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2 comments on The Bullroarer - Wednesday 12 March 2008
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2 comments on The Bullroarer - Wednesday 12 March 2008
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Big Grids help Big Coal. Absent carbon taxes that is. As with loading of export coal the main thing currently stopping the rise and rise of coal is infrastructure bottlenecks, in the domestic case it is the national grid. Queenslanders want us to know about solar panels and coalbed methane, but to ignore the real emitters. Even the new Kogan Ck station (850 MW if I recall) cuts emissions only a measly 5% relative to the average. Coal power has also featured heavily in flows of the Basslink HVDC cable. Tasmania went from 0% coal power in 2005 to an anecdotal 10% and rising in 2008 because of the extreme dry.
I'd like a couple of things to happen;
1) NEMMCO to publish 'State of Origin' transmission data, in a format we can understand
2) our new PM (who now wears a Kyoto scout badge) to tell us why coal production keeps going up.
Its easy enough to tell where the power comes from - just add up the regional production numbers and consumption numbers and you'll quickly see who is exporting power to whom.
Big grids are actually the key to harnessing large scale renewables, so personally I'm in favour of them (coupled with extensive use of solar hot water, PV, and insulation - plus some re-engineering of our cities).