Australia is quitting coal in record time thanks to Tesla • Hacker News Board

Re: Australia is quitting coal in record time thanks to Tesla

#71

Post by strken » Mon, Apr 10, 2023, 1:42 AM UTC

rippercushions wrote: post #35

asdefghyk wrote: post #21

RE "South Australia’s last coal-fired power plant had closed, leaving the province of 1.8 million heavily reliant on wind farms and power imports from a neighboring region. " So - now they import power from places that use coal fired power stations and they have grid stability problems. NOT quitting coal at all. Id ask what is the price of their power KWh?

If you keep reading, that was the situation seven years ago before the giant Tesla battery that solved their stability problems.

They still rely on interstate power even after getting the big battery, which solved their frequent brownouts but hasn't actually got much capacity: 150MW and 194MWh[0], when the peak grid demand in SA is 2000MW[1] and they've got grid interconnects with Victoria that can deliver nearly 900MW. They make up the capacity with natural gas generators, and their gas usage went up massively after their coal plants went offline[2].

The biggest problem is that SA is pretty flat[3] and doesn't have good sites for dams. They have a grand total of 3MW of hydroelectric capacity, which means they rely on Victoria (and soon NSW) for renewable energy when peak demand exceeds wind/solar generation, as well as their own gas generators and Victoria's coal plants. The big battery can respond faster than the interstate interconnects (which are far away) and the gas generators (which are expensive to run and only turn on when spot prices are high), which lets it fill the same role a big flywheel would in a coal/nuclear plant.

[0] https://hornsdalepowerreserve.com.au/

[1] https://www.aer.gov.au/wholesale-markets/wholesale-statistic...

[2] See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Electricity_generation_SA..., which is a year-by-year collection of the data from https://www.energy.gov.au/data/australian-electricity-genera...

[3] https://en-au.topographic-map.com/map-wwnx/South-Australia/?...

Re: Australia is quitting coal in record time thanks to Tesla

#72

Post by ClumsyPilot » Mon, Apr 10, 2023, 1:48 AM UTC

gkanai wrote: post #69

rippercushions wrote: post #32

Australia also has a remarkable tax incentive that lets you buy EVs basically tax free (fringe benefits tax exemption for novated leases, in bureaucratese). Basically, instead of paying $70k for a Tesla post-tax, you can get it deducted directly from your paycheck for around $45k pretax. The exact math depends on your income, and perversely enough the subsidy increases the more you earn and the higher your taxes, but…

> perversely enough the subsidy increases the more you earn and the higher your taxes Isn't this because those who are going to buy EVs today (which are premium if not luxury vehicle prices) are those who have more money to do so? There is not yet a widely available entry level priced EV that is broadly popular.

no, its because in a higher tax braket you pay more tax

its the sane in britain - if you earn $200,000 income-tax-free means 50% off, but if you earn $20,000. it means like 5% off

Also in Uk id you want to buy a e car, you get a grant of a few grand, if you want an e motorbike you get like $300, and if you want an ebike, the most wco friwndly option, you fuck right off

Re: Australia is quitting coal in record time thanks to Tesla

#73

Post by ClumsyPilot » Mon, Apr 10, 2023, 1:55 AM UTC

dsffghfghfghfgh wrote: post #65

Such crap, battery power is effectively just exporting pollution to Africa, anyone bothered to research the Lithium mines/processing plants? They are horrificly polluting.

lithium is mined in US and australia, not so much africa. And, unlike coal, only needs to be mined once

Re: Australia is quitting coal in record time thanks to Tesla

#74

Post by Merad » Mon, Apr 10, 2023, 1:56 AM UTC

cogman10 wrote: post #30

uejfiweun wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably a dumb question, but would mass-batterification leave our society extremely vulnerable to EMP?

EMP weapons are a scifi myth. It takes a lot of energy to generate an EMP that would do any damage (think, nuclear bomb levels of energy). And even then, the area of effect would be less than a mile or two radius. If someone wanted to attack a grid, well placed C4 would be cheaper and more practical (See moore county substation attack).

High altitude nuclear detonations cause powerful EMP effects over a large area. The US famously discovered this by accident in the 60s with the Starfish Prime nuclear tests, which caused EMP damage in Hawaii almost 1000 miles from the detonation.

Re: Australia is quitting coal in record time thanks to Tesla

#75

Post by mbo » Mon, Apr 10, 2023, 2:11 AM UTC

its-summertime wrote: post #15

https://opennem.org.au/energy/sa1/ is the one-stop-shop for current energy situation in Australia. Anecdotal: SA was pushing towards clean energy notably before the battery came in, but in turn, had a very unstable grid, and the things like energy trading et al. were tied up in international ownership iirc (needing authorization to do a large energy trade required someone from France giving approval, timezones didn't…

Side note: OpenNEM has some of the most beautiful data presentation I've seen in a very long time. Particularly great typography and mobile performance / responsiveness as well. Open source too https://github.com/opennem/opennem-fe

Re: Australia is quitting coal in record time thanks to Tesla

#76

Post by GenerWork » Mon, Apr 10, 2023, 2:17 AM UTC

rippercushions wrote: post #32

Australia also has a remarkable tax incentive that lets you buy EVs basically tax free (fringe benefits tax exemption for novated leases, in bureaucratese). Basically, instead of paying $70k for a Tesla post-tax, you can get it deducted directly from your paycheck for around $45k pretax. The exact math depends on your income, and perversely enough the subsidy increases the more you earn and the higher your taxes, but…

> the subsidy increases the more you earn and the higher your taxes

What's the name of this law called that does this? Seems like quite the oversight.

Re: Australia is quitting coal in record time thanks to Tesla

#77

Post by JumpCrisscross » Mon, Apr 10, 2023, 2:24 AM UTC

gdy wrote: post #39

arcticbull wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would it?

Rosatom builds faster than South Korea, which takes 9 years to build a reactor [0]. For example, the reactor in Belarus was built in 8 years[1]. The first reactor at the Akkuyu site in Turkey is going to be built in 6 years [2]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_commercial_nuclear_rea... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_commercial_nuclear_rea... [2] https://www.world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/Major-c…

> the reactor in Belarus was built in 8 years

That’s slower than average [1]. Striking, considering how much where you build influences timelines as much as who’s building. (I doubt Minsk subjects Rosatom to community input, labor requirements or environmental reviews.)

[1] https://hannahritchie.substack.com/p/nuclear-construction-ti...

Re: Australia is quitting coal in record time thanks to Tesla

#78

Post by 22c » Mon, Apr 10, 2023, 2:28 AM UTC

GenerWork wrote: post #76

rippercushions wrote: post #32

Australia also has a remarkable tax incentive that lets you buy EVs basically tax free (fringe benefits tax exemption for novated leases, in bureaucratese). Basically, instead of paying $70k for a Tesla post-tax, you can get it deducted directly from your paycheck for around $45k pretax. The exact math depends on your income, and perversely enough the subsidy increases the more you earn and the higher your taxes, but…

> the subsidy increases the more you earn and the higher your taxes What's the name of this law called that does this? Seems like quite the oversight.

It's not a law, it's math. Anything that comes out of pretax income is a bigger incentive (dollar-wise) for those who have a higher tax rate.

Re: Australia is quitting coal in record time thanks to Tesla

#79

Post by dsffghfghfghfgh » Mon, Apr 10, 2023, 2:30 AM UTC

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #73

dsffghfghfghfgh wrote: post #65

Such crap, battery power is effectively just exporting pollution to Africa, anyone bothered to research the Lithium mines/processing plants? They are horrificly polluting.

lithium is mined in US and australia, not so much africa. And, unlike coal, only needs to be mined once

[Edited my original comment to include processing plants]. There is a secondary stage of processing after extraction which is highly toxic, that is the polluting part. Have a look at the huge tailings dams they set up to hold the toxic waste. These things just kick the can down the road for future generations. They also probably leak into groundwater. Lucky you don't have to drink that water.

Re: Australia is quitting coal in record time thanks to Tesla

#80

Post by rgmerk » Mon, Apr 10, 2023, 2:32 AM UTC

andrewstuart wrote: post #54

Yeah but Australia also happily digging vast quantities of coal out of the ground and selling it to India and China and elsewhere, utterly dwarfing any local cutbacks in usage. A land of opportunity (for the OzzieGarchs) and hypocrisy (for the politicians).

Yes, we are hypocrites, but the export trade in thermal coal is doomed regardless.