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Solar power in Australia outstrips coal-fired electricity for first time
- marcus_holmes 5y agoIf there's anywhere in the world that solar makes sense, it's Australia. Vast stretches of land, more sunshine than you can throw a stick at. Good to see it's starting to happen.
- thejosh 5y agoIt's been huge for a while, see http://www.cleanenergyregulator.gov.au/RET/Forms-and-resources/Postcode-data-for-small-scale-installations http://www.cleanenergyregulator.gov.au/RET/Forms-and-resourc... for a run down on the installations. It's big here as it can save you a lot of money.
- stefan_ 5y agoCan't export solar very well from Australia
- SideburnsOfDoom 5y agoJust a thought, what if Australia had ways to use excess power and export the result. e.g. refining ores and exporting metals instead of exporting ores. You don't need to literally "export electricity" in order to leverage a surplus of energy, for export.
- chii 5y agoexport aluminium - often called solidified electricity.
- ginko 5y agoSeems obvious considering Australia is the world's largest producer of bauxite.
- jeeeb 5y agoYup. Australia is one of the world’s largest Aluminium exporters currently, although I doubt that has much to do with using excess solar energy.
- ginko 5y agoThey aren't though. They're only number 6, despite producing the most bauxite by far. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_primary_aluminium_production https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_primary_a...
- jeeeb 5y agoAustralia is the 6th largest producer and 5th largest exporter of aluminium. To me that fits well within the statement “one of the world’s largest” Of course Australia also sells a lot of bauxite to China.
- htneak 5y agocrypto-mining comes to mind
- SideburnsOfDoom 5y agoTrue. In the same way that car-crashes and other pointless disasters come to mind.
- marcus_holmes 5y agoI've had this discussion around why we export iron ore and coal rather than steel. Which seems ridiculous to me. Why are we building huge port facilities for vast shipments of coal and iron ore, and not smelters with much smaller port facilities for shipping steel? The answer I got was that smelters are hugely expensive and last longer than the mines, and so it makes sense to build the smelter near the factories, and ship the raw materials to the smelter from wherever they are being mined currently, rather than building the smelter near the mines and then having to ship raw materials there anyway once the mines run out. I've always thought this was a bit dubious (why is commercially viable to build smelters in Korea but not Aus?), but it does kinda make sense. So the problem isn't "not enough excess power" but "insufficient infrastructure" coupled with "insufficient government willpower to build a decent manufacturing base here".
- nelox 5y agoSun Cable is trying https://suncable.sg/ https://suncable.sg/
- robbiep 5y agoA good mate of mine runs 5B, the company that may end up deploying all the panels if it goes ahead. He’s a legend and if it happens throughly deserves the success. Would totally change australia!
- philipri 5y agoHydrogen is a possibility. Some serious investigation are underway. https://www.aemc.gov.au/hydrogen-new-australian-manufacturing-export-industry-and-implications-national-electricity-market https://www.aemc.gov.au/hydrogen-new-australian-manufacturin...
- hutzlibu 5y agoIt would be a good start, if australia would not burn so much coal anymore. Apart from that ... build energy intensive industry, anything with metal. And then if you still have a surpluss (very possible) export hydrogen or biofuel. Or build high voltage direct current power lines to asia.
- legulere 5y agoYou could use the electricity to make hydrogen, ammonia or aluminium and export that.
- jl6 5y agohttps://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2021-06-09/future-of-world-energy-lies-in-uhvdc-transmission-lines https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2021-06-09/future-of... Ultra high voltage DC ultra long distance submarine cables.
- belorn 5y agoAustralia biggest export is iron ore, followed by coal. If you have a lot of energy and iron, a great way to combine the two is steel. Sweden is currently experimenting with the idea of green steel, using hydrogen as an replacement for coal.
- throwawaysea 5y agoIt’s like any other exchange of electricity between grids, which already takes place within larger countries. You just need to run a cable to create an export grid. Offshore wind farms have to run high voltage marine cables to the shore, for example. It is laid using the same techniques as underwater communication cables - with specialized ships.
- grecy 5y agoIf the government would get out of the way, yes. Unfortunately we have a government that has so clearly been bought and paid for by the existing money. Our Prime Minister brought coal into Parliament and extolled it's virtues, going on and on about how it's the future. Right now they're building a $600M gas power plant[1], and Victoria is the only jurisdiction in the world where you are actively fined for driving an EV. [2] [1] https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/aug/23/solar-power-in-australia-outstrips-coal-fired-electricity-for-first-time https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/aug/23/solar... [2] https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-04-22/victoria-electric-vehicle-levy-road-users-opposed-by-industry/100086872 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-04-22/victoria-electric-veh...
- stirlo 5y ago> where you are actively fined for driving an EV. Hyperbolic statements like this are unhelpful; The government has implemented a distance based tax on EVs (road pricing) to offset losses from the existing fuel excise taxes. It's certainly not progressive but it is not and never has been a "fine"
- grecy 5y agoTaxes on undesirable behaviour are for all intents and purposes the same as fines. i.e. carbon taxes.
- rswail 5y agoYes, that is one form of taxation. But taxes for road use are to pay for the roads, ie consider them a "network usage" fee. Having it be distance based is because there is currently a petrol tax that is also distance based, because it is per litre of fuel. What should happen is that all vehicles should have the same distance based fee applied, with the additional cost of the CO2 output as a multiple. Make EVs the base fee.
- reitzensteinm 5y agoExactly. Or EVs could be taxed for road use, but a subsidy put in place to not discourage adoption during the transition. Oh, wait, that's exactly what Victoria has done: https://www.solar.vic.gov.au/zero-emissions-vehicle-subsidy https://www.solar.vic.gov.au/zero-emissions-vehicle-subsidy Personally, I'd keep the EV tax as is, remove the subsidy, and significantly increase the ICE tax. Cars are awful, and their negative externalities don't stop at CO2 emissions.
- foobar33333 5y agoYou might be interested in this solar project in Australia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sundrop_Farms https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sundrop_Farms This farm grows a huge amount of tomatoes in the desert. It has its own water desalination plant powered by solar. Unlike most of the stuff you see, this isn't PV solar generating electricity, but just a bunch of mirrors pointed at a single point to collect a huge amount of heat to generate fresh water. Just look at the land in the photo on wikipedia and imagine how much food could be produced in this space.
- marcus_holmes 5y agoI've always thought that the vast aquifer in the centre of Aus, plus abundant sunlight, should make for easy desalination and irrigation. Glad to see someone's working on it :) But they can chuck the leftover salt back into the ocean. That's harder to do away from the coast.
- nielsbot 5y agoCan't they just pile it up in a huge salt mountain?
- foobar33333 5y agoThe salt would leach in to the ground, killing any plant life in the area for a very very long time.
- lwouis 5y agoSolar power has all sorts of downsides when you start looking at who makes it, the complexity of the process, it's reliance on fossil fuel, its intermittence which brings up a whole new problem of mass scale storage, etc Headlines like this make it seem like "some countries are making progress, why is anyone not following faster?". Solar strikes me as a bad direction to go in. There is no magic want for energy that doesn't impact our environment. The most impactful, and actually sustainable approach is to reduce our usage of energy. Ban crypto mining waste for instance. That's 10% of global electricity these days. That's a whole lot of power plants you suddenly don't have to build using "green" energy that's nothing but green.
- asplake 5y agoCredit where it’s due though: the headline alone is (in a good way) surprising news considering how pro coal Australia is
- BLKNSLVR 5y agoIt is testament to solar power that Australia has been able to achieve this given the decade of constant government sponsored FUD aimed at suppressing renewables whilst simultaneously actually encouraging, and attempting to provide financial backing for, new coal-fired power plants.
- lwouis 5y agoBut how is it a good thing though. It's really not a simple "solar > coal". Solar has its own set of downside. And solar supply chain is heavy on fossil fuel right now, so you may have the same burning of coal behind the scene to make that solar energy. I've read reports where it was actually worse than directly burning the coal. Some people wave solar and wind like it's some miracle no-impact tech. It's heavy duty tech that impacts the environment at every step of its lifecycle, and for which even CO2 emissions are not a clear winner once you look at the full picture.
- caf 5y agoAnd solar supply chain is heavy on fossil fuel right now, so you may have the same burning of coal behind the scene to make that solar energy. I've read reports where it was actually worse than directly burning the coal. Those reports are incorrect. The energy payback time for a PV installation including structures, cabling etc is typically 2 years.
- Proven 5y agoInvestors have found an easier way to milk the Aussie taxpayer and consumers.
- thepangolino 5y agoCould that also be a side effect of the reduced economic activity due to covid measures ?
- jeeeb 5y agoI doubt it. The Australian GDP is up on 2019 (although QE might be distorting the figures somewhat). This is more of a long term trend. Solar power generation has been increasing for years in Australia, and meanwhile large generators have been mothballing coal plants. The energy grid is shifting rapidly to a mixture of solar, wind, hydro and gas/batteries for load balancing.
- postingawayonhn 5y agoRight now the two most populous states (Victoria & New South Wales) have active COVID lockdowns.
- caf 5y agoGeneration across the NEM is on par with a year ago. It's more about a combination of long term factors (the slowly achanging generation mix) and short term ones (a slightly more windy than usual August pushing a bit more coal out of the market).
- jillesvangurp 5y agoPretty remarkable considering the governments pro-coal and anti-renewables tone and policy. Australia still generates more than half of its electricity using coal and even brown coal. Inevitably the same dynamics that are killing the coal power generation elsewhere will play out in Australia as well. Basically, periodic over supply of electricity because of solar leads to temporary shut downs of plants. That is expensive and makes these plants less profitable. That over supply comes both from renewable energy generated on the grid and home owners putting solar on their roofs. Each year there's more of it. And Australia gets a lot of sunny days. So, the pressure to shut down more coal plants just keeps on growing.
- roenxi 5y agoThere is no such thing as pro-coal. There is pro-money. The more militant arm of the renewable lobby has been lying for decades, claiming that they are cheaper than fossil fuels. There is still a bit of confusion because now it might actually be true and a lot of people are reorienting. Nothing in particular stands between Australian businesses from going the most profitable (ie, cheapest to produce in a total cost sense) form of power. The Liberals just aren't going to subsidise it.
- toomuchtodo 5y agoDo fossil generators in Australia pay for their carbon emissions?
- stephen_g 5y agoNo. They did, but one of the first things the (yes, actually literally pro-coal) current Government did after being elected in 2013 was abolish the carbon price.
- BLKNSLVR 5y agoGillard, ironically, had fucking balls. Australia is a decade behind where it was 10 years ago - so, yep, we're fucking 20 years behind where we should be. And these corrupt cunts will be voted in again, I'm sure of it. cough Off-topic, but... NBN cough
- jussij 5y agoOne of the reasons this is happening in Australia is because the price of electricity has been rising quite sharply for over a decade now and that makes solar more attractive. It turns out one of the main reasons for these price rises has price gouging by the newly privatized energy companies. https://www.businessinsider.com.au/accc-overspending-on-poles-and-wires-is-the-key-reason-why-electricity-prices-have-soared-in-australia-2017-10 https://www.businessinsider.com.au/accc-overspending-on-pole... Basically these energy companies have been screwing their customers for decades and successive governments have been letting them get away with it.
- AussieWog93 5y agoAnd people said the LNP were fighting against renewable energy!
- stephen_g 5y agoWell, they are trying. Problem is they can only fight the market so much. Especially when economics are so much in solar’s favour - the levelised cost (which includes the CAPEX of building) of battery backed solar will cost less than just the fuel for coal power per MWh in a couple of years (LCOE of solar and onshore wind by themselves already is less)!
- BLKNSLVR 5y agoLucky the current government has some pet economists that are happy to continue to prove the "lies, damned lies, and statistics" mantra. https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Australian_think_tanks#Institute_of_Public_Affairs https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Australian_think_tanks...
- BLKNSLVR 5y agoHah! That's pretty funny. By screwing the Australian public with the poles and wires investment guarantee they accidentally heralded 'the great consumer protest' of the fastest worldwide uptake of residential solar panel installations. Something something law of unintended consequences... To compound the shame of it, all the money spent on the 'poles and wires' initiative did nothing to contribute to the grid's ability to cope with the influx of power from the volume of rooftop solar installations, and so all that investment has just smeared problems around, and now there's a whole lot more planning and likely investment necessary to migrate to a rooftop solar heavy grid. Maybe that's all part of the plan (I don't believe that - never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by incompetence). https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/what-the-us-can-learn-from-australias-roaring-rooftop-solar-market https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/what-the-us-can... https://www.csiro.au/en/news/news-releases/2021/australia-installs-record-breaking-number-of-rooftop-solar-panels https://www.csiro.au/en/news/news-releases/2021/australia-in... https://theconversation.com/australia-is-the-runaway-global-leader-in-building-new-renewable-energy-123694 https://theconversation.com/australia-is-the-runaway-global-...
- xyzzy21 5y agoNot for assuring baseline supply it doesn't...
- stephen_g 5y agoIt’s baseload, and having fixed baseload is just one operating model, not a requirement. The future is VRE + storage + dispatchables, with a bit of demand management.
- Jedd 5y agoIn addition to being tone-deaf and/or incompetent on basically every big-ticket issue facing us, our (AU) power grid (mis)management is almost on a par with the US's E[R]COT debacle ... just stretched out over a few more decades, so it's harder to notice. This story from 2014 [0] describes a sequence of events that could, if you were feeling sanguine, be attributed to generic incompetence, even if they smell more like congenital corruption. In any case, AU citizens pay a bucketload for power, way more than it costs to generate (domestically). Combine that with active disincentives at the large-scale (to develop sensible power generation / storage systems) and small-scale (witness the recent regularly change [1] to allow primarily fossil-fuel based power companies to charge residential solar subscribers a fee to feed-in power). [0] https://www.themonthly.com.au/issue/2014/july/1404136800/jess-hill/power-corrupts https://www.themonthly.com.au/issue/2014/july/1404136800/jes... [1] https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-08-12/power-companies-to-charge-solar-owners-for-exporting-to-grid/100368588 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-08-12/power-companies-to-ch...
- valw 5y agoReminder: this sort of metric is sensational but hardly relevant. The relevant metric is how much fossil production is left, not how much low-carbon production we add. All the more so because production peaks of renewables tend to be outliers.
- caf 5y agoThis was a result of both, though: the same dispatch interval also set a new record low level of coal-fired generation in the NEM (9,365MW - the previous low being 9,507MW in October 2020).
- stephen_g 5y agoOur grid demand has been fairly steady (obviously it varies by season) since 2008 or so (probably due in part to some economic slowdown back then, but also energy efficiency improvements e.g. LED lighting, as well as behind the meter solar etc.) so all renewables added is displacing gas and coal in our electricity market. Looking at OpenNEM, coal peaked in 2007 at 84.9% of all power generated (averaged per month), and in July was 63.4% (record low was October 2020 with 62.5%). Gas looks to have peaked in Jan 2014 with 13%. Recent peak was June with 10.4% and record low was February with 4.6%. Renewables are now 29% over the last month, up from around 6% in 2008. Still a long way to go!
- throwaway59553 5y agoOr Australia could just build a few smaller nuclear plants away from urban centers and be much more effective and environment friendly.
- stephen_g 5y agoSure, but the power would cost about double per MWh than the wind, solar and (projected) storage - in 12 or so years which is the earliest one could be finished… I’m not opposed to nuclear in principal but without some kind of huge advance, the economics and time frames don’t really stack up…
- throwaway59553 5y agoThe plant's lifespan would outweigh that, as we should plan for the long term.
- caf 5y agoFor a slightly more wonky take on this with more speeds & feeds: https://reneweconomy.com.au/solar-exceeds-coal-for-first-time-as-renewables-set-new-records-on-australias-main-grid/ https://reneweconomy.com.au/solar-exceeds-coal-for-first-tim...