Like all good energy nerds, I keep track of my old electricity bills. I recently stumbled across an old spreadsheet with some analysis of different retailer offers from the time my wife and I moved into our house back in 2010. I was curious to see how much our bills had changed so I started …
The renewable energy sector continues to demonstrate it is largely COVID-proof with continuing growth in the pipeline of projects, based on the latest data from the Clean Energy Regulator (CER). In the longer term the recently launched NSW electricity infrastructure roadmap will stimulate many more projects, but the newest utility-scale plants are in Victoria and …
Grattan’s latest energy analysis has provoked much debate in the media including pushback on some of its conclusions from the federal government and the gas network sector, amongst others. Grattan’s main thesis is that the idea of a gas-led recovery is a mirage and would require massive government subsidies. They go further and say that …
The energy transition brings with it big and bold plans for megaprojects, futuristic technologies and radical new business models. As a cautionary tale we consider some of the spectacular failures of the last decade. Remember when a Perth based company was going to build the world’s tallest structure in the mid-west of WA? The solar …
The energy culture wars continue unabated (pun intended) with recent news reports of how pumped hydro and/or gas peakers compare to batteries. Firstly, NSW environment minister Matt Kean reportedly argued that renewables plus “storage and demand response” are cheaper and better than traditional coal and gas. Second, Victorian Energy policy centre director Bruce mountain continues …
The Clean Energy Regulator has provided its monthly update on renewables progress in Australia. An anaemic 3MW of new accredited projects in September appears to be a temporary lull likely affected by COVID constraints on construction and similar activities. In the two prospective categories of “committed and “probable”. Committed projects are defined as those that …
One of the key reforms arising from the Finkel review was the introduction of the integrated system plan (ISP). By mapping out some plausible scenarios for changes in electricity use and the generation mix over the next few decades, the market operator (AEMO) was able to identify a business case for several large scale transmission …
This morning’s news showed the contrasting fortunes of two of the NEM’s coal plant owners. While Trevor St Baker’s Delta was celebrating the Morrison government’s largesse in supporting an upgrade of his Vales Point coal plant in NSW, the AGL Board was nursing a black eye from a shareholder resolution to accelerate the closure of …
The latest in a series of reports from Australia’s peak gas industry bodies makes the case for low and zero carbon gas playing a key role in decarbonising the Australian energy sector. The gas collective commissioned Frontier Economics to model three ways to decarbonise: full electrification; renewable fuels (hydrogen and biogas) and zero-carbon fuels (as …
