Australia’s renewable energy may have prevented higher bills and blackouts – Watts Up With That?

Essays by Eric Worrall

According to professor Liam WagnerIf the Australian government had encouraged more renewable energy than 15 years ago, we wouldn’t be in this situation.

Intermittent blackouts and higher bills: Energy markets will give Australians a Christmas present no one wants

By Daniel Jeffrey – 2 days before

This image: it’s the pinnacle of summer. Temperatures all over Australia is finally warming up, and people across the country are reaching for their fans and air conditioners – only to be thwarted by the threat of a rotating blackout.

It seems unlikely, but according to a energy and environmental economists, that’s a real threat.

Liam Wagner, associate professor in the Center for Food and Resources at the University of Adelaide, told 9news.com.au: “I think it’s more likely that we’ll repeat June.

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“Most (coal-fired generators) are too old to work,” he said.

“But they continue to operate because we do not have an energy policy in Australia that is conducive to replacing their capacity with something else.

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“You will see a significant drop in prices in the wholesale market (by) bringing more renewables into the grid,” he said.

“It didn’t happen fast enough. It should have happened 15 years ago. I’ve been screaming at the top of my head, my face has turned pale for the past 15 years.”

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Read more: https://amp.9news.com.au/article/5cfb151e-2b4c-4e50-b324-bb585d37ad92

Professor Liam Wagner believes renewable energy is cheaper than coal

If renewable energy is so cheap, why is government policy necessary to encourage investment in renewable energy? Why don’t people rush to build renewables of their own free will, to replace Australia’s ailing coal plants and address the power shortages I agree are possible during the Summer. this Southern Hemisphere summer?

True money-driven energy revolutions don’t require substantial government policy support – new energy quickly replaces old energy, as investors flock to the opportunity to make money new.

… When the clean-burning oil lamp invented by Michael Dietz hit the market in 1857, it had an immediate effect on the whaling industry. Kerosene, known in those days as “Coal Oil,” was easy to make, cheap, smelled better than animal fuel when burned, and didn’t spoil on the shelf like whale oil. The public abandoned the whale oil lamp almost overnight. By 1860, at least 30 kerosene plants were being produced in the United States, and whale oil was eventually removed from the market. When sperm oil dropped to 40 cents a gallon in 1895, due to lack of demand, refined petroleum, which was in great demand, sold for less than 7 cents a gallon. …

Read more: Geology of the San Joaquin Valley

The rapid replacement of traditional energy sources simply does not happen with the green revolution, because green energy is too expensive. Regulatory hostility is destroying old energy, coal and gas – but new energy production is not being built on a sufficient scale to replace fossil fuel plants that have been demolished.

Another option to address the blackout is to relieve political pressure on coal plant operators, restore enough market confidence to repair existing plants and build coal plants. new. A lot of coal plant construction is going on around the world, because burning coal is cheap, even if it has to be imported from Australia. Global coal consumption hits a historic record of 8 billion tons this year. But regulatory hostility in Australia is preventing this obvious solution to our energy shortage.

Overcoming this stalemate will require Australian voters to wake up and elect different politicians. As long as Australians continue to elect pro-Net Zero politicians, as long as Australians continue to mistakenly believe that renewable energy is cheap and will eventually come down, the risk of power outages and energy costs will increase. The spike in volume will continue.