be the Solar farm I think as the cost is reliability if not!
"The Northern Territory government is being accused of anti-competitive behaviour and making a mockery of its renewable energy target, because it is blocking four solar farms it encouraged private companies to build from supplying electricity to its grid."

The whinging like this is common! Expecting Demanding others to pay huge cost to allow part time intermittent power supply such as Solar farms which is cheap and cheerful. Everyone including me is welcome to use the cheap power they have for products and users that can use intermittent power. That our electrical Grid is not intermittent is overlooked by far to much media and green washed by what I think are deluded environmental activists.

My battery back up systems to be 99.9% reliable cost me a packet! My solar saves some $. I cannot be in business if I was off grid with out spending well over $100,000 extra or more, every 10 years or so! I cannot afford to do that.



"ARE YOU READY TO LIVE INTERMITTENTLY WITH WIND? All jokes aside the consequences of intermittency on a fragilized grid are no laughing matter. The grid is after all our civilizational life support system." link

"

The "energy return on investment" or "EROI" of an energy type is an approximate measure of how much energy has to be expended in order to get it.
For example, it takes a certain amount of energy to dig an oil well, extract the oil, transport it, and refine it. But each barrel of oil recovered this way gives a much larger amount of energy back than what was required to get it. The return on energy invested is quite high, especially for conventional "easy to get to" oil.For an apples-to-apples comparison, if a given power source is going to be a large portion of our total electrical usage, we have to assume storage for it if it is variable/inconsistent. In other words, we can't just consider solar panels; we have to consider solar panels and battery storage together, since that is what it takes to replace the reliability of base load power."



"

total amount of solar energy reaching the Earth's surface is immense, the amount of solar energy hitting any given square meter is low, and highly variable. That's why solar panels are a low-density power source, and a low-EROI power source.

"


There is really only one option to add to all the solar, wind and hydro power and that is Nuclear.
The link below is very concise and very well researched by Lyn Alden Schwartzer
Well worth a read I think.
Energy: Still A Major Problem | Seeking Alpha

This story makes it clear why the WA govt wants to close its coal power stations by 2028 and move towards renewables and gas.
With 15% of WA's gas reserved for domestic use and the price capped, why would they stay with a failing coal power system?

Entire state's power system on the brink as Indian loan to Aussie miner Griffin Coal turns toxic
Entire state'''s power system on the brink as Indian loan to Aussie miner Griffin Coal turns toxic - ABC News