There seems to be some unrealistic proposals in the Finkle report.
The one that has attracted my attention is the requirement that each
new solar and wind farm provide backup systems and batteries get a
mention as being that backup.

A solar or wind farm only produces 25% to 35% of its nameplate output
over a 12 month period.
Think about that for a moment.
To produce a backed up supply it has to have a battery with 3 to 4
times the capacity of the solar cells/ wind turbines.
Catch 22; you have to charge this battery !
When are you going to do that ?
The solar/wind cannot do that it is too small. The charging rate has
to be at least four times the rate the solar/wind can supply !

Isn't this understood ?
The battery with a capacity that size will be ginormous.
Modern turbines are around 8Mwatt and if a farm had say 20 turbines
that would be 160 Mwatt, so the battery would be 640 MwattHrs !
And that is not taking into account losses in the battery.

But how do you get it charged ?
It won't matter no one will be able to pay for the battery.

Bazz,

My issue is not with Finkel, only the report, which is based on the terms of reference. A previous chief scientist Ziggy Switkowski made it clear that there were reliability problems around renewable power, and that achieving near zero emissions would not be possible without nuclear power.

This has not escaped the notice of China and India who are amongst those now building 60 new nuclear reactors and upgrading existing reactors, adding more nuclear power to the world than at any other time in history.

However, due the greens and other ignoramuses it looks as though Australia will have the learn the hard way, with a report coming out today showing that Victoria and SA are now at serious risk of blackouts. And the more the lights go out the louder the claims from left whingers that it has nothing to do with renewables.

Yes SM agreed. There is such a high threshold to the acceptance of
nuclear that it will need a collapse of the whole economic system
before a change can be implememnted.
The greens and labour should be forced to read a book by J Tainter
called "The Collapse of Complex Systems".

I am reading a paper on the the subject now and widespread collapse
is a real risk if we get significant power failures.
The author shows how financial collapse could be caused by what would
appear to be disconnected events. He shows how power failure can cause
a financial problem as ATMs would not be working and that would
simulate a run on the banks. It would also cause fuel shortages.
He postulates that the collapse is not linear and would cascade.

Trade-Off
Financial System Supply-Chain Cross-Contagion:
a study in global systemic collapse.
By David Korowic
http://tinyurl.com/bmh4bmn

It amounts to a warning: Don't stuff around with complex systems !

Finkel Review: "Large, traditional nuclear power plants are limited to large-scale applications, which the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation notes makes it “difficult to envisage [traditional nuclear power plants] being established on the NEM given current grid structure.....”."

The cited reference given for this statement is http://www.environment.gov.au/submissions/nem-review/australian-nuclear-science-and-technology-organisation.docx

The sentence finishes with "...unless it were to substitute for a coal-fired plant of similar capacity; however anticipated developments in small modular reactors and Generation IV nuclear technologies will become commercially available within this 30-year timeframe."

Where is justification for Finkel to just blow off the nuclear option as if it doesn't exist? He has guzzled the renewablista Kool-Aid, down to blind faith in viable storage solutions, yet avoids what already works in the world. Is ANSTO infiltrated by Greens? More on smaller reactors here:
http://www.world-nuclear.org/information-library/nuclear-fuel-cycle/nuclear-power-reactors/small-nuclear-power-reactors.aspx

We are not even on the cusp of viable mass storage while reactors to replace coal-fired power exist already.

We also find from ANSTO:

"In Australia, the establishment of nuclear power would require significant community consultation and the development of a social licence; however this should not lead the Independent Review Expert Panel to avoid consideration of the technical advantages and disadvantages of what is a proven mature, reliable, dispatchable and synchronous low emissions technology, widely used in countries with significantly lower emissions intensity and electricity prices than Australia."

Further to my comment on battery backup there was an article in today's
Australian that said that wind costs $92 per Megawatt/hr.
It added that the addition of battery backup makes the cost of wind
$300 to $700 per Megawatt/hr.
Those costs are what I would have expected given my scant knowledge of
the costs of batteries.

Unless questions such as the all up cost of wind/solar can be answered,
as well questions about when & how charging will be done then the
Finkle plan should not go ahead.

These are fundamental problems and no one has addressed them.
Trying to read pollie comments I do not think they have ever been told about these problems.

Good to hear the word "nuclear" emanating from Liberal back-benchers.

Finkel's plan of going first to gas with the promise that energy storage will miraculously become a non-issue after that is hopefully unravelling.

The idea that new renewable generation should be made reliable by backup is where attention must immediately be concentrated, which is what Bazz is doing but the vast majority of pollies are not.