Renew Economy today stated: "The march of change on Australia’s main grids grinds on, with the nation’s rapidly growing fleet of big batteries discharging more energy into the National Electricity Market in November than peaking gas generators."

Further: "It should be no surprise, given the falling costs of battery storage and the fact that these installations are highly flexible and can play in numerous different markets and deliver even more services. The cost of gas generation, and gas turbines, on the other hand has soared in recent years."

Also: "The few peaking gas plants that are being built are heavily subsidised, or paid for by governments, including Snowy Hydro’s Hunter gas generator, and the newly announced Brigalow gas peaker in Queensland, which is backed by the state utility CS Energy and underwritten to protect it from low wholesale prices."

Hopefully some of these good news stories about renewables will help alleviate some of the fear that the renewable alarmists are generating for themselves.

WTF,

I don't know if you are Chris Bowen in real life; you work for Chris Bowen, or you have Obsessive-compulsive disorder. I doubt that you are a big-money grifter heavily investing in the renewables scam.

Is there anything else that you are interested in, apart from this tedious renewables rot that every country except Australia has woken up to?

You should widen your horizons, take it easy, because your posts will not make an iota of difference to the success or failure of Albanese Labor's so-far total f… up of our economy and our security, by fiddling with renewable energy.

Neither will anything I say in opposition to you have any effect. We have no say. Neither the Labor Party nor what's left of the Coalition give a tinker’ curse what we think.

WTF?

mhaze why do you care so much about who I am? I do know that a while back you were obsessing about a poster who went by the name of Ant (or something like that) and banged on about that person being me. You only stopped when I pointed out your obsessive behaviour.

Chis Bowen and Albanese - you seem to want to bring the conversation back to politics. I imagine that is because it is hard to argue against actual facts and easy to try and polarise a discussion by introducing politics.

If you want to talk about particular politics then start your own conversation about it.

I'll stick with highlighting the tremendous strides that are taking shape in the technology of renewable energy.

I understand that some people will feel conflicted about how rapid some of these are occurring. I gave the example of Prometheus Energy the other day who went from an uneconomical technique to a real profitable alternative in a matter of years.

If that's "tedious renewables rot" then that's what I'll stick with.

WTF?

I do apologise, mhaze, I was responding to ttbn and at the time of writing and made the mistake of identifying you as the commentor.

WTF

Obsessions always take you over and can make you do silly things.

I don't know what mhaze would think about being confused with me, but it gave me a good laugh.

I've never heard of anyone calling himself “Ant”; check with mhaze.

Neither do I care about who you are. Mhaze, again?

It's your obsessive drivel about hoaxes and scams that is somewhat irritating - and pointless.

“Back to politics”. It's all about politics, son. And ideology.

But, who am I to try to help someone who can't tell the difference between ‘ttbn’ and ‘mhaze’. They are not remotely alike. But I suppose anyone who puts his own moniker at the top of his posts instead of that of the person he (thinks) he is addressing, has to be somewhat "different" from other people.

WTF?

ttbn - my apology was to mhaze and exchanges we have had in the past - not you. Sorry if you have a case of "main character syndrome".

When I realised the misidentification I had a chuckle to myself but probably not for the same reasons as you.

It's a pretty weak basis to work from - trying to score points after a correction of an error has been made.

But, I'll continue to inform our readers here about technological advances in renewable energy.

Don't fear, ttbn, the future is bright.

TTbn is one of those lost pom souls that have never assimilated, just like tony going to england for a homecoming.

Ah, see. I missed the ? after WTF.

What a charming fellow you are, saying what the f...? to every poster you address. With your manners and attitude, I don't think you will have much luck in convincing many people of too much at all. But, of course, you are as entitled as anyone is to rabbit on about your ideological obsessions, or your personal opinions or those of people you don't know.

The more the merrier. But hearing about a few isolated examples of people waxing lyrical about renewables, and the few enterprises that are using them - at the moment, and with fossil fuel back up if things go wrong - is worthless. Particularly from people like us - anonymous and powerless - is just a bit of fun really. Even for a one-trick pony like you.

I don't know if you are Chris Bowen in real life
ttbn,
That's exactly what came to my mind the moment I saw the headline. The proponents are literally & deliberately oblivious to the devastating environmental consequences of the manufacturing of batteries with present technology.
If only the money & resources spent on this folly could be spent on real research instead ! The renewable "industry" is actually preventing the development of retables by absorbing the costs for literally nothing to show for in the future. I predict that it'll either be nuclear or Hydrogen that'll be implemented in the next ten years & it'll take years upon years to clean up wind farm sites & sorting out the disposed equipment.

WTF?

ttbn, I really don't see why you have a problem with WTF? It could mean anything.

On here, however, you recently referred to someone as a "disagreeable arsehole". Talk about bad manners and a malicious attitude.

You have also said in the past that "Opinions do not require references, evidence or information." So we really can't take your comments too seriously except as examples on how not to form opinions.

Renewable energy alarmists do not have to be so fearful. Stay away from the rantings of youtube crazies and follow the facts.

Just don't follow the facts, follow the money as well. Private equity wealth is pouring into renewables.

WTF,

You are well aware what WTF means, as are we all. It's extremely aggressive, as you mean it to be.

Not that I mind. You are having trouble stating your case, so you've delved into my posts to see what bad language I have used along the line.

I don't remember whom I called a “disagreeable arsehole”, but I'm certain that it was well deserved. And, it is not the same as saying WTF to each and every poster you deal with. There are some here who don't deserve such nonsense.

You don't have to “take (my) comments seriously” if you don't wish to. I don't take anything you say seriously. You are just the source of a bit of fun. And I don't “fear” the economy-killing renewable energy because I'm well set up, and old enough not to be around long enough to experience the brown stuff really hitting the fan. I hope you will be, though

Now. I think that we have reached the ‘unnecessary conversation’ stage.

WTF?

I don't have to delve into your posts, it just appears that I have a better memory of the distasteful and unnecessary insults that you have resorted to on OLO.

Why does it stand out? - it's an insult.

WTF? on the other hand is a remark indicating a sticking difference of opinion to the commentator

And no - the person you levelled the insult at did not start off by insulting you - that was something you initiated.

Why? Because they drove a truck through your opinions which did not have references, evidence or information.

If you really want to get pedantic you can easily check and see that I don't start every comment with WTF? But that would be evidence and you don't do that.

Well WTF, from your OLO commentary I think NFI a more apt nic. Take this spoon full from your bucket of ignorance:

/Also: "The few peaking gas plants that are being built are heavily subsidised, or paid for by governments, including Snowy Hydro’s Hunter gas generator, and the newly announced Brigalow gas peaker in Queensland, which is backed by the state utility CS Energy and underwritten to protect it from low wholesale prices."/

The key word is peaking, meaning that gas generation is firming capacity or backup generation. Used on its own as baseload gas provides power at far less cost.

The other point you missed by swallowing this grifter propaganda is that you would still need as much backup generation with the batteries unless you wanted to spend trillions on batteries.

End the ban and ditch the grifters.

L1q

This statement from from Australians for Better Government sums up our broken energy system nicely:

“Electricity prices have sky-rocketed and we face the risk of blackouts, despite previously having CHEAP, ABUNDANT AND RELIABLE ENERGY.

We ceded our energy independence by rejecting coal, gas and nuclear power. Instead we are importing wind and solar components from the rest of the world, mainly our STRATEGIC OPPONENTS”.

Hence: “Our manufacturing industry has moved offshore and it is almost non-existent”.

Thanks to the current far left, CPA-hugging Albanese government - and before it, the navel-gazing Coalition - Australia is now a basket case.

People who keep their eyes and ears open will now be aware that Rennie Advisory, consultants and supporters of renewable energy, have called out the lie that renewable energy will be cheaper. Mr. Rennie himself says that the days of cheap electricity in Australia are over. (ABC).

The best thing with gas fired power is it can be ramped up or down instantly, a one man observer required, Unlike coal fired boilers it can take days to answer a call OR jettison the cargo of steam, then ramp up next week. let alone the continues flow of coal at unchanged costs for producing less power, for the boilers.
Coal has seen it's best days when lanterns were lit with coal gas.
Fester loses on all accounts. Coal and nukes are obsolete.

doog,

Wind and solar cannot power a grid without 100% backup with gas, coal, hydro, geothermal or nuclear. That is a fact. If you build coal or nuclear, you don't need anything else, and yes, both provide cheaper power than wind and solar.

You just swallow the lies of cult leader Albo and his grifter buddies.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=otSAEca41eE

I wouldn't rely on Renew Economy for very much WTF. If you click on this link http://drive.google.com/file/d/1-oYzDCUstYy2eByfeIwD5yQlc5YSl3Sv/view?usp=sharing you can see the Australian Energy Market Operator's official figures for the last three months which show batteries producing less than a quarter of the output of gas.

Batteries may overtake gas at some stage, but so what? They need to be recharged, and to eliminate gas entirely would cost an astronomical amount of money because gas can run for long periods of time without needing to be recharged like batteries do. This means gas is available for the rare, but unavoidable, occurrences when batteries and pumped hydro, and ever other form of storage can't perform because of the duration of the outage.

The Australian AAA has revealed another example of dishonesty about batteries - in EVs this time.

Their tests have proved that manufacturers' claims about distances achieved by some of these vehicles are 31% upwards LESS than claimed.

Several brands were tested; one, the MG4, touted to have a range of 405kms, only went for 281kms. The brand was caught out 10 years ago in Europe and its testing procedure dropped because of its inaccuracy.

The BYD ATTOS3 could make only 369kms despite the claim that it could travel for 480kms on a charge.

Some did better, but all couldn't manage the range claimed: Smart 13% under, Kiama 11% under, Tesla only 3% under