Author: Peter Gardner

Numerous column inches have, and continue to be, devoted to the impending shutdown of the Liddell power station in NSW, and how the grid will cope without it. Closer to home, the supposed crisis that closing the Yallourn Power station will precipitate – and who or what policies may be to blame (or thank?) for bringing this forward – appears to be a growing preoccupation for some in the Murdoch press. With the dubious honour of being Australia’s dirtiest power station following the closure of Hazelwood, along with an increasingly patchy reliability record and challenges accessing coal going forward, the case for closure is compelling. As with Liddell, none but the most ideologically driven (or those with a political narrative to perpetuate) are questioning ‘if’ closure in the short to medium term is necessary. The ‘when’ and ‘how’ – particularly what is to replace it – are more pressing.

Whilst Yallourn has, over its lifetime, burned through a large chunk of our ‘carbon budget’, it has also provided a number of benefits to the state. Victoria’s power grid was built around the large, synchronous generators of the Latrobe Valley, delivering not only large volumes of energy to the residents and industries of Melbourne and beyond, but also stability (frequency and voltage control) and reliable power capacity. Through construction and operation it has also provided steady jobs for many in the Valley.

Despite a lack of policy certainty, renewable energy generation is taking up the slack of delivering energy to the grid, with the 3.5GW of projects under construction or completed nationwide in 2017 alone eclipsing Yallourn’s 1.5GW. This intermittent generation does, however, raise new challenges with increased requirements for peaking capacity and spinning reserve, and contributes less to grid stability than traditional synchronous, ‘base-load’ generators. There may, however, be a replacement not so far from Yallourn that replaces its grid stability and firm capacity functions, whilst providing the peaking and reserve capacity that will be increasingly required going forward. And, of course, jobs.

In November last year, ANU released a report on an ongoing study which identified 22,000 potential Pumped Hydro Energy Storage (PHES) sites around Australia, including 4,400 in Victoria. PHES accounts for 96% of installed energy storage capacity worldwide, and requires an upper and lower reservoir- water is pumped up when the wind/sun are blowing/shining, and let down when power is needed. Many of the potential reservoir sites identified by ANU are relatively small and distant from the existing grid, and work is currently ongoing to identify potential lower reservoir sites. There is, however, one site that appears to stand out from the pack, and could rival or surpass the proposed ‘Snowy 2.0’ expansion in scale and value.

At an altitude of over 1000m, the upper reservoir would be created off the north-west boundary of the Baw Baw national park with a 600m dam, impounding approximately 30GL of water covering up to 140 Hectares. Tunnels under the Baw Baw plateau would connect this new reservoir to the Thompson dam approximately 15km to the east and 650m below. A two gigawatt power plant (equivalent to the Snowy 2.0 proposal, and 30% larger than the existing Yallourn W generator) could be run at capacity continuously for up to 40 hours- sufficient to firm up much of the renewable capacity expected to be installed in Victoria over the next decade.

By comparison to Snowy 2.0, tunnelling (the major cost of that project) is reduced by almost 50%. A new reservoir is required, unlike in the Snowy scheme, entailing a longer environmental approvals process, but using rock excavated from the head-race tunnel to build the dam wall should mean construction costs are not prohibitive. The key differentiator between the two, however, is likely to be in connecting to the existing grid. Whereas the cost of integrating Snowy 2.0 has been estimated in the order of $2b, owing to its location adjacent to large existing peaking capacity (the existing Snowy scheme), the Baw Baw power plant would be 33km as the crow flies from the Victorian 500kV backbone, and only 40km from Yallourn. Associated cost are, therefore, expected to be an order of magnitude less- the grid is designed for large, synchronous generators at this point. If planned well, the Baw Baw PHES could well provide a seamless transition to support the Victorian grid in the way Yallourn now does.

So next time the press or politicians infer that extending the life of our dirtiest power station is the only way to support the Victorian grid, provide Latrobe Valley jobs, and keep downward pressure on energy prices, our response should perhaps be to turn the question around. The descendants of Sir John Monash – the visionary behind the Victorian grid as we know it – have objected to the use of his name by these group to support extending the use of technology that no longer suits the times. We should likewise challenge our leaders to think as he did: consider how today’s technology can meet the needs of tomorrow, and plan accordingly.

* Paul is an Engineer and Project Manager with over ten years of experience in the large-scale wind and solar industry

Hardly a day goes by when I do not get an email request, usually from an organization I am sympathetic with, for donations of one kind or another.  These organisations all require funds to function and the more they have the better are their chances of success. The problem in part is that the bulk of the people they are often appealing to have little or no funds to part with.

For most of my life I have been in this category and at times so broke that I could not maintain my financial membership of the two organisations I have continued to support – the ACF (Australian Conservation Foundation) and the ATA (Alternative Technology Association). Now, since retiring and beginning the process of downsizing I have accumulated a small ‘nest egg’ through the sale of assets, and thus in the position to respond to donation requests.

At the same time as downsizing I have continued my political campaigning through candidacy in various elections as a ‘climate independent’ and the funds required – legal deposits (all lost) advertisements, travel – have been substantial and a serious drain on my savings. More recently as secretary of the now defunct Renewable Energy Party I was putting aside funds for its use, promotion and possible political candidacy. With my active political career now coming to a close I can look to use these freed funds elsewhere.

To date with one exception, my political donations have been small. The exception is donating $500 (with my wife) for the last two years to the ATA’s East Timor solar project – which covers the cost of installing solar systems on village houses and the training of a technician. One attraction of this project is that it is technology based and thus apolitical – something some of our dimmer politicians have yet to recognise. Other small donations have gone to local organisations (Earthworker) and climate activists (Climate Council).

The example of a recently discovered second cousin is inspiring.  Following the sinking of the Rainbow Warrior in Auckland harbour in 1985 he decided to make a regular monthly donation to Greenpeace and has done so ever since. For someone in regular employment this remains a possibility.  I prefer the ‘one off’ donation as I still function mainly in the old economy – I can make electronic transfers but prefer the chequebook. Hopefully I will make a few more of these in the coming years helping to promote the climate action cause and a few of its solutions.

Of recent times I have been a follower of Stanford University futurist Tony Seba. His message appeals strongly to me as one of hope so I dearly want most of his predictions to materialise. Consequently I can be called a ‘sebarite’ (not to be confused with ‘sybarite’). Some of his predictions of 10 years ago especially of cheap solar energy are happening now and in fact have turned out far cheaper than his prediction. Seba has made similar predictions about costs and adoption of batteries, electronic vehicles and sensors but his most contentious predictions are about autonomous (ie driverless) vehicles.

A recent pedestrian fatality in Arizona caused by a collision with an autonomous vehicle resulted in a flurry of mostly unfavourable news items around the globe. An article on the accident in the Conversation noted that 5,984 pedestrians killed in 2017 did not warrant similar news items and examined questions of legal liability. Autonomous vehicles or ‘vehicles as a service’ may take some years more to be adopted than Seba predicts. Certainly Gippsland will probably be one of the last places to do so.

Other more readily and rapidly adopted solutions to the public transport problem have been recently offered by retired CSIRO climate scientist Barrie Pittock. He noted “The solution is really rather simple and quite economic. It is to install rapid express…buses on all our existing major urban transport main roads/freeways, with connections to feeder buses on major crossroads. We could economically generate the required electricity by installing solar panels lining all freeway cuttings and noise barrier fences and bridges, and bus stop shelters. These would be close to where the demand would be and on free public land, and often exposed to good sun lighting. They could have their reserved express bus lanes, which would speed transit and help people to decide to use them. Short-term energy storage would be necessary, but this is becoming cheaper and more economic by the day…” *

It should be noted that unlike Seba, Pittock has no preference for fuel to transport the express buses and whilst the quote above specifies electricity it could easily be by “solar generated hydrogen or ammonia, which can be quickly and economically converted back to electricity or else used directly in hydrogen or ammonia driven engines in buses.”

How the suggestions of Pittock and predictions of Seba can be applied to Gippsland is another question but is no doubt linked to the train in some way with improved services. Any drastic improvements in the Melbourne transport jungle will also greatly benefit gippslanders. Perhaps autonomous electric vehicles could also be trialled in the suburbs of Sale or Morwell?

*from Barrie’s notes for an ACF workshop on Public Transport

I can recall reading a CSIRO publication on climate change that was published in 1989 predicting that fire seasons would become worse and the fire season would grow longer. The latter extended season is now definitely with us in south-east Australia and Gippsland. Large bushfires at Cann River in November 2017 and Licola in March 2018 are hopefully the bookends of an otherwise moderate fire season.

Recently Climate Council’s Dr Martin Rice noted: “Intensifying climate change is exacerbating extreme weather events including rising temperatures, severe heatwaves, supercharged storms, flooding, intense rainfall and even bushfires…” and “High bushfire danger weather has been increasing in Southeast Australia over the past forty years due to worsening climate change, which unfortunately has increased the odds… [of] dangerous fires…”

Due to loss of property it has been the recent bushfires at Tathra (which apparently was experiencing record warm temperatures) and in the Western District that have been in the news. The Age ran an article on Tathra councillor Jo Dodds headed “’I’m furious’: Tathra councillor says now is the time to talk climate”.

Ms Dodds’ anger was directed at PM Turnbull. The article further noted: “Mr Turnbull may well have picked the wrong community to be dismissive about climate change…” and that “Tathra, and the wider Bega Valley area, has long had a goal of reaching 50 per cent renewable energy sources of electricity and cutting energy use by half from 2006 levels by 2020, led by the Clean Energy For Eternity group.” She sensibly called for a return to bipartisanship on the climate question.

For the first time in living memory – perhaps the first time ever – there have been bushfires in northern and southern hemispheres at the same time. Whilst bushfires devastated property in California’s autumn and into their winter with a large fire in December at the same time as a substantial bushfire in Gippsland at Cann River was burning out of control. This fire eventually burned an area of over 8000 ha but did little property damage.

Following closely climate change predictions our weather patterns have been all ‘topsy turvy’ with dry spring and autumn but a relatively benign summer – three months with normal temperatures, certainly no heatwaves, and regular rainfall giving us an almost bushfire free summer. I can’t recall east Gippsland having a ‘total fire ban’ day or an ‘extreme fire danger’ day this season.

The long term Bureau of Meteorology forecasts for the next quarter for south-east Australia are for above average rainfall. So we await the autumn ‘break’ and in the meantime wonder if there is a right time to talk about bushfires and climate change?

On 19 March Australian Paper, owners of the Maryvale paper mill, had a public relations exercise on their Waste to Energy proposal feasibility study. At least one third of the cost of this $7.5m study has been contributed by State and Federal governments. Accordingly Gippsland MHR Darren Chester and Harriet Shing MLC were featured in the publicity.

A report commissioned by the company stated “Over the past few years there has been an increasing interest in Energy from Waste (EfW) facilities across Australia. EfW plants have the potential to contribute to Australia’s renewable energy targets, reduce carbon emissions and divert waste away from landfill. They also have the potential to improve the energy mix in Australia by supplementing wind and solar production through base load generation.”

“The proposed EfW Plant at Maryvale will assist Australian Paper in its commitment to managing waste responsibly and ensure future sustainability and reliability in energy production. The EfW plant will promote low carbon network emissions, economic development and employment growth in the Latrobe Valley Region of Victoria.”

The report concentrates on economic aspects and employment generation. The quote above contains the single reference in 17 pages to greenhouse gases. Supposedly about 500,000 tons of greenhouse gases will be saved and a report in the Latrobe Valley Express emphasized the large amounts of municipal waste diverted from landfill.

Energy from waste is a sustainable concept and I campaigned on this in the State Election in Morwell in 2010 (using pyrolysis the other plank of my platform was exploiting geothermal energy under the coal). However what the reports and publicity fail to mention is that the whole process appears to be diverting attention from Maryvale’s dependence on logging native forests. As such it has a limited future and no doubt currently produces far more greenhouse gas than it saves.

It is an example of another proposition (see other examples below) to bolster the old carbon economy that recently includes the coal to hydrogen, carbon capture and storage, the clean coal power generator projects and the purchase of the Heyfield timber mill – all supported (read subsidised) by State and Federal governments and ‘good money after bad’.

By all means have a waste to energy plant but preferably owned and financed by council or the state and independent of Maryvale. And Australian Paper should be looking at alternative sources for their paper including hemp, crop waste and plantations instead of wasting their time and money on public relations exercises and greenwash.

The recent purchase of the Heyfield Timber Mill by the Victorian government is a monumental mistake. It is not the involvement of government that is the problem. A strong, probably dominant, contribution will be required from government to achieve any just transition to a low carbon economy. The mistake is investing in the continuing destruction of Gippsland’s native forests – probably amongst the best carbon stores in mainland Australia.

They government have invested in a lose/lose situation almost certainly because of the influence of the unions – in this case the CFMEU. This union is the natural power base for the Labor party in Gippsland and the timber workers jobs have become sacrosanct. This is regardless of the fact that they are in electorates that are most unlikely to return Labor members and from anecdotal accounts many of these workers will not vote Labor anyway. The decision was also probably influenced by Vicforests – a government business tied to the continuation of the logging industry. Aside from shoring up their base support any political gains of the purchase are hard to find.

Labor (and eventually we all) will lose because of the loss of this precious carbon store. As it becomes increasingly obvious that the remaining forests must be retained and protected the union base of the old economy will decline. So too will their political support diminish unless they can also change to support and even promote the new economy. They will also lose because there will probably never be a return on the so called investment. The mill purchase was only ever a short term political fix.

A just transition in the bush should take no more than ten years. Employment should be the primary concern. As areas are closed to logging all bush workers should be offered work with DELWP changing their tasks from forest destruction to forest protection. Likewise, as mills close, the workers should all be offered employment preferably near their current jobs. In the remote mills the main employment may be with DELWP. In Heyfield employment could be offered in large government projects such as floating solar on Lake Glenmaggie and plantation or reafforestation projects. No doubt there are many other low carbon economy options.

The rapid changes in the South Australian renewable energy should serve as an example to the Andrews government. Although SA Labor has lost political power their achievements in renewable energy and energy storage will stand the test of time and emphasise how mediocre successive governments have been across the nation.

The task of change in Victoria is much harder given the power of big business, the unions, bureaucracy and the status quo. This is not a criticism of unions alone, but of all those power blocs that have yet to comprehend that we are in a climate emergency. And Gippsland is the base for the two carbon intensive industries – coal powered electricity and logging – where planning and action on a just transition is urgently required.

 

(first published in Environment Connect – an electronic publication of the East Gippsland Shire Council)

Work to install 287 solar panels on five East Gippsland Shire Council buildings has started. It is expected to reduce council’s carbon dioxide emissions by 123 tonnes annually, equivalent to seven Australian households.

Customer service centres and libraries* in Lakes Entrance, Paynesville, Omeo and Orbost, as well as the Bairnsdale Business Centre, will benefit from the project. A total of 94 kW of solar panels will be installed by the local company EnviroLinkAu.

Omeo continues to experience frequent blackouts, which is a problem for the community and local businesses.  A grid-connected battery will also be installed at that site to keep some services running, such as the town’s only bank, when there is a grid failure.

The payback period for the project is between four and five years. Rising energy prices combined with the declining cost of solar products and the current feed-in tariff means solar is more viable than ever before.

A study was undertaken to see which council buildings would benefit most from solar panels.  It found the customer service centres and libraries, which are open during daylight hours were most suitable.

Once the solar panels are installed, the buildings will use electricity generated by the sun, with any excess sent into the power grid for a minimum payment of 11.3 cents per kW – a feed-in tariff.

Considering solar? For households or local businesses considering solar in 2018, the likely financial outcomes for a 3 kW solar photo voltaic (PV) system should be:  Installed cost $3,600, Annual generation 3,450 kWh, Retail tariff 25cents per kWh, Export tariff 11.3cents per kWh, Amount of export 30%, Annual income $720, Simple payback time 5 years, Simple rate of return 20% pa

For further information: Rebecca Lamble

*the obvious location for PV in town is the Bairnsdale Library. However apparently Heritage Victoria has blocked installation of panels even on the new part of the building if they are visible from the pavement.

In the 1930s a young Wilfred Burchett was clearing scrub on the family farm at Poowong. He went on to become one of Australia’s most controversial and well known journalists and commentators. He rose to fame with the journalist scoop of the twentieth century in Japan at the end of World War II. Whilst every other war journalist in Japan went with the flow and attended the signing of the peace treaty on USS Missouri, Burchett went against the flow deciding that the real news story was elsewhere.

Following his hunch he made a difficult and dangerous journey to Hiroshima and was the first journalist to witness the destruction of a city caused by a single bomb. Newspaper headlines flashed around the world; everyone who could read now knew about the Atomic bomb and the insidious radiation sickness that followed in its wake.

Like the nuclear age that burst on an unsuspecting world, man-made climate change is in a similar, but different, position in the world of news. It can be seen like that well-worn cliché as ‘the elephant in the room’. Paradoxically climate change is well known but little understood. Vested interests have successfully muddied the waters and distorted the science. People in Gippsland generally, and some journalists, have accepted the distortion that our current climate change is natural and that therefore nothing can be done about it. The priority for the local media becomes the road accident at Briagolong or a drug bust in Mirboo North.

Many journalists and commentators still confuse weather and climate. From Alan Jones down some crow their disbelief every time there is a massive snow storm in the eastern USA (forgetting of course the record hot temperatures in the Arctic) or when there is a record frost in Bairnsdale. Normal weather patterns dictate that there will be both hot and cold records but not in a ratio of six hot ones to every cold. It is also becoming clearer over time that global warming is influencing all weather in many ways from warmer winters to longer fire seasons.

Amongst current mainstream media journalists working on climate Peter Hannam of the Sydney Morning Herald is a standout. Others such as Tristan Edis of News Corp lost his position some time ago as his work was continuously running counter to the political thrust of his organisation. The campaign of opposition, distortion and misinformation emanating from News Corp, the major print media organisation in Australia, is bordering on criminal. The Guardian by comparison is light years ahead.

This then is a conundrum especially for local journalists. How do they write (or present) about climate change? Barring a nuclear holocaust or a major plague (from bacteria released from a melting permafrost?) global warming will be the news event(s) of the twenty first century. Can Gippsland produce another journo of the calibre of Wilfred Burchett to report on this?

It is becoming increasingly clear that most politicians don’t understand the science of climate change. Even if they do their actions are governed by gaining or retaining power, and thus using dirty politics, rather than tackling the difficult tasks climate action involves. There are numerous examples on both sides of politics of this situation.

The current conundrum of ALP leader Bill Shorten over the proposed Adani mine in Queensland and Labor’s quest for power means that he ends up sitting on the fence. On the one hand he states that he does not like the proposal to appeal to city based voters and on the other does not veto the project to appease his union base. This is the predicament that he currently faces in this weekend’s by-election in Batman.

It is also a problem for the so called ‘conservative’ side of politics, who when defending big money in the form of coal find themselves in ridiculous situations.  The Lib/Nats attempt at greenwash promoting the dying coal industry is ‘beyond the pale’ and such efforts as passing around a suitably varnished piece (so they would not get their hands dirty) of ‘clean coal’ deserves all the mockery it attracted. And politicians pushing low emissions (or lower) emissions with carbon capture and storage have yet to grasp the urgency of the situation.

In Gippsland the CFMEU, representing coal miners and forest workers, has a substantial amount of power and influence. This is clearly seen with the Labor state government’s purchase of the Heyfield timber mill – another example of pollies protecting their power base instead of grappling with the problem – logging of native forests – that is destroying the State’s most valuable and irreplaceable carbon storage. Each tree that is felled should be replaced by 100 seedlings. Each tree that is felled is another nail in the Labor Party’s coffin. It is also a nail in ours.

There are two separate but related major disruptions happening today. The first is man-made climate change. This is still well down our list of concerns, but in spite of this, requires urgent action. The second is what Tony Seba describes in his book Clean Disruption as the rapid uptake across the globe of solar, wind, batteries, electric vehicles and autonomous electric vehicles. The latter will be hugely beneficial in reducing our carbon emissions and Seba cogently argues that all this will happen very quickly regardless of politics. The rear-guard actions of the Lib/Nats against renewable energy will, aside from delays of a year or two, be pointless.

It is clear many bureaucrats – in Earth Resources for instance or Vicforests – and most politicians do not understand the problem of climate change, nor the urgency for action. For when they do working on mitigating and adapting to climate change will become their overriding concern and dominate their energies and efforts. Dirty politics should disappear and a return to bipartisanship at all levels of politics on this issue hopefully will return. As a starter attendance at Climate 101 classes should be compulsory for them all or at least watching one of Seba’s videos of the disruptions we are now facing.

 

Much has been made for employment prospects in the Latrobe Valley that are not going to occur like ‘clean coal generators’ and ‘carbon capture and storage’. Instead of these dead end strategies industry and government should be concentrating on exploiting some of the natural advantages of the Valley. One of these advantages is, strangely enough, the fly-ash waste that has accumulated over the last 100 years and is still being produced by the current generators.

A publication by independent think tank Beyond Zero Emissions (BZE) entitled Rethinking Cement (2017) recently highlighted the possibilities of exploiting the fly-ash in cement production. The publication is part of their detailed analysis of how industry can move to being carbon neutral over a ten year period. The study notes that cement production is industry’s major carbon polluter causing 8% of global carbon dioxide emission – more that the global car fleet. And the fly-ash waste produced by coal power generation is an environmental problem.

The report stated “Geopolymer cement production does not require a kiln and therefore the set up cost of a new plant is relatively low, at less than 10% of a Portland Cement plant. New plants can be established at or close to sources of stockpiled fly-ash, potentially forming part of transition planning for local communities impacted by the closure of coal-fired power stations.” (p.7)

I am reliably informed there are large deposits of fly-ash in parts of the valley including at the bottom of the Hazelwood open cut. The study suggests that there is enough fly-ash to last for 20 years of cement production. Some years ago the Gippsland Trades and Labour Council expressed interest in such a project and apparently Monash Gippsland (now Federation Uni) Engineering did studies on fly-ash cement products although I have been unable to locate these on the internet.

The study also noted that waste clay can also be used in cement production and “there are large kaolinite deposits left around the Morwell and Yallourn coal mines in Victoria’s Latrobe Valley. This waste material could be the source of metakaolin used in cement.”

The use of fly-ash for cement production has been identified by at least one Morwell resident as a win/win opportunity. The climate emergency necessitates that coal fired power be closed down as quickly as possible and that all other carbon dioxide pollution is minimised, including cement production emissions. Fly-ash to cement production is one obvious step in a just transition and the BZE book* of 95 pages spells out most of the detail!

* all BZE publications are available in the East Gippsland Shire Library or you can purchase them here.