Touted as the saviour for subsidised wind and solar, pumped hydro turns out to be a whole lot harder in practice. The Snowy 2.0 plan (see above) never stacked up economically – see our posts here and here – and never will. One of the tunnel boring machines (TBMs) critical to the project, Florence had barely struck … Continue reading Mega-Pumped Hydro Project Becomes Total Economic & Environmental Disaster
Tag: Cost of Snowy 2.0
Doomed to Inevitable Failure: Grand Wind & Solar ‘Transition’ Built On Subsidies & Bullshit
As wind and solar capacity increases, it becomes increasingly evident they are hopelessly incapable of delivering power as and when we need it. Back in January 2021, Germany shut down 11 coal-fired power plants (with a total capacity of 4.7 GW). That shutdown lasted eight days, with most of the plants up and running by … Continue reading Doomed to Inevitable Failure: Grand Wind & Solar ‘Transition’ Built On Subsidies & Bullshit
Snowy 2.NOTHING: Giant Pumped Hydro Scheme Becomes Costly & Pointless Disaster
Along with giant batteries and ‘green’ hydrogen, pumped hydro is touted as the solution to wind and solar power’s hopeless intermittency. Five years ago, Australia’s PM, Malcolm Turnbull pitched his very own mega-pumped hydro project, tagged Snowy 2.0. The numbering was meant to be a nod to computer program upgrades and signal an improvement on … Continue reading Snowy 2.NOTHING: Giant Pumped Hydro Scheme Becomes Costly & Pointless Disaster
Energy Transition Turns High Farce: Power Prices Surge 80% After Coal-Fired Plant Shutdown
Destroying coal-fired power plants is all part of the grand wind and solar ‘transition’ and precisely the point of the subsidies to wind and solar which are designed to allow the unreliables to undercut cheap and reliable coal-fired power, thereby driving coal-fired plants out of business. The inevitable consequences include rocketing power prices and rolling … Continue reading Energy Transition Turns High Farce: Power Prices Surge 80% After Coal-Fired Plant Shutdown
All Downhill: Australia’s Largest Pumped Hydro Scheme Grinds to Insanely Costly Halt
Loose talk about ‘green’ hydrogen, mega-batteries and pumped hydro is the default response from rent seekers forced to face up to wind and solar’s hopeless intermittency. None of the aforementioned generate a single watt of electricity; all of them chew up mountains of energy and resources in their creation; and all of them consume electricity … Continue reading All Downhill: Australia’s Largest Pumped Hydro Scheme Grinds to Insanely Costly Halt
New-Age Cargo Cult: Why Wind & Solar Push Continues to Deliver ‘Green’ Elephants
A new cargo cult is wedded to the notion that sunshine and breezes is all we need for peace and prosperity. When reality rattles the cult (eg sunset and calm weather), it tells us that a little mythical technology (think giant lithium-ion batteries or ‘green’ hydrogen) is all that stands between us and a veritable … Continue reading New-Age Cargo Cult: Why Wind & Solar Push Continues to Deliver ‘Green’ Elephants
Impossible Dream: Why Energy Storage Systems Can’t Solve Wind & Solar’s Intermittency
Renewable energy storage is literally setting the world on fire. When giant lithium-ion batteries aren’t exploding in toxic balls of flame, their limited capacity means that they add a trivial occasional trickle of electricity to the grid; and do so at an astronomical cost. The wind and solar acolyte would have us believe that if … Continue reading Impossible Dream: Why Energy Storage Systems Can’t Solve Wind & Solar’s Intermittency
Wicked Waste: Snowy 2.0 Pumped Hydro Project Australia’s Biggest Energy White Elephant
With a price tag in excess of $10 billion, Australia’s biggest pumped hydro project, Snowy 2.0, is easily its single biggest white elephant. Sure, the Feds have already squandered magnitudes more on subsidies and soft loans to wind and solar. And the purported benefit of Snowy 2.0 is to use excess wind and solar power … Continue reading Wicked Waste: Snowy 2.0 Pumped Hydro Project Australia’s Biggest Energy White Elephant
All Uphill: Australia Squanders $10Billion on Giant Pumped Hydro Power White Elephant
Australia has its former PM, Malcolm Turnbull to thank for its largest and most expensive renewable energy boondoggle, the Snowy 2.0 pumped hydro project. Touted by the patrician and aloof Turnbull and his hapless sidekick, Josh Frydenberg as the Nation’s mega-battery, the heavily-hyped pumped hydro scheme (shelved in the 1970s because it was uneconomic then) … Continue reading All Uphill: Australia Squanders $10Billion on Giant Pumped Hydro Power White Elephant
Snow Job: Giant Pumped Hydro Scheme Set to Destroy Australia’s Favourite National Park
Future generations will wonder why this one destroyed the planet, while claiming to save it, using completely useless industrial wind turbines and solar panels. Whether it’s dumping hundreds of thousands of toxic solar panels and windmill blades into landfill, or the toxic lakes in China where the rare earths are processed that make them, the … Continue reading Snow Job: Giant Pumped Hydro Scheme Set to Destroy Australia’s Favourite National Park
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