It’s now cheaper to build a new wind farm than to keep a coal plant running

Inflation dictates that the cost of living will continue to rise — except, it seems, when it comes to renewable energy. The cost of building a new utility-scale solar or wind farm has now dropped below the cost of operating an existing coal plant, according to an analysis by the investment bank Lazard. Accounting for government tax credits and other energy incentives would bring the cost even lower.

"There are some scenarios, in some parts of the U.S., where it is cheaper to build and operate wind and solar than keep a coal plant running," said a Lazard banker who was involved in the report. "You have seen coal plants shutting down because of this."

Every year, the investment bank analyzes the cost of different types of energy using a metric called the levelized cost of energy, or LCOE. This analysis factors in the cost of components and the cost of operations, as well as the cost of debt, to come up with the smallest dollar amount, per unit of energy, for an investor in the project to see a 12 percent return. 

Read the CBS News story by Irina Ivanova - “It’s now cheaper to build a new wind farm than to keep a coal plant running.”

Report costing climate change policies is ‘propaganda’: Shorten

Bill Shorten has come out swinging against “propaganda” modelling of the cost of his climate change policies, likening its author to doctors shilling for tobacco giants.

New modelling has put a price on the ALP's climate policies. 

In a report for BA Economics, former federal government economist Brian Fisher estimates Labor’s carbon reduction targets could wipe up to $542 billion from the nation’s growing economy.

“This fellow and his report remind me of the doctors that big tobacco companies used to roll out in the ’70s and ’80s to say that smoking was healthy for you,” Mr Shorten said in Tasmania on Thursday.

“We will file this report under ‘P’ for propaganda.”

Dr Fisher estimates Labor’s plan to cut carbon emissions by 45 per cent by 2030 could shrink economic growth by 0.8 per cent over the decade.

Read the story from The New Daily - “Report costing climate change policies is ‘propaganda’: Shorten.”

Scott Morrison warned on 'cherry-picking' $35 billion climate cost

The election fight on climate change has sparked warnings against "misleading" voters about the cost of cutting greenhouse gas emissions, as an independent researcher repudiates Coalition claims of a $35 billion hit from Labor policies.

Scott Morrison (left) and Bill Shorten have clashed over climate policy.CREDIT:

Prime Minister Scott Morrison has been accused of "cherry-picking" numbers in the escalating row over the competing pledges on climate, as he prepares to release new estimates of the economic impact of the Labor carbon target.

Read the story from The Age by David Crowe - “Scott Morrison warned on 'cherry-picking' $35 billion climate cost.”

Renewables will replace ageing coal plants at lowest cost, Aemo says

Australia’s energy market operator says the future of power generation in Australia will be renewables with storage, and gas, with those technologies able to replace the power currently supplied by coal generators at least cost.

Some 30% of coal power plants will be decommissioned in the next
20 years and it will be cheaper to replace them with renewables than
with new coal plants, Aemo says. 

A new forecast by the Australian Energy Market Operator (Aemo) notes 30% of Australia’s coal generators will approach the end of their technical life over the next two decades, and it says it is important to avoid premature departures if the looming transition in the national energy market is to be orderly.

But while some in the Turnbull government have been campaigning to bolt new coal-fired power into the system, backed with government subsidy or underwriting, Aemo is clear about where the future lies, and it is not with coal.

Read Katharine Murphy’s story from The Guardian - “Renewables will replace ageing coal plants at lowest cost, Aemo says.”

Falling renewable costs 'chilling' for fossil fuels

The rapidly falling cost of renewable energy and batteries is "chilling" for the future of the fossil fuels sector, raising doubts about the viability of new coal power stations.

The combination of batteries and wind farms
is providing more power flexibility.

A Bloomberg New Energy Finance report has found the price of renewables has fallen by almost a fifth over the last year, with wind and solar generators becoming cheaper than both coal and gas-fired power stations.

Elena Giannakopoulou, head of energy economics at BNEF, said the rapidly falling cost of renewable generation and battery power is changing the game for the electricity sector.

"The conclusions are chilling for the fossil fuel sector," she said.

Read Cole Latimer’s story from The Sydney Morning Herald - “Falling renewable costs 'chilling' for fossil fuels.”

Pledge to ditch renewables target could cost Guy in sandbelt: poll

Matthew Guy's determination to scrap Victoria's renewable energy target will cost him votes in some of Melbourne's most marginal electorates and reduce his prospects of becoming premier, a poll has found.

The Macarthur wind farm in western Victoria. The Victorian
 government has set a target of 40 per cent renewables by 2025.

A clear majority of voters surveyed in the four swinging "sandbelt" seats of Bentleigh, Mordialloc, Carrum and Frankston in Melbourne's south-east supported moves to boost the proportion of wind and solar power generated in Victoria at the expense of coal.

A ReachTel poll of almost 3000 people in the four electorates found there is strong support for the Andrews government’s ambitious renewable energy target of 25 per cent by 2020 and 40 per cent by 2025.

Read Adam Carey’s story from The Age - “Pledge to ditch renewables target could cost Guy in sandbelt: poll.”

Climate wars have cost us the chance to lead

The climate wars between the major political parties have cost us a host of lost business and employment opportunities, even a global leadership role, and yet we drift on without an energy policy that might provide some relief to rising power costs and some strategy to meet our commitments to reduce emissions.

John Hewson takes us through the climate wars.

The government’s most recent policy, the National Electricity Guarantee (NEG), is the fourth most effective response, only being proposed after an emissions trading scheme, an emissions intensity scheme and Finkel’s clean energy target were sequentially rejected.

In this sense, the guarantee is the last, and only, game in town, but it is still likely to be exhaustively debated, mostly for not moving fast or far enough, with concern about the longer-term future of the renewables sector.

Read John Hewson’s opinion piece from The Age - “Climate wars have cost us the chance to lead.”

Canberra hit by heavy rain, flash flooding inundates homes.

A deluge has brought parts of Canberra to a standstill and left some residents counting the cost as their homes flooded.

Cars under water at an apartment complex's car park in O'Connor

After a night of high winds and rain, Canberrans woke up on Sunday to more wet weather, which caused flash flooding through the morning.

Sixty millimetres of rain were recorded in the space of an hour at Sullivan's creek, just off Lake Burley Griffin, according to the Bureau of Meteorology (BOM).

Just before 1:30pm, BOM cancelled the severe thunderstorm warning in place for the ACT, but warned Port Macquarie, Taree, Orange, Bathurst, Walgett and Dubbo could experience flash floods.

Read the ABC News story by Jon Healy - “Canberra hit by heavy rain, flash flooding inundates homes.”

Salt could supercharge storage batteries

Humble salt could replace lithium-ion batteries as an energy storage source for a fifth of the cost, and without the ethical concerns, according to new research.

The University of Wollongong's Shulei Chou
demonstrating a sodium-ion energy battery. 

A Stanford University study into sodium-ion (Na-ion) battery technology has demonstrated the potential of these batteries to displace lithium-ion, which requires rarer, and more difficult to obtain materials.

The research has found a way to dramatically increase the energy efficiency of the new batteries to more than 87 per cent, but at less than 80 per cent the cost of lithium-ion batteries with equivalent storage capacities.

The new materials would also spare the ethical concerns that can come with lithium-ion due to the locations of mines for the raw minerals.

Read Cole Latimer’s story in today’s Melbourne Age - “Salt could supercharge storage batteries.”

Josh Frydenberg hints the government could back away from clean energy target

The Turnbull government is hinting that the rapidly declining cost of renewable energy is undermining the case for further clean-energy subsidies, as it maintains it will make a decision on a clean energy target in coming months.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull with Minister
Josh Frydenberg at Parliament House in Canberra.

In a speech to the Australian Financial Review's National Energy Summit in Sydney on Monday, Energy Minister Josh Frydenberg has emphasised the "declining cost curve" for wind, solar and renewables storage.

"Globally in the past seven years, the cost of wind-powered generation has more than halved. Domestically, solar PV costs have dropped more than 50 per cent," he said.

"By 2020, costs of battery technologies are expected to fall 40 to 60 per cent and over 70 per cent to 2030.

Read Adam Gartrell’s story in today’s Melbourne Age - “Josh Frydenberg hints the government could back away from clean energy target.”

Solar energy to become the cheapest source of electricity

"....there's no end to the cost
decline in photovoltaics."

Solar energy is set to become the cheapest source of electricity in many parts of the world within the next 10 years, according to a new report released by German think tank, Agora Energiewende.

An ABC story headed: “Solar power set to become cheapest source of energy over next decade, German think tank says”, discusses a report commissioned by an independently funded organisation, designed to steer Germany towards its 80 per cent renewable energy target.

CEO Dr Patrick Graichen said they wanted to see if recent falls in the cost of photovoltaics would continue.

"The finding is there's no end to the cost decline in photovoltaics," he said.

We procratinate and the costs mount

The idea that climate change will be hugely expensive seems to escape most in the business world.

CBC News has written about that topic in its story headed: “Climate change will cost big business dearly, report warns”.

CBC focusses on what is happening in America, but the dynamic is similar in most developed countries.

It quotes a report published by the so-called “Risky Business Project” that argues that American businesses need to start factoring in weather and environmental-related losses, and take tangible steps toward reducing carbon dioxide emissions.

What will it 'cost' before the world takes notice?

How “much” will it take to have people take notice of climate change?

The cost of dealing with global warming in terms of lives lost and injury, the replacement and repair of damage houses and other buildings and the replacement or repair of infrastructure nearly broke $200 billion in 2012.

However, that doesn’t appear to be enough as the climate change skeptics still strut around the world declaring all is well, and for them, and for the moment, it is.

The alarming mounting costs of climate change are discussed in Climateprogress story headed: “Global damage from extreme weather and other disasters set to break $200 billion a year”.

War on terror costs insignificant, compared to climate change

Former U.S. president, George W. Bush, declared a war on terror.

Former U.S. president,
George W. Bush.
 

That war cost U.S. citizens dearly -the "war on terror" - and by terrorists - has directly killed a minimum of 62,006 people, created 4.5 million refugees and cost the U.S. more than the sum needed to pay off the debts of every poor nation on earth.

That alarming legacy of death does not stop there for if those of Iraq military killed during 2003 invasion, along with insurgents and the countless innocents are accounted for, and the can’t accurately be, the death toll leaps to near 200 000.

The cost to Americans specifically and the world generally was alarming.

However, compared to costs associated with climate change, they are insignificant and already many in the various militaries around the world have declared climate change the world’s greatest ever security threat.

Terrorism, some have said, is of little, or no consequence compared to what will unfold as the effects of climate change take hold.

We, well certainly Americans, Australians and the English, we prepared to pay to protect their lifestyle in the Bush “War on Terror”, but few, it appears are prepared to pay to do what they can to mitigate the circumstances that are changing our climate.

The Australian Federal Government is stepping away from being an active participant in combatting climate change, dismantling our climate change infrastructure and today moving in the first sitting of parliament since being elected in September, to repeal the carbon tax introduced by the then Labor Government.