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SILICON
SILIC
CHIP
www.siliconchip.com.au
Publisher & Editor-in-Chief
Leo Simpson, B.Bus., FAICD
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Greg Swain, B.Sc. (Hons.)
Technical Editor
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Mauro Grassi, B.Sc. (Hons), Ph.D
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2 Silicon Chip
Publisher’s Letter
Wind power is no substitute
for base-load generators
Back in the July 2009 issue we featured a story on
Sydney’s water desalination plant together with a panel
entitled “Where does the electricity come from?” As explained in the panel, the state government has decided
to build wind farms to generate the power which would
otherwise come from coal-fired base load power stations,
albeit at a higher price.
But in the this month’s Mailbag pages, reader Paul
Miskelly points to the fallacy in this arrangement.
Desalination plants must run continuously and therefore must draw their substantial electricity requirement from the grid all the time. Paul Miskelly has taken
the trouble to analyse the figures for wind farm output and has produced graphs
which clearly indicate that wind power is a very variable source – hardly suitable
for running a desalination plant.
It is stating the blindingly obvious to say that the wind does not blow all the
time. But it doesn’t and for the politicians and public servants to try and pass off
wind power as a “green solution” is just a lie. When the wind stops blowing, all
the electricity required by the desalination plant must come from the coal-fired
power stations. There are no ifs, buts or maybes. And one can envisage a situation
where, if there was a major overload on the grid and the wind wasn’t blowing,
the desalination plant would be one of the last to be subject to “load shedding”.
In other words, normal commercial and domestic consumers will be blacked out
long before the desalination plant.
I remember some years ago having lunch with one of the magazine’s advertisers
and the subject of the mooted Sydney desalination plant came up. I wondered out
loud where the power for the plant should come from. Nuclear power was the instant
and only practical answer. “Where should we put it?” was the next question. The
immediate answer was “Right next to the desalination plant at Kurnell!” Then “How
big should it be?” and the answer was “A bloody big one!” And while the answers
to the questions may have been glib, they were absolutely correct and practical.
Desalination plants need lots of power and nuclear plants can provide that power
on a relatively small site with no air pollution at all. None. Since such a large
amount of power is required, it makes sense to site the power plant right next to
the desal plant, to minimise transmission losses. And since Sydney requires more
base load power in any case, having the nuclear power station adjacent to the city
also makes sense, to minimise transmission losses. That’s how they do it in many
other parts of the world.
Sadly, while everything we discussed was and is correct and practical, nothing like that is ever likely to eventuate even in the far future, given that State and
Federal governments appear to be so inimical to the concept.
But those people who say that we can rely more on renewable energy sources
must face the fact that when those source are not available, such as when the wind is
not blowing, then the base-load power stations must be able to take up all the slack.
Unfortunately though, all of the interconnected electricity grid for the eastern states
of Australia is running very close to capacity, especially in the summer months.
Finally, those people who point to European countries which apparently have a
much higher component of their electricity coming from wind power should realise
that those same countries buy their electricity from nuclear-powered France when
the wind doesn’t blow. Furthermore, those countries that have invested heavily
in renewable energy, such as Spain with its government-mandated solar energy,
are paying much more for their energy. That is now recognised as a gross misallocation of resources.
Leo Simpson
siliconchip.com.au
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