{"id":301923,"date":"2024-02-15T16:13:38","date_gmt":"2024-02-15T15:13:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=301923"},"modified":"2024-02-15T16:13:40","modified_gmt":"2024-02-15T15:13:40","slug":"professor-dargaville-we-need-more-grid-scale-batteries-to-combat-supply-outages","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=301923","title":{"rendered":"Professor Dargaville: We Need More Grid Scale Batteries to Combat Supply Outages"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

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

From Watts Up With That?<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Essay by Eric Worrall<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wild weather has pushed the Aussie State of Victoria\u2019s fragile grid beyond breaking point during the last few days. The last thing Victoria needs is senior academics pushing non-solutions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

A major blackout left 500,000 Victorian homes without power \u2013 but it shows our energy system is resilient<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Published: February 14, 2024 8.10am AEDT
Roger Dargaville<\/a>
Director Monash Energy Institute, Monash University<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Half a million homes and businesses in Victoria were left without power<\/a> late on Tuesday following a major power outage. The disruption occurred when severe winds knocked over several high-voltage electricity transmission towers<\/strong>, causing all four units of the Loy Yang A coal-fired power station to trip and go offline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Victorian Energy Minister Lily D\u2019Ambrosio described<\/a> the blackout as \u201cone of the largest outage events in the state\u2019s history<\/strong>\u201d. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The event has prompted questions about the reliability of the state\u2019s electricity grid. But it\u2019s important to note these extreme winds would have seriously disrupted any power system. It has little to do with the mix of renewable energy and conventional fossil fuels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to a statement from AEMO<\/a>, the storm also damaged hundreds of powerlines and power poles and restoring electricity to all customers \u201cmay take days if not weeks\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Battery storage may have helped steady the grid.<\/strong> Batteries have ultra-rapid responses to these kinds of disuptions and can add or subtract power from the grid within milliseconds to keep the grid stable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2026Read more: https:\/\/theconversation.com\/a-major-blackout-left-500-000-victorian-homes-without-power-but-it-shows-our-energy-system-is-resilient-223494<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

The immense vulnerability of Australia\u2019s industrial heartland to the severing of a single connection to a distant coal plant is a disgrace.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I don\u2019t know why Professor Dargaville suggested batteries might solve the problem. Batteries could have stabilised the grid \u2013 for a few minutes. The suggestion any remotely affordable level of battery capacity could have maintained grid supply in the face of major and prolonged transmission outages is absurd.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

More powerlines might have improved the odds of electricity getting to where it is needed \u2013 but more powerlines would also have been damaged by the storm. At best this would be a very expensive solution to energy resilience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A distributed network of modular nuclear power plants could have eliminated the risk of a single point of failure bringing down the system, and could have reduced or even eliminated widespread blackouts.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

If a network of modular nuclear plants was established inside Melbourne, Melbourne would not have suffered a major outage after the connection to a distant coal plant was severed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But nobody is implementing sensible energy solutions in today\u2019s Australia. Australia\u2019s climate obsessed politicians only permit uselessly unreliable green energy solutions which don\u2019t actually solve anyone\u2019s energy problems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

Wild weather has pushed the Aussie State of Victoria\u2019s fragile grid beyond breaking point during the last few days. The last thing Victoria needs is senior academics pushing non-solutions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":121246920,"featured_media":301925,"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":"Wild weather has pushed the Aussie State of Victoria\u2019s fragile grid beyond breaking point during the last few days. The last thing Victoria needs is senior academics pushing non-solutions.","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":[691818216,691818226,691819094,691826942,691826941],"class_list":{"0":"post-301923","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","6":"hentry","7":"category-uncategorized","8":"tag-australia","9":"tag-blackout","10":"tag-renewable-green-energy","11":"tag-states-electricity-grid","12":"tag-victoria","14":"fallback-thumbnail"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/02\/00destroyed-wind-turbine-636817004.jpg?fit=1200%2C798&ssl=1","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paxLW1-1gxJ","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":277265,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=277265","url_meta":{"origin":301923,"position":0},"title":"Renewable Fail: East Coast Aussie States Are Failing or About to Fail Energy Reliability Standards","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"04\/09\/2023","format":false,"excerpt":"First published\u00a0JoNova; A just published Australian Energy Market Operator report highlights the urgent \u201copportunity\u201d for the provision of reliable electricity to Australia\u2019s East Coast grid.","rel":"","context":"In \"Australia\"","block_context":{"text":"Australia","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?tag=australia"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/09\/image-152.png?fit=1200%2C618&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/09\/image-152.png?fit=1200%2C618&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/09\/image-152.png?fit=1200%2C618&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/09\/image-152.png?fit=1200%2C618&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/09\/image-152.png?fit=1200%2C618&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":229443,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=229443","url_meta":{"origin":301923,"position":1},"title":"Renewable South Australia Islanded, flying by the seat of their pants, afraid of a solar surge on a sunny day","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"16\/11\/2022","format":false,"excerpt":"The biggest blackout has hit South Australia since the statewide crash of 2016. 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