Australia needs to get ready for a future without coal: Origin CEO   :)

Sydney Morning Herald
November 17, 2024


Power and gas giant Origin Energy’s boss has warned Australia is under-prepared as it drifts closer toward a decade of extraordinary upheaval for the electricity grid when all remaining coal-fired generators are expected to close.

While coal has been Australia’s main electricity source for decades, its years of powering the grid are numbered, as utilities face spiralling costs to maintain ageing power stations and intense competition from cleaner and cheaper renewables.

Origin CEO Frank Calabria is leading the industry’s push for a comprehensive redesign of Australia’s energy market rules.


At least half of eastern Australia’s coal-fired plants are due to shut down within 10 years, while the market operator expects coal to leave the grid entirely by 2040. Efforts to clean up Australia’s polluting electricity sector depend heavily on replacing fossil fuels with more wind, solar and hydropower projects.   :)

But balancing a system increasingly dominated by less-predictable renewables is much more challenging, says Frank Calabria, who is running Australia’s biggest power and gas retailer, adding the need for long-term vision and policy certainty.

Calabria is leading the industry’s push for a comprehensive redesign of Australia’s energy market rules, which he says are no longer fit for purpose and will be unable to drive the multi-decade investment boom needed to transform the grid and minimise the threat of power shortages or price spikes after coal’s exit.

“We’ve got this enormous transformation of the energy sector required, and therefore the amount of investment, new technology and scale needs to be put into that context,” Calabria said.



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“We need to do it as smoothly as possible for customers, and we need to make sure the lights are on at all times.”

Much of the federal government’s energy transition focus centres on Australia’s 2030 targets, which include delivering a 43 per cent emissions cut and more than doubling the share of renewables in the grid from 40 per cent to 82 per cent.



The Capacity Investment Scheme, launched by Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen, aims to turbocharge the financing of new renewable projects and dispatchable assets, such as big batteries (for when it’s not sunny or windy), out to the end of the decade.

Calabria backs the government’s 2030 targets, but warned the energy transition “does not end in 2030”, and difficult reform decisions for the 2030s and beyond must not be kept in the “too-hard basket” or left too late.

“One of the features today is decisions get made, but they get made very late, and they tend to get made late against an urgency or real need,” Calabria said.

He pointed to the need for more fast-response gas-fired power stations, known as “peakers”, which the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) warns will play an infrequent but critical role covering supply shortfalls during long periods of low wind and sunlight.

Last winter, gas-powered generators ran much harder than usual as a protracted wind lull collided with a burst of cold weather hiking electricity and gas demand from home heaters. Unlike grid-scale batteries, which exhaust their stored energy in a matter of hours, gas plants can run for as long as they are needed.

However, gas remains shut out from federal funding under the Capacity Investment Scheme. The Victorian government has refused to support taxpayer money going to fossil fuels that contribute to global warming.

“Not everyone has the same support for gas,” Calabria said. “But if you look at what’s required if you are going to close coal ... we do need to have a scalable, long-duration technology that can go for days.”

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A wind farm in Bungendore, NSW.
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He also called for market rules to give greater consideration to the promising role of aggregated networks of home solar panels and batteries, known as “virtual power plants”, whereby power providers give customers bill credits in exchange for being able to use their stored energy to address imbalances in the grid and keep the network stable.

Australia is experiencing one of the world’s fastest energy transitions as renewable energy expands its share of the grid every year and now supplies nearly 40 per cent of the average generation mix.

But the installation of new renewable generation and storage projects and thousands of kilometres of new power lines needed to link them to major cities is running behind the rate officials say is necessary to keep power supplies and prices stable once the next wave of coal-fired power stations retire, making grid planners and governments nervous.

The Albanese government is expected to launch a fresh review to examine post-2030 power market reforms which will consider arrangements to pay generators for being on standby to supply the grid when needed, rather than only paying generators for the power they produce.

Yes time to start moving away from coal, and start moving more towards renewables.   :( 

whiteknight wrote on Nov 17^th, 2024 at 5:54pm:

Yes time to start moving away from coal, and start moving more towards renewables.   :(

And energy poverty. :'(

He pointed to the need for more fast-response gas-fired power stations, known as “peakers”, which the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) warns will play an infrequent but critical role covering supply shortfalls during long periods of low wind and sunlight.

Last winter, gas-powered generators ran much harder than usual as a protracted wind lull collided with a burst of cold weather hiking electricity and gas demand from home heaters. Unlike grid-scale batteries, which exhaust their stored energy in a matter of hours, gas plants can run for as long as they are needed.

However, gas remains shut out from federal funding under the Capacity Investment Scheme. The Victorian government has refused to support taxpayer money going to fossil fuels that contribute to global warming.

“Not everyone has the same support for gas,” Calabria said. “But if you look at what’s required if you are going to close coal ... we do need to have a scalable, long-duration technology that can go for days.”






Typical of whiteknightbozo's posts - the point is buried half way down from the idiotic headline.

whiteknight wrote on Nov 17^th, 2024 at 5:54pm:

Yes time to start moving away from coal, and start moving more towards renewables.   :(

https://www.ozpolitic.com/album/forum-attachments/wind_fails.jpg

Nuclear power generation is coming and Albo better get with the times.  :)

The UK and USA are going to push hard for nuclear generation and Australia is "expected" to sign up.

...

Nuclear will play a vital role in our clean energy future.

That is why we are working closely with our allies to unleash the potential of cutting-edge nuclear technology.

Advanced nuclear technology will help decarbonise industry by providing low-carbon heat and power, supporting new jobs and investment here in the UK.

As part of this new agreement, the Generation IV International Forum will no longer include Russia – ensuring future collaborations remain among mutually willing parties who respect nuclear safety norms.

The new agreement will come into force from 1 March 2025 and is expected to also be signed by: Canada, France, Japan, Republic of Korea, Republic of South Africa, China, Euratom, Switzerland and Australia.  8-)

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/uk-and-us-join-forces-to-speed-up-advanced-nuclear-technologies#:~:text=The%20new%20agreement%20will%20come,%2C%20Euratom%2C%20Switzerland%20and%20Australia.

By refusing to sign up to the nuclear power pact, Albo and Bowen look even more stupid than before.  :D :D

In America, they moved away from Coal alright.
Moving to Bio plants and burning trees instead.

https://www.visualcapitalist.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/07/CoalProductionwithFooter.jpg

Albo is going all in.


"In excerpts from a speech that Bowen planned to give to an Investor Group on Climate Change event at parliament on Tuesday, the minister said the transition to clean electricity was urgent as ageing coal-fired power stations were becoming more expensive and unreliable. “We need new generation now,” he said.

But he said the cost of deploying solar and batteries had fallen faster than expected – down 8% and 20% respectively over the past year, according to the CSIRO – giving the country the chance to “supercharge” its transition.

He announced the government would add 5GW of dispatchable capacity, which typically means large-scale batteries and 3GW of large-scale wind and solar generation to its underwriting program. In total, the government has promised to underwrite 26GW of generation and 14GW of storage or clean dispatchable capacity that can be called on when needed."

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2025/jul/29/australia-expands-renewable-energy-scheme-2030-target

Some things to ponder -

Lithium price has surged 19.33% this month. There goes that 20% saving. The glut seems to be over.

https://tradingeconomics.com/commodity/lithium


Merredin 100MW costing $220 million, gives someting of a price guide.
https://energynews.biz/merredin-bess-secures-220m-financing-but-pays-premium-over-global-battery-cost-benchmarks/

5GW would give about 30 minutes power based on AEMO figures.

We are doomed to third world status thanks to AnAl and his traitorous government. We should be investing in coal and gas until nuclear comes on line, not this 'renewables' fantasy that has foreign investors laughing all the way to the bank while the Australian countryside is destroyed and our farmers driven off the land.   

How long will it be though, before we are forbidden to criticise AnAl and his traitors? Ever more restrictive laws are being put in place to silence the people and prevent access to information.

There are signs that the decent people of Australia have had enough, but will the momentum build in time to save our country?  >:(

This bloke should be our Energy Minister - better yet PM.

Miner Gerry Noonan tells it as it is re: Greens & renewables.

Warning: Australian Language for Dummies on display.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V9QEwsaIIh0

Belgarion wrote on Jul 30^th, 2025 at 6:13pm:

We are doomed to third world status thanks to AnAl and his traitorous government. We should be investing in coal and gas until nuclear comes on line, not this 'renewables' fantasy that has foreign investors laughing all the way to the bank while the Australian countryside is destroyed and our farmers driven off the land.    How long will it be though, before we are forbidden to criticise AnAl and his traitors? Ever more restrictive laws are being put in place to silence the people and prevent access to information. There are signs that the decent people of Australia have had enough, but will the momentum build in time to save our country?  >:(

Well that should have transcribed at the last election - but it didn't, the opposite occurred.

More of the same for who knows how long seeing the LNP Opposition are virtually weak as piss Labor Lites.

Where are all these decent people who've had enough?

Every State should have built a large coal fired power station-
maybe 2 Giga Watts
which would burn high quality Anthracite coal from the Bowen Basin in QLD -
to tide us over and prevent blackouts till renewables supposedly take over.

Our politicians couldn't organise a root in a brothel.   ::)

Bobby. wrote on Jul 31^st, 2025 at 8:34am:

Every State should have built a large coal fired power station- maybe 2 Giga Watts which would burn high quality Anthracite coal from the Bowen Basin in QLD - to tide us over and prevent blackouts till renewables supposedly take over. Our politicians couldn't organise a root in a brothel.   ::)

Why should they? They're giving us the biggest root we've ever had.

Gnads wrote on Jul 31^st, 2025 at 10:42am:

Bobby. wrote on Jul 31st, 2025 at 8:34am: Every State should have built a large coal fired power station- maybe 2 Giga Watts which would burn high quality Anthracite coal from the Bowen Basin in QLD - to tide us over and prevent blackouts till renewables supposedly take over. Our politicians couldn't organise a root in a brothel.   ::) Why should they? They're giving us the biggest root we've ever had.

It's all so silly -

our exports of coal and gas dwarf our own consumption.

The net zero is just a nice sounding phrase that is meaningless.