As protesters locked themselves onto a conveyor belt at Loy Yang power station in protest, those of us listening to the ABC heard Tony Eastley intone these words:
With the Garnaut report due out tomorrow and an emissions trading scheme to be introduced by 2010, building a coal-fired power station may not be high on many peoples’ agendas.
But the Victorian Government has just approved the building of a new brown coal plant in the Latrobe Valley.
Samantha Donovan reports:
The $750-million power station will be up and running by 2013, providing its Australian and Chinese developers can secure enough funding.
The Victorian Government is putting in $50-million and the previous federal government committed $100-million from the Commonwealth.
Victorian Energy Minister Peter Batchelor says the 400 megawatt plant’s carbon dioxide emissions will be 30 per cent lower than other Latrobe Valley coal-fired plants and use 50 per cent less water.
Emissions are not a worry, according to Batchelor:
The emissions trading scheme and the climate change target requires us to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions by 60 per cent but to do that by the year 2050, so clearly in that time frame some of the existing power stations will reach their use-by date.
The 60% target is so far away, we can do it in a doddle.
Warwick McKibbin of the ANU says the Victorian Government doesn’t have any choice. He thinks we can do it all in a doddle also.
The World Today picked up the story later in the day. Professor Barry Brook of the University of Adelaide thought the new power station in Victoria showed a stunning lack of foresight.
It doesn’t make sense to invest there. It makes sense to consider that there is going to be a price on carbon. The emissions trading scheme is coming in. Carbon price will probably start at something like $20 a tonne and quickly increment. And at that point, when we’ve got to about $40 per tonne, a whole raft of renewables including concentrated solar power, wind power, these will be cost competitive with coal-fired power stations anyway, because right now we’re not paying the environmental cost of carbon, which is what the emissions trading scheme is meant to deal with.
Pro-nuclear blogger Luke Weston was also perplexed.
This plant is slated to cost 750 million (Australian) dollars, and will have a nameplate capacity of 400 MW.
That is; $1875 per kilowatt of nameplate capacity.
The US nuclear energy industry is aiming to build new nuclear power plants for a cost of $1500 to $2000 per kW capacity.
The General Electric ABWR was the first third generation power plant approved. The first two ABWR’s were commissioned in Japan in 1996 and 1997. These took just over 3 years to construct and were completed on budget. Their construction costs were around $2000 per KW.
Westinghouse claims that the AP1000 power reactor will cost $1400 per KW for the first reactor and fall to as low as $1000 per KW for subsequent reactors.
Robert Merkel blogged on this in March last year. He found that this new ‘clean-coal’ technology sounded great
until you realise that all that does is bring the emissions into line with the black coal power stations in NSW and Queensland, and is nearly double what a state of the art natural gas power station would do.
They didn’t ask Robert, more’s the pity, so it’s one step forward and two steps back, or vice versa at best, as we stumble into the future.
Luke Weston’s numbers are rather out of date - not because Westinghouse’s numbers were completely out of the ballpark, but because the cost of steel and concrete has risen so much. Here’s a newspaper report that gives numbers of between 2500 and 3500 USD per kilowatt for AP-1000s proposed for construction in Georgia (the US state).
On the other hand, the $750 million number seems to have miraculously remained unchanged. I suspect no new cost estimate has been announced, and the media is just using the old number from the media reports last year.
In any case, note the, well, money quote:
They’re going to have to be able to convince investors to put up the cash for this plant, in the full knowledge that a) the emissions trading scheme will already be up and running by the time this plant is built, b) it’s highly likely that over the life of the plant, the emissions limits will be cut substantially (60% by 2050 is a nonsense), and c) any sweetheart deals for existing polluters aren’t going to cover them.
They’re going to have to persuade investors that the plant can be retrofitted with carbon capture technology at an affordable price, or they’re not going to get any investors. I reckon they’re going to really struggle to get the cash, given that the same plant built burning black coal would almost certainly face lower carbon costs.
You’re quite right about the economic estimates for the AP1000, Robert.
However, if the $2500/kW point could be acheived at present, I still think that’s surprisingly competitive when compared to the $1875/kW figure for the coal plant - especially given the prevailing idea that there’s no way that nuclear or other clean energy can begin to compete economically with coal, in the absence of an ETS or carbon capture.
As you say, it would certainly be interesting to see up-to-date cost estimates for the IDGCC plant, to see how they’ve followed cost increases in concrete and steel over 12 months.
I should have highlighted that it was the previous Commonwealth government that committed the funds. Obviously the Victorian Government has the running on this. At the very least it’s an example of how ordinary dome of them are on global warming matters.
Also Barry Brook in The World Today piece emphasised that if the Govt implemented concerted energy saving policies there should be no need for another power station.
….”especially given the prevailing idea that there’s no way that nuclear or other clean energy can begin to compete economically with coal, in the absence of an ETS or carbon capture.”
I just want to ask Robert or Brian about this - is nuclear power generation NOW accepted as a clean energy?
Judging by his wimping out of any serious addressing of transport problems, I wouldn’t be relying too much on Batchelor initiatives on so-called green coal. Though I confess that I’m not knowledgeable on the concept. Brian and Robert might offer something on whether it is viable.
Brown coal is the classic dilemma: available in huge cheap quantities, but among the worst carbon emitters. I’d have thought algae from the carbon exhausts (and the subsequent creation of bio-diesel from algae) would offer more prospects for saving the Latrobe Valley jobs in the long term. Anyone have any technical information on that possibility?
From my perspective, it’s clean enough. No energy source is perfect, but nuclear’s environmental concerns are comparable to renewables as far as I am concerned.
Brian disagrees, but I think he’ll concede that it’s better than coal. Jeez, even Ian Lowe was prepared to concede that
Officially, however, it’s not counted as renewable energy (and nor is coal with CCS). So it’s not eligible for the same incentives as solar, wind, and geothermal in most countries.
I have to say if there’s anyhing I want to see privatised, it’s coal-fired power plants. If some private enterprises wants to foot the bill for such a thing, including paying for necessary emissions permits, that’s their business, but why should taxpayers be stumping up for technology that surely a majority would not want to see pursued?
A question for Luke and/or Robert. Does the cost estimate for Nuclear of $2500/kW take into account decommissioning and waste disposal costs?
Long have I dreamed of a protester-fired power station. Obviously we need more research into teflon conveyor belts.
er those protestors linked to above locking themselves onto the conveyor belt were in Sept 2007 and protesting the policies of the evil, but vanquished, JWH.
if there’s anyhing I want to see privatised, it’s coal-fired power plants.
wizofaus, the coal-fired plants in Victoria are all privately owned - the Government money is only a small proportion of the total, and is capped, and is there to make the plant cleaner. Had it been bog standard thermal lignite power generation, it wouldn’t have received a cent (though of course it would have, since they’re all rentiers).
murph and Don. Robert is the engineer and knows about all the practical mitigation stuff. I respect his knowledge.
I change a bit from time to time on nuclear. Generally, I’ve thought that we don’t need to do it in Australia. I do wish the Germans would rescind their nuclear phase-out policy. They have fewer options than we do, especially with concentrated solar, which required direct sunlight as distinct from PV which doesn’t.
I’m less keen on the developing countries going nuclear, simply because I have less confidence in their technical competence and quality control in avoiding accidents and disposing of waste.
I think we are in big enough trouble that we can’t just let the market work things out. Picking winners is justified.
I’d like to see concentrated solar supported actively in Australia. Go inland 150km anywhere in Oz and we have what is classed premium solar territory. We are better placed than most places in the world to use this technology.
I’ve read about storing solar energy with a big pot of molten salt, which adds to the cost, but helps to overcome the base-load power problem. Then we could look at a network of stations east-west and north-south to provide for greater continuity. Built-in reserve capacity also costs, but maybe we should have gas backup at each solar station in case, praise the Lord, we get extended cloud cover over a wide area.
Then there is geothermal (”hot rocks”) which shows good prospects of providing commercial quantities into the grid from 2015. Geodynmics (I’ve got a few shares) reckon they can do it competitively with what the price of carbon will be by then. The technology is not quite proven yet, but it’s looking good. We have so much of it and it entirely solves the base-load problem, so I think it’s worth a few taxpayer dollars to kick it along.
I reckon we should aim at entirely decarbonising the grid and becoming emissions neutral by 2030. If that means going nuclear, then so be it. In any case we shouldn’t be building coal-fired power stations. It’s a crime against the planet.
FXH, turns out you’re right about that protest being last year. I thought I heard on the radio about another protest this time, googled and that’s what came up.
Yet another senior moment!
wilful - thanks for that. I suppose if it’s an issue of Company XYZ deciding that building a coal-fired plant is a commercially viable decision even with an ETS, and the government is approving it on the basis that it is cleaner than existing technology, and money going towards it is only to ensure that it truly is cleaner, I’m not going to object too strongly. Meanwhile those that do should all be ensuring they buy 100% green power (and trust me, the early bills will act as quite a good movitator to moderate your electricity usage!)
wizofaus,
the planned plant will use newish Aussie technology developed by HRL Technology, a company based in Morwell and Melbourne; grew out of the old SEC “Herman Research Labs” as a privatised R&D company. Had a big shareholding by media magnate Kerry Stokes some years ago. The process planned is “Integrated Drying Gasification Combined Cycle” IDGCC. They had a test plant operating near Morwell for about a year, a few years back.
Peter Batchelor said “…(it) can reduce emissions of CO2 from brown coal-fired power generation by 30% and reduce water consumption by 50%, compared to current best practice for brown coal… in the Latrobe Valley. HRL figures suggest the technology could almost halve emissions from the Latrobe Valley if substituted for all existing (power plants)…”
“Latrobe Valley Express”, 3rd July, p.5
This suggests there are some bad emitters amongst the power stations, see the difference between “best practice” and “subsituting for all”. So I’m with Robert Merkel: phase out Hazelwood if that’s the worst. The carbon price and Hazelwood-power-too-expensive may do it.
cheerio
You talk about solar-thermal and geo-thermal power, Brian, which are both great low-carbon solutions for Australia; but what about wave power?
There is a company doing a trial off Gracetown in southwest WA at the moment for a wave power/desalination plant known as CETO.
Check out http://www.ceto.com.au/home.php for some information on this very interesting technology.
This solves the problem of dwindling water supplies and increased energy demand (with very low emissions) in suitable coastal areas… which happens to include nearly all of the major population centres in Australia. Seems like a no-brainer to me.
Andos, I had wave and tidal in my mind when I started typing the comment, but they disappeared before I finished. I know less about them, but, yes, why not?
We are particularly blessed with access to potential renewable power in our wide brown land girt by sea. Perhaps we could even export it via hydrogen fuel cells or something.
Brian, FXH: there’s been another bunch of protesters at Eraring Power Station, just yesterday. Greenpeace Oz’s own blog about it and some pics on Flickr.
Huh, for the second time, Twitter has been useful. I got those links off the Greenpeace Oz twitter feed.
Appropos the Eraring power station, some 250 unionists were apparently locked out during a Iemma Government stunt to kick start a pilot CO2 sequestration project. While the power workers were obviously protesting about Iemma’s energy privatisation plans they pointed to the fact that the nuts and bolts of the clean coal porject were still sitting around waiting to be installed and that they would take at least six weeks to do. So the question of why Iemma wants to do a ’stunt’ on Ross Garnaut’s day could be asked. Timing is everything they say.
If Hazelwood or one of the other old brown coal plants isn’t the first to shut under the ETS, there’s something gone seriously screwy with the design of the scheme.
As far as waste disposal and decommissioning goes, that’s not counted in the construction cost. What happens is that a levy is collected by law (somewhere between 0.1 and 0.5 US cents per kilowatt hour) to sit in a bank account, accumulate interest, and fund disposal after the plant shuts down. The temporary fuel storage pools are included in the cost. At the higher level, the plant is collecting around 50 million dollars a year, and does that for 40 years (and probably nearly 60).
The thing to keep in mind when the British example is used with their decommissioning costs is that a) they didn’t collect a levy, b) it also includes their military nuclear program, c) they used a unique nuclear plant design which was designed for making bombs easy, not for making decommissioning easy.
RM - isn’t it in the coal mob’s interest to keep old bad high emitting plant in operation until trading is sorted so that their starting point is as bad as possible and then to whip into a frenzy of cutting back? Didn’t a few sneaky Italians try that already?
Eraring should read Munmorah power station as the stunt site.
FXH: only if they’re allocated free permits, or compensation, based on their current emissions. That’s one of the reasons people have opposed compensation for power generators.
Nuclear is not clean, and neither is Brumby and Batchelor’s new coal fired power station in Victoria. They are telling big porkies.
More carbon emissions = bad. What part of that don’t they understand? Oh, the CFMEU, industry interests and Labor marginal seats in Gippsland. Ah, so there is method to their madness.
Trouble is, we are all toast if this lunatic behaviour continues.