Actually wind power is much cheaper than Conventional Coal power.

Lets take a look at Victorian Brown Coal power plant vs wind power.

Assumption - Coal Plant lasts 30 years - Wind Power Turbines last 30 years.

What is required to deliver 2000MW of 24x7 electricity 99.99% uptime from wind solution vs coal solution.

Coal solution
2000MW Coal power plant 4x 500MW Generation units.
1x 500MW Gas plant (5x100MW generation units) - to backup any of the 4 Generators during maintenance.

Annual Power from Coal 365*.95 = 346 then 346days*2000MW*24hours
= 16608000MWh @ $45 = 747 Million p.a * 30 years = 22.5 Billion

747 Million * 30 years = 22.4 Billion

Gas Backup = 330Million for plant 365-346 (5% of time it's running output 2000MW*24*19*30 @65 =1776Million

Total for Coal Solution 4.5Billion 2000MW plant + 22.5Billion Wholesale Electricity sale price + 330Million Gas backup plant + 1776 Million Gas backup fuel/operating cost (5% of time @ 500MW)

= 29.1 Billion Dollars

2000MW reliably delivered wind.

HVDC Grid upgrade 2 Billion Dollars

6000MW of wind = 9.6 Billion AUD
Geographically distributed Vic + SA + Tas + NSW 20% reliable.
6000*.2 = 1200MW

Maintenance of 6000MW wind over 30 years = 500Million

Build 800MW of Gas for backup 530Million

65% of the time Wind power delivers 100% of 2000MW

35% wind power delivers anything from 1200MW -> 2000MW

Much of the 35% of the time wind is delivering 80% 99% etc, the worst case is that wind is only delivering 60% of the 2000MW.

The total usage of Gas to generate the 54days * 24 hour * 2000MW reliable Wind solution for electricity is 15% * 30 years

5 Billion Dollars For Gas Fuel

So total cost of Wind/Gas solution is 9.6Billion + 530Million + 5 Billion + 2 Billion Grid upgrade

17.13Billion

Wind/gas solution is 12 Billion dollars cheaper than Coal solution

and produces 5% of the Carbon Dioxide.

http://beyondzeroemissions.org

The author, TQ, writes about Mark Diesendorf's article:
" ... The Base Load Fallacy ... explains how there is a real alternative to coal fired power stations. It is of course not nuclear energy but all the renewable energy sources of biomass, wind, solar, geothermal and gas."

"Unfortunately, present experience does not support this view."

TQ's argument is very rational, but it reminds me of the strong argument once mounted by an aerodynamic engineer, who successfully debated that The Bumblebee Cannot Fly. Indeed, the bumblebee flew in the face of every orthodox aerodynamic assumption of the era.

MD's article doesn't seem so fallacy ridden to me as it does to you, TQ. Maybe it's time to add a few new ideas to your repertoire.

I just love the optimism of the renewables supporters.

Matt, you glibly slip in 2bn for HVDC as the answer to the reticulation.

What you missed is a zero. Reticulating that diverse power would probable be closer to 20bn.

Also, the need for base load would need to include 90% of the coal / gas capital cost.

I should get you to do my taxes!

I agree with your 20 Billion figure -- that is the cost for doing the entire grid, diversified and resilient, from Cape York Penninsula to Eyre Peninsula and through tasmania via an upgraded bass link

This could easily bring online The 55,000MW of wind power that we would need to go 85% renewable.

Which as it happens is, 10 years of what they installed this year in the United States and in terms of cost, and scale-- the industry in the united states is only just getting started and they're install 5500MW in one year -- we can easily mimick this and do it over 10 years. Build the 20Billion of HVDC.. and we're home

I happily agree with your figure.

2 Billion was the HVDC upgrade just to integrated 2GW into the Grid for each additional 2GW just add another 2Billion upto 20GW then you can add the additional 35GW on without very much aggregated grid cost.

Recently read article where German farmers are instaling solar panels on their farms and selling the power thus generated to the Grid.
Apparently this has become so profitable many farmers are no longer producing primary products but living solely on money earned from their power generation, and would you believe, once installed they don't have to do a thing.
Now if the Germans can do this in the Northern hemisphere, one really has to wonder what's wrong with us down here with the amount of sun we have and the abundant land available.
Another article also, was the development of a giant Battery by the Japanese, these batteries could be situated near substations and would capture power generated thru the grid via wind of solar, stored in the battery and then when needed, utilised thru the grid.
According to the article, these were being tested insitu right now and have passed the feasability stage.
Clearly, there are many avenues we need to consider and an open mind seems to be the most important as well as avoiding being involved with vested interests.

What am I missing here?The majority of our population live on or near the coast.There is constant wave action all around the said coast.Base line power available 24 hours every day?Why no mention anywhere?If there is no viable method of generating power from the waves then why no attempt to find something? Curmugeon