OK, Cody. Sorry about the delay - I've been having a few wifi problems lately.

For a start, the direct cost of the politicians, by Vic's own figures, come to less than half a billion, so there's no justification for the comment "a billion here, plus a billion there..."

And more generally, complaining about the size of the government misses the point. Government should be effective and efficient. Those who advocate small government tend to assume that limiting its budget will force it to spend only on what gives it the best bang for the buck, increasing efficiency. But what actually happens is false economies are made; efficiency declines, competence is lost and the government becomes less effective but no less wasteful.

The reference to "chasing impossible green dreams" shows a severe lack of engineering knowledge on Viv's part. Though the task is big, it's far from impossible. Meanwhile it's the fossil fuel lobby (and their lackeys like Viv) who dream of climate lockdowns; they fail to notice that green technology is capable of doing the job.

Nuclear power's a costly option. Banning it was a bad move but that's irrelevant now; it's totally uneconomic in Australia as renewables can do the job far more cheaply. Coal fired power stations are proving very unreliable, but Viv refers to them as "reliables" because that fits his narrative far better than the truth.

(tbc)

Getting to 100% renewables poses some technical problems, but the solutions are now apparent, Not much can be sensibly said against them, so Viv resorts to belittling them with cartoons! Also he claims that the grid is "struggling to meet current demands" but in my state at least, it struggled far more before it had any solar or wind power in it - and the more solar and wind power are added, the less it will struggle. The challenge is timeshifting the power from when it's most abundant to when demand is highest. Pumped hydro (pushing water uphill) is an old solution but a reliable one, in use around the world for over a century and in Australia more than half that time. More recently, giant batteries have proven reliable and are always ready when we need them. And once EVs are in widespread use, there'll be plenty of distributed spare battery capacity that the owners can use to make a bit of money timeshiftimg electricity. The fact that EVs are currently subsidised to encourage their uptake is of little relevance: it's a short term measure; in the long term they'll be taxed not subsidised.

But hydrogen production promises to be the most significant solution, as hydrogen is very useful stuff! It can be used to make sponge iron, slashing the amount of coal required for steelmaking. It can be used to make ammonia more efficiently than natural gas can. It can substitute for natural gas in many other industrial processes. And there's plenty of export demand. It means there can always be demand for more electricity, which makes more generation infrastructure economically viable. And there's always the option of reversing the process to produce more electricity when it's needed. Sure, there's a net loss of energy (just like every other process on this planet) but there's a gain of value.

The cartoon likening the simple electrochemistry of hydrogen production to witchcraft reminds me of this corollary to Clarke's third law: http://freefall.purrsia.com/ff300/fv00255.htm

(tbc)

Early experimental US wind turbines could accurately be described as "bird slicers" but modern wind turbines are designed to avoid bird strike. Wind turbines and solar panels don't take up much space and tend to be compatible with other land use. But his point isn't totally without merit, as there are some exceptions, and Queensland in particular has inadequate environmental restrictions on what's built.

Viv then rails against green strawmen, then apparently changes the focus of his attack to the National Cabinet (a sensible attempt to harmonise state laws and responses to events when a Federal takeover is not considered warranted) and the veto he assumes the Voice will have (despite neither those proposing it nor the politicians wanting it to have any veto powers at all). It's as wide of the mark as his subsequent attempt to blame "green dreamers" for the problems caused by European reliance on Russian fossil fuels. It all just goes to show how ridiculously out of touch he is.

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Bazz,
When measurements of incoming solar radiation don't show an increase,
BLAMING THE SUN IS STUPID!

Not a sound answer Aidan,
Shows you do not understand what is going on.
It is quite likely the sun is at peak.

It is possible to get an idea of how many more wind and solar systems
are needed by dividing the demand by the wind and solar.
At this moment solar is zero and wind is 8%. 100% load / 8% supply.
So 12.5 times the current number of wind turbines is needed to keep
the lights on.
Of course they all have to be in just right place.
The cost of batteries would be enormous to make up that sort of
difference.

Bazz,
>Not a sound answer Aidan,
Far sounder than anything you've written!

>Shows you do not understand what is going on.
You say that, but fail to point out anything actually wrong with what I said... which indicates it's far likelier you don't understand what's going on.
Do you even understand how CO2 absorbs and reemits infrared?
If so, what makes you think the 50% increase in CO2 concentration in the atmosphere isn't to blame for the rise in temperature?

>It is quite likely the sun is at peak.
Maybe, but if the sun's at it's peak, why isn't the warming slowing markedly?

>It is possible to get an idea of how many more wind and solar systems
>are needed by dividing the demand by the wind and solar.
Unless you subtract hydro capacity first, it will be a pretty poor idea.

>At this moment solar is zero and wind is 8%. 100% load / 8% supply.
What exactly is it you're claiming the load is 100% of?

>So 12.5 times the current number of wind turbines is needed to keep
>the lights on.
A reasonable starting point which engineers should be able to improve on.

>Of course they all have to be in just right place.
Like all infrastructure, putting it somewhere other than where it'a meant to be will adversely affect its effectiveness!

>The cost of batteries would be enormous to make up that sort of difference.
Firstly, exactly what sort of difference are you referring to?
Secondly, fossil fuel costs are enormous. So are nuclear costs. So don't dismiss batteries just because they have the kind of costs that are par for the course!

Hello Aidan

Thank you very much for the explanation; I appreciate your time spent writing it.

Regards

Cody