Whatever you say, Peter.

Craig certainly brings something to a thread when he arrives, doesn't he?

Whooohooo, we're all going off grid, and the sun will power our daily lives, and our night-lives too. Can't wait. I live on an urban acre and can spread my panels around. My brother will have to take turns at using his electricity with the other residents of his apartment tower.

It's all so wonderful!

"True costs of wind electricity" http://judithcurry.com/2015/05/12/true-costs-of-wind-electricity/ provides an excellent reality check on the real cost of wind energy. (this is well worth reading - it's by professionals who have a life time of experience in electricity system planning and systems analysis).

Solar costs are much higher.

This is an excellent report, just published, that estimates the emissions avoided by wind generation in the NEM. This is the gold standard for such analyses.: http://joewheatley.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/sub348_Wheatley.pdf

The negative consequences of our RET are not widely understood:

What’s the cost of CO2 emissions abatement with wind turbines?

Answer: much higher than current estimates.

The cost of abatement with wind power in Australia in 2020 under the RET will be:

• 2 to 5 times the carbon price which was rejected by voters at the 2103 election

• 4 to 8 times the Direct Action average price achieved at the first auction

• 6 to 12 times the current EU ETS price

• 100 to 200 times the international carbon price futures to 2020

The Warburton RET Review estimated the cost of abatement under the LRET at $32-$72/tonne CO2 in 2020 (Section 5.6 – Cost of abatement’ – from estimates by ACIL-Allen, Frontier Economics and Deloitte).

But the actual cost is likely to be much higher because the estimates apparently do not take the CO2 abatement effectiveness into account.

Wheatley estimated wind energy in the NEM was just 78% effective at abating emissions in 2014, and would be about 70% effective if wind power’s share was doubled.

Under the current RET legislation, wind energy would have to supply about 15% of electricity in 2020. At 15% share, wind is likely to be about 60% effective.

At 60% effective, the CO2 abatement cost would be $53-$120 per tonne CO2

Compare these abatement costs:
Source Year $/t CO2
Warburton review 2020 32 - 72
With effectiveness included (at 60% in 2020) 2020 53 - 120
Carbon price at 2013 election 2013 24.15
Direct Action (based on first auction 2015 13.95
EU ETS price 2015 9.50
International carbon permit futures (to 2020) 2020 0.56

Of course, you must be right, Peter.

Luciferase, distributed generation is facilitated by grid connection. Perhaps next time you should ask about things you don't understand?

Of course, you could always join Peter and form a lovely conga line going round and round and round and round...

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0378779601001018

So, the grid distributes the supposed excess electricity from my acre, my needs, my storage, to my brother's apartment building and its residents' needs and storage. This is this supposed to be more efficient than mass installation generation and storage. There's an argument to be had right there, but that would be rearranging deck-chairs.

The basic problem remains, the affordability of, and the time we have to act on, mitigating AGW.