Wow, you've really got me this time 579. Here I was thinking all these extra costs, & the "carbon tax" was designed to price fossil fuels out of the market. You know, to stop the "global warming" that the whole con is based on.

Best be careful there, you're forgetting your lines. Julia won't be pleased.

People need to realise that we need aluminium refineries to keep the electrical network stable, as they act as our hydro stations. Having very little hydro power, due to lack of water, the refineries provide the only large consumer of power that can be supplied at the convenience of the generating authorities. That is why they get their power so cheaply. If Eraring Power Station were to ring in and say that they had a problem with No2 alternator, and that their output would fall by 500 Mw in 3 minutes time, the order would just go out "Kill the refinery", and balance would be restored. The refineries can go without power for 5 hours before the pots cool down. Hydro is the only continuous source of power that can go from zero to 100% output in 60 seconds, but the capacity in Tasmania and the Snowy is insufficient to stabilise the eastern state network. As the proportion of erratic sources of renewable power in the network increases, the refineries will become even more important for network stability. (For technical dummies that means the mains voltage staying at 240 volts).

plerdsus

a useful point.. um, is that actually what they do or is it surmise on your part? Can they switch the smelter on and off a lot and still preserve efficiency, for example? wind power would have a lot of ups and downs during the day. Interested..

Yes Curmudgeon, that's how it works. It is all based on the fact that it is not possible to store electricity (cheaply at any rate) and that it has to be used as it is generated. That is the same reason that people have off-peak hot water systems. The electricity for them is provided at the convenience of the generating authority (usually at night when they have a lot of surplus power to dispose of). They just send a control pulse down the line to the selected area, and all the off-peak systems are turned on. The tank insulation keeps the water hot, so it doesn't matter to you just when it was heated. In the same way, Alcoa doesn't care when the aluminium is produced, as long at it is produced. (By the way, I had a career in electrical engineering).

The carbon price is raising airfares between $1.50 and $8 for long haul.
Qantas is axing 500 jobs, hopefully the CEO is one of them. Profit is down 83 % If there was 500 jobs that didn't need to be there, why take so long.
Joyce says qantas is going to trial an alt fuel later in the year.

Yes, thanks plerdsus for confirming that versatility about fossils; the big coal powered plants can rotate their generators for reasons other than maintainence, mainly reduction in demand. This is the reason why alarmists can claim the capacity factor of the big coal plants is < 100%. In fact it is not; coal is 24/7.

One of the other lies of the alarmists is that renewables can also be versatile; in fact hey have no flexibility at all; whenever an alarmist sprouts rubbish about the renewables I just ask them whether wind and solar can guarantee 4 hours power in a weeks time. The answer of course is no; in fact wind and solar cannot guarantee power at any time.