NSW heatwave: Another catalogue of fossil fuel power failures.

A recent New South Wales power supply scare has been found to have been caused – not by renewables – but by a series of gas and coal plant faults and failures that happened to coincide with record high electricity demand as the state sweltered through a February heatwave.

A report published on Wednesday by the Australian Energy Market Operator has found that, like in South Australia, renewable energy performed more or less as expected. But it was the sudden and unannounced failures of gas generators that put power supplies in peril.

The NSW report confirms – as revealed last week by RenewEconomy – that the state narrowly avoided mass blackouts on Friday, February 10, after a faulty gas turbine caused EnergyAustralia’s 480MW Tallawarra gas plant (below) to trip, taking it out of action at around 4.30pm for two hours, just as demand was reaching its peak.

Read Sophie Varath’s story on RenewEconomy - “NSW heatwave: Another catalogue of fossil fuel power failures.”

GFC carbon dioxide falls being replicated in Australia

W

orld carbon dioxide emissions fell away during the global financial crisis of 2008.

Lisa Cox.

A drop off in production and consumption, and the subsequent lower use of fossil-based energy, by both producers and consumers is being replicated, in a sense, here in Australia.

Writing in today’s Melbourne Age, Lisa Cox tells us that if Australia meets its 5 per cent emissions reduction target by 2020 it will be by "luck not design".

She reports that a leading economist has said, as the government published new figures showing the task ahead of Australia has almost halved.

“The Department of Environment projections show Australia's task of meeting its carbon reduction goals by 2020 has fallen from an estimate of 421 million tonnes in 2013 to 236 million tonnes due to a drop in electricity demand, lower than expected agricultural production and less activity from manufacturing and coal mining,” she reports.

Her story - “'Luck not design' will enable Australia to meet 2020 emissions targets” – quotes Environment Minister Greg Hunt who claims figures show Australia is on track to meet its 2020 target and it was, he said, "clear we can meet our targets without a destructive carbon tax".

Mr Hunt fails to acknowledge that the drop in emissions results from a slowing of Australia’s production and consumption.