Peter, there is no point in casting pearls before swine.
David

Might be worth mentioning in the article that there are 98 nuclear reactors generating power in the USA. Seems a lot for a country where nuclear is a "hard sell".

There is a factor that no one considers.
From my reading it appears that to get a national electricity system
running on wind, solar and Hydro and batteries you need a country about
as large as Australia. Well that is the first problem overcome.
You need to spread the windfarms around the country to take advantage
of the wind blowing in several other places when not blowing in others.
The bigger the spread the better change of generating supply.
Solar farms can be spread across the country at the best latitude to
get advantage of time difference.

Then you have to build a high capacity grid to link all the farms
together and arrange for any part of the generation to supply any
other part of the load.

Frankly this resolves into thousands of wind & solar farms.
I seriously doubt we can afford such a system.

In ancient times when we started farming and village building we had
slaves to provide the extra energy needed. Time moved on and Rome
was built by slaves.
The coal fired steam engine was cheaper than slaves.
Get the message ?

IT IS EITHER NUCLEAR OR SLAVERY !

Bazz, correct on all points.

Here is an estimate I did a decade ago of the cost of an Australia wide transmission system to supply Australia with solar power from high insolation areas
"Solar power realities and transmission costs -- Addendum'
https://bravenewclimate.com/2009/09/10/solar-realities-and-transmission-costs-addendum/

For other readers, regarding nuclear power plant accidents see Shellenberger's new post on Forbes:
'It sounds crazy, but Fukushima, Chernobyl, and Three Mile Island show why nuclear power is inherently safe.'
https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2019/03/11/it-sounds-crazy-but-fukushima-chernobyl-and-three-mile-island-show-why-nuclear-is-inherently-safe/

Peter, there was an article I read by a US engineering group that
worked out what the US would need, 15,000 wind and solar farms spread
out over the US. As Australia is about the same size we would need
something similar based on their calculations. Ours would not need as
many turbines on each farm as the US's but the grid would be similar.
One point they made was maintenance, based on mtbf they would need to
replace 100,000 solar panels every day !
I can no longer find the article.
I personally think all this is so far beyond the average politician and
the man in the street that it is no wonder they do not understand the problem.

My suggestion is for csiro to set up a virtual computer model using
real input data from a network of wx stations around Australia on
likely windfarm sites, real data on electricity demand, real data
from existing wind farms and solar farms, have a virtual grid linking
everything and increase/decrease turbines/solar panels until it works
then get quotes to build the thing.
I suspect everyone would be staggered.

BAZZ,

You didn't say if you had read the links I posted. Do you have an authoritative estimate for the grid and storage costs for 100% renewables?

CSIRO does not have the necessary expertise. They are scientists, not the highly experienced, competent engineers that are required for such work. Furthermore, their culture is bogged down because of its believe in CAGW and that renewables are the solution.