another big battery for SA power

[Shiraz]

for interest, according to the SA Advertiser, the board of GFG Alliance (new owner of ZEN Energy) has committed to a strategic plan to establish nearly 1GW of dispatchable renewable power in SA.

plans are:
- 100MW/120MWh lithium ion battery at Pt Augusta to be operating Q1 2019 (same size as the nearly complete Tesla battery at Jamestown)

- 200MW solar PV plant in Whyalla on line early 2019

- 120MW/600MWh pumped hydro in the Middleback ranges operating by 2020

- addition 480MW solar committed to but details not yet finalised

there are many other such plans underway in SA and it all seems to be happening in spite of the best efforts of coal lobby, The Australian and the shock jocks telling everyone that renewables do not work.

cheers Ray

Edit: also just for interest, it seems that the new "in" word is "dispatchable" energy, which presumably means that it can be turned on and off to meet short term demand, rather than the old favourite "base load", which refers to very long time constant generation (coal fired steam for example) that is very slow to fire up and shut down.

[AussieTrooper]

Interesting to see pumped hydro going ahead. It is very 'lossy' compared to battery banks. The rest of the stuff looks promising.
The 'smart' thing to do is to put the battery banks at the weakest part of the networks, or at the point where large wind/solar farms inject into it.
Makes sense to do this stuff in SA.
Base load as a phrase is going out of fashion with the spin doctors, as when you combine wind/solar with batteries, you get base load that is just as reactive as hydro. Network owners love it.

[The_bluester]

As I posted in the other thread, "Base load" is also utterly the wrong catch phrase for our pollies to have latched on to. Given it was originally a description of the minimum load that the generators wanted to see maintained to avoid having to shut down and fire up big, slow reacting steam turbines.

I am sort of on the fence with pumped hydro. The round trip efficiency surely has to be considerably lower than modern battery storage with multiple stages of energy transfer in both directions (Power to drive motors, to drive pumps, to pump water, then water driving turbines driving generators (Which may or may not be the pumps and motors used in the opposite direction) to produce power, but aside from the environmental effects of building honking big dams to store the water it is at least relatively benign in operation and uses up less environmentally unfriendly materials.

And it is pretty hard to imagine a dam catching fire if a fault develops!

[AndrewJ]

Fracking around the dam to provide fuel to run the pumps starts leaking into the base of the dam????
We already have burning rivers in Qld :-)

Andrew

PS if they did do a pumped Hydro, would it be simpler to use local "Off grid" solar and wind to power the pumps. That way they could run independently of anything else and just devote max efficiency to pumping water up hill when they can????

[Visionary]

Our civilization is built upon, cheap & consistent energy supply. This plan looks certain to deliver expensive & inconsistent energy supply.

[el_draco]

Whether you like it or not, our "civilisation" is gonna change.:rolleyes:

[Visionary]

Rom, I am with you our Civilization needs to change. Without cheap, plentiful energy Civilization of an advanced industrial kind cannot exist. It takes an advanced society to provide such things as universal healthcare, care for the aged etc: It is care for the sick, the marginalized & poor that are the first things that fall by the wayside as a society slips into poverty. My concern with the feel-good-fairy dance some privileged sectors of our society believe constitutes Power Policy will condemn the least advantaged to even greater disadvantage.

[Shiraz]

apparently modern pumped hydro has round trip efficiency of around 0.8.

the one proposed is to be in a disused mine pit, so presumably the engineering costs will be relatively low (there is a big hole in the ground and plenty of loose rock/soil to make a simple dam nearby). The site is close to regional industry hubs, so transmission losses will be low.



The announcements on renewable energy come from a hard nosed company director and have nothing to do with government policy. The company is investing in the best and cheapest power technology to make money - nothing feel-good-fairy about that.

Can't see how a company investing its own money in the cheapest sources of power that will initially be used in it's own activities is going to disadvantage anyone. Renewables are already cheaper than coal or gas, even with the add-ons like batteries and pumped hydro that add reliability - so they would be foolish to look at anything else. This is the message that is also coming loud and clear from AGL, Energy Australia, ENGIE etc - but some pollies and the shock jocks are putting their coal blackened hands over their ears so that they cannot hear.

[The_bluester]

More or less what I was thinking, when even the operators of coal fired plants are not interested in extending the lives of what they have or building more then the writing is on the wall for coal.

A different twist on pumped hydropower what I was thinking. I suppose I am pre conditioned to see hydro as tens of kilometres of pipes coming down mountains, which would mean big pumping losses going back the other way. If they can make it work with a few tens of meters of head then it makes much more sense.

[Shiraz]

interesting question Paul, but no detail from the company. Just looked up the elevation profile of the pit at Iron Knob in Google earth. If that is the one they are thinking of using, looks like they have almost 200m of head to play with, depending on where the top dam goes (and there is already water of some sort in the pit, so maybe it is either waterproof or has a potentially helpful water-table).

[AndrewJ]

I need to dig up a paper i saw a few years back for a small private water power system near a stream, but it used a constant gravity feed vs an impulse feed.
Very compact and virtually no loss of potential energy on the way down ( unlike the big turbines ) but not sure how scalable ( or durable ) it would be in large scale, as i assume mechanical losses would go up accordingly.
( Think of it like a string of buckets on a looped rope that goes vertically the whole way from top to bottom. The weighted buckets on the rope always provide a constant torque supply so designing the turbine can be matched to suit.

Andrew

[Exfso]

Pretty sure all this will put the cost of power up even more in SA, it is ridiculous now, so many people in default paying their power bills. :shrug:

[Shiraz]

Nobody is arguing that power is not expensive in SA, but how on earth will a private company investing in new generation capacity increase the bills? Investment in low cost power sources is what we need and that is what this delivers.

[The_bluester]

I think I saw a TV show on that one. It was for a remote restaurant with the hydro setup and a wind turbine competing to power the place? Water taken from a stream some tens of meters above the site, run through a custom made turbine driving an automotive alternator and the discharge water returned to the stream?

Not even any sort of dam required to make it work, just run a pipe over the side of the bank up top, use a little vacuum to initially get the water over the top of the bank and down below the level of the intake and then let it siphon to get it flowing, really simple setup.

[julianh72]

What do you base that comment on? Typical large pumped-storage hydro schemes have round-trip efficiency of around 80%, even up to nearly 90%:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pumped-storage_hydroelectricity

This is pretty much the same as large scale battery systems for round-trip efficiency, when you factor in losses for charging, inverters, whole-of-life charge capacity degradation, etc - especially when they are run at high currents, as they would be in a grid installation scenario.

Importantly, pumped-storage hydro can maintain that efficiency over many, many years of continuous operation, with no loss of capacity as they "age". Pumped-storage is already demonstrated to much higher capacity than any battery installation - e.g. Wivenhoe Pumped Storage in SE Qld has a storage capacity of around 5 GW.hr (500 MW for 10 hours continuous running), which it can store and release on a 24-hour cycle. Contrast that with the SA Tesla battery (currently, the world's biggest battery), which has a capacity of 0.13 GW.hr (100 MW for a bit over an hour).

Batteries are an important part of a renewable energy future, but if you want a really big "battery", pumped-storage hydro is hard to beat.

[julianh72]

See my previous post - pumped-storage hydro is actually pretty much on a par for efficiency with the latest battery technology, but unlike batteries, it doesn't "degrade" with age, or cycles of charge / discharge.

Also, the footprint isn't necessarily as big as you might think; e.g. take a look at Wivenhoe Pumped Storage - https://www.google.com.au/maps/@-27.3669669,152.6446189,3883m/data=!3m1!1e3?hl=en-GB&authuser=0
The pumped storage dam is the little "pond" (about 2 km x 1 km) to the east of Wivenhoe Dam (which provides Brisbane's water supply and flood prevention). That little "pond" supports a 500 MW power station (the building you can see sitting at the edge of Lake Wivenhoe below the pumped storage pond).

Compare that with the "footprint" of a large solar power station - e.g. Ivanpah solar-thermal power station in eastern California, with a total combined generating capacity of 392 MW across the three units, with a "footprint" of around 5 km x 2 km:
https://www.google.com.au/maps/place/Ivanpah+Solar+Electric+Generating+S ystem/@35.5617789,-115.4673277,9775m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x80cf4334c eebc76d:0x81620c57d7b15ade!8m2!3d35 .5565665!4d-115.4708525?hl=en-GB&authuser=0

Don't get me wrong - solar, wind, batteries and pumped-storage all have their place in a renewable energy future, but let's not discard some proven technologies because of un-founded prejudices.

[AndrewJ]

Gday Paul

Nope, this was a simple unit by a bloke on a block near a hill with a stream.
It was a simple bucket drive that operated very similar to an overshot water wheel, but rather than being circular, it had about a 10m drop,
and the design used meant it was only about 1m wide vs 10m for a wheel, and very lightweight.
By having multiple buckets all full at the same time on the downward run, it gave constant torque, but without requiring a large flowrate.
The closest i can find so far is attached
( but it operates in reverse using air to lift the buckets. Never seen that before )
The main thing in these is they can extract nearly all the potential energy of the water without leaving much potential energy in the exhaust race.
Again, im not so sure how scalable it would be tho.

Andrew

[The_bluester]

I am happy to be corrected on efficiency of pumped hydro versus modern battery storage.

I think both will have a place, battery storage and the immediacy of them taking up load while things like pumped hydro get moving would be essential for events like the SA blackout where a huge amount of supply was lost in a very short time, the battery/inverter setup would be what keeps the network standing up for the seconds to minutes required to take something like pumped solar from standing ready to on load.

Tomorrows grid is not going to look very much at all like todays, but yearning for the simplicity of a network supplied almost exclusively by coal fired steam looks an awful lot like motor nuts yearning for Weber carbs and kettering ignition because it is simple and easier to understand and work on than modern EFI. Ignoring the fact that a modern small capacity deisel makes more power and torque than a big banger V8 from the 1980's.

[AstralTraveller]

Yes, dams aren't as environmentally friendly as many might believe. The discharge of cold de-oxygenated water is the biggest issue I'm aware of but they generally try to mitigate that problem. Of course if the storage is in a disused pit and not on a stream that is a major plus. The other enviro problem of course is the concrete. Making cement produces a lot of CO2. I expect that the CO2 savings of pumped hydro would offset the enviro costs but the calculations should be done and laid out plainly before we proceed.

[julianh72]

Absolutely!

But don't forget - we tend to use concrete in ALL of our major projects (even if it's just the footings and slabs), whereas not all dams actually need much concrete (Wivenhoe Pumped Storage and Wivenhoe Dam itself are earth / rock dams, with concrete only used in the spillway structures etc.) And while we're doing the environmental audits, let's not underestimate the environmental impacts of mining and processing for lithium batteries:
http://gridedge.com.au/assets/facts-about-lithium-ion-batteries-20151108.pdf

Pumped-storage hydro simply needs two water reservoirs with a head difference - e.g. you can dig out a "turkey's nest" pond (no concrete!) above an escarpment on the coast, so that the ocean is the bottom reservoir. Environmental impacts are very limited - you have occupied a couple of square km of land above the escarpment, and because the water in the upper reservoir is "turned over" every day, it doesn't get as cold or stratified as long-term storage in a deep reservoir and it doesn't de-oxygenate, so there's no real impact on the ocean, other than in the immediate vicinity of the intake / outlet structure. (Pumped storage can of course be incorporated into conventional hydro schemes as well, or conventional hydro can be converted into pumped-storage, which is the thinking behind "Snowy 2.0".)

Coincidentally, ocean-front escarpments are often great sites for wind wind energy schemes, because of the high energy density of ocean winds, and the energy concentration as the sea wind rises over the escarpment, so co-location of wind farms and pumped-storage schemes at such locations is a great way of producing a zero-emission 24-hour base-load power scheme.

[Visionary]

We have a social obligation to supply power to all members of our community, be they rich or poor. The rich can afford a swath of alternate power, the disadvantaged within our community can't. Electrical power shouldn't be just for the wealthy, the poor also need access.

[The_bluester]

I would also argue that we have a social obligation to ensure that we continue to have a planet that is comfortable to live on and unpolluted.

Coal fired power is only cheap and affordable if you assume that the sky is an unlimited resource into which we can pour for free the waste products generating that cheap power. It ain't free, every creature on the planet will eventually pay for it.

No matter which way you dice it up, we have released to the atmosphere over a bare couple of hundred years compounds which took natural processes millennia to capture and store. To hold that there is no price to be paid for that is head in the sand thinking at the very best.

[Visionary]

So it's OK to have a stratified society, one side with plentiful power, the other unable to afford power?

[clive milne]

You talk as if there is some intrinsic quality wrt) renewable energy that stratifies society and that the fossil fuel industry does the opposite and naturally leads to some capitalist consumer shopping mall utopia equally accessible and desired by all...

[Visionary]

Electricity is a consumable, its difficult to hide the cost of alternative energy production. My Parents in Law cannot afford their current power bill. This winter past, my Mother in Law developed chilblains from keeping the heater too close to her feet.
Anything that drives their bill up will result in even more appliances being switched off. Why is it OK for the poor to have to be switching off their limited appliances, whilst the privileged switch on ever more devices?
In all likelihood, if the current trend in power bills continues we will have to subsidize or completely pay for my Parents in Law electricity bill. This is not the Australia that was promised, an equitable country.

[clive milne]

Renewables drive energy prices down...

If you are going to go on about equality... ask yourself why this country spends 8 billion a year subsidising fossil fuels?

Now that's what I call a welfare state.
Welfare for the rich multinational corporations that is.

[Visionary]

[QUOTE=clive milne;1342879]Renewables drive energy prices down...

If you are going to go on about equality... ask yourself why this country spends 8 billion a year subsidizing fossil fuels?

Now that's what I call a welfare state.
Welfare for the rich multinational corporations that is.[/QUOTE

Place your rainbow glasses to one side.... the Fossil Fuels, of their various kinds, represent one of the greatest inflows of revenue to both State and Federal Gov. The last time you filled your cars tank..... about half the bowser price is State and Federal Taxes

2017 ABS stats are as follows

The estimated number of motor vehicles registered in Australia was 18.2 million.
These vehicles travelled an estimated total of 249,512 million kilometres in Australia, with an average 13,716 kilometres per vehicle.
Total fuel consumption by all road registered vehicles was 32,732 megalitres.
Freight vehicles in Australia travelled an estimated 204,575 million tonne kilometres.

Total fuel consumption = 32,732 mega a litres x50% Fuel @ $1.00 per litres = Tax rev pa: $16,361,500,000 These are ABS figures (not the $1 per litre, that's mine to make the maths easy) there are a few more zeros in tax receipts from fossil fuels than you have indicated.

It would take a lot of windmills to generate $16,361,500,000 in tax revues. They may be able to suck up quite a few $ in subsidies but $16,361,500,000 in revenue would definitely be beyond the reach of even the biggest windmill.

[gary]

Nobody enjoys the burden of an unexpected financial outlay.

Ever been to the car mechanic and been told your trusty old
vehicle with several hundred thousand kilometres on the clock
is going to need something like a new head-gasket?

You might figure the repair is worth more than the market value
of the car.

And you might be faced with a dilemma. The car is getting old.
What happens if you should outlay all that money for the repair
only to have something else fail a short time later?

Is it time to replace the car?

But to be realistic, it wasn't totally unexpected. The day you bought the
car new you appreciated that one day it would need to go on the scrap
heap and you would need another.

Machines wear out.

And that is the reality of much of the older coal power generation in
Australia and other parts of the world.

Last month, the University of New South Wales School of Electrical
Engineering and Telecommunications held their annual Alumni
Connect Night.

The guest speakers were Dr Alex Wonhas (https://www.aurecongroup.com/en/about/aurecon-executive-committee/alex-wonhas.aspx)(Managing Director -Energy,
Resources and Manufacturing at Aureco), Dr Timothy Nelson (Chief
Economist at AGL Energy Ltd) and Prof Joe Dong (https://www.engineering.unsw.edu.au/electrical-engineering/prof-joe-dong)(Professor in Energy
Systems, EE&T UNSW).

As Dr. Wonhas points out in last month's edition of "Energy Source
& Distribution (http://en.calameo.com/read/000373495bf3aeb336dc6/12)" magazine :-



Article here :-
http://en.calameo.com/read/000373495bf3aeb336dc6/12

[Visionary]

There were no subsidies for the first coal-fired power stations, they didn't need it, they were superior technologies, and the builders "made coin". When the Hydro scheme at Niagara was built (Tesla) a fortune was made. When Diesel built the first Diesel, a fortune was made.
As "alternative" energies are being rolled out a fortune is being made, a fortune in Government Subsidy payments.
Why can't we hasten with caution and wait until "alternative" energy production can stand on its own 2 feet? The wait won't be long, batteries (storage) are getting close, but they are still some time off being economically feasible. Wind Power, Ocean Power, all the other more marginal approaches are still a long way off. Pumped Hydro is economic because at it trades off cheap Hydro & Coal & price fast price/demand movements, Pumped Hydro is dependant upon older maligned technologies.
In the meantime... who else but my family will offer my Inlaws the money they will need to pay their next power bill? A bill that's already bloated with "feel good" warm and fuzzies subsidies for the affluent.
I understand the point your making, however, we have blown 50billion on the NBN that does not work. What makes anyone believe a Gov will do any better with Alternate Power? What's alternate power going to cost 500Billion, 750Billion?

[Shiraz]

So let me summarise the red herrings.

in your posts, you have now raised the following:
- health care
- aged care
- poverty
- rising power bills
- motor vehicle tax revenue
- the NBN cost
- feel good warm and fuzzies for the affluent
- the history of coal generators, the Niagara hydro scheme and the Diesel engine
- "batteries .. are still some time off being economically feasible" !!
- "Wind Power, Ocean Power, all the other more marginal approaches are still a long way off."!!!!
- "Pumped Hydro is dependant upon older maligned technologies." !!!!!


The thread is about a commitment (NOW) by a large company to spend their own money (not ours) on a power system based on solar PV (NOW) a large battery (NOW) and pumped hydro to support renewable energy. It could be expected to benefit consumers in South Australia by reducing power prices, since it will reduce our reliance on increasingly costly coal fired power from interstate and expensive local gas and Diesel powered generation.

This seems to be another genuinely positive step forward - a good news story. No amount of obfuscation will alter that.

[The_bluester]

I think you can regard the fact that In the main, coal fired generation in Australia we're state owned and built with taxpayer funds to say that they were extremely heavily subsidised.

The NBN comparison is meaningless, though perhaps not quite. Given that there is little to no interest in building new coal fired capacity by the companies that largely own the existing ones, who but the government would build them? Or who else would build them without huge subsidies and shifting of risk to the public purse?

Given the above from Gary regards the operating costs of various methods of generating power, what do you suggest as an alternative to building more coal fired power as the existing plants age and shut down? There is no point in railing about energy costs and renewable unless you actually have some idea how to drive down energy prices.

As for pumped hydro being reliant on old and maligned technologies, it is a big, fat, wet battery, the source of the energy it is storing up the hill is not relevant to it, but what it does do is allow for non traditional power sources to be used, overcoming the "intermittency" that the Feds love to tell us over and over again is the "We'l all be Rooned" downfall of any and all renewable sources of energy. Hell, they would even be able to help coal fired stations with their still existent base load issue by "consuming" energy overnight when the generators would really rather not have to test out the PID settings to ramp the boilers down and back up again and then release it over the day when demand starts to outstrip supply. There is probably even money to be made trading energy like that, and unless you suggest re nationalising power or providing subsidies, making it possible to make money is the only way things will happen.

[Visionary]

The only Red Herrings are those you are choosing to find.
You know someone is going to have to pay for the stupidity going on in SA. My guess is... the Vic & NSW power grid, then the Taxpayers of the Commonwealth as we fund a bailout.
It is an affront to the Nation that we are going to be saddled with yet another half-arsed Political thought bubble, that will cost us all serious $$$

[clive milne]

Stupidity is in the eye of the beholder...

[Visionary]

The mechanism for pumped Hydro is this....

I) When power is cheap water is pumped uphill
II) When power is expensive you run the water downhill make more power and then sell that power.
III) It's not Pumped Hydro it is "Wet energy trading" therefore limited by the differential between buying & selling, the closer those two points, the less desirable "Wet energy trading" can quickly achieve negative returns.
IV) The Grid does not discriminate between any form of electricity generation, for the purists out there, indeed even the mighty Hydro Scheme may draw on power generated by coal.
My apparent criticism of Pumped Hydro is just that apparent. Pumped Hydro may be costly, but at least it's not going to be a black hole. At worst we can use it reticulate water during drought at best it will generate some cheaper power whilst employing our existing grid and be recouping the cost of construction and make it appear the LNP is doing something, that's a 5/10 outcome.
Interesting.... I have never once proposed that Coal is a good thing. Having spent many winters in Beijing I can assure unconstrained use of Coal is a dirty, smelly, business.
I mentioned the NBN because our Nation cannot afford a repeat of the profligate and flamboyant spending that's characterized the NBN. We need to back a winner, for the sake of our children we must move away from Carbon based tech, but not before a viable alternative is found and as of yet that alternative hasn't been found until that time we have no alternative but to use Fossil Fuels efficiently.
The closest we have found to a safe and secure alternative is Nuclear but the Green's killed off Nuclear in the 1970's and 1980's in this the Green's are responsible for much of the Carbon floating around in our ever-warming atmosphere. Green's complaining about Global Warming is a little like Ben Cropp talking about saving the Grey Nurse from overfishing if only a Crocodile had so many tears.
It is a ridiculous notion that the Premier of South Australia is going to find the answer to the Worldwide Power crisis & save the planet. If the SA Premier wants some half-arsed NBN Powered Star Sprinkles Power Scheme he should have to pay for it out of his own Super. The last time I heard anything as absurd as this proposal was the Multifunction Polis (MFP) for Adelaide, what a cracker that one was!
Maybe there will be a Super Battery and maybe it will resolve the World's energy storage problem, but it hasn't happened yet... Maybe there is a super efficient Windmill, but it hasn't happened yet... Or a Biogas generator that will save the "bacon" but it hasn't happened yet!
What I do know is this.... My Mother in Law has chilblains because she is scared of turning on her larger heater, and uses instead a little bar heater on her feet, hence the chilblains, her story isn't unique. In 2017 her story in inexcusable whilst the privileged are enjoying Solar power subsidies.

The only answer I have in the short term is.... use energy dense fuel sources efficiently. By way of a cautionary note: beware spending money on snake oil as it will buy you Hyperloops

[AndrewJ]

One thing i think everyone is missing here.
If we ever manage to get truly "cheap" power, the nature of our "economy" will mean that we can ( ie need to ) populate at a faster rate in order to get economies of scale, and we will be back to where we started.
Bit like the stupidity in Melbourne of continually widening the one or two "fee"ways, vs making a diverse network.
When opening them the pollies say look at this, 10 extra years of easy travel for your tolls. Then it is full again in less than 6 months because the roads fill immediately to the congestion level people will tolerate before they start taking the rat runs instead.
One crash and the whole system dies.

Andrew

[ZeroID]

Not having heard of pumped storage hydro before I did a google and wikipedia came up with this. It basically is a lossy process ie only ~80% of the energy used to pump the water up is recovered in the regeneration of power. It only works financially by saving during cheap power periods and generating when the spot price goes up. Unless it uses power that would otherwise be lost, ie wind or solar excess, it seems to be a rather ineffective way to support the system. But I guess it is a necessary option when you have limited choices.
I just cannot figure out how your pollies over there are so pigheaded about renewables.

Pumped-storage hydroelectricity (PSH), or pumped hydroelectric energy storage (PHES), is a type of hydroelectric (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydroelectricity) energy storage (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_storage) used by electric power systems (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_power_system) for load balancing (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Load_balancing_(electrical_power)). The method stores energy in the form of gravitational potential energy (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravitational_potential_energy) of water, pumped from a lower elevation reservoir (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reservoir) to a higher elevation. Low-cost surplus off-peak electric power is typically used to run the pumps. During periods of high electrical demand, the stored water is released through turbines (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_turbine) to produce electric power. Although the losses of the pumping process makes the plant a net consumer of energy overall, the system increases revenue (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revenue) by selling more electricity during periods of peak demand (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_demand), when electricity prices are highest.
Pumped-storage hydroelectricity allows energy from intermittent sources (such as solar (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power), wind (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_power)) and other renewables, or excess electricity from continuous base-load sources (such as coal or nuclear) to be saved for periods of higher demand.[1] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pumped-storage_hydroelectricity#cite_note-1)[2] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pumped-storage_hydroelectricity#cite_note-2) The reservoirs used with pumped storage are quite small when compared to conventional hydroelectric dams of similar power capacity, and generating periods are often less than half a day.
Pumped storage is the largest-capacity form of grid energy storage (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grid_energy_storage) available, and, as of 2017, the DOE Global Energy Storage Database reports that PSH accounts for over 96% of all active tracked storage installations worldwide, with a total installed nameplate capacity of over 168 GW (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gigawatt).[3] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pumped-storage_hydroelectricity#cite_note-3) The round-trip energy efficiency (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_conversion_efficiency) of PSH varies between 70%–80%,[4] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pumped-storage_hydroelectricity#cite_note-EconomistPSH-4)[5] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pumped-storage_hydroelectricity#cite_note-thier-5)[6] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pumped-storage_hydroelectricity#cite_note-Levine-6)[7] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pumped-storage_hydroelectricity#cite_note-yang-7) with some sources claiming up to 87%.[8] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pumped-storage_hydroelectricity#cite_note-heco-8)

[AstralTraveller]

"I just cannot figure out how your pollies over there are so pigheaded about renewables."

You leave our pollies alone! It's not just renewables. Rarely has the world seen such outstanding ignorance, prejudice, and malevolence on such a wide range of issues, supported with such misinformation and displayed with such hubris. It's an achievement worth celebrating. I for one feel that Australia should develop a space program capable of putting a man (actually quite a few men and some women) in space.

[julianh72]

Yes, pumped-storage hydro is a "lossy" system - but so is ANY energy storage system - the First Law of Thermodynamics tells us that!

However, the "round-trip" efficiencies are comparable to any other large-scale energy storage system that has been demonstrated to date, and it scales MUCH bigger than any other currently available technology (such as Li-Ion batteries etc.)

As to the economics - there have been some notable "market failures" where pumped-storage systems have been owned and operated by traditional "carbon-based" energy companies, and the pumped-storage plant has been run to generate maximum revenue for the energy company, rather than to provide maximum benefit to the community as a whole.

"Maximum revenue" means that you run all your plant to provide as much power as possible at times of high demand / high spot price - but not TOO much, because that lowers the spot energy price. (Energy companies actually do best when there is a slight shortfall of supply, so the spot price stays high.) For energy companies who are reliant upon fossil fuels, pumped-storage hydro reduces the amount of base-load plant they need to build, but it doesn't help with reducing our net CO2 output.

"Maximum benefit to the community" would mean you "farm" as much renewable energy as possible and store it for release when demand exceeds supply, minimising our reliance upon fossil fuels, or even eliminating it altogether. If you are a carbon-based energy supplier, this isn't possible, because every mega-watt-hour you generate ultimately comes from burning fossil fuels. If you are a renewables-based energy company, then pumped-storage hydro (and other "battery" schemes) are a natural adjunct to help us move to a zero-emissions energy future.

I for one can't really see a MORE effective and sustainable way to supply our energy needs.

[gary]

2018 has been a sobering lesson in how expensive the construction of state-of-the-art nuclear power stations can be.

So much so that Westinghouse Electric* filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy (http://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/2017/03/29/toshibas-westinghouse-to-file-for-chapter-11.html)in March, because of US$9 billion losses from nuclear power plant construction projects (https://www.reuters.com/article/us-toshiba-accounting-westinghouse-nucle/how-two-cutting-edge-u-s-nuclear-projects-bankrupted-westinghouse-idUSKBN17Y0CQ).

Their AP1000 reactor (https://www.iaea.org/NuclearPower/Downloads/Technology/meetings/2011-Jul-4-8-ANRT-WS/2_USA_UK_AP1000_Westinghouse_Pfiste r.pdf)which was designed to passively cool itself after an accidental shutdown was seen as the solution in a post-Fukushima nuclear reactor market.

But three decades of highly skilled engineering, regulatory reviews and construction later, the AP1000 is yet to generate a watt of power.

A pair of AP1000's being built in South Carolina were abandoned after costs spiralled from US$10 billion to an eye-watering US$25 billion.

Meanwhile, a pair of AP1000's being built in China have suffered several engineering shortfalls.
The blades on the circulation pumps that are crtical to the reactors safety would stop spinning too quickly after the power was shut off, before the signature passive cooling could kick in.

There were leaks in the steam pipes exiting one of the reactor vessels.

Meantime a glut in power in China may not make either reactor ever economically viable in the market and so economies of scale for the reactors may never come about.

The missed deadlines and cost overruns have lead to the conclusion by many in the industry that the rapid growth of nuclear power has peaked and is now a thing of the past.

As at today, the costs of renewables has plumetted making them the current choice for the lowest $/kW in Australia.

Elsewhere in the world, such as Europe, the United States and China, renewables have become ubiquitous.

For example, in 2015 there was a solar eclipse over parts of Europe that resulted in a 18GW dip and 25GW rise in the amount of power in the grid just from solar alone.

25GW is equivalent to the output of about 18 nuclear power plants fully ramped up.

Currently there is about 84GW of solar deployed in Europe, equivalent to the output of about 60 nuclear reactors.

The current cost to just build that many AP1000-class nuclear reactors would run at around AUD 1 trillion.

Everyone wants cheap power in Australia. But the rest of the world is facing the same experience (https://www.aemo.com.au/-/media/Files/Media_Centre/2017/Letter-Advice-to-the-Commonwealth-relating-to-Australias-NEM.pdf). And it will get cheaper.

But if by "cheap" you mean the types of prices we paid per kW/hr decades ago, it is not going to happen at this point in time.

The reason is that the existing coal power plants have come to the end of their lives. Like an old car, they have reached the end of the road.
So even if there wasn't the requirement to urgently decrease CO2 outputs, they would need replacing anyway.

So either way we go, there are a lot of capital replacement costs at the moment but they will be amortized over time.

But unless you have very deep pockets and are willing to throw a lot of money at improving reactor designs for the benefit of the rest of the world,
nuclear power in Australia would be the most expensive option.

Westinghouse Electric would appreciate it though. They are looking for a willing buyer to take them out of bankruptcy.



* Footnote. Westinghouse Electric built the first hydro-electric power plant in 1895 in Niagara Falls

[Shiraz]

I will say it again :lol:. This tread is about a private company spending its own money over the next couple of years on a significant power system based on solarPV, a big battery and pumped hydro. They will do so because that approach represents the best and cheapest technology for future power generation.

This is not a decision by the LNP, the SA government, or the Greenies, although they should all welcome it.

[gary]

Hi Ray,

Thanks for the story.

Who would have thought a billionaire would know anything about making lots of money? :shrug:

Particularly one that would seek out failed businesses, acquire them and turn them around and make a profit?

Or that they would be willing again to put some of that money where their mouth is? :)

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-09-20/steel-maker-teams-with-ross-garnaut-to-run-factories-using-rene/8965240

https://www.zenenergy.com.au/blog/gfg-alliance-invests-in-zen-energy-to-create-a-new-australian-national-energy-champion/

[Visionary]

The site of the Multifunction Polis would be a great location for expansion.

[clive milne]

Hi Ray...
I think most of here understand the point to the extent that it would be redundant for us to labour it any further...

On somewhat of a tangent, iirc) as far back as 2015, private utility scale solar ventures were winning contracts in Saudia Arabia by virtue of cost alone.

The Saudi's may be many things but stupid isn't one of them. They are fully conscious that every kWh produced by solar is a kWh of crude oil they can put on a ship instead.

[Shiraz]

good links - thanks Gary

[Visionary]

The lens through which this debate has been conducted has everything to do with preferred belief and nothing to do with reality. Belief statements such as those being put forward by the protagonists cannot be either proven or shown in error as they are belief statements.
Good science, on the other hand, is never hamstrung by belief, science, good science is always unfettered by belief. Your arguments seek to link Science with preferred belief.
Ray, you may want all our electricity generated by Green preferencing New Age Pixies but as of this moment in time, if you want electrical power and you want a lot of it 24/7 and you want that power cheap, burn coal. Australia's latte drinking set is dependant upon those Coal laden ships that leave the Port of Newcastle every 1/2 hour.
At this juncture your breathlessly waiting to pounce and denounce the gross and politically incorrect position of proposing that Coal is burnt to generate power. Coal is dirty, Gas is a viable and affordable alternative that will keep the lights on even when the Pixies run out of puff and the windmills stop turning.
It's impossible for everyone to be employed in a Public Service job. We actually need to generate some income. Certainly, we can do as we are currently doing and mortgage our Children's, Children's prosperity against ever-expanding National and Individual debt but even that desperate ploy has an end date.
As of this moment, the harsh reality is.... We have the most expensive electricity in the developed world. This make manufacturing more difficult, it makes business more difficult and has delivered chilblains upon my Mother Inlaws toes.
South Australia, that great economic powerhouse of our Nation may decide to use AA batteries for everything conceivable purpose, that does not make using AA batteries a good idea. When you run a deficit the Piper must at some time be paid, the realities can be hidden by sleight of hand borrowing from the National Grid, but at some time, most likely a hot day this Summer, it will turn to crap.
Good science, the science that changes the world, leads us literally out of the darkness isn't dependent upon argument, it stands on its own two feet and is a beacon for all. All this talk of batteries has the decided whiff of Hyperloops and Monorails and as for benevolent Capitalists, the Easter Bunny will be delivering presents this Christmas.

[Shiraz]

today is a fine windy day in SA and we are currently running on ~80% renewables with some gas as a standby. The graph shows the huge price advantage of renewables - this is cheap power and something to look forward to more often in future. It also shows one of the downfalls of renewables in that overproduction penalises the producers, since there is currently nowhere to store the excess (literally) for a rainy day.

The pumped hydro system (and to a lesser extent the battery) noted in the first post will go part way towards solving such problems in 2020 and beyond - it won't smooth out supply/demand in less beneficial conditions this summer, but it is another step in the right direction. We have just spent a long time under the illusion that a market mechanism was a substitute for policy - industry now seems to be finding ways to bypass the resulting logjam and get us back on the most cost effective track - thankfully.


https://www.aemo.com.au/Electricity/National-Electricity-Market-NEM/Data-dashboard

[Visionary]

Enthusiasm is a good thing, enthusiasm for renewables is fine along as you don't have anything time critical to do or industry to run. When the Vic grid gets stressed and SA is deigned access to the Vic grid, SA will again fall into darkness. The longer SA is deigned access to the Vic/National Grid the more serious will the situation become until it inevitably develops full-blown emergency Statewide emergency and innocent lives are lost but wait, that's already happened has it not? Or was all that talk of SA power outages Fake News?
SA is dependant upon the good graces of the National Grid. In saying that SA uses 80% renewables is very much like the Germans saying that they will no longer use Nuclear Power. When the Germans' closed their Nuclear Plants they began drawing more & more of their total electrical power from French Nuclear Power plants. The German's are no more non-nuclear than the French. Does it make the Pixies' feel good that the German Nuclear plants have been turned off? Of course, the Pixies are happy.
Renewables are about perception, the perception that something other than what actually happening is happening.
At some point in time renewables may become reliable and cost-effective, until then we must walk a tightrope, balancing Carbon emissions against a "greater good". The more honest we are, the less we spin the story the sooner we will get to the point where renewables are a stand-alone, cost-effective solution to power generation. Until such time that renewables are cost effective my dear Mother Inlaw's chilblains will continue.

[Shiraz]

Which brings us neatly back to the thrust of this thread. What is actually happening is that a private company has just announced a major investment, of their own funds, in solar PV, a battery and pumped hydro in South Australia. Industry is stepping up to the plate to support the transition to a renewable future and they are doing so for financial reasons - nothing at all to do with enthusiasm, just realism.

The power companies and the banks have indicated no interest in new coal generators - the perception that there is a viable long term alternative to renewables simply does not reflect what is actually happening. There is a lot of hard work to do to make the new technologies work at their best as they gradually take over from the ageing coal generators. There will obviously be some hard lessons along the way, but let's at least put our efforts into something with a future.

[Visionary]

Ray, I have no issue with your last post. My concern is and remains, we don't delude ourselves into the irrational belief we have found the solution to our necessary energy transition.

[clive milne]

David... seriously... just stop it.

[Visionary]

For God's sake..... SA has the answer to power? .... SA can become the Blueprint for the entire World? I am not the deluded one, the Emperor needs some clothes and fast.
The minute SA is cut off from the National grid SA will slide headlong into a desperate Blackout, you know, the minute SA cutoff from the lifeblood of the grid.
Gentlemen, enjoy a reality check, enjoy a cool drink, relax whilst the National Grid keeps the dreams and aspirations of SA Power Pixies alive though clearly a little confused & bewildered.

[AndrewJ]

Gday David
When the first steam engines came about, people said it would never work.
When the first biplane took off people said it would never work
When the first monoplanes were designed, people said they would never work.
Wne the first "motorised" buggies were invented, people said they would never work.
When the first desktop computers came about, people said they would never work.
The transition to renewable energy will follow the same path.
It wont take long ( as long as there is a dollar to be made ).

Andrew

[clive milne]

And in other FOX news... a recent study (funded by coca cola amatil) has found that in any given 12 month period it is cheaper to drink coke twice a day than to clean your teeth and visit a dentist once a year... there is some debate about that.... But we'll just call that a conspiracy theory.