The climate change debate continues.

[facthunter]

IF  some forms of nuclear are cost  effective, people will  use it. Some don't have a lot of choice. The FACTS will decide. To me waste Heat seems to be Part of it. Waste heat goes into the Environment as does the waste heat from Ice and steam engines because they are far from 100% efficient, unlike Electric motors. Nev

[Siso]

Electric motors and converters still release heat as does anything that makes the electricity to power them. Would be interesting to see how much a WTG releases with gearboxes, muliple electric motors converters and hydraulic systems/ MWh.

[kgwilson]

Electric motors typically run at between 85% & 95% efficiency. Energy lost is mostly heat. Older AC induction motors usually run between 75% & 85%. Modern EVs convert over 77% of the energy at the wheels. The rest is lost to heat and friction. Fossil fuelled cars are very inefficient when converting the energy in the fuel to the wheels at between 12% and 30%. Again the rest is lost to heat and friction. 

[facthunter]

The  real waste heat is when you have to go to obvious and visible ways of disposing of it like heated water towers. All energy ends up as heat. (Entropy) Gears lose more than chains. Torque converters create heat, Hydro drives etc. electric is way ahead. Nev

[Siso]

With electricty (I'm a fan by the way) we need to remember transmission losses as well. 

[Marty_d]

27 minutes ago, Siso said:

With electricty (I'm a fan by the way) we need to remember transmission losses as well. 

Which is why neighbourhood batteries and a more distributed grid in general makes sense.

Keep generation, storage and usage close where possible.

[Siso]

So windfarms in city parklands? Was in Europe recently, Quite a few in Amsterdam and could see a WTG from the London Eye. The ones in Amsterdam that I saw close were 3MW machine, so reasonably large.

[Marty_d]

Australia's 'burbs are overwhelmingly detached houses. Thousands of hectares of them. All with roofs which in many cases already have solar panels.  

Cheaper than nuclear or new gas or coal to fund neighbourhood batteries and more solar, and smart boxes on each property. 

Batteries could still be connected to wider grid for importing or exporting when demand changes.

[facthunter]

About 1/3rd of the Price I paid for Panels and better performance. Nev

[Jerry_Atrick]

I think Europe is seeing the consequences of climate inaction. My guess is even France will be seriously looking at solar and wind after this season.. 

 

The UK is in its 4th heatwave (I have suggested this is the new norm) Apart from the different tree species and narrow roads, it look a lot like an Aussie landscape in summer. And that means it too is becoming a tinderbox.

 

This is the third year running.

 

 

Edited 7 hours ago by Jerry_Atrick

[Siso]

France will be and I would say all ready are looking at wind and solar, but they will always have their NP to do the heavy lifting. The reason they are curtailing nuclear generation is because of environmental issues that weren't thought of at the time. I would think this would not happen with their new builds.

 

Are they really cheaper then Nuclear over 80 years, Really?  Currently France exporting about 12GW with a green grid. Germany, not so much!

 

https://world-nuclear.org/information-library/country-profiles/countries-a-f/france

https://app.electricitymaps.com/map/zone/FR/72h/hourly

 

[pmccarthy]

Remember you are debating only about 9% of Australia's energy consumption. As a share of Australian energy consumption, hydrocarbon fuel declined only marginally, from 91.2 per cent in 2021-22 to 90.7 per cent in 2023-24. This has not been due to the take up of alternative energy sources, but due to the decline of energy consumed by the manufacturing sector. In the first two years of the Albanese government, energy consumption in the manufacturing sector declined by 10.4 per cent, or 5.2 per cent per annum.

[kgwilson]

Australia currently gets around 36% of its electrical energy from renewables & this is increasing all the time as our reliance on fossil fueled generation reduces with retiring assets and increasing wind & solar with some pumped hydro on the way. Our reliance on diesel for heavy transport has to be addressed more urgently now given global volatility and ever increasing cost.

[Jerry_Atrick]

Manufacturing accounts for around 20% of electricity consumption. It's drop in electricity consumption, according to AI, is due to structural issues and reduction in production outputs; not efficiency gains, so that needs to be addressed - but that is outside the scope of this thread, unless you are somehow asserting the transition to renewables is inhibiting manufacturing output. Of course, one can argue that the cost of the transition has to be borne and this flows into higher input costs for manufacturers, which makes them less competitive. But, that would be an argument more that the longer term planning of our manufacturers and government was deficient as the world's largest manufacturing country, China, is going hell for leather into renewables and surely they would be having similar transition costs. Be that as it may, if we stay with relatively high fossil fuel costs or move to expensive nuclear costs, we will, by the next generation or so, have much higher input energy costs. Not to mention the increasing cost of geopolitical and civil unrest by staying with fossil fuels and further accelerating the earth heating up, drying out, and food and other resources (such as wood) becoming more and more scarce. The one saving grace on resource demand is in the western world, the birth rates are declining and in some cases, dramatically, but the rest of the world will fill that hole. 

 

Also, other environmental impacts such as ocean warming, jetstream and gulfstream disruption will have a profound impact and cost far in excess of economic costs. Algal blooms; microrganisms dying which are causing starvation up the food chain are very worrying because of the impact they will have on the ecology and life on earth - ironically which sustains human life. 

 

 

It looks like there will be an "I told you so" moment able to be delivered by Greta. 

 

But I digress.. The cost of not doing it  is far bigger than the cost of doing it. 

 

 

 

 

[facthunter]

The fact that Labor have subsidised installing batteries,  solar panels heat Pumps would have Made a big a difference , NP costs are out there if you want the Facts. Might work better in a Cold place where People live densely populated situation.  Nev

[Siso]

We will see. It is going to get harder as the penetration of renewables increase. There will be more machine contrained during the windy and sunny days meaning that prices will go up to pay for these machines. Underutilised plant cost $$$$$. The fact that labour has subsidised batterys has taken customers away from paying for grid infrastructure. People can off set there whole bill meaning other people who cant afford batterys or rent accomodation have to subsidise these peoplesbills as well as the batterys. I think we will end up paying a subscription type cost like we do for phones. (after everyone is sucked in to get batterys)

 

[facthunter]

Having Batteries anywhere helps everyone. Currently it's about $400 to be on the grid. That's about what it costs to have Oxy and acetylene bottles. In the Big scheme of things that is NOT a lot.. I still run a LPG Gas Falcon. It's my cheapest vehicle to run at the Moment. Australia has plenty of GAS. You can easily convert a big diesel engine to run on gas. It IS putting CO 2 into the air though and some NOx. That's not a long term problem out side of big Cities' Nev

Edited 34 minutes ago by facthunter
more content