Yes let's keep using coal and oil to power our dream world. Even if we cause catastrophic climate change, pollute the air, denude the fertile soil to get at the minerals, cause death and ill health for millions, what does it matter as long as we live the NeoCon dream of a constantly expanding economy and population who will all eventually become extinct as will their mega cars, mega houses and way of life.
After all without an economy what is the point of having a clean green way of life?
Who is going to be in the top 1% if there is no one to lord it over?

Sooner or later, the penny will drop and all the anti nukes will realize that if they want base load power at a cheap price, it will have to be nuclear, not the renewables that are available now and into the foreseeable future.

The Labor Party will never learn: still spruiking the same old rubbish that got them dumped. Not satisfied with already too-high power prices, thanks to the need for taxpayers to subsidize inefficent windmills, they want more of the insightly things, a 50% reliability on renewables, and a new, you beaut carbon carbon tax which, among other imposts, will put an extra $1,500 on the price of a car.

Every time Shorten opens his mouth, he proves that he and his mob are not fit for office; and this is bad for Australia, given the not at all comforting attidudes and arrogance of the government.

More research and basic intelligence would inform this, I believe, broken record "expert"; that one doesn't need 19th century blast furnaces to make steel!

[An X being an unknown quantity and a spurt merely a great big drip under extreme pressure.]

When all that is needed is vastly superior single step direct reduction in electric arc furnaces, which by the way can be powered by cheaper than coal thorium, which by the way is a carbon free alternative to coal; or a super scenic coal mine!
Incidentally you can't eat coal!

The addition of energy loss reduction microgrids, would allow us to reduce industrial energy prices by at least half ;and indeed enable the lowest carbon creating steel production in the world!

Ditto aluminum and light metals smelting!

We may not be better off with so called renewables, or even save the world, let alone our going to hell in a handbasket economy; but the answer is yes, yes, yes with, I'll have what she's having, alternatives!

Which just has to include endlessly sustainable biogas production and utilising that homemade gas in household ceramic fuel cells to produce carbon neutral power.

And the lowest costing energy in the world, given there's no transmission/distribution losses to account for; plus the combination provides energy saving free hot water, and also produces an 80% energy coefficient; the best in the world!?

Wind farms have a place where the wind is super reliable, which is probably in the roaring forties?

And a better top up substitute for Tassie than taking more expensive coal fired energy from Victoria?
Rhrosty.

Johns: Can you build a wind turbine, or start a wind turbine, without fossil fuels? The answer is no and no, you cannot.

And of course, once you start a wind turbine, can you rely on that contraption to go on producing continuous reliable power output, without fossil fuels? Again, the answer is no, as you require fossil-fuel-powered backup for when the wind don’t blow -- or for when the sun don’t shine in the case of solar. Nuclear power is a higher cost alternative to coal-fired power as backup

Gary. The 'uncosted' benefit that is never included when factoring the economics of coal generated electricity is the released CO2 into the atmosphere.

With the increasing use of this form of energy production in Germany, India and China, with luck we should eventually reach 700 or 800 ppm atmospheric levels, close to the optimum concentrations for the benefit of our biosphere. Goodby deserts and vast food production.

In terms of the silliest anti windfarm spiel, this article ranks second: beaten only by the report in The Australian that Victoria's wind farms hadn't reduced the amount of brown coal burnt in that state's power stations, but failing to mention that this was because the extra electricity was exported to NSW.

The fact that fossil fuels are used in constructing wind farms is well known. But the amount used is small compared to the amount of electricity they generate. Similarly the amount of electricity they consume is small compared to the amount they produce.

So in answer to Gary's question at the start of his article:
"So what is the point of saddling Australia with an increasing load of wind turbines?"
The main answer is TO REDUCE OUR CONSUMPTION OF FOSSIL FUEL.

Until we do that, whether we can eliminate our use of fossil fuel is a purely academic exercise!

There is potentially a second answer: to drive down the price of electricity. But whether they achieve that outcome depends on how they are funded.

Hey I wonder how many resources go into building and operating a Power Station?

+ its Fuel.

Wow
I am incredulous that the Australian would even print an article like this, which has no connection with reality, I can only guess they thought it had merit as fiction.

Of course Gary Johns is correct as far as he goes in arguing why renewables can’t replace all energy sources. If he tried going further he would soon get bogged down in technicalities and numbers, leaving most readers behind. But it’s a critical subject; the politics of future energy is shaped entirely by public opinion on the matter. The renewables camp demands the immediate end of fossil fuels. They accept no excuses and invoke weird conspiracies to explain the delay. I see it again and again.

So, why cannot the matter be resolved authoritatively? Surely it’s just about technology and engineering, facts and numbers.

There’s no simple answer. I confess my own theories are a bit conspiratorial too. Firstly, the ‘experts’ are nearly all conflicted. For example there is barely a solar or wind or geothermal (or CCS for that matter) expert who is not a solar or wind or geothermal (or CCS) advocate. Perhaps worse, the folk who make a living out of supplying energy and should be in the best position to settle the matter authoritatively don’t really mind where their electricity comes from because someone always pays the asking (subsidised) price no matter the cost of the energy source. Plus, they feel the political pressure to toe the green line. And they are not terribly interested in what will happen when penetration of renewables into the whole grid system starts to approach its inevitable limits.

Reminding people that no solar panel or wind turbine has ever been built without fossil fuels is useful. Gary could have stressed that the ‘50% target’ is only about electricity, representing around 40% of primary energy. Transportation, heating, cement production etc. account for the rest. While electrified personal transport should be feasible, fossil fuels will be much harder to replace for many other uses. The ‘let’s stop now’ brigade ignore those limitations.

All of these constraints can usefully be fed into realistic thinking about cutting carbon emissions. Renewables will hardly register in the solutions.

warmair it's not actually fiction. It's just a bunch of irrelevant, mostly obvious, facts cobbled together with ignorant opinion that reinforces the party line!

_______________________________________________________________________________________

Prompete, when the limiting factor is the amount of fresh water available, more CO2 doesn't help much. And if the higher CO2 levels result in warmer temperatures causing a sea level rise which floods our farmland, we'll be much worse off.

_______________________________________________________________________________________

Tombee, the problem is those limitations (which are really technical problems to overcome rather than actual limitations) are being used as an excuse to do nothing even though we're nowhere near the "limits" at the moment.

Australian coal, oil and gas companies receive $4b in subsidies
Sue Lannin 11 Nov 2014,
A new report finds exploration by coal and energy companies is subsidised by Australian taxpayers by as much as $US3.5 billion ($4 billion) every year in the form of direct spending and tax breaks.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-11-11/coal-oil-and-gas-companies-receive-4-billion-dollar-in-subsidie/5881814

King Island has no problem achieving 65% renewable electrical energy, despite the fact it has no hydro, and if they can get biodiesel may be able to get 100%.

The site below is particularly interest as it shows in real time the energy mix.

http://www.kingislandrenewableenergy.com.au/

Hi Robert LePage

Subsidies to fossil fuel sector are even more expensive for the taxpayer. The fossil fuel sector is set to receive $47 billion in federal government subsidies over the next four years.
http://reneweconomy.com.au/2014/australian-fossil-fuel-subsidies-put-at-47bn-as-ret-wrestle-continues-58572

And count all those $Billions in subsidies for the Victorian brown coal industry during the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd Government.

Regards

Pete

Sadly predictable that Gary Johns' article should draw out so many trolls. It seems that in climate orthodoxy there is no room for open discussion. I have to say that the myth that wind power is fossil clean is a hard one to tackle. A few years back when I ran the World Coal Association we came across a report from Vestas - the then largest manufacturer of wind turbines - which detailed the materials used in an average wind turbine. Vestas' own figures showed astonishing levels of coal and other fossil use over the lifetime of the turbine - 250 tonnes for a single offshore turbine, 150 tonnes for onshore. But of course these facts don't fit the story some want us to believe and I have no doubt the trolls will now attack this on the basis that I worked at the WCA rather than on the facts themselves. Well done Gary.

Hi plantagenet and Robert

The two largest values in the so-called “subsidy” are removing the carbon tax and the Fuel Tax Credit scheme. One could argue that one of these is a subsidy, but if so the other cannot be. The logic of both rests on economic “externalities” – costs imposed, or not imposed, on the wider community and not paid for by the company that causes them.

The argument for a carbon tax is that emitters should pay the cost they impose on the community through global warming. And the argument for fuel being Australia’s second most heavily taxed substance (after tobacco), is that vehicle drivers impose substantial costs on the community that they don’t pay for, in the cost of building and maintaining public roads, and indirectly through urban congestion and pollution. The Fuel Tax Credit scheme is fair because farmers and miners use most of their fuel off road or in heavy machinery, so don’t contribute to the cost of building and maintaining roads, or of urban pollution and congestion.

The logic against one of these “subsidies” is the logic in favour of the other.

Personally, I’d prefer to see a carbon tax, but with the Fuel Tax Credit retained.

Please read this article....

http://reneweconomy.com.au/2015/coalition-makes-it-up-in-campaign-against-renewables-climate-action-85091

You're a bit brave trying to talk facts to the warmists that infest this blog Gary. Facts just wash over them, with no penetration of the closed minds.

To salute your courage I offer you a theme song. I like the Frank Sinatra version, "They didn't believe me", & it is what to expect from the Greenies particularly, along with the academic gravy train riders.

Hasbeen, your response is extremely hypocritical — you frequently display the faults that you attribute to "warmists".

BTW Gary's not at all brave. He didn't write his misleading* criticism of wind turbines for the readers of this website, he wrote it for The Australian, which likes to discredit wind turbines and no longer lets the facts get in the way of a good story!

* If you're under the illusion the article isn't misleading, try reading the page Petro linked to!

Aidan. I take your point on the limitations of available fresh water. However, the effect of increased atmospheric CO2 for a plant, is to increase its efficiency in using the nutrient value of existing water resources, in other words, you get increased plant growth efficiency (some 28 to 30%) with increased CO2. Hence, it being used at some 1000ppm in tomato houses.

With an increase in atmospheric levels from 280ppm to 400ppm I have not noted an increases in average global surface level temperatures of more than about 0.7 degrees and, over the past near 2 decades, no discernible temperature increase at all really.

Laboratory studies indicate that increases in CO2 levels within the atmosphere are logarithmic, the 'heating' effect is drastically reduced for each doubling of CO2, so any volumetric expansion of the oceans creating increasing sea level rises is highly unlikely to have the effect of inundating farmland.

Hence, my comment that an increase of CO2 by German, Indian and Chinese clean coal fired electric plants is financially beneficial to those countries economies.

It's a bizarre argument.
Fossil fuels are also used to manufacture electric cars and solar panels too.

In fact, the amount of energy it takes to manufacture electric cars - the mining of all the components plus the additional minerals required for the fuel cells plus their transportation costs - is greater than the nett savings in fuel during the cars lifetime.

Likewise, the total amount of energy used to manufacture and fuel a nuclear power plant is greater than the amount of energy it will ever produce. It takes energy to mine, process and transport uranium too.
The only savings would be if they were mass-produced, which is certainly not the case.

Power plants (including nuclear) are not perpetual motion machines - You don't get something for nothing from nature.

The production of food - when transport, harvesting and fertiliser are taken into account - expends more calories than are produced.

The difference is the resulting long-term cost to the environment, which is what the debate should really be about.

Should the world wait until fossil fuels run out and react when the situation becomes critical or take steps now?

Prompete

The fertilizing effect of increased CO2 on plants is well know, however it is not certain that plants grown outside a greenhouse will benefit. It is an interesting area of science, but has very little bearing on the harm that increased levels of CO2 will have on the climate.

The trend in increased temperature since the 1970s remains pretty much unchanged, unless you cheery pick the data such as starting in 1998 and finishing in 2010, which is simply accounted for by the short term difference between El Niño and La Niña effects on global temperature.

The heating effect of CO2 is indeed logarithmic as you say, but then you say that the heating effect is drastically reduced for each doubling of CO2, which is slightly misleading. Each doubling of CO2 produces the same amount of heating. The important point is not the amount of heating that CO2 directly produces, but the resulting feedbacks of which, the primary one is the increase in water vapour leading to further enhancement of the greenhouse effect and thus higher temperatures.

Some of the effects on climate that have been observed so far are an increase in storm intensity, but not frequency, an increase extreme rainfall events (flash floods) more extreme droughts and changes to the lengths of the seasons. The rate of sea level rise has increased since the 1990s and will almost certainly continue to do so. A sea level rise of over a meter by 2100 is well within the bounds of possibility which would jeopardise numerous large cities on the coast.

Clean coal is an oxymoron.

wobbles says, "Likewise, the total amount of energy used to manufacture and fuel a nuclear power plant is greater than the amount of energy it will ever produce. It takes energy to mine, process and transport uranium too. The only savings would be if they were mass-produced, which is certainly not the case."

Complete crap.

Just saying.

Dr Hansen promotes nuclear waste-eating GenIV reactors like the Integral Fast Reactor. GE have the S-PRISM ready to go to the first country that will authorise it, based on the strong physics & engineering demonstration of the EBR2 for a few decades. While I reckon the IFR is a good idea, my favourite reactor was passed over by Nixon when he favoured the EBR2 program. He *should* have more fully developed the thorium Molten Salt Reactor program into the modern LFTR concept.

But renewables? Advocates keep contradicting each other! EG:

1. We're all going OFF grid, and magical storage devices are going to back up wind and solar on our own houses or industrial estates or offices in town.

1. We're all going ONTO a continent-wide SUPER-grid, and it's going to cost $10 billion in its own right to build and is an important backbone of the grid as we get wind and solar from Perth when there's a drop in wind and sunshine in Sydney or Cairns or whatever.

2. We're going to charge about half our electric cars at night on excess nightime baseload power supply when business closes down for the day!

2. We're NOT going to really do anything at night because... who needs power at night? Amory Lovins says the requirement for baseload electric power is a myth, and there's no real need for power at night. Except for charging iphones and running fridges and, HELLO, charging about HALF the American car fleet with surplus night time power! Amory seems to think we need to beef up the grid to allow ALL electric cars to charge during the day as well as everything else!

Honestly, when I hear contradictions like this in wishy washy wishful thinking fairy land, I agree with Dr James Hansen! Tooth fairy, here we come!

Luciferase,

The capital cost of building a nuclear power plant is enormous - that's why there are comparatively so few of them.

Add up the total energy it takes to mine, process and manufacture all the raw materials, then add all the transportation and assembly costs. Almost every component is customised. You can't buy the bits from Bunnings.

Mining and processing uranium is currently cheaper than gas but global reserves are as precarious as oil and even more limited. If the whole world converted to nuclear power overnight, we would run out of known reserves in about 10 years.

Then the cost of decommissioning a nuclear plant is about 50% of the initial construction cost. There are about a dozen plants in the USA still in the process of being decommissioned years after they were turned off. The cost of cleaning up and decommissioning plants in the UK is over 70 billion pounds. That's not mentioned anywhere in the sales speil.

Now add the ongoing storage costs for the waste material and the efficiency is looking pretty sad.

Just saying.

Hi Wobbles,
yes, interesting points. However, the next generation of Small Modular Reactors *will* be assembly line, factory produced reactors. Today's LWR have a problem: over-pressured cores. Water wants to flash to steam and so is under incredible pressure (so the engineers tell us) and this means the core flange must be the one huge incredible bit of steel poured at the only foundry in the world that can do it!

But SMR's will be salt or sodium cooled. That means room pressure, and standardisation, and assembly lines. It's the difference between a hand-crafted Rolls Royce and a Hyundai on the factory line! Decommissioning is built into the construction cost, and reactors just 'sitting there' are intentionally parked in SAFSTOR mode for 50 years. It makes it easier and safer to disassemble them at the end.

Lastly, and this is the MOST important point! The next generation of reactors will eat nuclear waste. That means massive savings on the energy cost of obtaining all that uranium. The same uranium will provide 60 times the energy! That's a *massive* saving, and hugely increases the EROEI of the overall plant!

Please watch this 2 hour documentary about thorium, the greatest technology never sold! President Nixon really stuffed the world when he picked the wrong reactor to develop. (GE have that 'wrong' reactor ready to go in the S-PRISM, which can burn nuclear waste, but I'm thinking of public perception. I've seen even anti-nukes accept thorium reactors as necessary after watching this video!)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P9M__yYbsZ4

The opposing view to the video link above:-

http://independentaustralia.net/environment/environment-display/dont-believe-thorium-nuclear-reactor-hype,4919

Personally I suspect the thorium nuclear plant is not the answer, but I have not devoted the time or effort into looking into the question, and anyway I just don't see the need to go that way at present. In Australia we should fully exploit hydro, wind, solar, geothermal, biomass, and tidal power, before we consider expensive and polluting alternatives.

Hi Warmair,
The Independent raises some interesting points. I would agree that there is a lot of inertia around the known pathway. But as Weinberg said decades ago, it’s the wrong pathway! And it will take some time to develop, although not ‘many decades’ if China kicks off her large scale program again. (Currently stalled). President Nixon got it so wrong in so many ways! It’s not ‘commercial viability’ that ruined their chances but the military’s quest for The Bomb!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alvin_M._Weinberg
The beauty of these reactors is that while most of today’s Gen2 reactors need power to cool and control the reactor, Gen4 reactors like the thorium Molten Salt Reactor only take a *lack* of power to trigger a complete shut down of the reactor. They cannot “melt down” as the reactor is already a liquid! The fuel is in the coolant fluid, giving it a greater surface area to cool down in an emergency. Imagine your kitchen sink is full of boiling water, but there’s no plug, just a thin wedge of ice in the drain pipe: ice that’s only there because electricity is blowing a freezing gas across it. The moment the power fails, the ice melts and the boiling water flows away! That’s a thorium reactor in a nutshell. It’s also normal room pressure, meaning no pressure-cooker explosions as with water-cooled reactors.
As for the fuel cycle being more expensive: where on earth do they get that? The thorium is already mined: a waste product from mining rare earths! Not only that, but it eats ‘nuclear waste’ from other reactors, and can get 60 times the energy out of nuclear waste. YES the *final*, real waste product is more radioactive than regular nuclear waste, and that’s a *good* thing because it means they are fission products that will burn themselves back to safe levels in 300 years!
If you blow up a LFTR with TNT, the liquid salt dries at a few hundred degrees, trapping the radiation. There will be no radioactive cloud like Chernobyl. There’s no water

Max Green and others in favour:
If these nukes are so good can you tell me why they are not being built by the dozen by the big corporations?
And let's not forget that the Governments are bought by these companies, so there would be no problems passing legislation to allow them.

Start here http://www.phyast.pitt.edu/~blc/book/chapter9.html

Good question Robert! It's about the accidents of history and politics, not physics. Nuclear engineer Kirk Sorenson explains in his half hour Google Tech Talk, "Why the MSR didn't happen?" If you want the whole story, please watch this 30 minute introduction to the history of MSR's.
http://energyfromthorium.com/2011/12/23/techtalk-why-tmsr/

The short version is that:-
1. The military already knew about uranium & plutonium from the Manhattan Project and "The Bomb".
2. Nixon wanted to push jobs in a certain electorate, and so went with a fast breeder program instead of the 'slow' thermal reactor like the Molten Salt Reactor burning thorium.
3. An arrogant Senator basically thought Weinberg's insistence on more safety than the Light Water Reactor (that Weinberg invented!) meant Weinberg shouldn't be in the nuclear game, and fired him. This effectively ended the MSR program.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alvin_M._Weinberg#Leadership

The only good to come out of it is that the Liquid Metal Fast-Breeder program eventually created the EBR2. Fast-breeders are a GOOD reactor, and can be configured to prevent 'bomb grade' plutonium, and burn nuclear waste and warheads instead. The EBR2 ran well for decades, and like the MSR / LFTR has inherent safety, is room pressure, and can burn nuclear waste. But I don't like it using sodium, which is unstable. However, I'd much rather the world use a whole fleet of LMFB's burning nuclear waste than coal, as it would save 3 million lives a year! Coal kills 4000 times more people than nuclear.
GE have developed plans for the PRISM reactor based directly on the EBR2.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(reactor)

The only problem? Politicians again! They shut down the EBR2 program fearing proliferation, and didn't understand there are different isotopes and purities of plutonium, and not every reactor can make a bomb! GE are now just looking for a country willing to let them build the PRISM, then they could start converting all that lovely nuclear waste into clean energy for the whole planet for 500 years! Today we should build out AP1000's as fast as we can. They produce the perfect 'waste' for future PRISMS and MSR's to eat.

Nuclear 'waste' is actually not a problem to store for 100,000 years, but a fuel to burn in IFR's and LFTR's and could power the world for 500 years! Because the nuclear 'waste' in the USA could power America alone for 1,500 years, nuclear 'waste' is actually worth $30 TRILLION!

(Once all the actinides are burned out, the final 'fission products' are the true waste, and only have to be stored for 300 years).
$30 TRILLION dollars from point 4 here!
http://bravenewclimate.com/2009/10/16/ifr-spm/

I have had a look at the figures for renewable energy generated in Europe and compared it to Australia.
Europe in 2013 generated GWh of power by:-

Hydro 361000
Wind 352067
Solar 89482

Total 793303

Australia generated in total from all sources:-
213500 GWh

Therefore Europe which is smaller in area than Australia produced 3.7 times more renewable energy than Australia did from all sources.
So why would we even bother with underdeveloped thorium nuclear power with all its technical and political problems?

Wind and hydro are almost certainly cheaper than nuclear, and solar will probably be as well fairly soon.

Yes, there are some big figures there, but the BIGGEST is the amount of money wasted on relatively tiny energy returns! It's ideology, not rational energy policy, driving any attempt to get to 100% wind and solar. Some countries with large hydro can go 100% renewable with a good mix of hydro wind and solar. But they're few and far between. The MOST abundant renewables are also the MOST intermittent and unreliable: wind and solar. Let's check them out!

First, in Germany solar is 3 times more expensive than nuclear: and it doesn't run on a cold German winter night.
"An analysis by the Breakthrough Institute finds that the entire German solar sector produces less than half the power that Fukushima Daiichi – a single nuclear complex – generated before it was hit by the tsunami. To build a Fukushima-sized solar industry in Germany would, it estimates, cost $155bn. To build a Fukushima-sized nuclear plant would cost $53.5bn. And the power would be there on winter evenings."
http://thebreakthrough.org/blog/2011/03/doing_the_math_comparing_germa.shtml

Secondly, to back up renewables seasonal fluctuations in northern countries like Germany could bankrupt any nation that tried it. You can *either* buy Tesla Powerpack batteries to back up *one week* of winter in Germany (at a hypothetical 30% penetration of wind and solar, and these wind and solar farms must still be bought), OR you can just buy safe modern nuclear-waste eating nukes that will do the whole job for 60 years. Again, *backup* a third of a renewable grid for just one week, or nuke the whole grid for 60 years! That’s the economics of renewable storage V nuclear.
Point 2 below
http://thebreakthrough.org/index.php/issues/renewables/the-grid-will-not-be-disrupted

Third, in some places like Germany, Solar PV + STORAGE may not even be much of an energy source!
Nuclear, on the other hand, can have an ERoEI* of about 75 to 100 or more.
(* ERoEI = Energy Return on Energy Invested: or how much energy you actually get after all the energy to build it).
http://bravenewclimate.com/2014/08/22/catch-22-of-energy-storage/

This is why Dr James Hansen supports a waste-eating GenIV reactor called the Integral Fast Reactor.
http://www.thesciencecouncil.com/

Warmair: I have had a look at the figures for renewable energy generated in Europe and compared it with Australia.

So, what were the respective Europe and Australia GWh totals for energy generated from all sources combined?

Max
Fukushima Daiichi is as good as proof anyone could ask for that nuclear is a bad idea. First of all it cost billions to build and now it is going to cost anything up to $100 billion or more to clean up the mess. At this stage some $150 billion dollars has been or will be spent and the power station will never produce power again. An area of around the plant of some 20ks will remain unusable for 100 years or so, and the fishing grounds off the coast are now contaminated. The plant was notorious for fudging the maintenance work and should never have been built where it was. The result of the tsunamis was that all of the nuclear plants in the Japan were closed down and in it is only in recent times that some of the other nuclear plants have been allowed to restart. The result for the Japanese has been severe power shortages and rationing.

How people can promote nuclear and then claim wind and solar are no good because they are intermittent boggles the mind. I also like the way they fail to mention that hydro, tidal, biomass, wave power, and power storage, can make up for most the occasions when insufficient power is available from wind and solar.

Raycom
Total electrical power generated from all sources in 2013 was:-
Europe about 3.10 Million GWh
Australia about 213500 GWh

Of the European totals renewables contributed hydro (12.8 %), wind turbines (7.5 %) and solar power (2.7 %).

Non renewables
Nuclear power plants (26.8 %) and falling
Fossil fuels (49.8 %)

Based on information from here:-
http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/Electricity_production,_consumption_and_market_overview

So tired of the warmairs trying to put the absolute fear of Christ into anyone who mentions the upside of nuclear energy in the battle against AGW. Nuclear technology can never be seen to have evolved beyond Chernobyl while going into hyperbole over every advancements in renewables. Radiation can hurt you, but let's have some perspective.

On Fukushima,
http://www.radiationandreason.com/uploads//enc_ANStalkforWeb.pdf :

"So what were the consequences at Fukushima? The impact of the actual radiation and the released radioactivity for workers and public have been zero, as expected on the above criteria. In the next 50 years there is unlikely to be more than one single case of radiation-induced cancer, buried among all the other "natural" cases. There may have been superficial beta-burns, but no significant hospital cases"

To add, from http://www.radiationandreason.com/uploads//enc_NAIICcommentNEW.pdf (sorry that this also contains a several aspects of my previous citation)

"While other buildings and plant, such as a major oil refinery, were completely destroyed, seemingly without public comment, the nuclear reactors almost survived an assault far greater than that which they were designed to withstand."

Nobody thinks the reactors were brilliantly situated, but alternative energy installations don't miss out on the effects of immense catastrophes as tsunamis and typhoons. Well situated, well built nuclear installations will hold up way better over their 60-70 year lives than renewable installations, and their damage-exposure footprint is absolutely miniscule in comparison.

The world will not end with growth in nuclear energy, and renewables will not meet man's needs alone.

5 Findings about Fukushima from the environmentalists at *The Breakthrough Institute*:
1. Thyroid Cancer Rates Lower in Fukushima Children Than Other Regions
2. Fukushima Seafood Safe to Eat
3. Fukushima Evacuation Zone Is Mostly Habitable
4. Cancer Rates in USS Reagan Crewmembers Lower Than Control Group
5. Fukushima Death Toll Is Too Small to Measure
http://thebreakthrough.org/index.php/issues/nuclear/five-surprising-public-health-facts-about-fukushima

WHAT IS THE ACTUAL RISK TO PEOPLE AT FUKUSHIMA?
Authorities have found that the Soviet evacuation of the Chernobyl region caused depression and mental illness which has probably killed more people than Chernobyl’s radiation would have. Mark Lynas then goes on to say:

“So the scientific consensus currently is that the radioactivity released by the accident at Fukushima will very likely present a small additional lifetime risk of cancer for people whose homes are in the relatively high 10-100 mSv contamination range. Given that the contamination comes largely from caesium-137 (which has a half-life of about 30 years) this will persist for long enough to make permanent evacuation a worrying prospect. Think about it seriously: would you return to your home if doing so presented you with a one-in-a-thousand to one-in-a-hundred additional risk of cancer? This is the choice faced by the Japanese population and authorities.”
http://www.marklynas.org/2011/08/how-dangerous-is-the-fukushima-exclusion-zone/#sthash.dI0gnJQC.dpuf

Given that the choice between a certainty of far higher rates of suicide from evacuation OR the *possibility* of slightly higher rates of cancer, when modern medicine could have a *cure* for cancer in the next few decades, I would say go back and live in the Fukushima zone! By living there, and rebuilding and mowing and gardening, the radioactivity will gradually be dispersed and moved and possibly erode into waterways and the ocean where it will be much, much safer.

For those people who are touting nuclear power and claiming that there is no danger from Fukushima and Chernobyl I only have one thing to say.
I have this bridge in Sydney that looks a bit like a coat hanger.
I am willing to sell it to you for a price that you cannot refuse.
If you would just forward to me details and access codes for your bank accounts, then you can collect the bridge whenever you like.

No danger? Of course there is! But look at the death record rather than vivid imaginations. Also, look at advancements in nuclear technology rather than rooting it in the past. Radiation and reason.

Keep that bridge, you'll need it to cross into the imagined Nirvana of a world completely run by renewables.

Dreamer

Robert LePage (or is that Robert Strawman?)

You obviously don't read replies: so why should we bother answering your childish strawman attacks? Try reading this paragraph again as it evaluates the risk based on the best and *most* conservative radiation science available. (The theory that holds there is *no* safe level of radiation, the so called NLT model.)

“So the scientific consensus currently is that the radioactivity released by the accident at Fukushima will very likely present a small additional lifetime risk of cancer for people whose homes are in the relatively high 10-100 mSv contamination range. Given that the contamination comes largely from caesium-137 (which has a half-life of about 30 years) this will persist for long enough to make permanent evacuation a worrying prospect. Think about it seriously: would you return to your home if doing so presented you with a one-in-a-thousand to one-in-a-hundred additional risk of cancer? This is the choice faced by the Japanese population and authorities.”
http://www.marklynas.org/2011/08/how-dangerous-is-the-fukushima-exclusion-zone/#sthash.dI0gnJQC.dpuf

However, it may not even be *that* bad. The No-Linear-Threshold (no safe level) model is itself being debated by the scientific community. Sure, above a certain level, radiation is dangerous, and even more radiation, deadly! This is understood by modern science. But what about living in Kerala India, which is quite radioactive naturally? What about nations that are up on mountains or plateaus and get hit by more cosmic rays? Sadly, a major study into the actual medical effects of much lower thresholds of radiation was cancelled last year in America, probably by political lobbyists fearing the results. If NLT was abandoned, it would reduce fear of low levels or radiation. The Coal brothers, sorry, Koch brothers in the USA wouldn't want increased competition from nuclear, which France shows is the fastest way to shut down fossil fuel electricity.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linear_no-threshold_model

The main issue I have with nuclear is simple and that is it is too expensive.

First let me state I see no theoretical problem in dealing with the radiation and waste produced by nuclear power stations. Unfortunately this has not eventuated in practice.

The problems are:-
We have failed dismally to deal with the problem of high level waste from both a political and practical aspect.
No private company will insure a nuclear plant so governments are left to carry the can.
When they reach their use by date the cost of decommissioning them can be astronomical.
Commercial banks are generally unwilling to finance them so they are for the most part financed by governments.
Proliferation of nuclear weapons, If a nation can build a nuclear power station it is relatively easy to go the next step to build a nuclear bomb.

Some of the real costs of a nuclear power station are simply ignored and ultimately pushed on the the taxpayer.

Just as mater of interest of all the nuclear power stations ever started only half of them were actually completed, which should ring alarm bells to any rational person. The nuclear lobby continuously underestimate the real costs.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/nov/07/japanese-nuclear-power-plant-fukushima-restart

Quote
"All 48 workable reactors in Japan have been offline for safety checks or repairs since the 2011 disaster, except for two that have temporarily operated for about a year. Sendai would be the first to restart under safety rules imposed after the Fukushima crisis."

The bottom line is that nearly all of Japan's nuclear power stations have been offline four 4 years.
My estimate of the cost to the Japanese economy is conservatively 5% of 50 times 8 billion US dollars times 4 =$US80 billion.

Then we have another 29 billion US to pay for the imported fuel that they had to buy to make up for the short fall.

Then there there is the cost of the clean up I have no idea what that might finally add up to but 100 billion US does seem unreasonable.

Anyone for cheap nuclear power?

http://www.psr.org/environment-and-health/environmental-health-policy-institute/responses/costs-and-consequences-of-fukushima.htm

Oh dear the "ad hominem" attacks start as soon as someone disagrees with a pet theory.
For the record do NOT think that the answer is "renewables" to keep our lifestyle going in the manner that we think we deserve.
I DO think that we are not going to be able to continue with our present lifestyle.
The planet will not allow it.
So sorry to disagree with you again.
Instead of dreaming up a slew of ideas to provide power for the people, just think up a way to reduce the population slowly and without too much pain.

I really hear you on cost, and nuclear costs have been going up over the last few decades. There are many ways we can bring costs down, especially when we finally stop building a 1950's Light Water Reactor! Water really isn't the best coolant and massively complicates the reactor core, requiring an enormous single cast high pressure flange vessel. This will be solved with IFR's and LFTR's that don't use high-pressure vessels. They have other challenges, like managing sodium (explosive) or fluoride salts (corrosive), but both of these have unique solutions and allow the MASS PRODUCTION of nuclear reactors. Standardised. Factory line. Safe. Cheap!

But what really concerns me is that renewables can *look* cheap on a simple per-watt delivered to the grid basis, but try making them baseload!

"An analysis by the Breakthrough Institute finds that the entire German solar sector produces less than half the power that Fukushima Daiichi – a single nuclear complex – generated before it was hit by the tsunami. To build a Fukushima-sized solar industry in Germany would, it estimates, cost $155bn. To build a Fukushima-sized nuclear plant would cost $53.5bn. And the power would be there on winter evenings."
http://thebreakthrough.org/blog/2011/03/doing_the_math_comparing_germa.shtml

Proliferation? Banning nuclear power because of nuclear weapons is like locking the gate after the horse has bolted. The majority of CO2 emitting nations *already* have nuclear weapons. But here's what recent history tells us. The Russians found that old Soviet bombs were expensive to maintain, so they sold many to America for 20 years. America 'burner' reactors fissioned 16,000 bombs-worth of material and provided 10% of American electricity for 2 decades! That’s like running the whole of Australia for 20 years on old Soviet bombs! Safe, clean nuclear power provides a market for burning warheads.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megatons_to_Megawatts_Program

Hey Robert,
how about actually looking at humane ways to reduce human population growth, like providing everyone with everything they need to run a safe, dignified, modern lifestyle in a modern convenient eco-city, which could look quite different to today's energy inefficient suburbia. But once we give everyone modern health and education and especially empower women, population growth settles down and declines.

So rather than let things go "Mad Max", how about we ask some smart boffins how to provide all our energy needs, and come up with a vision of a more sustainable future where 10 billion people will not entirely use up this planet because we've tightened up the human industrial ecosystem to hardly impact on the natural ecosystem? That's where the Eco-Modernist Manifesto comes in!
http://www.ecomodernism.org/manifesto-english/

The EM is an inspiring read. Grab a drink and give it a go.

I'd hate to see you drop out of this conversation, because if I'm wrong, I want to know it. But please prove that I'm wrong with data and facts, don't just assume that I'm wrong and then basically run Ad Homs against me.

The last link above does not work for some odd reason but this should:-

http://www.google.com.au/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CB4QFjAAahUKEwipwqTW7InHAhXB3aYKHe15B-0&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.psr.org%2Fenvironment-and-health%2Fenvironmental-health-policy-institute%2Fresponses%2Fcosts-and-consequences-of-fukushima.html&ei=IsO9VampLsG7mwXt853oDg&usg=AFQjCNGHiRJSz02WIstPQySpiiattbjj5w&bvm=bv.99261572,d.dGY

The original proposition in the article was that supplying 50% of Australia's electrical power by renewables was not practical. This I argue is entirely possible and further we could if wanted too supply a 100% of Australia's current electrical supply with renewables. On the other hand to generate enough renewable electricity for all transport and industry needs is I suspect impractical at this stage.

Sorry Robert we can not fix the population problem before 2050 by which time the population will have reached 9 billion, only war or a massive epidemic can change this.

Dreeeaam, dream, dream, dream.
Good grief!

How badly polluted is Fukushima? Some spots might have 20 mSv / year
http://tinyurl.com/peuzkh5

But the Charles Sturt University Radiation Safety Committee says: "Dose rates greater than 50 mSv/yr arise from natural background levels in several parts of the world but do not cause any discernible harm to local populations."
http://www.csu.edu.au/acad_sec/committees/radiation/radiation_life/how_much_ionising_radiation.htm

Not only this, but the environmental group The Breakthrough Institute has the following conclusions about Fukushima.

1. Thyroid Cancer Rates Lower in Fukushima Children Than Other Regions
2. Fukushima Seafood Safe to Eat
3. Fukushima Evacuation Zone Is Mostly Habitable
4. Cancer Rates in USS Reagan Crewmembers Lower Than Control Group
5. Fukushima Death Toll Is Too Small to Measure
http://thebreakthrough.org/index.php/issues/nuclear/five-surprising-public-health-facts-about-fukushima

Fear of radiation comes from Dr Helen Caldicott who does not work from peer-reviewed sources.
http://www.monbiot.com/2011/04/04/interrogation-of-helen-caldicotts-responses/

But the most amazing statistics of all? Mark Lynas documents them for us. It may be that evacuating people from nuclear accidents is worse for them than letting people just stay there! First of all, there is the risk of evacuee related depression, basically becoming a refugee in their country. This can have health consequences, even suicide. Then there's the fact that nuclear power plants are often rural and the air is often far less polluted than a big city! Living in a polluted big city is probably more dangerous than living in either the Chernobyl or Fukushima evacuation zones!
http://www.marklynas.org/2011/08/how-dangerous-is-the-fukushima-exclusion-zone/#sthash.dI0gnJQC.dpuf

This is also confirmed by the fact that worldwide, coal and oil and gas kill far more people than increased cancer rates from nuclear disasters. Bottom line? Coal kills 3 million people a year, and so is about 2 Chernobyl's every day!
http://www.intellectualtakeout.org/library/chart-graph/deaths-terawatt-hour-energy

http://nextbigfuture.com/2011/03/deaths-per-twh-by-energy-source.html

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2012/06/10/energys-deathprint-a-price-always-paid/

Want to kill fewer people? Go nuclear!
http://www.theage.com.au/comment/want-to-kill-fewer-people-go-nuclear-20130710-2pqbq.html

Max the problem you have not addressed is the fact that Japan shut down all its nuclear power for 4 years thus losing 30% of its total power supply. Wind power might be out for a few days in the worst case scenario but we can both forecast when this is likely to happen and make up the short fall.

It seems to me that the most common argument against renewable is the intermittent supply problem. This problem is entirely solvable and the answer is energy storage not just electrical storage as most people seem to assume.

The methods of energy storage can simply divided into heat, mechanical and chemical

Some examples are:-
Heat can be stored by a number of methods such as in high temperature salts used in solar thermal power stations essentially making solar thermal practical for base load power.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gemasolar_Thermosolar_Plant
Heat can also be stored in liquids and solids for later retrieval.

Mechanical
Hydro power is stored energy but it can be further enhanced by using spare power from wind or solar when available to pump the water back up again.
Fly wheels are used in some small to mid size applications to store power as in King Island.
Compressed air
http://energystorage.org/compressed-air-energy-storage-caes

Liquid phase transition that is compress a gas to the point it becomes a liquid and then release the pressure later to power a turbine.
The heat pump uses mechanical energy to move heat to and from a reservoir thus permitting seasonal storage of heat and cooling as required.

Chemical
The rechargeable electric battery while very suitable for those living off grid, is only recently being rolled out on a large scale.
http://www.aesenergystorage.com/2014/11/05/aes-help-sce-meet-local-power-reliability-20-year-power-purchase-agreement-energy-storage-california-new-facility-will-provide-100-mw-interconnected-storage-equivalent-200-mw/

The use of solar energy to create liquid fuels for example splitting water into hydrogen and oxygen and possibly using atmospheric CO2 to make artificial hydrocarbons.
Bio-fuels E.G. growing wood as a fuel, as a case in point Australia burns huge areas of bush every year just to reduce the fire risk, why not harvest some of those areas for fuel to be used as further power backup.

Hi Warmair,
well I'm glad you've agreed that radiation isn't *that* big a deal! But James Hansen thinks storage for renewables is!

First, in Germany solar is 3 times more expensive than nuclear: and it doesn't run on a cold German winter night.
"An analysis by the Breakthrough Institute finds that the entire German solar sector produces less than half the power that Fukushima Daiichi – a single nuclear complex – generated before it was hit by the tsunami. To build a Fukushima-sized solar industry in Germany would, it estimates, cost $155bn. To build a Fukushima-sized nuclear plant would cost $53.5bn. And the power would be there on winter evenings."
http://thebreakthrough.org/blog/2011/03/doing_the_math_comparing_germa.shtml

Secondly, to back up renewables seasonal fluctuations in northern countries like Germany could bankrupt any nation that tried it. You can *either* buy Tesla Powerpack batteries to back up *one week* of winter in Germany (at a hypothetical 30% penetration of wind and solar, and these wind and solar farms must still be bought), OR you can just buy safe modern nuclear-waste eating nukes that will do the whole job for 60 years. Again, *backup* a third of a renewable grid for just one week, or nuke the whole grid for 60 years! That’s the economics of renewable storage V nuclear.
Point 2 below
http://thebreakthrough.org/index.php/issues/renewables/the-grid-will-not-be-disrupted

Third, in some places like Germany, Solar PV + STORAGE may not even be much of an energy source!
Nuclear, on the other hand, can have an ERoEI* of about 75 to 100 or more.
(* ERoEI = Energy Return on Energy Invested: or how much energy you actually get after all the energy to build it).
http://bravenewclimate.com/2014/08/22/catch-22-of-energy-storage/

Robert wrote, "For the record do NOT think that the answer is "renewables" to keep our lifestyle going in the manner that we think we deserve.
I DO think that we are not going to be able to continue with our present lifestyle.
The planet will not allow it."

Watching to Q&A, Neil deGrasse Tyson reminds us that one asteroid holds more minerals than have ever been mined on earth, means we will not be limited by Earth's resource offering.

Cheap energy will allow us to repair damage do Earth. Why shouldn't growth continue? Civilization can only be improved by the availability of cheap energy. EROEI is critical, as well as a more reasonable approach to radiation. Renewables will have their place but cheap base-load is central to affordable sustainability. Nuclear is the only way forward. We can drive the entire global industrial/transport complex with nuclear delivering day and night to avoid CAGW and dislocation.

OK,you might say, I'm the dreamer now.

For those who still believe that Fukushima was “harmless” it might pay to take your head out of the sand and look about you.
Denial can cause blindness.

http://enenews.com/tv-believe-happened-again-san-francisco-coast-scientists-baffled-mysterious-whale-deaths-continue-officials-inexplicable-summer-trend-dolphins-wash-dead-beach-nearby-heartbreaking-hear-dying

Robert Le Page has proved to be quite anti-science. What peer-reviewed articles have shown those whale deaths were a result of Fukushima? Where were the whales, and how radioactive where they? How were they contaminated?

Once again, the radioactive material is dispersing and going to the bottom of the ocean, where the 7cm rule applies.

Do you know that water stops radiation? Every 7 cm's of water stops about half the radiation getting through. Again, if the stuff has washed down to the bottom of the oceans, halve the radiation for every 7 cm. Soon none gets through, even for some of the most deadly stuff. In fact, water is so good at stopping radiation you would swim through a reactor pond! As long as you stayed away from the *deadly* nuclear waste at the bottom of a storage pond, and swam through the middle, you would experience *less* radioactivity than here on the radioactive surface of the earth because in the reactor pool the water *above* you would shield you from cosmic rays and this radioactive old planet we live on!
https://what-if.xkcd.com/29/

Max
We are not limited to any single source of renewable power we have as primary methods hydro, wind, solar and biomass but there are numerous others not least of which is simply using more efficient equipment. It is quite practical to keep a house warm in a European winter using very minimum amounts of power.

http://www.treehugger.com/environmental-policy/town-goes-grid-achieves-energy-independence.html

It is worth emphasizing that the idea of battery backup for energy is only one of many ways that energy is and can be backed up, but it is not at this stage very practical for large power stations. The Spanish store enough heat in some of their solar thermal stations to run them over night. Also it is interesting to note that Spain actually uses slightly more electrical power than Australia but in 2013 sourced 42.8% power from renewables, it should be obvious that if they can do it in Spain, it should be even easier for us to do.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_in_Spain

Quote

"Nuclear as a whole provided 23.8 percent of the country’s electricity in March, while 47 percent came solely from renewable sources"

Luciferase
If a lot more people spent time dreaming of better world, it would pay big dividends.

Thats all folks from me on this thread.

I really don't know what references to growing renewable energy penetration demonstrates. What, that it's heading for 100%? Really?

It's not ever going anywhere near 100% so why not focus on what underpins its existence at all, base-load power. Renewables could then retreat to where they are truly necessary, rather than a ridiculously expensive tilt at base-load bound for failure. The money should be spent on what will really hit AGW, not a chimera.

Furthermore, what of the cost of raising that percentage so expensively when other of other societal needs are so great?

I just shake my head. How we will rue time and resources wasted seeking the end of this rainbow.

March is what, Spring in Spain? Hmmm, interesting time to try and get a picture of RE performance in Spain. Why not winter? Why not just 'average' it out over the year, as the Spanish electricity wiki does? It just says Spain has about 25.9% renewable electricity.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_sector_in_Spain

Wow, a quarter of all electricity from RE? Wow! Except, what does it do in WINTER? What is done with surplus electricity? Is it spilled, or sold to neighbouring countries? On a quiet, cold, winter evening when there's no wind or sun, where does the power come from? France? French nukes? Naaaah, couldn't be!

Except France exports more electricity than any other country in the world. "The country is also among the world's biggest net exporters of electricity."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_sector_in_France
I wonder why? Naaah, wouldn't be anything to do with the rest of Europe being pro-renewable ideologues, and needing bailing out by reliable baseload power now and then?

Oh, and try and make Andasol 1, their 'solar thermal' tower that can apparently run some way into the evening, into baseload power? You'll end up paying *$25 billion* for a GW plant. That's over 10 times the price of coal. Not only that, but it would take 15 times as much concrete and 75 times as much steel and 2,530 times as much land to make that gigawatt, so there are serious CO2 emissions making all that as well.
http://bravenewclimate.com/2009/12/06/tcase7/

In "Wind farms use fossil fuels for construction and operation" Adjunct Professor Gary Johns writes (29 July 2015) that that an area the size of Italy would need to be set aside to replace the USA's coal-fired power. Italy is only about 3% the area of the USA, so that would not appear too much land to use. Also wind farms do not prevent other productive uses for land, such as farming and can be placed in shallow water.

Professor Johns writes that renewable sources cannot produce the heat needed to make wind turbines, or "just about anything else that makes the modern world modern". However, wind turbines, and most forms of renewable energy, produce electricity and electricity can be used to produce intense heat. Electric arc furnaces are used to make steel from scrap metal. These furnaces use less energy and produce less pollution than making steel from ore using coal. More than half of the steel produced in the USA today is from electric arc furnaces.

Wind turbines need electricity to operate, but this is a tiny fraction of the energy they produce, not the "large amount of energy" Professor Johns suggests. This energy can come from other renewable sources or from stored wind generated energy: it need not come from fossil fuel power. Wind turbines can be built and operate without fossil fuels.

Wind turbines alone are not a solution to global warming and we will need fossil fuels for decades to come. However, wind turbines are a useful source of renewable energy and the sooner we start action to stop global warming, the sooner we will have a solution.

Max
Actually I was not planning to comment further on this thread because it is clear we both hold entrenched positions, but I will make an exception here to clarify a few facts. The web site you linked to is out of date as the it refers to the year 2009 since then the share of renewable energy has substantial increased the last year I can find data for is 2013.

Source_ TWh_____per%_____renewables
gas_____57.1____21.05
Nuclear__56.7____20.90
wind____55.8____20.57____55.8
coal_____41.6____15.33
hydro____41.1____15.15____41.1
solar_____13.1____4.83_____13.1
Biofuel____5.9____2.17______5.9

All_______271.3___100_____115.9

Renewables accounted for 42.8% of all electrical power in Spain for 2013.
Nuclear accounted for 20.9% and falling.

Data from a pro nuclear site
http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/Country-Profiles/Countries-O-S/Spain/

I don't understand? I'm happy that RE increased! I support maybe 40 to 50% penetration of RE.

I've been saying "grids will be be half black and half white". Your argument seems to be "But look at Spain! It's half black!"

When you can find a grid that is 100% renewables**, get back to me.
(**Without it being an atypical large hydro nation, which even Dr James Hansen admits can do 100% renewables).

In the meantime, that was a *very* interesting link!

"The 2012 reforms had started to address this deficit, then in July the Ministry of Industry, Energy and Tourism introduced further ‘definitive reforms’ to reduce the deficit by €4.5 billion per year. These measures will cost utilities €2.7 billion per year and consumers €400 million in 2013 and €900 million per year thereafter, while the government will cover a further €2 billion in 2013 and €900 million per year thereafter of costs. Solar companies are expected to be worst affected, due to debt load estimated at €30 billion, and widespread financial distress was predicted by solar and wind industry groups. In 2000, the government had promised more than 20 years of large subsidies, and investment proceeded on this basis. In May 2013 renewables received an average subsidy of €100/MWh. The reforms remove the feed in tariffs system and substitute a new Regulated Asset Value-based system (or "reasonable profitability" system).

At the start of 2014 the impact of the switch to capacity-based incentives was unclear. Enel Green Power said it expected to lose FiTs for one-third of its capacity installed before 2005, mostly for wind. All renewable sources now have to take the pool price and there follows some uncertain assessment regarding “reasonable profitability”. In April 2014 CNMC said that proposed reductions in subsidies for renewables would cost producers some €1.7 billion in 2014 (wind €400 million, others €150-250 million each). The FiT modifications would determine the rate of return for existing renewable energy companies at 7.4% and for future ones at 7.5%, compared with more than 10% in the past. Iberdrola and Acciona were reviewing their business plans."

"Italy is only about 3% the area of the USA"

Good grief! That's about 300,000 square kilometres of build and maintenance, about 550 by 550 km. And what efficiency rating is being applied to the calculation, 100% all gleaming and orientated perfectly, or something real?

By the time we realize we have hit the wall renewable limitations we will have lost our shirts and spent our pants yet still need to produce a massive amount of non-emitting baseload. Given that this baseload can provides 24/7 energy much, much more cheaply than renewables, if we'd only find reason and release its shackles, why on earth are we persisting with this massive spend on expensive renewables?

Luciferase, the estimate of the USA needing an area the size of Italy for find farms is from Professor Johns. If you want to know how this was calculated you will need to ask him.

An area of 300,000 square kilometres does sound like a lot. But open cut coal mining, dedicated rail corridors, roads, coal stockpiles and power stations also take considerable areas of land. As I pointed out the area under the wind turbines can still be used for some types of farming and turbines can also be positioned in shallow water (not using any land at all).

Open cut coal mining has much more effect on the land than wind turbines, as an example in the US Appalachians a technique is used called "mountaintop removal mining". While wind turbines on a mountain might not be aesthetically pleasing, at least you still have the mountain. ;-)

Renewable energy is generally more expensive than fossil fuel at present, but the consequences of continuing to burn coal are unacceptable. This is not the first time the world has had to make a difficult decision to stop using a material because of its adverse effects. Asbestos is a very cheap and effective material, but has been all but phased out because its health effects are unacceptable. Chlorofluorocarbons were banned by international treaty as they were destroying the ozone layer. Similarly, we must reduct carbon dioxide emissions and that will require most of the available coal to be left in the ground.

Hi TomW,
Which model do you follow?

GRID SIZE?
1. We're all going off grid, and magical storage devices are going to back up wind and solar on our own houses or industrial estates or offices in town. Indeed, the grid has a 'death spiral' it will never recover from.
http://paulgilding.com/2014/03/19/carbon-crash-solar-dawn/

2. We're all going ONTO a continent-wide super-grid, and it's going to cost $10 billion in its own right to build and is an important backbone of the grid as we get wind and solar from Perth when there's a drop in wind and sunshine in Sydney or Cairns or whatever. This is the backbone of nearly every big renewables think tank! (Also note the sheer money wasted on building a super-sized, super-smart, super-grid AND look for 'efficiency gains' which assume we'll *halve* our electricity!)

REPLACING OIL WITH ELECTRIC CARS
1. We're going to charge about half our electric cars at night on excess nightime baseload power supply when business closes down for the day!
(Page 10 of the NREL study below).
http://energyenvironment.pnnl.gov/ei/pdf/PHEV_Feasibility_Analysis_Part1.pdf

2. We're NOT going to really do anything at night because... who needs power at night? Amory Lovins says the requirement for baseload electric power is a myth, and there's no real need for power at night. Except for running fridges and hospitals and night transport and some industries and replacing *half* our family car oil on the *existing* grid with night time electricity! Note: if the *huge* spare night-time capacity of a baseload grid can not quite charge *half* the fleet, then no baseload at night means we must charge the *whole* fleet during the day. Just how many times over are we going to build out the grid again? How are we going to charge all those EV's? Are we going to double the grid? Triple it? Quadruple it? No. Watch Amory's 'efficiency gains'. We're going to *halve* our electricity supply according to Amory. While replacing oil. Pull the other one!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MsgrahFln0s

Max Green, if you look at the reasons for the predictions, you'll see the apparent contradictions start to dissolve.

GRID SIZE
Renewables strengthen the case for a bigger grid. But the inefficient way the grid is funded means that some consumers will be financially better off getting lots of battery storage and disconnecting from the grid. And the more who do so, the more the remaining consumers will be charged, which will encourage more of them to go off grid. That's the "death spiral".

Many people (and not just environmentalists) are quite enthusiastic about going off grid because they're under the illusion that the grid is very inefficient, with over half the power being consumed by transmission and distribution. But in reality the losses are an order of magnitude less, and the grid's technically very efficient.

In reality the death spiral won't destroy the grid. If the regulators did their job properly they'd be willing to block price rises even when the grid operators are making a loss. Those parasitic companies have had it their own way far too long. We should make it clear that regulation is the price of being allowed to run a monopoly, and does not guarantee profits to badly run companies!

Electric cars are likely to greatly increase the demand for electricity, which would end the death spiral if it persists. But meanwhile there are other changes that could make the grid far more practical to consumers. Chief among them is allowing anyone who wants to to trade electricity on the wholesale market instead of being on a contract with a power company. That would make staying connected to the grid much more attractive to those with solar panels and battery storage.

(TBC)

(Continued)

REPLACING OIL WITH ELECTRIC CARS
Many of us will charge electric cars when the electricity is cheap. Where we get most of our power from solar PV, this will be during the daytime. For those who get a substantial proportion of their power from nuclear, it will be at night.

I think you're making up the claim that Amory Lovins says there's no real need for power at night. Is your comprehension so poor that you think that's what "there's no real need for baseload" means?

I think Keith Lovegrove put it best:
"People made plants that weren't very good at ramping up and down, looked for things to do with them and called them baseload".

///I think you're making up the claim that Amory Lovins says there's no real need for power at night. Is your comprehension so poor that you think that's what "there's no real need for baseload" means?

I think Keith Lovegrove put it best:
"People made plants that weren't very good at ramping up and down, looked for things to do with them and called them baseload".///
Nukes can be made to ramp up and down, nukes can also provide baseload that plugs into all today's night-time energy markets like off-peak (yes, created for plants that didn't ramp very well) and of course charging electric cars.

Lovegrove's quote typifies many who want to call RELIABLE electricity at night superfluous. Tell that to your German solar power owner when the nation's RE drops to 5% of capacity for weeks at a time!

Max, the 'many who want to call RELIABLE electricity at night superfluous" don't actually exist!

But there is no need for electricity to continue to be (or in some cases, resume being) cheaper at night than during the day.

BTW Lovegrove's area of expertise is solar thermal. Providing reliable electricity at night is his objective.

See my post below for details of Europe and world wide renewable electrical power generation.

http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=6942&page=7

Max, I favor the approach of more efficient energy use and more renewable sources to reduce carbon emissions, not attempt to replace them completely in the foreseeable future. Fossil fuels should be reserved for those applications where they are difficult to replace, such as for transport. The most polluting fossil fuels should be reduced where it is easiest to do so, such as eliminating the use of brown coal for electricity generation.

Renewable energy sources, such as wind farms, can be used to replace some electricity supply and as storage options become available, they can be used for more of the base load. It would be preferable if this was done through a market mechanism, such as price on CO2 emissions.

Off grid is not currently an option as storage is too expensive. A continent-wide super-grid would not be worth the investment, as it will likely to obsolete before it can be built. Instead renewable energy can be used to supplement fossil fuels.

Electric cars are not worth the investment. Promoting public transport would a cost effective way to reduce carbon emissions from transport, even with conventional fossil fuel buses. One simple option is to paint bus-lanes on existing roads to make public transport more efficient and displace some cars. The autonomous technology now being incorporated into cars will also allow us to within ten years have a driver-less uber-like mini-bus service using the same bus-lanes.

ps: I teach how to reduce energy use using computers: http://www.tomw.net.au/ict_sustainability/introduction.shtml

///The autonomous technology now being incorporated into cars will also allow us to within ten years have a driver-less uber-like mini-bus service using the same bus-lanes.///
I love this, especially the idea of driver-less and *much* cheaper taxis as the 'security blanket' for those nervous to go without a car at the moment. Investments in public transport should be massively improved, not just from a climate perspective but from the perspective of designing a more energy and traffic efficient city! If we all had cars and we all had charge, how are we going to get anywhere as Sydney hits 6 or 7 or 8 million people? (Not that I want it to get that big, but it seems inevitable with current government policy).

Transport as a service, rather than an individually owned vehicle. That's the meme to get out there! Car brands didn't make the top 20 coolest brands list with young people in Europe. Why drive when you could be in the back of a bus catching up on facebook?
http://www.theguardian.com/cities/2015/apr/30/have-we-really-reached-peak-car

But energy efficiency? It's always over-rated in these studies. Always. Don't forget Jevon's Paradox, which even the UN admitted means energy efficiency programs are limited by human behaviour which makes more use of *cheaper* energy to have an even better lifestyle, and even though that energy is now stretched further and doing more, we respond to the cheaper price signal and use more. It reduces the final energy saved.

Basically, we can supply all that, quickly, through clean SAFE nuclear energy! (Which is *thousands* of times safer than coal: so safe I don't know why people are not screaming *for* nuclear energy and against coal!)

Max, I am not sure we will be able to convince many Australians to do without a car, nor do we need to: we just have to stop them driving their cars as much. This is where public transport can help. You may have a car, but if you know you will be driving on a congested road (or a toll road), while the buses whiz past in their own lanes and you will not be able to find anywhere to park (or have to pay a lot), then perhaps you will leave the car at home.

I have just come back from a trip to Guangzhou, HK and London, so have seen how Sydney can have transport when it has a larger population. These cities have extensive underground metros and toll roads, which are expensive and controversial to build. But they also have buses, mini-buses and maxi-taxis, which are not. Cambridge even has a guided bus-way: http://blog.tomw.net.au/2015/07/longest-guided-busway.html

In teaching about energy efficiency, I remind students about the importance of considering human behavior. In green IT we have what I call the "beer fridge effect". This is where you buy a new fridge because it is efficient, but then keep the old one in the pool room for the beer. The result is you use more energy. The IT version is that you replace your old computers with more efficient ones, but then pass the old ones on to someone else who uses them: http://www.tomw.net.au/ict_sustainability/materials.shtml

I am not a big fan of nuclear energy, partly because of the safety issues and the capital costs, but also because it provides a false hope of cheap energy. What we need to do is accept energy will cost money and so use it sparingly.

"I am not a big fan of nuclear energy.....because it provides a false hope of cheap energy."

Do you mean as opposed to unknobbled, ridiculously subsidized renewables?

If unreasonable shackles were removed from nuclear energy the process of affordably saving the planet could begin. Instead we place hope in the impossible dream that one day, soon enough to make a difference to AGW, 100% of all energy consumption will be from renewables.

///I am not a big fan of nuclear energy, partly because of the safety issues and the capital costs, but also because it provides a false hope of cheap energy. What we need to do is accept energy will cost money and so use it sparingly.///

What you need to do is accept that any modern economy that tried to go 100% renewable in a low-hydro state would go bankrupt. What we NEED to do is educate smart people to stop saying dumb things like "safety issues" and understand that NUCLEAR POWER HAS SAVED JUST UNDER 2 MILLION LIVES ACROSS AMERICA!

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/the-curious-wavefunction/nuclear-power-may-have-saved-1-8-million-lives-otherwise-lost-to-fossil-fuels-may-save-up-to-7-million-more/

Do you get this? Do you understand why it has saved so many lives? How can something that SAVES 1.8 million lives be overlooked because of "SAFETY ISSUES!"

Also, when we can mass produce GenIV reactors on a production line (because they *mostly* avoid using overpressure water systems), then I've seen estimates that clean baseload reliable nuclear power will come down to about coal. Maybe even cheaper, if one considers coal's deadly and dangerous legacy!

Luciferase, I had in mind renewable technologies such as silicon solar cells, which are now down to about 40 cents per Watt (about 4 cents per KWH), without a subsidy.

It is not feasible to replace all fossil fuel with 100% renewable energy in the foreseeable future, but we can replace some fuel use.

Also we can also reduce CO2 emissions by efficiency measures. As a example, I bought a replacement power supply from my laptop which has a power saving feature. When the laptop is fully charged, the power supply shuts down. The old power supply used several Watts when the laptop was fully charged and turned off.

A simple change would be to encourage households to buy smaller fridges. Modern kitchens are designed with a space for a large family fridge, even though the average home has only 2.6 people. Halving the fridge size (from 520l to 280l) would save 30% of the energy used.

With some renewable energy and savings measures it should be possible for Australia to halve its greenhouse gas emissions at minimal cost and with few lifestyle changes.

(sighs) Once more unto the breach...

First, in Germany solar is 3 times more expensive than nuclear: and it doesn't run on a cold German winter night.
"An analysis by the Breakthrough Institute finds that the entire German solar sector produces less than half the power that Fukushima Daiichi – a single nuclear complex – generated before it was hit by the tsunami. To build a Fukushima-sized solar industry in Germany would, it estimates, cost $155bn. To build a Fukushima-sized nuclear plant would cost $53.5bn. And the power would be there on winter evenings."
http://thebreakthrough.org/blog/2011/03/doing_the_math_comparing_germa.shtml

Secondly, to back up renewables seasonal fluctuations in northern countries like Germany could bankrupt any nation that tried it. You can *either* buy Tesla Powerpack batteries to back up *one week* of winter in Germany (at a hypothetical 30% penetration of wind and solar, and these wind and solar farms must still be bought), OR you can just buy safe modern nuclear-waste eating nukes that will do the whole job for 60 years. Again, *backup* a third of a renewable grid for just one week, or nuke the whole grid for 60 years! That’s the economics of renewable storage V nuclear.
Point 2 below
http://thebreakthrough.org/index.php/issues/renewables/the-grid-will-not-be-disrupted

Third, in some places like Germany, Solar PV + STORAGE may not even be much of an energy source!
Nuclear, on the other hand, can have an ERoEI* of about 75 to 100 or more.
(* ERoEI = Energy Return on Energy Invested: or how much energy you actually get after all the energy to build it).
http://bravenewclimate.com/2014/08/22/catch-22-of-energy-storage/

Max, does you costing of a Fukushima-sized nuclear plant include the cost of insuring against a Fukushima style accident? The last estimate I saw for the cost of the cleanup was $105B.

The cost of PV has halved since the 2011 figures you cite and the rate of cost reduction has been accelerating. It takes at about five years to build a nuclear plant and by then PV will be down to 2 cents per kWH. If integrated into the roof, wall cladding and windows for new buildings the cost will halve again (half the cost of PV is the installation). In sunny climates, such as Australia, it will then be cost effective to install PV just to run a building during daylight hours on sunny days. If included in all new Australian buildings, this would add about half a Fukushima size plant of generating capacity (2,200 MW) per year.

///Fukushima style accident///
Please explain how we are *ever* going to have one of these if the world fast tracks GenIV reactors, especially LFTR's? They *cannot* melt down: they are *already* a liquid that hardens at 450 degrees centigrade outside the reactor vessel, and would harden, trapping most of the radiation on site, even if the reactor were blown up by terrorists!

Also, please explain why the Japanese government evacuated 20k around the Fukushima plant when a few blocks back would have been enough, and explain how many people died as a result of the Fukushima plant, and how many people would die if they all moved back again?

1. Thyroid Cancer Rates Lower in Fukushima Children Than Other Regions
2. Fukushima Seafood Safe to Eat
3. Fukushima Evacuation Zone Is Mostly Habitable
4. Cancer Rates in USS Reagan Crewmembers Lower Than Control Group
5. Fukushima Death Toll Is Too Small to Measure
http://thebreakthrough.org/index.php/issues/nuclear/five-surprising-public-health-facts-about-fukushima

But go ahead and attack nuclear using words like 'Chernobyl' and 'Fukushima'. It's about as sensible as attacking modern aviation using words like 'Hindenberg' and modern shipping with 'Titanic'.

///half the cost of PV is the installation///
False. Buying PV is about 10% of the actual cost. The really expensive part is trying to change EVERYTHING WE DO to dance around PV's "moods". Whereas coal (public enemy number one!) was reliable, PV has cloudy weeks where it just doesn't want to work as hard so only provides 50% power. It has night time where it also doesn't want to work. It's moody. Coal could be relied upon. Nuclear *can* be relied upon

Max, you introduced the word "Fukushima" into the discussion. Unlike the technology of the 'Hindenberg' and 'Titanic', water reactors like Fukushima are still in operation and being built. There are much safer reactor designs which do not use water, but as far as I know these are not out of the pilot stage.

As you say PV does have "moods", in that it does not work as well on cloudy days, or at all at night. However, this suits some applications, such as air conditioning, which is needed most when PV works best: on sunny days. Coal fired power stations also have characteristics which make them less than perfect, in particular they can't be quickly turned on or off. Also you can't build a small efficient coal plant, nor it it likely to be near where the customer is. We need to combine the strengths of different technologies. I expect that coal will remain for the foreseeable future for base load, with gas turbines for peak loads, along with solar and wind power.

In addition, I expect we will see increased use of demand management. The power generating system and the grid has to be sized to cope with a brief peak load. We have made the mistake of trying to hide this fact from the consumer and given them the illusion they can have as much power as they want, whenever they want it. The result is a much more expensive system.

If the peak can be reduced, the system can be smaller and cheaper. Household appliances such as air conditioners, refrigerators and air conditioners can be switched and and off remotely as required, with minimal inconvenience to the consumer. One example is "PeakSmart" air-conditioning: https://www.energex.com.au/residential-and-business/positive-payback/positive-payback-for-households/households

///However, this suits some applications, such as air conditioning, which is needed most when PV works best: on sunny days.///
Unless of course those PV cells are relied upon when people use reverse-cycle airconditioning for heating on a cold, dark winter's night. PV just doesn't do winter.

There are nukes that are despatchable.

///demand management///
Is just code for "make the problem with intermittent, unreliable renewables someone else's problem". No thanks. The climate is changing while we debate this, and the only nation in the world (with relatively modest levels of hydro, just like the rest of us) that has a clean grid is France.

Why are you anti-nuclear? Why? Seriously? It's *thousands* of times safer than coal.

///The power generating system and the grid has to be sized to cope with a brief peak load. We have made the mistake of trying to hide this fact from the consumer and given them the illusion they can have as much power as they want, whenever they want it. The result is a much more expensive system.///
Typical! Just typical! This is exactly the sort of customer-spanking that Tony Abbott and his ilk play up to. We can avoid this if we just go nuclear.

///If the peak can be reduced, the system can be smaller and cheaper.//
Yes, but how much? No wonder every renewable report I read says ridiculous things like we'll cut our energy use in half! It's romantic nonsense! We've got 200 years of energy efficiency improvements since the Industrial Revolution, and less energy is doing far more per unit of GDP than ever before. Yet we STILL find more and more uses for electricity. It's useful stuff! I say clean it up without spanking people for wanting to use it, and you might find a more willing electorate.

The economics behind the high renewables contribution in Europe do not stack up.

Based on the 2013 European power generation GWh total figures kindly provided by Warmair:
Total renewables 0.7933 million
Total all sources 3.1 million
This means renewables contributed 25.6%.

One certain consequence of this large contribution from renewables is that electricity prices have been pushed up substantially in Europe. So much so, that Germany et al are discouraged from further investment in, or rather subsidisation of, renewables.

The key outcome that gets ignored is that, despite the billions and billions of euros that have been invested in installing those renewables, there is no measurable impact on global warming. This is capital misallocation at its worst.