Australia’s Finkel Report into electricity security
Environmental matters in Australia were dominated by the travesty that is the report of the committee headed by green entrepreneur and activist Dr Alan Finkel. Together with the modelling it commissioned the report assumes wind is or will soon be cheaper than coal for electricity generation but still see the need for subsidies. The report recognises that electricity prices have doubled and supply has been made less reliable since the forced introduction of wind and solar but sees the solution as an intensification of these harmful policies.
Within days of its release in June 2017, like a cold snap following an Al Gore global warming speech, the report’s shortcomings were obvious; the Finkel forecast of a 3 per cent increase in 2017 electricity prices were overshadowed by retailers' announced price increases of 15-20 per cent as a result of the forced closure of coal power stations. The report welcomes such outcomes but seeks to have them better managed. I undertook a comprehensive analysis for One Nation Senator Malcolm Roberts. In that work I demonstrated that the cost of new coal fuelled plant would be $45-47 per MWh and not the $80 plus that the Finkel report estimated. A report issued by the Minerals Council of Australia estimated that costs might be even lower.
According to the Climate Institute most Australians want most of their electricity to come from renewables but did the survey tell them the costs of this would be an extra $1,000 a year in electricity bills plus a de-industrialised economy?
Solutions
South Australia is considering a lease of a ship, normally used for electricity generation in war zones, to supply the state while it installs the reliability proofing batteries that were supposed to be in place by year end. The State Opposition Leader said, for “A$8m a year in keeping the Northern Power Station open South Australians would have been shielded from these shocking electricity price rises.” The plan of subsidy harvester, Elon Musk, to insulate South Australia from the renewable energy fomented unreliability is a distant memory that got mugged by reality.
There seems to be bipartisan support in the US Congress for extending subsidies to carbon capture and storage (CCS) – such a waste of money! But the carbon-capture-and -storage plant of the Southern Company in Kemper County, Mississippi once again shows the wasteful dead end of this technology. Already requiring twice the price of conventional plant for its output, the costs look set to double again and Southern has abandoned the folly.
Australia, in addition to funding a globe trotting CCS agency, has spent around one billion dollars on sequestering carbon dioxide, at a cost of $4200 per tonne (by comparison, the wasteful renewable energy regulations cost about $70 per tonne). And Jo Nova has totted up $70 billion in wasteful spending around the world.
China which had planned to have a carbon trading scheme in the first half of this year now estimates that it will be November at the earliest.
India goes pragmatic: halves the tax on coal and introduces an 18 per cent tax on solar panels.
Angela Merkel’s pro Paris/anti Trump alliance crumbles as Japan, Canada and now U.K. show reduced resolve to act on climate change.
As President of the G20, Germany has also been forced to dilute the intended communique for the upcoming meeting. Removed are: calls for “the alignment of public expenditure and infrastructure planning with the goals of the Paris Agreement”, a call for carbon pricing and a pledge to develop a “profound” climate plan for multilateral development banks plus numerous mentions of nationally-determined contributions and the 2050 mid-century pathway for net zero emissions.
Meanwhile Trump himself has further moved to dismantle the Obama green legacy by seeking to encourage nuclear and coal – including allowing US bankers to finance overseas coal generators.
