By Viv Forbes
While the West wages war on coal, hydro-carbons power China’s industrial and military might.
China uses massive amounts of coal to generate electricity, smelt metals and manufacture cement – they generate almost twice as much electricity as the USA, and two thirds of that is coal-powered.
In China, wind power is a token 5% (probably earning carbon offsets from western shysters). But the stop-start power from wind/solar is not allowed to interrupt reliable base-load generators like coal.
In Australia, wind and solar are promoted, protected and subsidised. Their variable output requires quick-start electricity from gas, hydro or batteries to maintain supply. And the sudden surges of power from wind and solar send short-term electricity prices so low that steady reliable generators like coal become unprofitable. They will close prematurely.
Once the coal generators are gone, what will keep the Australian electricity flowing when wind and solar fail? Zillion-dollar batteries may help for an hour or so, but what then carries the load AND recharges the batteries? And what happens when batteries fail? Prepare for blackouts and electricity rationing.
It is a green fantasy to expect cheap reliable power from wind or solar.
And only UN climateers could believe that China will cap coal usage any time soon.
Read More?
China Loves Coal more than Wind:
https://saltbushclub.com/2021/01/12/china-loves-coal-more-than-wind/
Electricity generation in China:
https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics?country=CHINA&fuel=Energy%20supply&indicator=ElecGenByFuel
China’s Coal output Surges:
https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/chinas-2020-coal-output-rises-to-highest-since-2015-undermining-climate-pledges-2021-01-17
U.S. electricity generation by energy source:
https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=427&t=3
South Australia’s big battery cost:
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-09-27/tesla-battery-cost-revealed-two-years-after-blackout/10310680
The Green Road to Blackouts:
https://saltbushclub.com/2020/09/01/green-road-to-blackouts/
More Billion dollar Batteries for Australia:
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-01-12/largest-battery-in-australia-to-be-built-at-nsw-coal-fired-plant/13050642
After Wind Speeds Dropped, UK Electricity Prices Rose 10,000%:
https://climatechangedispatch.com/wind-speeds-dropped-uk-electricity-prices-rose/
Viv Forbes has qualifications in applied science and financial analysis and experience in industry and government. He earns no income from coal, oil or gas but does have solar panels on his shed.
Killing off the coal industry will cripple Australia. But that’s hardly unique. Diesel is also under the pump despite being just as necessary as coal.
Now, as an asthmatic, I’m not real keen on diesel, but I know that without it irrigation pumps, tractors, harvesters and trucks will come to a grinding halt. Agriculture has come a long way in the last hundred years and diesel usage has been central to much of that transformation.
Any chance of batteries operating such essential machinery for feeding Australians is laughably non-existent. Thus, the eco-focus turns to ‘green hydrogen’, or hydrogen fuel produced with ‘renewables’ such as solar panel and wind turbine electricity.
Of course, hydrogen fuel has an image problem and that image is of the Hindenburg disaster. Selling the idea to the public at large shall not be easy. Potential safety problems are not the only stumbling block for hydrogen fuel, however. Unlike diesel, hydrogen fuel is not exactly cheap.
This is where the renewables are prophesied to save the day. Apparently, renewable energy is cheap. That is, as long as it’s subsidised. Or as long as other more critical generation capacity is made utterly subservient to it. Or, more likely, both of these scenarios at once.
Australian agriculture deserves better than a grab-bag of unfulfilled promises and sleight-of-hand economics. Farms need assured, affordable energy supply. Starving farmers of diesel could starve Australians.
One simply cannot eat promises.
Fortunately, our federal government seems unable to meet the expectations of the virtuous global alarmists who endlessly criticise our PM when he merely institutes actual remedies to the (fake) crisis rather than create a dodgy nature-trading system to appease the scoundrel financiers. Global cooling has arrived.