Antinuclear

This talk of nuclear is a waste of time: Wind, solar and firming can clearly do the job

RENEW ECONOMY, David Leitch, Dec 30, 2024

Australia’s economic future will be at risk if we stop the wind and solar construction to build nuclear. Big energy-intensive manufacturing industries such as aluminium smelters would likely be forced to close, and the risk of blackouts from forcing coal generators to stay on line would be huge.

Wind, solar and firming can clearly do the job. Every hurdle from reliability to inertia has been overcome. There is no need and no reason to change course. Certainly economics is not a reason.

• Makes blackouts more likely by forcing coal stations, already expensive to maintain, that require government support and are increasingly unreliable to go for much longer. The idea of replacing the coal plants with gas while we wait is likely not very realistic, largely because gas plants themselves are expensive and hard to permit and because if asked to run in shoulder mode they are not very efficient and require lots of gas. And right now we are already looking at importing LNG.

If the nuclear plants are 5, 10 or 15 years late, as is entirely possible, it would require heroic assumptions to see the coal fleet managing the gap.

More to the point it’s a completely avoidable and unnecessary risk. Australia is well set on its transition path.

There are some inevitable cost up and downs but no show stoppers have been identified. Every hurdle from reliability to inertia has been overcome. There is no need and no reason to change course. Certainly economics is not a reason.

• Increases emission costs by between A$57 and A$72 bn (NPV @ 7%) even in the very unlikely event the plants are built on time as compared to the present ISP.

• The nuclear plants stand a good chance of being well over budget and late. That’s because:

° Globally that is often but not always the case. By and large the nuclear industry is one of the most likely global industries to be late and over budget.

There is no real nuclear expertise in Australia;
° It will have to be more or less forced on an industry set on a different course;
° It will likely be government owned and developed and the record on that in Australia is poor;
° In general for most capital intensive industries there is an Australia cost premium relative to global averages. This in the end will disadvantage us compared to other countries in terms of the cost of energy.

• Likely will destroy the value of CER (consumer energy resources – rooftop solar, home batteries and EVs) in Australia.

• Will result in the temporary halt in the transition to a firmed VRE system which is already 20 years down the track with a penetration rate of say 50% within 18 months.

• Equally the LNP and by comparison Frontier don’t appear to have done the work or to understand the demand forecasts. The LNP bleat on about EVs, but the real differences are hydrogen, large industrial loads and business demand. One suspects that the aluminium industry in Australia will die if it has to wait for nuclear.

• Finally the old concept of baseload is changing, but in my opinion firming costs are cheaper the bigger the portfolio. This implies firming should sit at least with a large gentailer or possibly with a State or even Federal Govt.

The existing wind and solar build out is working, and it’s far too risky to rely on old coal plants

The biggest, by far, reason for the electricity industry to push back against the ideological LNP Nuclear plan is its far, far too risky.

Australia has a plan to decarbonise. It’s not a perfect plan, no plan survives first contact, but it’s capable of and is in fact being achieved. We are roughly already at 40% VRE. We have at least 20 years experience at developing and integrating wind, solar, behind the meter assets and batteries.

We know the issues around transmission and social license and cost and reliability. There are well developed plans for each issue and a wealth of industry finance and expertise.

The assets to take us from 40% VRE to 50% are already under construction, some are just starting to enter service.

The insurance finance to add another 12 GW of VRE and 4 GW of firming assets (essentially batteries) is already either awarded or in tender through the CIS.

The LNP wants to bring this to a crashing halt, keep our few, increasingly ageing and unreliable coal stations going for another 20 years while it starts up an industry in which Australia has zero comparative advantage and zero experience.

Only in politics could conmen say things with such a straight face. The risk of the coal stations failing is very high. Other stations like Eraring have full ash dams. Yallourn is already on Government support, Vales Point and particularly Mt Piper have coal supply issues………………………………………………………………………..

The errors and sleights of hand in Frontier’s nuclear v ISP analysis………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

Govt funded and managed likely increases risks very significantly

As far as I know the electricity industry in Australia has expressed zero interest in nuclear and obviously some parts of the industry that are busy building wind and solar will be actively opposed. Clearly this in itself is likely to raise costs. That is, the nuclear plants will have to be forced on the industry to a greater or lesser extent.

Again although the plans are very vague the understanding is that they will Goverment funded and owned. Leaving aside all questions of ideology, in my opinion having the Goverment manage the program rather than industry means that there will be less expertise at almost every stage.

I could rant on about this, the mind truly does boggle a bit at the possible negative outcomes, but perhaps it is sufficient to say that having the Goverment step into this area where it has no expertise raises the odds of cost and delay outcome substantially…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. more https://reneweconomy.com.au/this-talk-of-nuclear-is-a-waste-of-time-wind-solar-and-firming-can-clearly-do-the-job/

December 29, 2024 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | energy