SA power - a plan at last

[AussieTrooper (Ben)]

Originally Posted by The_bluester

No, if true it was a business decision to underspend on maintenance over the long term to boost profits and then when the plant an equipment gets to the point where the maintenance simply has to be done, shut it down instead having already booked enlarged profits over a period of years by "Deferring" the maintenance.

I.E. the PM accused them of not doing what would have been planned maintenance in order to make bigger profits, then shutting it down when the crunch came maintenance wise.

When you know that the one big item that you rely on is going to fail, why would you spend on full maintenance for the rest of the plant?
Two of the generators were already permanently out of service, as they had deteriorated to the point they cannot be put back into service. There is no ability to repair or maintain boilers that suffer age induced failure.
Spending money on maintaining other components would be a complete waste. They were clearly on a winding down schedule for the past few years, whether they publicly announced it or not.
The fact is that the company made a sensible decision to close, and no amount of spin from a politician is going to change that.

[The_bluester (Paul)]

Originally Posted by AussieTrooper

When you know that the one big item that you rely on is going to fail, why would you spend on full maintenance for the rest of the plant?
Two of the generators were already permanently out of service, as they had deteriorated to the point they cannot be put back into service. There is no ability to repair or maintain boilers that suffer age induced failure.
Spending money on maintaining other components would be a complete waste. They were clearly on a winding down schedule for the past few years, whether they publicly announced it or not.
The fact is that the company made a sensible decision to close, and no amount of spin from a politician is going to change that.

Despite some searching I have found nothing referring to failed generators being permanently shut down, when did those shutdowns happen? Unless it was in the recent past, IMO a decision not to replace them would be indicative of the decision to shut it down being taken a long time ago. If the decision to shut it down fully was not made a long time back then costs associated with those two generators would not be included in the safety and "Deferred" maintenance catch up costs that apparently led to the decision to close it down.

Despite the economic costs in the valley and the potential for energy shortfalls (And I do know some people personally who are likely to be affected business wise by the closure) my own view is that it was a filthy old dinosaur and it's time had come. It is pretty hard to argue against it's status as the least efficient generator in Australia, pollution wise. In state hands I suspect it may have been kept going though.

It is the difference between the profit motive and a public service, a distinction which has been unfortunately lost in the whole NBN debate over the years too.

The profit motive and "Let the market decide" leads to the market deciding on that which is most profitable, which in the case of a five decade old brown coal fired power station (Three decades old at the time it was privatised) would very clearly be minimise maintenance, run it into the ground over a period of a couple of decades and figuratively take it to the wreckers like a worn out old Falcon.

[Shiraz (Ray)]

the race is on.

Since the SA Govt announced that they would get back into the electricity market, we now have:

- SA Govt plan for 100MW battery + 200MW+ rapid reaction gas
- ENGIE resurrecting 200MW+ of thermal gas capability at Pelican point
- Lyon announcing 330MW solar + battery at Morgan in SA
- Lyon previously announced 100MW solar + battery at Roxy Downs in SA
- Snowy Hydro announce 100MW solar + battery? and diesel at Tailem Bend in SA
- Adani announce 150MW solar plant in Whyalla SA
- Federal Govt commit to funding part of a 100MW solar thermal + salt storage plant at Pt Augusta SA
- Federal Govt study into pumped hydro in the Snowies

As far as I can tell, some of this will be operational by Christmas and the rest within 2 years (apart from Snowy scheme). Looks like private industry is fairly desperate to keep any honest broker influences away from their very nice little closed market - or is that too cynical.

[Exfso (Peter)]

An interesting article in today's Sunday Mail about our premier. Apparently Alinta offered the SA Govt the opportunity to keep the Port Augusta Power station generating until mid 2018 in return for $25million payment which is 22x cheaper than the recently revealed $550million plan aimed at keeping the lights on. Apparently Mr Weatherill tried to hide this offer by Alinta and in recent weeks has been less than forthright about its existence. Makes one wonder what really is going on.

[Shiraz (Ray)]

But by mid next year, the 22x cheaper plan would have run out of steam and we would have been back to square 1 - and nobody would have been willing to plan any power investment in the meantime.

dunno who was hiding the offer - I read about it months ago. Oh, that's right - it was in another News rag, but the Sunday Mail is not going to let the odd fact stand in the way of a good beatup - maybe they just thought that nobody would remember what was reported in the Australian, on August 25th:

Tens of millions of dollars in taxpayer subsidies was sought by one of the country’s largest energy companies to keep South Australia’s only major baseload power station operating, Premier Jay Weatherill says.

Following a report in The Australian that the state’s Labor government had rejected an offer to keep Alinta Energy’s coal-fired Northern Power station in Port Augusta open, Mr Weatherill said the cost to delay its closure could not be justified. He said Alinta had sought “tens of millions” in taxpayer funding, despite its intention to close it.

“The gall of the Liberals is that (after they sold the power plant), they now criticise us for not wanting to rent it back at some extortionary rate,’’ Mr Weatherill.

The rejection of the deal resulted in the plant closing in May, leaving the state reliant on power from Victoria and renewables.....

even though the article is wrong on two counts (SA has other major baseload generators and the closing of the plant was not the result of the rejection of the deal), it is quite clear that there was an offer to try to keep Northern running. Another low point in SA journalism for the Sunday Mail.

[AussieTrooper (Ben)]

Originally Posted by The_bluester

Despite some searching I have found nothing referring to failed generators being permanently shut down, when did those shutdowns happen?

Last year. It wasn't made public.

[AussieTrooper (Ben)]

Originally Posted by Shiraz

the race is on.

Since the SA Govt announced that they would get back into the electricity market, we now have:

- SA Govt plan for 100MW battery + 200MW+ rapid reaction gas
- ENGIE resurrecting 200MW+ of thermal gas capability at Pelican point
- Lyon announcing 330MW solar + battery at Morgan in SA
- Lyon previously announced 100MW solar + battery at Roxy Downs in SA
- Snowy Hydro announce 100MW solar + battery? and diesel at Tailem Bend in SA
- Adani announce 150MW solar plant in Whyalla SA
- Federal Govt commit to funding part of a 100MW solar thermal + salt storage plant at Pt Augusta SA
- Federal Govt study into pumped hydro in the Snowies

There's about the same planned for Vic. I've never seen so many planned wind farms, and (more surprisingly) commercial solar plants. A couple already have the go ahead up near Mildura, with many more on the drawing board.

[The_bluester (Paul)]

I would say (Based on your second last post) that that was likely to be when Engie decided to pull the plug on it.

My biggest surprise is that there seems to be so much on the go by way of renewables given the federal governments rhetoric against them. In reality they have barely moved on from "Coal is good for humanity" (Particularly listening to the justifications put forward for the Adani mine this morning) and "Disgusting eyesore" references to turbines.

For once IMO we need to be thankful of private enterprise in the power space or the situation would continue to get worse. Coal can not realistically be seen as anything but on the decline and the federal government have spent the last three and a half years making renewables look like a risky investment while actively promoting coal, the only way I could see a new coal fired station being built in Australia would be if a government built it, private enterprise seems pretty apathetic on the idea, with good reason when it is on the nose and only likely to get worse worldwide and they would be doing the sums regard risk and returns on a 50 year asset.

[clive milne]

Should have made this guy PM... he would have fixed everything!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ckcH0Wrmy74

[AussieTrooper (Ben)]

My gut feel is that they have been watching peak demand very closely. In Vic, the departure of the manufacturing industry has lopped 2GW off the top of the demand curve. This is what has allowed Morwell and Hazelwood to close with minimal effect on prices or reliability.
Federal policy from both Labor and Liberal is seeing about 300,000 new electricity consumers in Australia every year.
These will soon pick up the slack, and the lead times for construction of major plants are too long to cater for it.
Solar makes it's money on hot summer days where the residential demand increases by more than the industrial load did. So the peak will be sharper than before. Owning a solar plant becomes fare more profitable under this scenario than it is today.
The only mitigating factor I can see is residential battery storage, which several utilities are already trialling.

[pgc hunter]

Originally Posted by Exfso

An interesting article in today's Sunday Mail about our premier. Apparently Alinta offered the SA Govt the opportunity to keep the Port Augusta Power station generating until mid 2018 in return for $25million payment which is 22x cheaper than the recently revealed $550million plan aimed at keeping the lights on. Apparently Mr Weatherill tried to hide this offer by Alinta and in recent weeks has been less than forthright about its existence. Makes one wonder what really is going on.

It's simple, he's a complete and utter dogmatic prick. And we are paying for it.

[Exfso (Peter)]

Ray, I see where you are coming from, I was merely bringing up the article in the Sunday Mail. Obviously lots of "creative accounting" going on, but that is always the case with any Govt. The proof will most definitely be in the pudding, I for one don't trust what any politician says, there are always too many hidden agendas for my liking

[casstony]

Originally Posted by AussieTrooper

. There is no ability to repair or maintain boilers that suffer age induced failure.
.

Where have you read this Ben? Boilers often have leaks repaired and when the tubing gets too thin resulting in frequent leaks either the superheaters alone can be replaced or the boiler can be completely re-tubed. About the only thing that would put a boiler out of service permanently is fault in the Drum which makes it unsafe.

I think Paul's take is closer to the truth. If maintenance doesn't fit into the monthly or annual budgets set by beancounters the repairs simply won't be done. Over a period of years deterioration builds up to the point that major expenditure is needed. Some years ago I worked at Hazelwood and I have not so fond memories of walking around the boiler in clouds of pulverized coal dust because the leaks on the mills weren't being repaired. We ran hoses on the leaks to suppress the dust. That sort of thing went in cycles; when it got too bad everything would get fixed, followed by another slow deterioration. It all came down to profit.

[AussieTrooper (Ben)]

Originally Posted by casstony

Where have you read this Ben?

Not read, told. From someone who works there.

[casstony]

Originally Posted by AussieTrooper

Not read, told. From someone who works there.

Could be miscommunication or political/management motivations.
The people actually operating the plant expected it to be maintained until 2025.
There was plenty of deception from company management and state politicians regarding Hazelwood's closure - workers were kept in the dark and told everything was full steam ahead even after it was know the business would close.

[AussieTrooper (Ben)]

No idea as to why his opinion was different to others, however he proved to be on the money. And I'll leave it at that.

[Shiraz (Ray)]

Originally Posted by AussieTrooper

There's about the same planned for Vic. I've never seen so many planned wind farms, and (more surprisingly) commercial solar plants. A couple already have the go ahead up near Mildura, with many more on the drawing board.

agreed. The more I read, the more it looks like a biggish pumped hydro plant could be the real game changer that would make wind and solar into grownup power sources. Maybe the feds are onto something with the Snowy scheme - provided they are fair dinkum.

Originally Posted by Exfso

Ray, I see where you are coming from, I was merely bringing up the article in the Sunday Mail. Obviously lots of "creative accounting" going on, but that is always the case with any Govt. The proof will most definitely be in the pudding, I for one don't trust what any politician says, there are always too many hidden agendas for my liking

couldn't agree more Peter. sorry my post was bit aggressive, but I saw red at the cynicism of the Sunday Mail journos - they really are treating us as mugs and they should do better. Making up a conspiracy like that is really bottom of the barrel when there are so many good news stories emerging on the power front.

[The_bluester (Paul)]

My worry with the snowy scheme stuff was it seemed to be a heavily qualified though bubble.

"We are going to build XXX'

Followed by the announcements that the "Feasibility study" will be completed by whenever it was, and then what? What if the study says that it is marginal or just not feasible?

They have runs on the board when it comes to stuffing up big infrastructure (I firmly believe they will not be remembered fondly in a decade for the MTM version of the NBN)

[Exfso (Peter)]

No problems Ray. It certainly does not help that SA is broke.
I believe that most of the problems have been caused by the privatisation and the resultant needs of the power owners to make the almighty dollar. Bugger the battlers as usual they will have to be the bunnies that wear the increased costs and decreased services.
I know it is a fair while ago, but I cannot remember these sorts of issues when the whole shebang was run by ETSA.

[The_bluester (Paul)]

Actually, in the case of Vic I do remember load shedding being a summer norm. Heat, flies and rolling blackouts.