{"id":282881,"date":"2023-10-11T15:59:29","date_gmt":"2023-10-11T13:59:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=282881"},"modified":"2023-10-11T15:59:32","modified_gmt":"2023-10-11T13:59:32","slug":"blackouts-are-coming-australian-grid-so-fragile-expensive-cement-giant-already-shuts-down-nearly-every-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=282881","title":{"rendered":"Blackouts are coming: Australian grid so fragile, expensive, cement giant already shuts down nearly every day"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Blackouts: When the lights go out in Australia.<\/mark><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

From JoNova<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Jo Nova<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Image by\u00a0Vicente Godoy<\/a>\u00a0from\u00a0Pixabay<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We can\u2019t even run a cement factory all day anymore<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Get your candles for summer!<\/a> Unlike the last three years the Australian national grid won\u2019t be rescued by another cooler La Nina this year. Fears of rolling blackouts are fraying nerves at The Australian Financial Review Energy & Climate Summit<\/a><\/strong>. The transition is described as stuttering, gridlocked, faltering, and the government as \u201cdesperate\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Things are so bad, former CEO\u2019s of major generators are warning that \u201cthe lights are going to go out\u201d and accusing one Energy Minister of speaking \u201ccomplete and utter horseshit\u201d because they don\u2019t think we need reliable peaking gas plants to replace coal power. Said Energy Minister has responded by refusing to even take his calls. That\u2019s really going to work. Meanwhile Japan is getting nervous just watching us, afraid we have screwed things up so badly we can\u2019t be relied on to keep sending them gas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not only is summer nerve-wracking, but things are already so bad, one of our largest cement producers is shutting down nearly every day because it can\u2019t afford to pay for the peak electricity spikes even in springtime. Here in Renewable World it\u2019s cheaper to let 5,500 workers sit around for 30 minutes than pay for electricity. The company was paying 54% more for electricity than the year before.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Riding the Express Train to the Renewable Faraway Tree<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

The numbers are staggering. Australia is racing headlong to the glorious 82 per cent renewables target by 2030. The catch is that the national grid at the moment uses coal for 62% of its electricity. The opposition energy spokesman is calling it \u201clunacy\u201d<\/a>, which it is.  To reach the land of sunshine and breezes, our grid manager, the AEMO, is theoretically going to close two-thirds of the country\u2019s existing coal power generation in the next ten years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To put this in perspective, since the last hot summer we\u2019ve shut down Liddell Coal plant<\/a>, and still haven\u2019t fixed the coal turbine that blew up in Queensland two years ago. New renewable investment has ground to a halt when it clearly should be going gangbusters. No one wants to build new wind and solar plants until someone builds the 10,000 kilometers of high voltage lines to reach distant cheap windy real estate, and no one wants to live or farm next to those transmission towers, so the protests are fierce.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Energy Summit confirms stuttering transition is not on track<\/a><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Decarbonising Australia\u2019s fossil-fuelled electricity grid is proving slower and more costly than previously advertised, with reliability risks increasing as the exits of coal-fired power plants run ahead of cleaner and reliable replacement generation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nerves are frayed \u201cWe\u2019re not having an honest conversation\u201d:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Get your candles\u2019: energy experts are \u2018terrified\u2019 about this summer<\/a><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Angela MacDonald-Smith, Australian Financial Review<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Former Snowy Hydro CEO Paul Broad said, \u201cthe lights are going to go out\u201d in a return to normal conditions after three mild summers and said politicians were not listening to the warnings about the risks around supply, while the industry was not speaking up enough.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThat\u2019s our problem,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019re not having the honest conversations and us in the industry we\u2019re not speaking up.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mr Broad, who abruptly exited Snowy Hydro last year after a run-in with Mr Bowen, accused Victorian Energy Minister Lily D\u2019Ambrosio of speaking \u201ccomplete and utter horseshit\u201d in her refusal to recognise the need for peaking gas power plants in Victoria as coal power exits the system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He listed Ms D\u2019Ambrosio among energy sector figures who would no longer take his calls as he tried to get the message through, including former Australian Energy Market Operator Audrey Zibelman.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We can\u2019t even run a cement factory all day anymore:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The startling reason Boral is stopping production almost every day<\/a><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Chanticleer, The Australian Financial Review<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mr Bansal [the chief executive of Boral] told the Summit that Boral\u2019s electricity price rose by 54 per cent in the 12 months to the second half of last year, and have not retreated, counter to expectations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He said Boral had about 5500 \u201cblue collar\u201d workers who were being told to stand aside and do nothing for 30 minutes at a time when power prices made it too expensive to operate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAt a certain price during the day, when the price goes up [to] a certain level, our manufacturing stops because we\u2019ve worked out economically it\u2019s actually better to have thousands of people waiting idle for the prices to come down then actually do the work,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThat\u2019s a real issue we are facing every single day on 300 manufacturing sites across the country. So we are extremely nervous what that means.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The chief at Boral pointed out that he\u2019s not willing to sign up to 20 year electricity contracts because everything is so uncertain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They still don\u2019t understand the difference between reliable and unreliable power<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s OK, the believers protest, Australia has added 20 gigawatts of solar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAustralia has three-and-a-half-million solar systems installed and that represents around 20 gigawatts of potential output,\u201d Westerman says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThat\u2019s more than seven Eraring power stations at full output and capable of meeting almost half the energy demand in the day when the sun is shining at its brightest.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As if solar panels can be measured on the same page as a coal plant. For half an hour a day, on a good day, only in summer, and as long as the clouds don\u2019t roll over, the peak output might be like seven coal plants. These people are crazy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Australians should protest and shout,
Leaving those in control in no doubt,
Of the wrong that they did,
In wrecking the grid,
When the lights all start to go out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2013Ruairi<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Blackouts: When the lights go out in Australia. From JoNova By Jo Nova We can\u2019t even run a cement factory all day anymore Get your candles for summer! Unlike the last three years the Australian national grid won\u2019t be rescued by another cooler La Nina this year. Fears of rolling blackouts are fraying nerves at The Australian […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":121246920,"featured_media":282884,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","_crdt_document":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Blackouts: When the lights go out in Australia.","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[691823376,691818279,691823523,691818247,691818154,691819094],"class_list":{"0":"post-282881","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","6":"hentry","7":"category-uncategorized","8":"tag-australia-2","9":"tag-blackouts","10":"tag-cement-producers","11":"tag-national-grid","12":"tag-net-zero","13":"tag-renewable-green-energy","15":"fallback-thumbnail"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/image-285.png?fit=1356%2C668&ssl=1","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paxLW1-1bAB","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":220949,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=220949","url_meta":{"origin":282881,"position":0},"title":"Grid Expert\u2019s Dire Warning: \u201cPower Supply of All Europe at Risk\u201d …30% Of Computers Could Be Destroyed","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"27\/09\/2022","format":false,"excerpt":"The economic damage resulting from a major blackout would be crippling. 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