Lefty,

I abandoned the thread on TPP because having shown that your original claims against the TPP were incorrect the thread veered way off the original topic, and as far as I am concerned has run its course.

The plant I helped build is very high tech with a huge capital cost and low numbers of highly qualified staff whose wages, though high, count for a small proportion of the cost of output. However, due to confidentiality requirements I can go no further.

If you take my lack of interest as a slight I apologise, but perhaps you would care to contribute to this thread?

SM, baseload is a concept that only exists because of the need to keep generators spinning, which is not the case for renewables.

In other words, it will die even more rapidly than coal power with the rise of renewables and with the change to more efficient lighting and industrial technologies.

You're about 10-15 years behind the curve mate.

LEFTY ONE, thanks for that. I've no way of knowing what his qualifications are, of course, since he doesn't have sufficient courage of his convictions to identify himself...

Craig,

And there we have it, the concept that separates the ideologue from the engineer. "baseload is a myth" is the cry of the greenie that wants the inconvenient facts airbrushed from reality.

Base-load is just that, the load that is always there, and always needs to be supplied, and base load generators are the large super efficient machines that keep spinning and making a profit from the very low prices of power off peak. Peak load generators are able to switch on for a few hours to meet the high peak demands, produce power at a much higher cost but sell it at the much higher prices.

Without base load generation you are left with intermittent renewables and essentially peak load back up. The consequences can be seen when the interconnector was down for maintenance, and the renewables didn't produce. The main source of power were the gas peak load generators, and the electricity price shot up to 4x the normal cost for several weeks.

Without cheap baseload to back up the renewables, the alternative is very expensive gas peak load generators or darkness.

SM, you have cause and effect arse backwards, which pretty much sums up your world view in a nutshell.

Craig,

So you are right, and all the electrical engineers are wrong?

Power demand has to be matched by power supply. The problem with renewables is that supply is based on wind and sun and not the demand profile. Germany now gets 30% of its power from renewables, but it varies from 100% to less than 5%, and when it is high, it pays France to shut down its nukes and take power, and when it is low, it pays France a fortune to supply power. The cost of this means that Germany has had to commission new coal fired base load to replace the nukes it closed and its emissions are climbing again, and it has one of the highest power costs in the EU.

Just like SA!

If you don't have base load generation, you need to connect to someone that does.

No, you're wrong and you're no engineer or you'd understand why you're wrong.