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Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

lenergy.com.au

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Re: Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

#381

Post by ZeroGravitas »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #349
ZeroGravitas wrote: post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Texas generates a lot more power than California. The generate more grid solar, more wind, more gas and more coal than other states. They're still #2 to California when you include distributed solar though.

That isnt an point for california because distributed solar is an economically inefficient solution. It is only attractive in California due to a combination absurd electricity prices from State sanctioned monopolies and red tape preventing grid development.

Coal is economically inefficient compared with distributed solar.

Nuclear is broadly on par in cost.

The health impact costs of running existing coal plants in Texas are higher than the cost of installing new rooftop solar. That's ignoring carbon costs, which could be the same again.

And that's at Texas install costs. While low for America they are double Australian costs mostly due to poor permitting regulations and lack of competition.

This artificially makes the gap between utility and rooftop solar wider.

So you're being weirdly specific in your desire for economic efficiency.

Re: Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

#382

Post by grey-area »

scheeseman486 wrote: post #360
grey-area wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Solar energy is not just infrared, and infrared is not what is used by PV solar. So not it’s not equivalent and anyway doesn’t in any way impact the extra heating effect of a new heat source on the ground. Instead of generate heat you could say they move heat if you like, from inside to outside.

All absorbed light gets turned into heat, infrared or otherwise (I'm not sure why you brought up IR?); solar panels catch some of that spectrum. I'm not sure what argument you're trying to make here, particularly given the second paragraph seems to contradict the first; "extra heating effect" (from where does this "extra" come from?) vs "you could say they move heat if you like" which yeah, not really about what I li…

Not all light is absorbed and turned to heat, much is reflected, for PV some turned to electricity.

I think we can agree energy is conserved. Extra heating effect OUTSIDE.

AC moves heat from inside to outside, ergo outside is hotter than it would be, this is not complicated.

Re: Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

#383

Post by josephcooney »

defrost wrote: post #49
jondwillis wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is their fire suppression setup like??? Granted I guess they could be doing pumped hydro storage lol

If they're in a rural / industrial area setting it could quite literally be a fire break around the battery area (bare dirt and no overhanging trees). Fire control in Australia is first and foremost about limiting spread - the bush in Australia goes off if it catches hard. "Mini" pumped hydro is a thing here (in places): https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-12-01/australian-first-mini...

Yeah, he is in a rural area. The batteries are off in a metal shed away from everything else.

Re: Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

#384

Post by josephcooney »

BLKNSLVR wrote: post #48
josephcooney wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of my co-workers (I'm Australian) has 500 kilowatt-hours of storage at home...which is wild. Much more common is the 10-20 kilowatt-hours of domestic storage for a house.

More details please, do they have a website that explains their setup? Are they a hoarder of old car batteries and the like?

I think they bought a whole bunch of batteries of some kind from China. I don't ask too many questions...which is I think how they like it.

Re: Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

#385

Post by CalRobert »

grey-area wrote: post #382
scheeseman486 wrote: post #360

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All absorbed light gets turned into heat, infrared or otherwise (I'm not sure why you brought up IR?); solar panels catch some of that spectrum. I'm not sure what argument you're trying to make here, particularly given the second paragraph seems to contradict the first; "extra heating effect" (from where does this "extra" come from?) vs "you could say they move heat if you like" which yeah, not really about what I li…

Not all light is absorbed and turned to heat, much is reflected, for PV some turned to electricity. I think we can agree energy is conserved. Extra heating effect OUTSIDE. AC moves heat from inside to outside, ergo outside is hotter than it would be, this is not complicated.

Yes, for a time, there is a temperature difference between indoors and outdoors. Air conditioners push heat outside. But they reach equilibrium eventually. (At night, or I suppose in the autumn).

Similarly heat pumps (which is what air conditioning is) also push cold outside when you use them for heat, so the outdoor environment is colder than it would otherwise be, again until equilibrium is reached.

Similarly your refrigerator is cold inside but makes your home warmer.

My point was just that the -net- heat added to the city is zero if you’re using solar.

Re: Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

#386

Post by ZeroGravitas »

simondotau wrote: post #370
ZeroGravitas wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Snowy 2.0 has major limitations on what it can supply, the headline number is very misleading. And the comparison shouldn't be to batteries alone, but solar/wind and batteries. The former can be used directly and fill the batteries repeatedly on a timeline that is predictable. It provides no extra value for the electricity to be stored long term if for the same money you can generate and store it short term. Article…

Your reply — and especially the attached article — misunderstand the reality of operating a grid at scale. Responding to you: Solar and wind are just as relevant to pumped hydro, which is really just a different kind of battery. The real question is how much short-duration storage is needed from chemical batteries and how much long-duration storage is needed from pumped hydro. Chemical batteries are essential for gri…

We want to eliminate fossil fuels and lower costs as quickly as possible.

Vague claims that some alternative like nuclear or Snowy 2.0 will somehow make that last 1% of fossil easier to eliminate are both dubious and irrelevant if their construction uses money that could have easily eliminated 1% of fossil fuel every year for decades.

And once we get close to that last few percent of fossil gas in the electric system it would be better for costs and climate to focus on electrifying industry and homes with cheap electricity anyway.

Re: Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

#387

Post by rswail »

andrewstuart wrote: post #241
rswail wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bullshit. Victoria's default offer will include the same offer from October [1]. Victoria has a separate regulator because it deregulated its electricity grid before the other states. [1] https://www.energy.vic.gov.au/households/save-energy-and-mon...

Impolite.

In response to your nonsense about Victoria somehow being bankrupt.

Re: Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

#388

Post by rswail »

protocolture wrote: post #352
rswail wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Victoria has had smart meters rolled out for over a decade. The rest of the states in the NEM are aiming for 2030 to complete their rollouts. Aside from the supposed "contentious" nature of smart meters, which is mostly the RW cookers thinking it's some nefarious plot, along with vaccines and 5G.

>Aside from the supposed "contentious" nature of smart meters, which is mostly the RW cookers thinking it's some nefarious plot, along with vaccines and 5G. Eh I sit on the fence on this one. Take your pick as to who is going to abuse the data. Corps or the government to taste. Consider this very proposal, incentives to use power at certain times are good. But that incentive structure could instead be very anti consu…

Smart meters don't make things better or worse, they are technology that enables better time-of-use metering than the century of multiple meters for peak vs off-peak consumption, as well as making meter reading/billing cheaper.

They enable new services like feed-in tariffs and incorporation of V2G and VPP infrastructure.

Rents have not doubled in 5 years.

Rental inflation peaked at ~8% and is now below 4% pa.

https://tradingeconomics.com/australia/rent-inflation

Re: Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

#389

Post by rswail »

nikcub wrote: post #229
rswail wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It applies in Victoria as well. Victoria deregulated its market before NSW/SA/Qld. All of the eastern states (SA/QLD/NSW/VIC/Tas) are part of a single market, with interconnects and wholesale prices set every 5 minutes. Victoria has its own "default offer" and regulator of the retail market, which is also offering similar "free power" hours. WA could be part of the NEM with some HVDC across the Nullabor, not sure if…

> WA could be part of the NEM with some HVDC across the Nullabor, not sure if it would be economically worthwhile though. Part of the motive of moving the WEM to 5 minute intervals was to eventually leave this option open. The largest renewable project in the world is being planned in this area[0] so it's feasible that it all may be connected one day [0] https://wgeh.com.au/overview/

Hope HVDC really takes off, having a power network that has solar feed covering 3 timezones as well as multiple latitudes adds to the national solar harvest and grid resiliency.

Re: Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

#390

Post by s1artibartfast »

ZeroGravitas wrote: post #381
s1artibartfast wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That isnt an point for california because distributed solar is an economically inefficient solution. It is only attractive in California due to a combination absurd electricity prices from State sanctioned monopolies and red tape preventing grid development.

Coal is economically inefficient compared with distributed solar. Nuclear is broadly on par in cost. The health impact costs of running existing coal plants in Texas are higher than the cost of installing new rooftop solar. That's ignoring carbon costs, which could be the same again. And that's at Texas install costs. While low for America they are double Australian costs mostly due to poor permitting regulations and…

What is oddly specific about it?

We should cut red tape and permitting processes to enable low cost green energy from the cheapest sources.

The California model is one of the last states should look to as an example of how to run an energy market and roll out solar.

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