Rooftop Solar Helps Send South Australia Grid To Zero Demand In World's First (reneweconomy.com.au) 180
South Australia on Sunday became the first gigawatt scale grid in the world to reach zero demand when the combined output of rooftop solar and other small non-scheduled generators exceeded all the local customer load requirements. Renew Economy reports: The landmark event was observed by several energy analysts, including at Watt Clarity and NEMLog, where Geoff Eldridge noted that a number of measures for South Australia demand notched up record minimums for system normal conditions. It was later confirmed by the Australian Energy Market Operator, which noted that "scheduled" demand -- local demand minus the output of rooftop solar and small unscheduled generators such as small solar farms and bio-energy -- fell to minus 38MW in a five minute period at 1235pm (grid time, or AEST).
Minimum demand is now possibly the biggest challenge for market operators like AEMO, because under current market settings it needs to have a certain amount of synchronous generation to maintain system strength and grid stability. It does this by running a minimum amount of gas generation, and through the recent commissioning of spinning machines called synchronous condensers that do not burn fuel. It also needs a link to a neighboring grid, in this case Victoria, so it can export surplus production.
Minimum demand is now possibly the biggest challenge for market operators like AEMO, because under current market settings it needs to have a certain amount of synchronous generation to maintain system strength and grid stability. It does this by running a minimum amount of gas generation, and through the recent commissioning of spinning machines called synchronous condensers that do not burn fuel. It also needs a link to a neighboring grid, in this case Victoria, so it can export surplus production.
In related news... (Score:3, Funny)
the CEO of southern Australia's largest coal power plant suffered a heart attack at approximately the same time. He was reported as saying, "I fear the day-star" before collapsing.
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You have no sense of humor.
Not quite the full story... (Score:3)
It also doesn't mention that SA has the most expensive electricity in the country. It's not unusual to have 38c/kWh for usage, and over $1/day in supply charges in SA...
Meanwhile, I'm in Victoria, and I pay 18.9c/kWh + 63c/day.
All pricing in AUD...
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Cost drives down demand, so demand meets supply?
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Intermittent sources make electricity cheap when sun doesn't shine ... but regarding solar, it certainly makes no sense.
Not really sure what you wanted to say with that
are exceedingly expensive as they are not allowed to sell until intermittents have sold their capacity out. ...
In Europe we have the https://www.eex.com/ [eex.com] - you can sell what ever you want there.
I assume in Australia it is similar? But well, you are the expert
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Is that related to the high number of solar installations though?
I guess it could be the reason why so many are buying solar panels.
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It also doesn't mention that SA has the most expensive electricity in the country.
Something which has nothing to do with the number of solar installations or the power mix, and everything to do with an ironic combination of both market deregulation as well as regulation mandating certain excessive performance requirements.
Net result: A for profit company is screwing you, nothing more.
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By making that energy expensive, it's encouraged rooftop solar, creating a huge distributed power grid located exactly where demand is without using any extra land. This removes the need to build large solar facilities on other land. Creating a market distortion carefully lets you guide the market in another direction.
As rooftop becomes common it becomes easier and cheaper due to economy of scale, and moreover creates a habit/tradition of people getting rooftop solar, allowing it to continue from simple ine
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In this way, the power utility can now focus on providing power in other ways for when rooftop solar does not meet capacity. Good stuff like nuclear, pumped hyrdro coupled with wind, etc.
Nuclear is worthless for solving the climate crisis [cleantechnica.com]. Literally worthless. By the time we could get enough capacity built to matter it would all be over but the last few tears, and meanwhile it is literally the least cost-effective way to solve the problem, and for what? Literally nothing but enriching the people who profit from the mining and construction.
In early July the SA grid was 66% fossil fuel (Score:3)
https://aemo.com.au/en/energy-... [aemo.com.au]
26 jun -3 july, 66% fossil fuel.
Don't believe the hype.
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They are talking about a period of no longer than 300 seconds...
It's called the "Nessie curve", and it's not good. (Score:2, Insightful)
I suspect most readers of Slashdot are familiar with the "duck curve" but for those that are not here's a link to read up on it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Related to the duck curve is the "Nessie curve", so called because the curve goes "underwater" like the back of the Loch Ness monster, AKA "Nessie". This becomes problematic if there is not a means to store, or divert off the local grid, the excess capacity from all the solar power on the grid. Then as the sun sets the utilities on the grid need
Re: It's called the "Nessie curve", and it's not g (Score:2)
I thought Australia just purchased a bunch of nuclear submarines?
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I thought Australia just purchased a bunch of nuclear submarines?
Which is better than all the other options - diesel, coal, wind, solar, or hydro power.
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For a submarine?
Is that a trick question?
I guess it is hydro then?
Hm, the Titanic was coal powered, but it went submarine pretty quickly. Never came back up again. I think it is hydro!
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Your AUD$4,000 power grid accessory is nice, but it alone is incapable of supplying all your residential needs - since your "solution" involves solar power, it only generates during daytime, and varies based on the weather. It is a nice tool, but it alone cannot power your home when the sun goes down - for that, you rely on the power grid, using it as a form of "infinite battery storage," during daylight hours you pretend you are "banking" electricity on the grid, then pull it back at night to run your ligh
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and in the process likely practice a bit of electricity arbitrage, selling your excess daytime electricity at a premium during the day and buying discounted off-peak electricity at night.
And why exactly are you attempting to make it sound as if that is a bad thing?
Yes, your solar system is a net positive for the environment, but until you can cut ties to the local power grid and neither buy nor sell electricity, your home relies on the power grid.
And why exactly are you attempting to make it sound as if th
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Imagine being so bloody obtuse, that you grasp at an edge case straw that proves you're wrong on the principle being discussed.
It is time to decouple signaling and power (Score:2)
The other rou
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Not sure what signalling you're referring to but most grid operations will use independent data links for control and monitoring. Older grids use microwave ... and fibre on upgraded/new ones.
As for HVDC, that gets used in special long links only. And will stay that way. Efficiently stepping the voltage needs a transformer. Transformers are highly robust, simple to build and are necessary, when in a hierarchical distribution, to provided stepping of voltage. Transformers don't work with DC.
HVDC links re
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Right now if a solar inverter is able to send power back to the grid, it needs to (1) see some AC voltage in order to sync the phase and (2) interpret the presence of voltage as "the grid is working, you can send power". If the power line is at 0 - is it because of "no power" or is it because of maintenance ? Can a solar inverter or a power b
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Oh, you're talking about home generation and connections with local lines company.
That could be done as ripple control. The lines company would instruct the home generation to limit its export. This would require the inverter to monitor the current flow on mains connection to the house. Which can be done at the main switch.
Everything else is already in place. Phase synchronising is already built into every export capable inverter. No comms needed for that.
Hybrid inverters that can maintain independent
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Already being done in many places. In general I think wireless networking is more popular than fiber, because fiber offers orders of magnitude more bandwidth than is necessary for monitoring the grid and costs about that much more too.
Putting fiber on the poles would be useful for providing internet access to rural communities, but is wholly unnecessary for grid monitoring.
But day, night, weather, nuclear (Score:2, Insightful)
Disclaimer (Score:2, Troll)
Wow Who Cares! (Score:3)
Ok yes I am cynical with my title, but hear me out. The UK has plenty of wind energy, and when it runs it does amazingly well. But oddly in the past few months there have been moments when there was not enough wind. In fact basically none. As a result the UK had to power up fossil fuels.
https://fortune.com/2021/09/16... [fortune.com]
I used to be a big proponent of renewable energy, now not so much anymore. For if we can't produce enough renewable, what then? We can't seem to find enough ways to store enough energy over many days. Meaning we need a backup energy supply and if that is the case, why on earth are we even doing solar and wind?
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For if we can't produce enough renewable, what then?
That is a stupid question.
As answer I cite you:
As a result the UK had to power up fossil fuels.
You see? You still have your old fossil plants, you simply can power them up ...
Wow, that was so simple again.
Meaning we need a backup energy supply
You already have one. Should I cite yourself again?
why on earth are we even doing solar and wind?
Because it is cheap and plenty?
Re: Yeah, but what happens at night, or cloudy day (Score:5, Informative)
Re: Yeah, but what happens at night, or cloudy day (Score:5, Informative)
I think he believes that all power plants operate in load-following mode, possibly because he thinks that running a grid where many sources can't ramp up and down with demand would have to be incredibly complicated. And he's right, it is.
There's no question that rooftop solar is a PITA for grid operators. But it's not a problem beyond the scope of human ingenuity. Sure, if your demand *unexpectedly* goes down to zero and you are *unprepared* for that, the grid could collapse. So the answer is to be prepared for that [energymonitor.ai].
In general renewables are a problem for grid operators; ultimately the answer to that problem will be grid storage. Curiously, an attempt to solve climate change with *nuclear* has the opposite problem (nukes are inefficient to run at anything less than full output), yet has the *very same* solution: grid storage. You run the nuke full tilt 24 hours a day and save the surplus energy you generate in off-peak hours to sell when prices are better.
A lot of the things you'd need to do for crash program in renewables would be exactly the same things you'd need for a crash program in nuclear. Making one financially feasible would tend to make the other feasible as well.
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Renewables are not a problem to grid operators. /. laymen problem.
It is a
Supposed you have an event like a "super ball". Does the advertizing break come unexpected, when everyone in the country runs to the fridge and opens it to get a beer and a coke?
For you yes. For a grid operator: not so much.
Is it unexpected that 250,000 fridges suddenly start cooling down again, and draw considerable power? For a grid operator: not so much.
For wind and solar grid operators use prognosises - after all every roof top sol
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Well, this is just semantics. I'm saying grid operators can handle these problems; so it's not an *unsolvable* problem.
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FWIW, grid operators in Australia (at least in Melbourne, but suspect it will be everywhere soon) are already adding their own battery storage systems onto the grid. Not huge systems, ones they can add relatively easily onto existing power poles. They can use these to soak up extra rooftop solar, adding stability, and then (the genius part) sell it back to homes later at their usual retail pricing.
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...ultimately the answer to that problem will be grid storage.
Grid storage is the centrally planned answer. There also the free market answer of variable rate pricing, incentivizing consumers to adjust demand (charging electric vehicles, bitcoin mining, etc... at the cheapest times of day). And, both answers can coexist.
However only one of them can be an effective, adequate solution by itself - the "planned" approach. [You stuck "centrally" in their to make it sound like Marxism, planning in no way has to be "central".]
The "free market" approach worked so well in Texas just this year [theguardian.com]. Yeah, they could just choose to shut off the juice while they are freezing to death.
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No it can not. Generators have a limit. If you were to run them faster they would cycle incorrectly and fry transformers, conflict with other generators, and give all your appliance the wrong hz. This means the system is balanced.
And don't forget ramp up and ramp down time. Turbine worlddoes not like things happeneing instantaneously. A sudden increase in demand can bog the turbine down, and a sudden decrease in load can cause overspin. We never want to go into overspin.
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You can't possibly be that dumb.
Re:Yeah, but what happens at night, or cloudy days (Score:4, Informative)
Re: Yeah, but what happens at night, or cloudy day (Score:3)
A GENERATOR can be set to higher speeds to help with peak demand There's no way you could have thought that up yourself. Have you been doing ... RESEARCH!?
Re: Yeah, but what happens at night, or cloudy day (Score:5, Insightful)
A GENERATOR can be set to higher speeds to help with peak demand There's no way you could have thought that up yourself. Have you been doing ... RESEARCH!?
Pretty sure he did think of that himself. What on earth happens when the grid is running at 50Hz and some numpty has a generator cycling at 55? Generators are synchronous machines. You put in more torque not more speed. Now of course if everyone puts in more torque the frequency will rise and you don't want that because equipment is designed to run at the specified frequency.
Grids don't just control the frequency but also the integral of the frequency as well, so synchronous machine used as a clock will never deviate more than a specified amount.
https://wwwhome.ewi.utwente.nl... [utwente.nl]
"run generators faster" is the sort of shallow, facile solution you get on tech forums inhabited by arrogant programmers who think that everything except programming is easy, and have no idea about the depths of their ignorance.
https://xkcd.com/1831/ [xkcd.com]
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Generators are synchronous machines
In general, grid-connected generators are that. But inverters are getting cheaper all the time, so you could in theory actually have generators that you throttled up to meet load. But the single biggest problem with that idea is that ICEs are only maximally efficient at one speed and load, and you only want to run them in their most efficient mode. Even if you allocated the additional budget to make it possible to run the generators at other speeds, you wouldn't want to. It would make more sense just to bui
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"run generators faster" is the sort of shallow, facile solution you get on tech forums inhabited by arrogant programmers who think that everything except programming is easy, and have no idea about the depths of their ignorance.
You're being too nice. But you are quite right.
The entire concept is indeed related to load, not spinning the turbine faster. What you don't want is for it to slow down, or into overspeed. I suspect that a lot of the instability they refer to is what can happen to a steam turbine if there is essentially no load demand.
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Wind is managed via feathering of the blades - up to peak power available. And individual turbines can be stopped, feathered right back and mechanical brakes applied. Flexibility in large numbers.
Solar cells themselves have no management as they are a fixed, albeit saggy, voltage. The inverters can dynamically draw current as desired - up to peak power available.
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Wind is managed via feathering of the blades
It’s bad enough wind turbines kill so many birds every year, but suggesting that’s how they are supposed to work seems like a stretch. /s
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It's not new to wind turbines. Feathering is used for propellers on aeroplanes and helicopters. Long, well proven history.
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*whoosh*
The joke he was making is that they were feathering the blades with feathers, as in tarring and feathering someone.
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*shrug* Even in hindsight, it's rather weak. I don't think I'd change my answer.
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Wind is managed via feathering of the blades
It’s bad enough wind turbines kill so many birds every year, but suggesting that’s how they are supposed to work seems like a stretch. /s
I hope you are trolling, because if you aren't, I suggest you look at airplane props
https://stocktonpropeller.com/types-of-propellers-constant-speed-controllable-pitch-feathering/
Feathering a propeller is a long used way of controlling the doodad it is connected to. The wind turbine has to be at a particular speed before coming on line, and the angle of the propeller blades to the wind is how they control it. In really strong winds, the blades are almost to the point of facing the blade directly into t
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Wind is managed via feathering of the blades
It’s bad enough wind turbines kill so many birds every year, but suggesting that’s how they are supposed to work seems like a stretch. /s
I hope you are trolling,
I was attempting to make a joke, which I had hoped the sarcasm tag would make evident, but Poe’s Law seems to have struck all the same.
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Itâ(TM)s bad enough wind turbines kill so many birds every year
You are now approaching age of 50, or surpassed it: and still do not know that this is a myth?
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Actually, I’m not even 40 yet, and you seem to have missed or are unaware of the sarcasm tag I used.
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First off, a generator manages “overload” by reducing voltage and frequency. Managing grid stability (as the summary indicates) is very hard without spinning reserve. It can be done with static inverters (especially bi-directional inverters), but it really is cutting edge today. The risk becomes that grid frequency becomes unstable, and all the rooftop solar shuts off and the grid crashes hard. Interconnection can help, but it really adds complexity to the whole system.
Personally, I prefer t
Re:Yeah, but what happens at night, or cloudy days (Score:5, Informative)
what happens at night, or cloudy days?
On cloudy days you get less sun, but not zero sun. At night or during other bad conditions (a snowstorm covering the solar panels with snow, etc.) you would fall back on battery power.
According to a study done by RethinkX, it is feasible to use nothing but solar and/or wind power if you have enough of it combined with enough battery storage. They call it "SWB" power, Solar/Wind/Battery. According to their numbers, with enough generation you would only need two to four days of backup batteries.
The really interesting part is that they are predicting that this will happen, because the cost of solar, wind, and batteries are all low enough right now for many uses and are still dropping in cost.
They are saying that to get by with only two to four days of batteries you should overbuild the generation by about 3x to 5x. If you have an area that needs 1 GW of power during the day, they think you should build 4 GW of renewable power plus two to four days of battery storage. They think that the costs of SWB are dropping enough that by the end of this decade it will be affordable enough to make sense: indeed, RethinkX claims that building and operating an SWB system will cost less than continuing to operate legacy power plants like coal plants, natural gas, etc. And because it will cost less it will happen, since people and companies like saving money.
Here's a YouTube video where Tony Seba explains all this stuff, and a bunch of other stuff. It's about an hour long. The power stuff starts around 31:40 or so.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kj96nxtHdTU [youtube.com]
P.S. Right now, the utility companies hate solar, because it's so unpredictable. When the sun is shining, solar power systems pump energy onto the grid; then maybe the sun goes behind a cloud, and the grid dips. The people whose job it is to keep the grid balanced hate that.
Well, what if all the solar power systems were combined with batteries, and the batteries were used to dump power onto the grid in a smooth and controlled fashion? Tesla is experimenting with this now; they call it "Virtual Power Plant" (VPP) and they are developing a software system called "AutoBidder" that can be used to decide how much power to release to the grid and when. One place Tesla is building a VPP is: South Australia, the subject of this Slashdot article.
https://electrek.co/2021/09/21/tesla-expansion-biggest-virtual-power-plant-australia/ [electrek.co]
https://electrek.co/2021/03/16/tesla-autobidder-managing-over-12-gwh-energy-storage/ [electrek.co]
I'm in the process of getting a Tesla solar system with Powerwall battery backup for my house, and I decided to specifically get Tesla because I'm hoping one day my home will be part of a Virtual Power Plant that will help run the grid where I live.
Washington state has a state law requiring greenhouse gas neutrality by 2030. I'm guessing my local power company will have to raise rates to make this happen and may be hungry for additional power during peak load times, so I'm getting the solar power system now so my house can be a small part of a solar power VPP.
https://www.bdlaw.com/publications/washington-clean-energy-transformation-act-establishes-aggressive-mandates-for-grid-decarbonization-and-renewable-energy-production/ [bdlaw.com]
Washington currently has very affordable electricity rates, so my payback period for the solar power system looks like it will take many years. If electricity rates go up, or I can join a VPP and get paid extra for helping stabilize the grid during heavy load times, the payback time would be shortened.
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Right now, the utility companies hate solar, because it's so unpredictable. When the sun is shining, solar power systems pump energy onto the grid; then maybe the sun goes behind a cloud, and the grid dips. The people whose job it is to keep the grid balanced hate that.
Sure, but you do realize that the easiest fix for that problem is just to add more solar panels, because the amount of cloud cover changes very slowly, while the holes in the cloud cover move rapidly. If you keep adding more well-distributed solar then the output becomes more constant.
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Right now, the utility companies hate solar, because it's so unpredictable. When the sun is shining, solar power systems pump energy onto the grid; then maybe the sun goes behind a cloud, and the grid dips. The people whose job it is to keep the grid balanced hate that.
I won't disagree with your statement, but I will add that utility companies also "hate" having to pay above market rate for random amounts of electricity completely divorced from the needs of the grid. At least in the US, and I assume it is the same/similar in South Australia, electric companies are required to "buy" any and all electricity private solar panels put on to the grid at a pre-set price, typically a premium over the wholesale market rate for electricity.
While the utility can predict - in the agg
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Right now, the utility companies hate solar, because it's so unpredictable.
It isn't. It is very fine predictable. Typical progonises are not even off by 1%
You are mixing up predictable with dispatch able.
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The people whose job it is to keep the grid balanced hate that.
but you do actually know: this is 99% completely automatic?
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but you do actually know: this is 99% completely automatic?
Oh gee, really, do you think? I thought a person has to sit with his hand on a rheostat, frantically watching a needle gauge and twisting the knob. While dramatic music plays.
Well, be that as it may, I believe the issue is that making up shortfalls with "peaker" plants is the most expensive thing. If all the power companies had lots of battery storage, that would also solve the problem: if the grid had a sudden excess, it could be dumped into sto
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We don't run generators at higher speeds. We run them at higher loads. Speed is synced to the grid. The generator of energy such as a coal boiler can run at higher speed to supply more steam to the turbine, but generator of electricity connected to the same drive shaft as the turbine cannot. It must be synced to the grid.
So when load increases, we increase the flow of steam to the turbine. Not the speed. That gives us more electric power from generator into the brake that is the grid load it's taking.
And it
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Plus, if there is a sudden demand, you can't make the sun shine brighter, or the wind blow harder. A GENERATOR can be set to higher speeds to help with peak demand, unlike solar or wind.
You don't know how turbines work do you? The ramp time has been a problem just about forever, one of the big problems with early jet engines. You'd kick the plan in the ass, then it would think about it for a while, then ramp up.
Big azz power generating turbines usually have a bit of steam lag, more turbine mass and more rampup time. It's considered a problem for sudden demand.
As well, wind is doing just fine in my area at peaking, although we have enough up now to start carrying base load.
Electroni
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It was later confirmed by the Australian Energy Market Operator, which noted that "scheduled" demand -- local demand minus the output of rooftop solar and small unscheduled generators such as small solar farms and bio-energy -- fell to minus 38MW in a five minute period at 1235pm (grid time, or AEST)
We're talking about a period that lasted approximately 5 minutes - aside from being totally blown out of proportion by climate "enthusiasts" this is an all but meaningless achievement. It wasn't predictable, it wasn't actionable, and it isn't repeatable - but YAY!
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Batteries such as the large Tesla MegaPacks going in at various places can hold a lot of energy and provide that far quicker than a generator can spin up. That said, most people I know who are putting in solar are also putting in batteries which take our excess generation and allow us to use it overnight. I barely use any grid power these days although Iâ(TM)m connected but my next house is going off grid entirely. Currently I shove most of my excess power once the house battery is filled into my car a
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You realize there was a surplus of electricity on the grid for a whopping 300 seconds, right?
The subject of this article is a brief, noteworthy blip on the printouts noticed after-the-fact - hardly the basis to reform the South Australian power grid.
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However these blips will become more and more frequent and last longer and longer. It might be a good idea to plan for that.
Re:Australia started and is ending as a penal colo (Score:5, Insightful)
I know there's no hope for this anonymous coward, but for any body reading who would like some context, read on.
This outbreak of Covid is in an extremely remote indigenous communities in far north of Australia. There is very little medical care up there, and certainly no hospitals to take Covid patients should they require it. Temperatures in the NT are already at 40c (104f), and indigenous housing is generally overcrowded, many without power. The indigenous communities are generally more susceptible to catching Covid, and have poorer outcomes when they do catch it.
The quarantine facilities are fantastic, and are much better equipped to handle covid cases. The indigenous communities themselves have actually asked for this help.
Sheesh. Way to make a mountain out of a molehill.
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Australia has never mistreated her indigenous people, ever.
Re: Australia started and is ending as a penal col (Score:2)
Re: Australia started and is ending as a penal co (Score:4, Insightful)
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Lockdowns effect people... with schools closed in lots of places they effect kids...
So there's going to be a baby boom after each lockdown?
Re: Australia started and is ending as a penal co (Score:2)
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"That is what happens when you allow fascist leftists to run your country unopposed"
Australia has been dominated by right leaning leadership for decades.
"Fortunately in the US we only have 1.5 years of the Democrat borrow show to live through until we take our country back permanently."
Not without a Civil War & extermination of the opposition. I'm sure you find a way to justify it, Constitution be damned.
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Conservatives just want to go 0-2.
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Democrats lost the first US Civil War.
Which is the same thing as saying that the US extreme conservatives of the time lost the US Civil war. The Democrats and Republicans of today quite clearly have different political ideologies of the Democrats and Republicans of that time. That said, they're still both quite right wing in many ways.
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"Conservative" and "Liberal" as used today, didn't exist then.
Neither did "Democrat" or "Republican" if you want to go that route. The terms "conservative" and "liberal" certainly were used then, of course, but not exactly as used today. For example, around the time of the Civil War in the US, you might have had some royalists still hanging around in US conservative (meaning mostly Democrats) circles. While the conservatives of today still seem to be more likely to be royalists than liberals, they're more likely to want to set up a brand new monarchy than return the U
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You continue to try to redefine the argument by introducing modern terms to define political parties that existed then and continue to exist today:
I'm not redefining the argument. To put it concisely the argument was that the Democrats who lost the US Civil war were the conservative party of the day.
The current Democrat party was founded in 1828. They are the ones that defended Slavery, introduced Jim Crow, founded the KKK, and ran the Tuskegee Experiments.
The "current" Democrat party. Cute. In any case, no real argument that it was primarily Democrats that defended slavery introduced Jim Crow and founded the KKK. As far as running the Tuskagee experiment, that's a little tricky. It started under a Republican administration (Senate and President, anyway) and also ended under a Republican administration (Nixo
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Plenty of people in the Black and Latino communities are actually quite conservative, but don't vote Republican due to some of the overt and obvious racism. Both Democrats and Republicans are guilty of thinking of those groups as homogenous blocks. Overall though, the Republicans still seem to be more guilty of that kind of thinking, including things like calls for collective punishment of communities, etc. I'm not really aware of too many black people labelled as "White Supremacists" by Democrats though. S
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Conservatives are the one who want things to stay the same. That's to keep their slaves, that's the south...
Your ignorance of the subject is staggering.
When do you think the Republican Party was founded?
When you look back at Jim Crow Laws, the states that fought to maintain segregation well into the 1960s, those weren't Republicans.
As a reminder, it was the southern Democrats in Congress that filibustered the 1964 Civil Rights Act [usatoday.com], it might do you some good to study up on the so-called "Southern Manifesto" [african-am...rights.org].
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STFU. 110% of them, within five years of LBJ signing the Civil Rights Act, became members of the GOP.
That's *your* party, scumbag.
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"Fortunately in the US we only have 1.5 years of the Democrat borrow show to live through until we take our country back permanently."
Not without a Civil War & extermination of the opposition. I'm sure you find a way to justify it, Constitution be damned.
"Civil War"? "Extermination"? Don't be so dramatic - Republicans can simply take over either the House of Representatives or Senate in the 2022 mid-terms, and hold majority positions sufficient to block any spending they don't approve of.
You do realize that every two years one-third of the Senate and every member of the House of Representatives are up for re-election, right?
"Constitution be damned"? Uh, no - more like "as laid out in the Constitution" - the same process that put Democrats in charge of the H
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Australia is run by right-wing wannabe dictators, you moron.
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You're right. They're all WRONG-WING "Conservatives"... and *still* not as far right as the GOP.
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I would never vote for anyone that was stupid and careless enough to catch COVID
Because smart, careful people never caught Covid?
Imagine for a moment you lacked the resources, occupation, and support to literally (and I mean it in the literal sense) stay locked inside your home for the past 18 months (and counting) - does that make you "stupid" or "careless"?
Re: Australia started and is ending as a penal co (Score:5, Insightful)
" you leftists politicize science"
Rightwingnuts have done a great job of ignoring science to the point that Trump got booed by his own rally crowd when he told them they should get vaccinated. And even some dying in ICUs hooked up to ventilators have tried to force doctors to give them ivermectin.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
It's been over 40 years since Asimov wrote the following.
Too many of you have not come a long way since then, baby
“There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.”
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And even some dying in ICUs hooked up to ventilators have tried to force doctors to give them ivermectin.
A lot of them even try to get the vaccine while they're dying in the hospital, because they are total numbfucks who understand nothing about anything. But sadly, even if 99% of them did this once there you couldn't convince the rest of them that they would feel the same way because all republicans think they are exceptional. They are literally the party of american exceptionalism above all the other things they're the party of. Every one of them is sure they are above average, despite the massive evidence t
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Rightwingnuts have done a great job of ignoring science to the point that Trump got booed by his own rally crowd when he told them they should get vaccinated.
More politicizing science? Did you miss that minorities are the least likely to have the vaccine? Perhaps you also didn't know, but that is the prime DNC demographic. You are making this into a political thing, to the detriment of all, instead of working to convince them of their errors, you demean and belittle them, and drive away people in your own party doing it.
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Among political groups, Republicans and White Evangelicals have among the lowest rates of vaccination, along with rural residents and uninsured under 65. (Democrats, over 65 years old, and college graduates have the highest rates). https://www.newsweek.com/least... [newsweek.com]
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Except for the people who followed proper masking and distance guidelines, avoided unnecessary travel, and were vaccinated at their earliest opportunity.
Aka all the stupid people caught Covid, and 1/2 of the population has below average intelligence.
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That's unfair. I had covid twice before there was a fucking vaccine...Once in Jan2020 before anyone wanted to admit to a problem. It was worse then any flu I've had except stomach flu (throwing up for two weeks and being unable to keep any food down was worse then covid).
I caught covid again in 21'. It was a super mild case but I still went off work to quarantine. I was able to test for the second time but not the first. If the first wasn't covid, then I would argue the flu was much worse but I'm pretty sur
"and", not "or" (Score:2)
You may have missed the word "and". They said:
> proper masking and distance guidelines, avoided unnecessary travel, and were vaccinated
The vaccine reduces your risk by 90% AND distancing reduces the risk even further AND masks reduce the risk by half again.
Meaning if you do all three (and) your risk is reduced by over 98%.
So yes, AND means get vaccinated AND don't cough in someone's face.
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In the US, there are the educated people, the people who worked hard in school. Those educated ones ARE concerned about the millions of mouth breathers who have become commies, voting to take their stuff.
Yeah, but why? You gotta wonder what it is about their education that led them to make that decision.
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Those educated ones ARE concerned about the millions of mouth breathers who have become commies, voting to take their stuff.
I thought the educated ones *were* the commies? Or so the uneducated ones (= religious, basically) in the US seem to think.
In the last two weeks alone, those mouth breathers who pay zero net income taxes have voted to take 3.6 TRILLION dollars from the 45% of Americans who earn more than $70K and therefore pay taxes.
Something tells me that you really would have hated the 1950s...
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Tax Avoidance was a thing in the 1950s, when the tax rates dropped, compliance went up, and tax revenues increased.
I can only imagine what you think those 80,000 new IRS auditors will spend their time doing - auditing Millionaires and Billionaires (exactly how many are there, do you imagine?), or grinding away at the gig economy workers who, along with waitresses and waiters, fail to report tips on their tax forms?
Source: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/b... [cbsnews.com]
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OVER TEN YEARS. And the people making more than $100k will pay most, unless we can RAM a new tax bill down your throat, so that Bezos, Musk, and the Waltons pay.
You contradict yourself (Score:2)
> Governments make money from thin air.
> They only have taxes to give currency value.
What, exactly, do you think 3.6 trillion DOLLARS is, if not currency?
Hint - it's dollars. The dollar is the US curren_y. See if you can fill in the blank.
If they want to get stuff valued at $3.6 trillion, they need to raise $3.6 trillion in value. Which as you said requires $3.6 trillion of taxes.
BTW, you got it backwards. The government creates *currency*(dollars) from paper / thin air. The monetary value comes fro
Re: You contradict yourself (Score:3)
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Economics 101: Govt increases supply of money by issuing it out of thin air (AKA debt - money is basically an IOU). Govt decreases the supply of money by taxing economic activities, i.e. removes debt from the economy. Excessive untaxed & untaxable debt typically leads to economic instability,
Pretty much this.
The only thing of real value to humanity is comestibles and water. All else is just something decided upon.
Even gold, of which there is not enough in the world to serve as a modern currency.
And those things are kinda hard to use as currency. So we make up money. And when managed correctly, it works pretty well.
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And do you actually think that 3.6 trillion came from taxes?
I hate to be "that guy" but it's not "came from", it's "will come from" taxes - the politicians that put forth the spending bill insisted that they were going to "pay for this new spending with new tax revenues", so if the politicians that crafted the spending bill that includes tax rate hikes, increased tax enforcement, etc. claim it will be paid for (draw an equal dollar amount out of the economy), then we should at least hold the position that it might, in some way, be paid for thru taxes.
If they want to spend 3.6 trillion. They ask congress to raise the debt limit and borrow some money and spend it.
Who are "they"
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If the coastal cities were full of such smart people, then why haven't they fixed their problems despite holding political majorities for over a decade? Sounds like all politicians are just there to make money and offer up false promises because none of our long term problems ever seem to get fixed.
Instead, politicians of all parties just run on fixing things and then don't.
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But it's a dry heat!