South Australia statewide electricity blackout. 10

[HamburgerHelper]

Cranky,

Of course you shouldn't go to work in that case. Haven't you read the plans about the grid using everyone who has a car plugged in to shave peaker generation?

I would hate it if the utility cycled my batteries but it does make me wonder how many cars you would need to black start a region. In places like India, where a lot of people have backup generation since the their grid is unreliable, I could see people using their car deal with power quality issues. After Hurricane Ike, here in Houston there was a guy using his electric car to power his house instead of a generator like everyone else.

 

[GregLocock]

Not much point in going to work if the grid is down. What are you going to do when you get there- fire up the grate and start blacksmithing?

Cheers

Greg Locock


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[wayne440]

My employer has standby power at every important location. A significant grid outage guarantees that I will be called in to work, assuming that there is a building, trailer or habitable piece of earth to report to.

 

[davidbeach]

But if we use electric cars and the power is off, is that a good reason to not go to work?

Actually one of the reasons that I have no interest in an electric car. If there's ever a prolonged major outage (can you say "The Big One"?) I'll absolutely be expected to be showing up for work, may even be camping out at work, and can be refueled from our stock of gasoline; an electric vehicle seems a "system normal" luxury, not a system restoration necessity. Probably means that we won't have to worry too much about interference from the VP that drives the Tesla.

 

[cranky108]

David, I would also have to be at work. This was a random thought that I had about electric cars (golf carts).

I had about the same thoughts as I watched the news last night, and a story about protesters demanding 100% renewable electric service.
I thought what dreamers.

 

[Trenno]

South Australia is becoming a great argument for the proposed '50% renewable energy by 2030' target

 

[hokie66]

Trenno,
I take it you mean "argument against". Or is that sarcasm?

 

[Trenno]

Definitely sarcasm.

I think we have a responsibility to adopt best practice in terms of environmentally sustainable power generation, but some of these figures being spouted are just ludicrous.

 

[GregLocock]

Here's a chart of the predicted situation in SA for the next couple of years

So they need 550 MW of generating capacity

Cheers

Greg Locock


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[cranky108]

The US has lots of coal available.

 

[hokie66]

Australia doesn't need to import coal, cranky. It exports 90% of its own production. It just needs to build more generating capacity. The problem is planning and governmental courage. The governments here are run by a conglomeration of people from all walks of life, not many of them technically literate.

I won't start a separate thread for this, but it is another example of the same government inertia problem. In Brisbane where I live, a new commuter rail line was recently built and opened. But this new line has now thrown the entire commuter system into chaos, because a fundamental planning issue was overlooked...they forgot to train enough new train drivers. Apparently, it will be another year before the "trains are fixed".

 

[cranky108]

We get the government problem every year with a new city panel.

Yes Australia has coal, but it seems like not much will to use it.

 

[Trenno]

Clean coal fired power plants are the way forward, at least until renewable energy becomes socially and financially viable/sustainable.

 

[JohnRBaker]

As the author of the below article tells us: NOT SO FAST:

http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/energy/a4947/4339171/

John R. Baker, P.E. (ret)
EX-Product 'Evangelist'
Irvine, CA
Siemens PLM:
UG/NX Museum:

The secret of life is not finding someone to live with
It's finding someone you can't live without

 

[ScottyUK]

In some locations most of the anti-CCS arguments in that article don't stand up to reasoned analysis. For example in the UK there's an established network of subsea and on-land pipelines which were part of the North Sea gas system. The North Sea oil has many depleted gas reservoirs which once held methane for millions of years, and have wells and pipeline infrastructure available to inject CO2. Geologically the North Sea is well-understood because of the intensive oil & gas survey work over the last 40 years. Not all locations have such promise for CCS, but some certainly do.

The newest supercritical power stations are far more efficient than those of fifty years ago which helps to offset the large internal energy use of a CCS-equipped plant. The overall efficiency of supercritical-with-CCS power plants takes efficiency back to roughly where the industry was in the late 1960's, but without the pollution. Not ideal, but not disastrous considering how many coal-fired stations date from the 1960's in the UK and probably elsewhere too.


What method(s) of reliable baseload power generation do you favour John?

 

[JohnRBaker]

It would require a diversified scheme, based on natural gas, hydro, geothermal for the baseload and then add in solar and wind. Also, with the advent of battery storage becoming more technically feasible, that could help sustain the contribution to the grid from cyclical sources like solar and wind. BTW, I'm not saying that 50 years from now, perhaps sequestration technology may have advanced to where 'cleaner' coal could sill be an option in certain places and situations. However, we still need to work on more efficiency in both distribution as well as consumption. More widespread use of LED lighting for example, for not only residential/commercial usage but also infrastructure like public lighting of streets and highways could have a significant impact. And who knows, someone may yet crack the secrets of a sustainable 'fusion' reaction ;-)

John R. Baker, P.E. (ret)
EX-Product 'Evangelist'
Irvine, CA
Siemens PLM:
UG/NX Museum:

The secret of life is not finding someone to live with
It's finding someone you can't live without

 

[waross]

I am struck by some inconsistencies in the Popular Mechanics article.

about one-sixth the cost of oil or natural gas per Btu

While estimates vary, a coal-fired power plant would have to burn roughly 25 percent more coal to handle carbon sequestration while producing the same amount of electricity. That would mean a vast expansion in mining, transportation costs and byproducts such as fly ash.

An increase of 25% in the use of a fuel that is 1/6 the cost of many alternative fuels is characterized as a "VAST" expansion.
Possibly an overstatement.
Bill
--------------------
"Why not the best?"
Jimmy Carter

 

[cranky108]

I would add caution to injecting CO2 into the ground, as we should have seen the news about earthquakes in Oklahoma from salt water injection in such formations.
Not that anything as such would happen, but be sure before we proceed.

Solar sort of make since to a point, as the sun shines at the times most humans are active. But we would need to watch the duck curve, and be sure we have the generating capacity to handle sundown.

I am amazed that pre-treating of coal has not taken off more. And that no one has built an actual coal gasification, and gas turbine plant (at least that I know of).

 

[GregLocock]

coal gasification is pretty ugly, if you mean the old UK town gas plant. Lots of sulphur and stinky tar.

Cheers

Greg Locock


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[hokie66]

And don't even think about underground coal gasification (as distinct from fracking). Wherever UCG has been tried, it has failed and created a contamination nightmare.