61–70 of 187 posts
Sounds like an ideal market for home solar and Tesla powerwalls.
The solar exposure is extremely high and the outback has limitless sunny land... You could build and charge all the world's batteries with solar there and ship it out on the Pacific or Indian oceans...
I moved to Newcastle, Australia from the US (Los Angeles) about two years ago. I was shocked when I received my energy bill. Australians in general are hesitant to use their AC or electric heaters, opting to just layer up when it's cold or try to use fans in the summer. Many (most?) households don't have clothes dryers, using clotheslines instead. I would like to see how much energy the average Australian household c…
> Australians in general are hesitant to use their AC or electric heaters, opting to just layer up when it's cold or try to use fans in the summer. Many (most?) households don't have clothes dryers, using clotheslines instead. Are you suggesting these are bad things? I think they're positive however, it varies wildly across different locations and demographics. > I would like to see how much energy the average Austra…
A/C was limited to a single in-wall unit that was only to be used when outside shade temperature reached 95 F / 35 C. If you wanted to cool down, it was a fan or go for a swim.
Heat was whole-house, natural gas with floor registers, set to inside 65 F / 18 C max.
House had both fiberglass and blown insulation, automatic ridge-line roof venting, tall tree shade, multi-pane windows, weatherstripping, room isolation manual practices (door and register closing), etc. This was in the 1980's-1990's before "green" was standard practice, it was self-interested to save TCO money.
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Is it really sunnier than Southern California?
Depends where you live in Australia. Queensland? Sure. Victoria? Only in Summer where temperatures occasionally exceed 100 Fahrenheit, winters are cold. Tasmania? No, never.
I live in Victoria, Australia. Energy bills are through the roof - almost literally as "insulation" is a thing just about no-one here has any competence with. Whatsoever. I'm talking about builders and building code designers specifically. Ironically (see the top and bottom positions of the chart), I spent the first 40% of my life in Norway where things do get proper cold as opposed to in Australia where it's accepte…
My family back home couldn't believe I'd walk around my apartment in shorts and a t-shirt with bare feet on floorboards and tiles in Sweden during winter. Turning on the heater in my apartment made you sweat when it was around -15 degrees celsius outside.
Australian's have a similar complex about wearing appropriate clothing during winter. Everyone complains about how cold it is, while wearing a light jumper or t-shirt in winter, even though it's no where near as cold as other countries.
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Depends where you live in Australia. Queensland? Sure. Victoria? Only in Summer where temperatures occasionally exceed 100 Fahrenheit, winters are cold. Tasmania? No, never.
If you're talking about Los Angeles compared to even Brisbane, Queensland, this is wrong.
I wasn't, I meant what I wrote, and nothing more specific than that.
Nonetheless, even comparing those two cities, I'm not sure "wrong" is an appropriate conclusion. It really depends on what metrics you're using.
http://www.holiday-weather.com/brisbane/averages/ http://www.holiday-weather.com/los_angeles/averages/
LA certainly has more hours of sunlight, but it's not nearly as warm. However, hours of sunlight probably isn't what people mean when they say "sunnier", or else the Arctic would be a popular tourist destinations for "sun seekers" during its Summer.
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You greatly underestimate how utterly devoid of morals both of our major parties are, resulting in them being in the pocket of the coal miners and other big corps. They are almost militantly opposed to non-coal, non-LNG investment. This is a government which earlier this year brought a lump of coal in to parliament as a prop to say that they were 'not afraid of coal' and to attack the opposition for 'attacking the jo…
That is unfortunate. I spent a month living in Ryde and I fell absolutely in love with Australia. I agree, as Bill Bryson once said: "It may truly be the greatest place on earth." Hopefully things sort itself out soon.
Things could have been much better if we'd taxed the hell out of the miners, like Norway's Oil Fund.
Sort of on-topic but I recall once an Australian company called Enviromission that was wanting to build solar updraft towers in the outback. With so much incredibly solar-rich, un-used land, I thought Australia would've gone all in for solar by now.
Funny you call it "the outback". Their final proposed site was 20km from my then family home :)
I was disappointed it never went anywhere, and yes, Australians should be adopting solar much, much faster than they are.
That said, my per kWh charge is about half the "market" price shown for Victoria there (although I do pay $0.94/day on top of that, which I guess brings it up a little), and that's after a 10% price hike about a year ago. Who's paying those prices?
There's an old joke where in Heaven the cooks are French, the policemen are English, the mechanics are German, the lovers are Italian and the bankers are Swiss - whereas in Hell the cooks are English, the policemen are German, the mechanics are French, the lovers are Swiss and the bankers are Italian. I'm pondering an updated version where in hell the healthcare system is American, the energy market is Australian...…
I've heard the joke told as: Canada could have had English culture, French cuisine, and American industry... instead it has American culture, English cuisine, and French industry.
(I have lived in the USA / Canada / Australia, my sister in France & England for many years)