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Queensland breaks the unthinkable tabboo, saves $26b and keeps old coal plants running *til 2046*!

Fantasy art, girl, fairy, spell, pagan, witchcraft, wolf, night. Sorcery.

Art by Syaifulptak

By Jo Nova

Queensland has opened the veil of Sauron — toying with planetary ostracism, death, fire, and cosmic doom.

QLD, Queensland, Map, AustraliaThe State Government shattered the taboo, asking: “Should we build the pumped hydro to bend the jet streams — or save $26 billion dollars and keep the coal plants instead?

In a brave move they added up the costs of storing sacred green electrons in an artificial lake upon the mount, and decided they’d rather save the money and just stick with perfectly serviceable, reliable coal plants. Turn on the lights.

This move will save every household in Queensland $1000.

Somewhere, a thousand bureaucrats are shrieking.  The government are summoning forbidden megawatts from the underworld. They’re calling back the black fire! And not just for a few cowardly years, but for two whole decades.  The oracles of Paris will not forgive this.

Queensland scraps Labor power plan in favour of ‘$26bn cheaper option’

By Sarah Elks, The Australian

Queenslanders will be saved $26bn – or $1000 a household – by keeping coal-fired power stations open for longer and scrapping or downsizing enormous pumped hydro schemes, Treasury analysis suggests.

Energy Minister David Janetzki said the new Treasury modelling indicated the former Labor government’s renewable energy plan – which hinged on building one of the world’s biggest pumped hydro facilities in north Queensland – would have cost the state $86bn in capital expenditure to 2035.

The big danger in messing with the delicate Green social conditioning is that if word gets out, this kind of rampant clear-thinking might spread.

If the e-Safety commissioner doesn’t ban discussion of cheap coal plants fast enough, other states will hear about this. Consider the state next door, where the owners of Tomago Aluminium Smelter just gave warning that they will have to close down because electricity costs are too high. They’re not waiting for New South Wales to build another 50 Gigawatts of wind and solar, Rio Tinto just don’t see any future where electricity is cheaper.

If only we had vast brown coal seams, or the worlds largest uranium deposit…?

Tomago on death row and due to close in 2028 with no end in sight to high energy costs

By Brad Thompson, The Australian

Rio Tinto is preparing to make a final call on the future of the Tomago aluminium smelter and its more than a thousand workers which could be out of a job by 2028.

The mining giant, its partners and the New South Wales and federal governments cannot solve the problem of high east coast energy prices that make the smelter an unviable future prospect.

A legacy coal power supply contract with AGL Energy expires in three years’ time, at which point Tomago will likely shut forever. To stay in business, it is faced with paying twice as much for its electricity needs beyond that date, a scenario that Rio and its partners are unlikely to support.

If Queensland doesn’t turn into horned turnip or a snivelling hunchback, other states might get the crazy idea that they can do this too.

Especially when the businesses move to Queensland…

 

9.9 out of 10 based on 135 ratings

127 comments to Queensland breaks the unthinkable tabboo, saves $26b and keeps old coal plants running *til 2046*!

  • #
    Just Thinkin'

    Common sense RULES.

    490

    • #
      Steve

      We’ll see. Common sense is back in the game, but it hasn’t won yet. It’s going to take years to undo the damage of 30 years of nonsensical green energy policies.

      770

      • #
        wal1957

        Correct.
        This could all flip on its head at the next election or change of leader.
        As for the “modelling”? This word has zero value. The climate mongers destroyed any trust that I might have had in “the modelling”.

        330

    • #
      Geoff

      If the Federal government paid Queensland say A$5B/year subsidy on renewables with the condition that they shut coal fired power-stations, Queensland would begin shutting same.

      If this sounds like Rio and the Gladstone power-station you would be correct. The power-station provides low cost power for an aluminium smelter. The state government hiked the tax on thermal coal. Rio made a deal with the Federal Government to convert to renewables and shut the money source to the state government.

      This will shut the aluminium smelter which will make the Qld grid unstable.

      Not one of the government bean counters would think or care about what would happen 5 years from now. They do not create beans. The word Bean counter is very misleading. It should be Counter of beans. Over at Rio they know exactly what they are doing ie making money out of manipulating government bean counters, not aluminium.

      Government rarely asks a Counter of beans to project the count at year six. They get elected every 3 or 4 years.

      Governments condone this behaviour as they do not create Beans. They count your Beans.

      Meanwhile Rio’s beans remain uncountable.

      242

    • #
      Hanrahan

      We once elected Campbell Newman, a breath of fresh air, an actual conservative and three years later the same ‘ole “mediscare” campaign destroyed him.

      Having the government pick the pockets of everyone else on your behalf [socialism] is an intoxicating power.

      330

    • #
      Exsteelworker

      Queensland will be charging NSW, VICTORIA 200% more for electricity when their ALBO NET ZERO FANTASY comes crashing down, unless NSW grows a brain and keeps their coal plants going for 40 years..bwahaha

      30

  • #
    Erasmus

    Coal is reborn. They have rolled away the stone that was designed to crush western nations.

    400

  • #
    Steve

    If the e-Safety commissioner doesn’t ban discussion of cheap coal plants fast enough, other states will hear about this.

    Especially once Queenslanders start posting their declining utility bills on social media.

    With it’s wealth of dirt cheap brown coal, there is absolutely no reason that Australia should have significantly higher electricity costs than New Zealand, or America for that matter. The only reason Australia’s electricity costs more is government interference in energy markets. Stop their meddling and energy prices will sink like a stone.

    https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/cost-of-electricity-by-country

    560

    • #
      Graham Richards

      “ Stop their meddling and energy prices will sink like a stone. “

      Stop the subsidies & the foreign leaches will have no benefits funded by the tax payer. They’ll leave in a great hurry.

      Next, flip the switch on the interconnection between the southern states OR CHARGE extra high prices per kw/hr, They’ll have to rely on their ever increasing overpriced energy. We’ll soon see others dumping the net zero lunacy. We will no longer play the leftoids games. It’s over!

      361

      • #
        RickWill

        Nothing will change unless the NEM get back to sensible bidding intervals and require bidding generators to be dispatchable. And rooftops need to pay for grid services if they are exporting.

        141

        • #
          Forrest Gardener

          I agree about the bidding regime and the imperative for dispatchable power.

          My fee for connecting to the grid is currently $1.38 per day.
          How much should I be paying for grid services?

          30

        • #
          ozfred

          And rooftops need to pay for grid services if they are exporting.

          Do you have a number on how much the coal fired plants are paying for grid services?
          In any case, the financial case for roof top solar is avoidance of having to pay grid supplied power prices. The roughly $0.07/kwh I receive for my exports is likely reasonable given the distance I am from the coal/gas fired generating units (transmission line distance being longer than the crow would fly).
          At the moment, this minor dollar reduction (exports) makes battery installation financially questionable. And I would certainly add some winter positioned solar panels if the export rate was reduced to zero. Which it would be (now) if I wanted inverters cumulatively rated over 5 kW (which would actually useful in winter).

          10

          • #
            Hanrahan

            Do you have a number on how much the coal fired plants are paying for grid services?

            That’s stoopid, they meet 100% of the cost to provide power to their fence. The price received is the electrical equivalent of FOB for iron ore, cost free at the substation. Everything after that is buyer’s responsibility

            30

        • #
          Helen Brimstone

          Do we even my NEM, AEMO and all the other bureaucracies designed to obfuscate decision making and accountability.

          How did we ever manage without them? Actually, really well!!!

          70

      • #
        Sceptical Sam

        Graham Richards said:
        flip the switch on the interconnection between the southern states OR CHARGE extra high prices per kw/hr,

        There’s a 3rd option, GR.
        Withdraw from the NEM.
        Give QLD industry a massive competitive advantage.

        Build a couple of HELE generators.

        111

    • #
      Mike Jonas

      Nice thought, but regrettably the renewable cost has all been sunk and can’t be recovered. Costs will decline relative to woke states, but maybe not all that dramatically.
      When a rogue government steals your money, it’s hard to get it back.

      40

  • #
    Murray Shaw

    Well May we say “Blessed are the Peacemakes”, but I say the real people that need blessing ar e those that can see beyond the renewables “zeitgeist”.(apologies to Gough), for they shall inherit the wealth that will be wasted.

    Queenslanders should be out dancing in the streets much as those in Israel and Gaza are doing, the worm has turned. The unspeakable has been spoken.

    410

  • #
    David Maddison

    Energy Minister David Janetzki said the new Treasury modelling indicated

    Part of the problem with Australia is that our politicians and the senior public serpents who tell them what to think are frequently staggeringly clueless, the products of a dumbed-down “education” system, possess little general knowledge and have little real world experience, including never having worked in proper jobs of any kind.

    Somewhere in their miserable, pointless lives they have heard the term “modelling” and thought it’s cool. They probably picked it up when they heard of discussion of fake climate models at some taxpayer-funded holiday to a climate crisis conference or from anti-energy propaganda.

    In this case, by accident or not, it’s fortunate that their model gave the common sense correct answer.

    Models ought not to be a substitute for basic knowledge and common sense. Models should only be used once one already has deep knowledge of a topic, not something that any politician, public serpent or indeed taxpayer-funded “scientist” is likely to have. And they should only be used once they’ve been extensively validated, i.e. that they are a proven correct representation of the system they purport to represent. Otherwise its just a case of the concept that used to be taught in computer science back in the day, GIGO, garbage in garbage out.

    Modelling in relation to anything to do with climate is overused and generally meaningless. Common sense and a “back of an envelope calculation” or even mental arithmatic in this case would have given the required and obvious answer.

    No “model” was needed to conclude the obvious.

    530

    • #
      Tony Dique

      Hallelujah!

      150

    • #
      William

      In this case the modelling was more a basic economic assessment – probably the only fantasy figures involved were the modelling were the figures Labor used to spruke the pumped hydro battery. Using the disastrous Snowy2 as an indicator, those figures may have understated the true cost of the ‘battery’ by 900% so the true saving is probably much greater than we are reading now. And add in the savings fom not having to build new transmission lines.

      220

    • #
      Helen Brimstone

      When you look at leftists, including LINOs, you are forced to conclude they couldn’t model play dough, let alone climate or the economy.

      110

    • #
      Sceptical Sam

      Validate the models.
      Have you ever seen a validation?

      30

  • #
    Neville

    I hope they are fair dinkum, but time will tell.
    Other states will hurl abuse and threaten the QLD govt and clueless Albo and B O Bowen will have several fits and roll on the ground screaming and yelling that they must follow their science and surrender to Putin and the CCP.
    Anyway I hope it’s all true but I’ll only believe it when I see it and let’s hope Rio Tinto have the balls and continue to hang tough in NSW.

    230

    • #
      PeterPetrum

      and clueless Albo and B O Bowen will have several fits and roll on the ground screaming and yelling that they must follow their science and surrender to Putin and the CCP.

      Already happening. Bowen spitting chips this morning and threatening to blame QLD if national climate targets not met. QLD gave him the finger.

      180

  • #
    Penguinite

    Might have to change the name to ‘KingsLand’

    If only Tasmania could see the light instead of the debt train heading their way!

    180

  • #
    Johnny Rotten

    The QLD Treasury people should give their Model(s) to the Feral Guv’ment Treasury people so that they can properly advise Blackout Bowen. That is, if Blackout Bowen can reveal the true cost of the ‘Ruinables’ Transition. Full costs to 2035/2050 please including all replacement costs as the solar and Wind Turbine stuff will need replacing along the way.

    Then, the Feral Treasury people can model all of that against Coal Fired Plants and Nuclear Plants too while they are at it. I bet I can guess the outcome of that, if and only if, everything is done above board.

    The modelled reduction in electricty prices as well please.

    Fat chance of that happening I know.

    180

  • #
    TdeF

    Wind and sun are free?
    But nowhere near where people live.
    And coal and gas and uranium are free too.

    290

    • #
      Dennis

      But all operating at the same time delivering combined installed capacity is needed, but that doesn’t often happen.

      It has been pointed out that wind and solar need power station generators back up, but power stations do not need wind and solar in the system.

      70

      • #
        Ronin

        ” but power stations do not need wind and solar in the system.”

        In fact wind and solar make operating proper power stations that much more difficult and shortens their life.

        160

    • #
      Gazzatron

      More importantly, Wind and Sun cannot provide “free” energy without a device to convert the energy into something usable, and those devices are certainly not free, not green, not ecologically viable, yet they’re covering the countryside like a plague.
      Bowen and other climate scam zealots childish quote of “the wind and sun are free” should be easily destroyed in seconds with this fact yet they’ve been saying it for years unchallenged by journalists etc.

      10

  • #
    TdeF

    Wind and sun are cheaper. But the havesting devices only last twenty years at best. And then you have nothing.

    320

    • #
      markx

      That should be a catch cry TdeF

      Wind and sun are free?
      Well, coal and gas and uranium are free too.
      In all cases some equipment and effort is required to harvest this free material.

      180

      • #
        TdeF

        And we don’t need $20Bn Snowy II or far more expensive National Grid to put all power in Canberra and nothing else. Power stations should be next to population centres. Otherwise they are ultra high voltage and run over the tops of the country people anyway, achieving nothing.

        Free is not free if you spend more collecting the free power than it is worth. And generate more CO2 building these temporary things than you save, if that was the intent.

        Most of what has been spent in the last 20 years is a complete waste of money. Meanwhile the 28 locks on the Murray protect many from drought. The Thomson dam in Victoria gives Melbourne ten years of water. And the original Snowy Scheme was worthwhile. Plus all the coal power stations which are still running the place.

        If you take our the notion of agricultural land gone to seed as a positive good, total National Co2 output has dropped 3% for hundreds of billions of dollar building nothing. What a disgrace!

        But at least we have paid for China to build the world’s biggest navy, army and nuclear ICBMs and put stations on the moon and generate 40% of the world’s CO2. The generosity of our politicians is unbelievable. And for that China sent us a killer virus, compliments of the Chinese Army Virus laboratory in Wuhan.

        190

    • #
      Dennis

      Codrington Wind Farm Victoria end of life, not being replaced, not cost effective for shareholders …

      https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14760031/Codrington-Pacific-Blue-windfarm-Victoria.html

      50

      • #
        PeterPetrum

        The wind farm generates enough energy required to power 10,000 homes each year

        Only when they are actually rotating- so realistically 20% of that figure which is 2,000 homes equivalent each year.

        100

        • #
          TdeF

          On a windless hot summer’s night in Adelaide’s summer, sometimes for weeks, there is nothing. But at least the SA Government has their giant diesels at Elizabeth. You don’t want tax collection to stop.

          90

    • #
      Mike Haseler (Scottish Sceptic)

      When all the subsidies and imposed penalties are eliminated so they compete in a free market wind is more expensive, off shore a lot more expensive and at least in the UK solar is so prohibitively expensive to had to be a madman to even consider it as a source of power. Howe they have managed to brainwash people into believe black is white is incredible.

      80

  • #
    Ken Stewart

    Life is great in the Sunshine State!

    200

    • #
      Neville

      I know it’s great Ken, but I only wish you’d comment here a lot more and use the data to dispel Labor’s BS and nonsense over the last few decades. Just saying.

      70

      • #
        Ken Stewart

        I regret I have slowed down a bit.

        Want some data? In sunny Queensland, the sunshine state, where solar generation should be most efficient, utility solar has averaged 15.5% capacity factor, rooftop solar 14.25%. Whereas coal has an average of 65.72%. Because of curtailment in the middle of the day rooftop solar CF an only get worse.

        130

    • #
      Graham Richards

      Shhhhh! We don’t need a rush of 3rd worlders making the population explosion & unemployment worse than it needs to be!

      61

    • #
      Jon Rattin

      Change their famous tourism slogan…

      “Queensland- impaired one day, functional the next.”

      160

  • #
    Neville

    I’m sure the CCP will not like this news from QLD and won’t like this clear thinking spreading to other states and Albo could enlist their help to quickly smack down QLD’s insolence.

    121

    • #
      Tel

      It pretty much has crushed Australian industrial production … although arguably there has been multiple crushing blows.

      At least you can still get a nice coffee in Australia. The espresso machines will keep going … while the sun shines, and who drinks coffee at night anyhow? See! All hope is not lost … our economy can run on baristas, bartenders and hairdressing.

      When the CCP military rolls up, we can offer them a gum leaf tea.

      210

      • #
        Lawrie

        Pretty much sums up our current situation. I just heard from a friend who has irrigation in the South of NSW. It costs him over $250 per megalitre to irrigate his wheat. The reason for this excess price is the amount of water that is redirected to “save the environment”. Plibersek and other useless politicians do not consider that without the dams that previous generations built to store irrigation water, the environment would have some very dry times rather than the constant surplus it now suffers under. The biggest waster of water in the Murray Darling system is Lake Alexandrina in SA where evaporation uses more than the irrigators. How about returning to nature and open the barrage and restoring the real environment?

        210

  • #
    Graeme No.3

    Tomago on death row and due to close in 2028 with no end in sight to high energy costs
    By Brad Thompson, The Australian

    This would cause problems with renewables; not being able to reduce output when renewables DO NOT deliver, as do most aluminium sites in Australian.

    170

    • #
      TdeF

      No one talks about the 35% CO2 tax the ‘biggest polluters’ have to pay under the Safguard Mechanism. All smelters, including Tomago, have to pay tax on CO2 because not only do they use vast amounts of energy, but their basic product is CO2. That’s how Al2O3 is reduced to Al metal by using Carbon anodes, producing CO2.

      The anodes are consumed during the process, reacting with oxygen from the alumina to form carbon monoxide. The basic chemical reaction is: 2Al2O3+3C => 4Al+3CO2. Polluters! They need to be punished and shut down with punitive taxes. We give thanks to mighty Albanese and his powerful Safeguard Mechanism, protecting the world from Carbon Dioxide.

      There is no future in Australia for smelters. Steel, aluminum, copper, zinc,… Or for the manufacture and use of Concrete, made from CaCO3 -> CaO+CO2. B*stards. We do not need concrete. And we can buy it from China.

      And then your get all those gigantic trucks and endless trains and ships for our exports of coal and iron ore and gold and everything else. They should be electric, powered by renewable magic electrons and Chinese trucks and trains. Tax them all out of existence. CO2 producers are evil.

      Plus aircraft. 35% tax on aviation fuel won’t be noticed in the ticket price. But only politicians and public servants should fly and they don’t pay their own bills. We do.

      340

      • #
        TdeF

        What’s wonderfully evil in the safeguard mechanism is the ability to give discounts for silence, so the buying public, even the newspapers are completely unaware of the world’s biggest 35% carbon tax. You will first start to notice it when the price of transport and flying doubles. And the smelters start to close, along with whole cities. But it’s fine. We can buy all we need from China who pay us in windmills and solar panels for the coal and iron ore we no longer need. It’s a complete ego system for Chris Bowen, minister without a brain.

        240

      • #
        Lawrie

        You sound angry and so you should be. We should all be angry that our once prosperous and largely self sufficient country has been reduced to a gravel pit and farm. City folk don’t understand that they seldom create wealth but simply shovel it around. Wealth creation occurs when something of small value is converted to a higher value with the input of energy either physical, mechanical or chemical. If all that energy including manpower is too expensive then we do not progress past the low value product. That is where we are at now and what value adding we still have is in jeopardy thanks to the socialists.

        180

        • #
          Gazzatron

          Ex Federal Qld Senator Gerard Rennick described “value adding” in a simple but brilliant way on the latest 2 Worlds Collide podcast, “add a bull to a paddock of 20 cows and you’ve likely doubled your herd in a short time with 20+ calves born”.
          Nature has provided us with vast natural resources that we can choose to value add or simply sell off at bargain prices with little benefit to our population, another example was bauxite, it was banned (at least in Qld) from being exported as a raw mineral, so then value adding was created of turning it into alumina at refineries for further refinement and export. Creating wealth, jobs, economic prosperity, manufacturing etc.

          20

      • #
        David of Cooyal in Oz

        Gee TdeF,
        I hope my long ago chemistry is still true and your first equation should end in loverly CO2, and not that poisonous CO.
        Cheers,
        Dave B

        50

    • #
      Graham Richards

      Ahhh, just maybe Gen Corp won’t be needing that $600,000,000.00 subsidy to continue with the Mt Isa smelter. If SA followed Queensland Whyalla wouldn’t need subsidising $ millions until it finally dies from energy chaos!

      The people are waking ( not Woking ). It needs to speed up there’s not much time left before there are more closures & poverty sets in!!

      151

      • #
        Graeme4

        Would have been cheaper to give all adults in Whyalla a quarter of a million dollars each to relocate, then shut the plant down.

        150

  • #
    Ronin

    Wind is free but yachts are expensive to own and maintain.
    TNSTAFL

    220

  • #
    David Maddison

    If the e-Safety commissioner doesn’t ban discussion of cheap coal plants fast enough, other states will hear about this.

    That’s why the Left are keen to have questioning of supposed anthropogenic climate change classified as “misinformation” and made illegal. (E.g. the present Australian Senate inquiry https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Information_Integrity_on_Climate_Change_and_Energy/ClimateIntegrity ) .

    Their whole Civilisation-destroying anti-energy narrative is falling apart.

    Plus questioning is how you do science, not that the Left would know that. That’s why they use nonsensical terms like “settled science”.

    Real scientists, not taxpayer-funded political propagandists such as in CSIRO or BoM, ask questions to challenge existing ideas out of curiosity, then formulate testable hypotheses as part of the process of experimentation and discovery.

    It’s all part of the Scientific Method.

    At least, that’s how science used to be taught, back in the day.

    170

    • #
      Forrest Gardener

      Indeed. The term “settled science” fits neatly with “safe and effective” and no doubt many other political slogans.

      100

      • #
        Mike Haseler (Scottish Sceptic)

        What gets me, is not that the jab proved to be a disaster. But that despite the evidence being quite clear it was a disaster and very numerous, and despite it being very high profile and well known it was a disaster, the “powers that be” simply refuse to accept that fact many years after. So, not only the easiest such big mistake to excuse as it was an “emergency”**, but the one that most people know about.

        So, what about all the other mistakes … not a cat in hell’s chance that any will be admitted.

        So, not so much the “tip” of a very large iceberg, but there certainly has got to be many many many many more scandals that are actively being hidden by a very corrupt industry.

        **And even that doesn’t now stack up. A once in ten year event for flu, was turned into the end of the world by a deluge of psychologically manipulative … well it can only be described as brainwashing … given how so many people just refuse to accept the many peer reviewed studies that now show the jab was not “safe” nor “effective”.

        80

    • #
      David of Cooyal in Oz

      An insightful statement I read in a flight magazine back in the 70’s, which I claim to have remembered correctly, has helped me considerably since:
      “A good scientist is always sceptical”.

      But, no, I’m not a scientist but do apply my scepticism quite regularly, and necessarily.

      80

  • #
    Neville

    Why can’t the QLD govt just quote the CSIRO / ABC cost estimate of a large Nuclear power station of 8.5 billion $ ?
    Then compare that to Renew Economy’s quote of up to 9 TRILLION $ for toxic, unreliable and environment destroying W & S?
    Just divide say 10 Nuclear power stns cost into 9 TRILLION $ = 105 times more for toxic, unreliable W & S.
    So how many more hospitals, schools, roads, AI centres etc could we build with the money left over? Just asking?

    140

    • #
      Graeme4

      I was surprised that Queensland households would only save $1000 a year by keeping coal plants running. Compared to the huge cost of renewables plus backup, I would have expected the savings to be at least double that amount.

      110

      • #
        Neville

        Graeme4 I also think it could be double or even more, but I’m not an expert.

        50

        • #
          Lawrie

          Apparently we all need to be experts. The sex discrimination commissioner is a woman (by my observation) but she doesn’t know what a man is. She obviously missed out on the “you show me yours and I’ll show you mine” moment in kindergarten. She says she is not a doctor or some such so can’t comment on what a biological man is. I wonder how she approaches the weather. Does she consult a meteorologist to tell her what to wear each day?

          120

          • #
            wal1957

            These are the people who I would like to ignore completely.
            Unfortunately she is also in a position that has some authority with it.

            In the loony world that we are now part of I think having a sex discrimination commissioner who doesn’t know what a man is seems to be par for the course.
            How can she do her job without knowing that basic biology?
            I suspect she does know but she walks in social circles where being politically correct is all important.

            What next? A defence minister who doesn’t know what a gun is?

            80

            • #
              ozfred

              A defence minister who doesn’t know what a gun is?
              WA already has a premier who does not understand what guns (at least rifles) are used for in rural communities.

              70

      • #
        ozfred

        Queenslanders will be saved $26bn – or $1000 a household
        If the Australian population of 26 million was considered (rather than just the QLD population) the numbers appear more logical.

        10

        • #
          Davidsb

          So….assuming you are correct, then that means that each Australian househild comprises just one person…..

          Well, my niece and her partner live together in WA, so there’s at least one empty house somewhere in Australia….

          ;¬)

          00

      • #
        David of Cooyal in Oz

        Isn’t it great that we can have valid challenges to this low estimate which is very safe politically and far better than that other, famous and fictitious estimate of $275.

        20

      • #
        Mike Jonas

        It isn’t double because the renewables money has already been spent and you can’t get it back. So coal will just stop the rot from growing worse.

        20

  • #
    david

    Big Tech builds or restores old nuclear plants for AI etc. Why can’t large mining companies and the like build their own coal / gas plants to ensure their energy needs and sell the left overs to others? Clive Palmer should be in the box seat?

    170

  • #
    RickWill

    The announcement caused me to look at the situation with weather dependent generation in Queensland. And was I surprised. It is far more like South Australia than I had realised with regard stranded assets:

    Last week in QLD wind served 112GWh but was economically curtailed for estimated 73GWh. Grid solar 120GWh served and 74GWh curtailed. Meanwhile rooftops met 245GWh. Coal did the heavy lifting of 724GWh
    https://explore.openelectricity.org.au/energy/qld1/?range=7d&interval=30m&view=discrete-time&group=Detailed

    Considering rooftops have only been on the scene for 10 year or so and they are already taking a large slice of the grid wind and solar demand, it is very clear where it is heading. Last month was the biggest month for rooftop installation yet in Australia and by far the biggest for household batteries. Payback on rooftop solar in Queensland is a few years and batteries around 5 years now as China dumps them into The Australian market.

    Of course rooftops are not going to run smelters but neither are grid wind or solar because their economics are destroyed by rooftops. BSL will only remain viable while there is coal generation and it gets a sweet deal on electricity price.

    The only source of electricity in Australia that is now competitive with rooftops is coal supplied with royalty free cost plus margin. Selling coal to generators at world parity price just guarantees heavy industry demise. Cheap energy and controlled immigration are why Australians have enjoyed a high standard of living over the past century.

    All work on grid scale wind and solar to cease immediately. The NEM bidding interval extended from 5-miniute to at least 24 hour and only dispatchable generators permitted to bid. That does not exclude wind and solar so they have to be paired with dispatchable plant.

    At least there is one State in Australia that is showing a little sense.

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    Neville

    David Crisafulli has now overtaken giggles Miles in number of days served as Premier of QLD and I hope he has the nerve to stand up to the howling and gnashing of teeth that’s coming his way.
    I’ve always had doubts about him and I’ll be very happy if he proves me wrong and I wish him well for the rest of his term in office.

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      RickWill

      He could be the next PM if he wanted. He already has a track record better than any of the current crop in Canberra. And he could install fellow Queenslanders into his cabinet. Pauline for Immigration Minister and Malcolm for Energy Minister.

      The role of the Energy Minister would initially include undoing all thew climate carp.

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    David Cole

    Great work QUEENSLAND! We can hope bandicoot Blowen is about to have vision of what should be done.

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      Jon Rattin

      Maybe Queensland’s shift in energy policy will be an embarrassment to Big Wind Bowen. One can only hope that it would provide a bad look to al the climate sycophants he wants to invite to COP OUT 31 next year and he’ll abandon Australia’s bid to host the event. Saves us money and the airports won’t get clogged with the private jets of all the grifters and charlatans that are attracted to these gatherings.

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    ianl

    Somewhere, a thousand bureaucrats are shrieking.

    A thousand, thousand bureaucrats, actually.

    Oh, and certainly the remaining lignite deposits in Victoria are both shallow and vast, so Yallourn/Loy Yang can motor along quite well for some centuries on existing raw consumption rates.

    But the NSW Hunter also still contains vast and relatively shallow good quality black coal seams, so Eraring/Bayswater/Mt Piper can also motor along quite well for some centuries (with routine maintenance unimpeded by malicious legislation) as well as supplying export income for as long as SE Asia remains a market.

    And the Central Bowen Basin, Q’ld ? …

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      el+gordo

      ‘The Bowen Basin Coalfields contains the largest coal reserves in Australia. This major coal-producing region contains one of the world’s largest deposits of bituminous coal. The Basin contains much of the known Permian coal resources in Queensland including virtually all of the known mineable prime coking coal.’ (wiki)

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      David of Cooyal in Oz

      “And the Central Bowen Basin, Q’ld ? …”

      Perhaps a change of name to start with?

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    Ronin

    One day soon, all states and countries will be doing this, as the realisation hits.

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      Graeme4

      Although WA now imports coal to keep its coal power plants running, the state has adequate supplies of cheap gas to keep the lights on, without adding any more useless wind systems.

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      • #
        Ronin

        Do they get their coal from NSW or Indonesia, I suppose Indonesia is closer.

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        • #
          Graeme4

          Both locations I believe. It’s interesting that they can import the coal from some distances away, cart it by road up to the coal power stations, and still manage to produce electricity at a cheap rate.

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        ozfred

        Should the WA government declare the WA coal mining companies bankrupt and up for sale? Apparently it is the interest payments that are making the mining process non-financial.
        Acquisition at a reasonable price would restore “profitability”
        And Collie might appreciate the jobs and associated $$

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        • #
          Graeme4

          I doubt that the Collie workers are that clued in to what’s going on. Despite the fact that the only major jobs there are the coal power stations, they are very Labor-oriented and have opposed adding a nuclear power station there for more jobs.

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            Sceptical Sam

            I continue to shake my head at the naivety of coal workers and their unions.

            They’re not dumb. And nor are the unions. But something is seriously missing in their analysis.

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        Gazzatron

        Graeme4 that’s not correct, WA isn’t importing coal, that was only a one off situation in 2023 when Premier coal was caught short in it’s ability to supply Muja and Collie A power stations for a month or so.
        I think accuracy of information is important in these discussions.

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    Ross

    Love that Janetski bloke!!!! If only we had another 6 like him in all the states and federal level. Seems like he’s able to overcome the Qld public service as well, somehow. Or maybe they were half decent in the first place? The heads of the state bureaucracies here in Victoria nearly all have links to the Labor party. DOGE is required bit time.

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    TdeF

    When I started commenting, my one fact was that C14 proves only 2.0% of atmospheric CO2 is fossil fuel. This is basically because 2.0% of the ocean CO2 is now non radioactive fossil fuel and we have equilibrium of 50:1, almost all CO2 being in the oceans where life started. If CO2 vanished from our air, life in the oceans would continue along with oxygen production from phytoplankton which started the story. With a lifespan in days they grab every bit of excess CO2 as we have seen. Although NASA and the CSIRO call the massive growth of phytoplankton and trees ‘fertilization’ to hide the fact that all life is made from CO2 and only CO2 and water.

    But since then I have realised that CO2 is in such massive rapid exchange there is NOTHING humans can do to change atmospheric CO2. Nothing. And nothing we have done, no 8x growth in population, no explosion in use of fossil fuels by China. CO2 is completely oblivious to all human activity, bushfires, volcanoes, cars, ships and planes (2020 world lockdown). It’s all in the graph of CO2. A dead straight line at 0.4% slope.

    So all this shutting down of smelters, taxing people to climate extinction, closing manufacturing is fake. And the only people profiting massively from it all are China, who are exempt for reasons Albanese does not explain with his ‘fun fact’s.

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      TdeF

      And one thing I find fascinating is that CO2 growth is 0.4% but fossil fuel output is now 1%.

      So the proponents of man made CO2 growth have decided that 53% of fossil fuel CO2 stays in the air forever. I have no idea how they explain this most remarkable phenomenon?

      I did read some story of a saturated ocean but even then why half? Why any? It’s like CO2 immigration, every second molecule is told not to be dissolved and not to come back again. An entirely new concept in physics and physical chemistry.

      But we should just close those coal power stations and help Professor Bowen reach his targets. With leaders like Bowen, you realise Winston Churchill was just a flash in the pan. And Albanese would have done a deal with Herr Hitler in a heartbeat.

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        el+gordo

        CO2 lags temperature and as temps decline CO2 follows, using stomatal instead of ice cores.

        ‘Atmospheric CO2 concentrations were found to have decreased rapidly from c. 260 ppmv to 210–215 ppmv within 200 years during the Allerød (GI-1)/Younger Dryas (GS-1) transition.

        ‘After 100–200 years, CO2 concentration started to gradually increase to 270–290 ppmv at the end of the Younger Dryas stadial (GS-1).

        ‘CO2 concentrations were relatively stable during the early Holocene, except for a short-lived period of lower (240–250 ppmv) values c. 11 350–11 200 cal yr BP.’ (Rundgren et al)

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          el+gordo

          The reason stomata gives us a more accurate picture of atmospheric CO2.

          ‘During the Holocene, almost all stomata CO2 reconstructions are on average 30 to 40 ppmv higher than ice core CO2 concentrations, with higher amplitude variability. It is widely recognized that the average of stomata CO2 reconstructions are consistently higher than Antarctic ice-core CO2 values.’ (Renee Hannon 2024)

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          TdeF

          As I write often, ice cores are amazing. Except the last 250 years of data is not from ice cores. It is from compressed snow called ‘firn’ which is twice the volume of ice. You have to get enough snow above and pressure to create solid metamorphic ice. And given that at -50C CO2 under pressure can become solid or liquid, it can still diffuse from the O2/CO2, creating a drop in CO2/N2. And of course instantaneous laboratory measurements are neither.

          There is nothing wrong with the excellent measurement but there is something very wrong in experimental science to join ice to firn to laboratory measurements as if they are the same thing. The same was true of Michael Mann’s joining of tree rings to thermometers to his own fantasy. And he still insists that the publicly funded data is his personal property.

          Also in studying the ice core spectra, one of the tricks of analysis is to estimate the resolution of the process by looking at the widths of peaks. The minimum width is about the resolution and as far as I can see, this is about 2,000 years. Averaging the last 250 years over 2,000 years would completely flatten the alleged peak. So now the CO2 excursion looks just like it did the last few times.

          And it’s this anomaly on this graph which is the only alleged evidence that CO2 levels are suddenly higher in the last 250 years. That in turn is the ONLY reason for shutting down power stations and passing laws about the weather and even commenting on causes of the weather. Apart from openly Communist politicians like Albanese and Bandt who are just itching to control everybody, as during the Chinese Army manufactured and spread Wuhan Virus disaster, about which we are not allowed talk either.

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      RickWill

      It’s all in the graph of CO2. A dead straight line at 0.4% slope.

      You need to put your glasses on when looking at charts. That one is nothing like a straight line.

      And it is even clearer when the baseline is shifted to the post WW2 period:
      https://www.scrippsco2.ucsd.edu/assets/graphics/png/mlo_record.png?1736161565769

      Increase was 22ppm in the first two decades compared with 48 for the for the last two decades. So rate of rise has more than doubled over that 85 year period.

      Sort of matches the steady increase in carbon burnt:
      https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.theconversation.com%2Ffiles%2F631317%2Foriginal%2Ffile-20241112-15-p04afe.png%3Fixlib%3Drb-4.1.0%26q%3D45%26auto%3Dformat%26w%3D1000%26fit%3Dclip&f=1&nofb=1&ipt=676fb76d1b2dfd3b76d11ad3b4fd6f319f58fc0eaa21bbe3304bc946ce3e94d8

      Not quite in line with the growth in carbon burnt. It has tippled in the same period. So some carbon being lost from the atmosphere through sequestering processes.

      Both Chine and India are doing the heavy lifting in restoring CO2 to abundance rather than starvation level. I applaud their efforts. USA has joined the winning team now and at least Queensland has made a small step in the right direction for all Australians.

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    Tony Tea

    It’s unlike a political party to hide its light under a bushel. The LNP say they will save $26 billion by not building stupid schemes, but you can bank on it that if they did indeed build said stupid schemes, it would cost a lot more than a measly $26 billion. If I were doing Bowen Maths, I’d say we were saving $52 billion. Or even twice $86 billion for the scrapped pumped hydro boondoggle.

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    David Maddison

    And all I hear from the fake conservative Liberal Party is silence.

    They just don’t have a clue, and don’t want to win an election in any case. They dont want to govern over an economic basket case and have to make the harsh and unpopular decisions to fix the economy. Plus, the few remaining Liberals are mostly in safe seats.

    It’s an easy life in Opposition for them with free taxpayer-funded travel and lots of invitations to cocktail parties…

    Australians will just continue to vote for the “free stuff” and the staggering economic incompetence of Labor until the country is effectively bankrupt.

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  • #

    Huh! Data and facts are just so passe! In reality, they actually mean very little really, because you’ll NEVER hear any of them, so the old adage ….. if you don’t hear it, it doesn’t exist, eh!

    Well, Queensland has the youngest fleet of coal fired plants in the Country, and the ONLY plants now referred to as HELE. In actual fact there are four of these plants with six Units. They use SuperCritical technology, just two, and one level lower than the most recent technology, UltraSuperCritical (USC) and Advanced USC, but mostly just USC, (so these Qld ones are just one level lower) where China has nearly all of them.

    These four Queensland plants were (luckily) approved and constructed before the CO2 ‘scare’ really set in.

    So let’s look at some data then, just for kicks eh!

    Callide C – 2 Units – on line in 2001 – Nameplate – 810MW – Total Energy to Qld Grid in 2024 – 2765GWH
    Millmerran – 2 Units – on line in 2002 – Nameplate – 850MW – Total Energy to Qld Grid in 2024 – 5517GWH
    Tarong North – 1 Unit – on line in 2003 – Nameplate – 443MW – Total Energy to Qld Grid in 2024 – 3145GWH
    Kogan Creek – 1 Units – on line in 2007 – Nameplate – 750MW – Total Energy to Qld Grid in 2024 – 4715GWH

    So, the Total Nameplate for JUST 6 Units is 2853MW, and Energy delivered to the Qld grid in 2024 was 16,142GWH. (and that was 25% of ALL Qld power generation for the year, and that just from these six Units)

    Let’s compare that to wind, but not wind in Qld, let’s actually compare it to ….. ALL the wind generation in Australia, and Joanne, thanks for that Post of two days back which told us that there are THIRTY ONE THOUSAND wind turbines in all of Australia. (Okay perhaps a little less in the AEMO comparison area here)

    All of wind in Australia has a Nameplate of 13460MW, and all of them delivered 28199GWH to the Australian grid in 2024.

    So, Industrial wind plant generation has a Nameplate of ….. 4.72 times that of these SIX coal fired Units.

    And yet all that wind can only deliver 1.74 times the total energy to the grid.

    And please please please, don’t even begin to tell me that 91 Industrial wind plants are ….. cheaper than those six Units at four coal fired plants.

    That’s four plants with a life expectancy out to 2050 and longer.

    So, waddyareckon then, are you EVER going to hear this?

    Tony.

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      Forrest Gardener

      Thanks for your work on this. As my mother always said, the truth will find a way out.

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      • #
        ozfred

        the truth will find a way out.
        And then there are the relatives who vow to continue the booster shots and refuse the read the new research papers on vaccine adverse reactions. Perhaps because the results highlighted in the papers never reach the MSM news?

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      Neville

      Tony why has Wiki listed Australia’s Wind capacity factor as 24% today compared to about 30% a few months ago?
      NZ is listed as 40% at this Wiki link and China is 21%. Is there a better site for all countries’ Wind capacity factors?

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_power_by_country

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      • #

        Well, that’s actually something I never would have even considered possible.

        Curtailment ….. and that’s all down to information and explanation from RickWill, and as much as I scoffed at first, he was 100% correct, and that’s a somewhat humbling thing for me, because I thought that wind and solar would NEVER be even considered to be removed from the grid, no matter what, such was the ‘power’ that renewables had at every corner of power generation. I could see coal fired power being the first to go, so this was actually eye opening to see that the ONLY plants being curtailed are wind and solar plants.

        Now, I completely agree with him, to the point that I’m now forming an opinion that this could actually be the death knell for those two renewables of choice.

        I mean, what operator would consider opening a new wind plant if the power that they do even intermittently generate will not be accepted by the grid.

        To highlight this, look at this link to the OpenNEM site for the generated power from the last 365 day year, so right up to yesterday.

        Scroll down a little and look at the text under the list of sources where it says curtailment.

        Just look at the wind power data listing there. That’s 2937GWH. (or 2,937,000MWH)

        Now look at the data for wind on that main list above at the right where it quotes the (and here, I think somewhat questionable but for the purpose of this exercise I’ll use it anyway) cost of wind at $71.43/MWH.

        So, curtailment has cost wind power over the last year around $210 Million, and that’s almost 10% of the total annual income for wind generation.

        That’s why no new wind plants have opened during the last 12 Months.

        Curtailment might just be the finish for wind generation, and added to that there’s major questions about Offshore wind as well, due to the added factor of access to the actual shipping required to construct those offshore wind plants.

        I still find it hard to understand that after so much hype surrounding how good wind power is, that it’s the first to get ‘shot down’ like this.

        And RickWill, thanks for everything in this space. I just would never have believed it.

        Tony.

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      Ross

      …if you don’t hear it, it doesn’t exist, eh!

      In more historical times , religions once “shunned” people. For some, shunning was probably a worse treatment than physical torture. Suddenly all your fellow parishioners were forbidden to talk to you and your opinion was worthless. That’s what seems to happen these days. If you state actual real facts (reality) you’re quickly shunned, censored, defunded. Same applied to any alternate views in medical practice or public health.

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      Graeme4

      Not the youngest – subcritical Bluewaters in Collie WA was opened in 2009.

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    RickWill

    The linked chart should be ringing alarm bells for anyone involved in electricity production in Australia:
    https://explore.openelectricity.org.au/energy/sa1/?range=all&interval=fin-year&view=discrete-time&group=Detailed

    Last year was the first year that generation curtailment was recorded. Grid solar lost 35% of its potential to curtailment and grid wind lost 11%. All of this curtailment was due to erosion of demand by rooftop solar. There was next to no rooftop solar a decade ago. Curtailment is heading to be greater for this financial year. At 10:30am today grid solar pumping out just 11MW with 485MW curtailed.

    There is plenty of roof space left in South Australia to keep the rooftop trend going. And with batteries going in at a great rate there is nothing to stop the progression of that bright yellow slice down into the entire demand.

    Queensland has delayed the inevitable de-industrialisation but it is only a delay. The only way to fix the problem is to restore the electrical grid to an essential service rather than a craps shoot with a throw every 5 minutes. Bidding intervals need to be extended to at least 24 hours and only dispatchable generators permitted to bid. Rooftops have to pay the true cost they impose on the grid.

    Queensland is just a few years behind SA in rooftop penetration. Rooftops served 15% of the QLD demand last January and the rate of uptake is accelerating – rooftops were not measurable 10 years back:
    https://explore.openelectricity.org.au/energy/qld1/?range=all&interval=1M&view=discrete-time&group=Detailed

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    Mike Borgelt

    Meh, just kicking the can down the road 20 years. What is the plan after that? Or when the Gladstone plant closes in 3 years which is 25% of Queensland coal generation. Not that the Chrisafooli government will survive the next election so it won’t be their problem.
    Renewables aren’t getting any better. Solar will never work at night and windmills don’t work unless the wind blows. If they had announced that they intend for nukes to replace the coal plants in 20 years we’d have something, but the ‘fooli is against nukes. We are governed by idiots.
    The ‘fooli could have cancelled the Olympics to save money too.

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      Ross

      Baby steps, I’d say. Remember, we’ve got a whole populace that’s been scared to death from the Climate Change monster. That ship will need a long time to turn around. If you’re in Qld, people need to write, email, talk or comment about what a good job this Janetski bloke is doing. Give them some positive feedback and maybe encourage them to go further. There’s an Overton window of opportunity for every issue and this is no different. Maybe as a resident of another state I might even email him. Cant hurt.

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    Mike Borgelt

    Here’s what’s being generated now:
    https://www.nem-watch.info/widgets/reneweconomy/

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    Selwyn H

    Unfortunately, no-one has mentioned the Borumba Pumped Hydro Scheme near Imbil, west of the Sunshine Coast which the Queensland Government is still planning to build. At present its estimated cost is $18.4 billion dollars but knowing government project cost overruns like the Snowy 2.0 it will cost well over $20 billion dollars if constructed. It will be a bigger “white elephant” than Snowy 2.0 and a waste of tax-payer’s money.

    I have been writing to both of my local MPs who include Queensland’s Environment Minister, Andrew Powell advising them to stop wasting money on engineering design. Instead of building two dams, they should build the replacement lower dam for water supply which the Sunshine Coast will need very shortly with its high population growth. This would also fulfill the LNP’s promise to build a new water supply dam in SE Queensland. So far, a deafening silence from both of them!

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    Neville

    In May 2024 Sky News’ Nick Cater interviewed the Greens’ Tea Tormanen in Finland about their new Nuclear power station and wrote an article. Here’s a few paragraphs of his article.

    “Living next door to Vladimir Putin lends a sharper perspective on matters such as energy security. The pro-nuclear policy shift drew a caustic response from other national Green parties, including Australia’s”.

    “They said we were nuclear shills,” said Tea Törmänen, one of the guiding figures in the Finnish Greens’ pro-nuclear shift. “We thought it was pretty funny to think that the nuclear industry in Finland would have bought the Green Party.”

    “Two years later, Törmänen has every reason to reflect on that decision with satisfaction. On Saturday, as the Finns enjoyed what the media described as a heatwave (a top of 20C in Helsinki), the Finnish electricity grid was 98 per cent carbon-free”.

    “Electricity generation in NSW was releasing 750g of carbon into the atmosphere per megawatt hour of electricity. In Finland, it was 35g”.

    “If the CSIRO’s GenCost report is to be believed, Finnish electricity prices should have gone through the roof a year ago when its newest reactor was turned on. They did not. The retail price of electricity in Finland, which is indexed to the spot market, came down almost immediately”.

    “Finns have been paying around €0.07 a kilowatt (12 Australian cents). Even allowing for transmission costs which are charged separately, Finland has the second-cheapest electricity in Europe”.

    “Were Energy Minister Chris Bowen to spend a few days in Finland, he might realise almost everything he says about nuclear is complete and utter nonsense. This might be why he spent his time in Europe last year trying to sell green hydrogen to the Germans”.

    Finnish Greens’ pro-nuclear shift a lesson for Australia — Menzies Research Centre

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      Neville

      Sorry, that Nick Cater Finland link didn’t highlight, but if you hold your mouse and highlight the link and use copy and paste it takes you to the article.
      BTW here’s the 20 minute interview of Nick Cater talking to the Greens’ Tea Tormanen in Finland.
      Very interesting and I must admit there are some intelligent Greens on our planet.
      Also some very intelligent ex Greens members like Jo Nova.

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1AN0KLrzYHQ&t=1s

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    Dennis

    NSW Labor Government has already compensated Eraring coal fired power station owners to extend operating life by a couple of more years.

    Hopefully the government will now encourage all remaining coal fired power stations to continue operating, and encourage investors to replace or recommission the power stations now shut down, for example Hunter Valley NSW Liddell with 4 units and 2,000 MW installed capacity combined.

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    Dennis

    Old saying that you can’t hide an Elephant in a strawberry patch, Minister Bowen.

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    Johnny Rotten

    ‘No Map Blackout Bowen’, are you listening to QLD and others?

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9r6JVaQ0RvQ

    Only 4 and a half minutes long of Sky News Gold.

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    OldOzzie

    U.K. weather office caught deleting inconvenient climate data

    By Editorial Board – The Washington Times – Friday, October 10, 2025

    It is becoming harder to get away with lying in the age of independent media. Progressives in particular are struggling to safeguard the sacred belief that the planet is on the verge of melting because naughty plebeians keep driving SUVs and using air conditioning.

    Climate change devotees are willing to lie to defend this article of faith.

    Ray Sanders, an engineer by trade, realized this as he double-checked the calculations of the Met Office, the U.K. government agency responsible for guessing whether it will rain in Blighty tomorrow.

    The Met is also known for making bold prognostications about the conditions expected half-a-century from now. “Heatwaves, like that of summer 2018, are now 30 times more likely to happen due to climate change,” it asserts.

    Mr. Sanders investigated each location the Met relied upon to gather temperature readings in making its assertion. He found a bit of mischief that would skew readings, such as thermometers placed in the middle of a parking lot or surrounded by a heat-generating solar panel farm.

    That’s nothing compared to his conclusion that a third of the 302 stations used to compute the country’s average temperature didn’t exist. The Met’s public website included 103 climate stations as the basis for the nationwide average, even though these had closed years or decades ago.

    To make up for the shortfall, the Met says it created “comparable data” from up to six nearby sites that were “well correlated” to the original spot. Mr. Sanders took a seaside town called Lowestoft to question the validity of this method. The only viable “comparable” regions would be located more than 25 miles distant—far from the ocean breeze.

    Rather than admit error, the Met stealthily removed the “Lowestoft” readings recorded after the building’s 2010 closure. It has done likewise with closed stations in Paisley and Nairn.

    This scientific establishment makes a living from government funding. Academics must toe the party line if they seek publication in the sort of scholarly journals that make it possible to secure tenure, or if they want their research bankrolled by the public.

    Climate alarmism has become a billion-dollar industry. Politicians need a constant feed of terrifying tales to justify spending the public treasure on uneconomic energy projects.

    When the models foretelling cataclysm are rooted in made-up thermometer readings, skepticism is entirely appropriate.

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    doc

    Good old Queensland.
    Joe Bjelke got it rolling years ago when he killed death duties. People and businesses fled to Queensland in a semblance of Gazans racing back to their home areas. All States followed as they saw the avalanche of disappearing mobile citizens heading for Queensland.

    Now the Qld Premier has broken out of the pathological disease of hating fossil fuels where the Bowen cure is worse than the non-existent disease and the fear that comes with it. The old hip pocket of the voters works every time. It’s where all sense seems to reside!

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    Gazzatron

    Jo, while this is a huge cause for celebration and a win for electricity consumers in Qld and possibly the broader NEM network.
    The arrogant and bullish push by the former Qld Labor party to create the “largest pumped hydro system in the world” as the backbone of its renewable energy dream was basically criminal in its roll out, it created a huge amount of distress and concern to many people in the immediate and wider area of the proposed location in the majestic Eungella range /Pioneer river valley west of the regional city of Mackay.
    Families were conned into selling of their properties to the Qld Hydro corporation, forced to move out of the area, all while the Labor Government at the time had not even completed the preliminary environmental studies.
    I don’t recall the exact figures but a number of millions (in the hundreds) of tax payer dollars were spent in geology drilling, surveying, property acquisitions and no doubt fat salaries for all those on the bandwagon, before the Liberal party thankfully won the last state election and put a stop to a project that would’ve made the 20+ billion cost of Snowy hydro 2 seem like pocket change.
    This project and it’s rollout should be subject to a high level enquiry and would provide any investigative journalist with a plethora of material for a block buster story.

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