I’m really hoping this is a temporary problem.

There are a lot of very large batteries in the process of being built that will start to meaningfully address this issue in the next couple of years.

When you “mine” natural gas and burn it for heat, it’s gone. It disappears (and produces harmful GHG in the process) You have to keep doing this to get more output.

When you mine materials for batteries, you end up with a physical thing that persists, can be used over and over and can be recycled into new batteries at end of life.

This means the amount of mining required for renewables + batteries is proportional to only the addition of new capacity, whereas the amount of “mining” for fossil fuels is proportional to the total gross energy output (including significant heat losses)

We’re mining a lot of battery materials now, but that’s because we’re adding a crapload of capacity.

American exceptionalism at its finest.

It’s such a dumb metric for batteries. I wish people would stop using it.

Unfortunately it doesn’t work like that. Energy is bid into the market at the spot price. Because the marginal cost of producing energy from renewables is so cheap, this will displace energy from all other sources when the sun is shining or the wind is blowing. This is what’s already happening with the coal generators today.

By the time any nuclear gets built, there will be so much solar in the system that nuclear will have to be forcibly shut off at least 40% of the time or operate at a loss. This capacity factor is then on par with wind, so you may as well just build more of that - it’s way cheaper.

The concept of baseload power is dead and has been dead for a while. What we need is more dispatch-able generation and storage.

Well he used to work as a tobacco lobbyist, and he was happy to get Channel Seven to buy him drugs, sex and a fancy apartment.

The overall picture has telltale signs of an entitled, narcissistic, selfish creep. But hey, maybe I only see him like this because Lisa Wilkinson told me to.

The policy will be backdated to June 1 2023

Excellent!

First Tesla and now Polestar have quit membership of the FCAI due to the automotive peak body’s misrepresentation of, and lobbying against, the government’s proposed fuel efficiency standards: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-03-07/tesla-quits-fcai-over-carbon-emissions-scheme/103558374

I applaud them for calling out the BS publicly. I hope others brands follow, and I hope this story increases scrutiny on the misinformation being pushed. Unfortunately, this leaves the FCAI free to adopt an even more conservative position in its advocacy without dissenting member voices.

This is exactly how Trumpism gets seeded into mainstream Australia. Dutton can fuck right off with his racist dogwhistling, and find something better to complain about.

Yep. The latest CSIRO/AEMO report published this week addresses exactly this, with various levels of renewables penetration modelled, including associated firming costs (additional transmission & storage) Here’s an overview (spoiler: renewables are still cheaper by far.) https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-12-21/nuclear-energy-most-expensive-csiro-gencost-report-draft/103253678?utm_source=abc_news_app&utm_medium=content_shared&utm_campaign=abc_news_app&utm_content=link

Cool. Next!