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I asked AI this: how much would a new coal-fired power station cost, and what impact would it have on electricity bills? The short answer is: A new coal-fired power station in Australia would likely cost A$8–15 billion, depending on its size and technology. It would probably increase, not decrease, average electricity bills compared with building new wind, solar, and battery capacity today. However, it could reduce exposure to gas price spikes if it displaced expensive gas generation. Here's why. Construction cost A modern high-efficiency, low-emissions (HELE) coal plant of around 1,000 MW would likely cost: Item Estimate (A$) Construction $8–15 billion Construction period 7–10 years Expected operating life 40–50 years The wide range reflects uncertainty because no large coal-fired power station has been built in Australia for decades, so there is no recent local benchmark. For comparison: The cancelled expansion of Medupi Power Station ultimately exceeded A$25 billion after delays and cost overruns. Recent coal projects in Europe and North America have also experienced substantial overruns. Why is it so expensive? Coal plants require much more than the boiler itself: enormous steam turbines pollution control equipment cooling systems ash handling facilities coal storage and conveyors high-voltage grid connection extensive environmental approvals. Modern emissions standards also require equipment that older Australian coal stations never had. What would electricity cost? This is where it gets interesting. The cost of electricity from a new plant is usually measured by the Levelised Cost of Energy (LCOE). Approximate ranges today are: Technology Cost (A$/MWh) Existing depreciated coal 40–80 New coal 120–180+ Gas peaking 150–300 (depends on gas price) Wind + firming 70–120 Solar + batteries 60–110 These figures vary between studies, but most recent analyses conclude that new coal is more expensive than new renewable generation with storage, largely because of its high upfront capital cost and ongoing fuel and maintenance expenses. Why are old coal stations cheap but new ones aren't? This often causes confusion. Australia's existing coal stations: were built 30–50 years ago, have largely been paid off, operate under older environmental standards. That means today's consumers mostly pay for: coal, maintenance, staff, repairs. A new station has to recover billions of dollars of construction costs over its lifetime. What impact would it have on household bills? For a typical Australian household spending around A$2,000 per year on electricity: Scenario 1: Coal replaces expensive gas Bills might fall slightly during periods when gas prices are very high because coal fuel has historically been cheaper than gas. Scenario 2: Coal competes with new renewables Bills would likely be higher than under a system dominated by new wind, solar, and batteries because the new coal plant's capital costs would need to be recovered from electricity consumers (or taxpayers). Scenario 3: Government subsidises construction If taxpayers funded part of the construction cost, electricity prices could appear lower, but the cost would be shifted from electricity bills to government budgets funded by taxation. Other considerations A coal plant also faces economic challenges because it operates best at a relatively constant output. Australia's electricity demand now has a deep midday dip caused by rooftop solar, making it harder for coal stations to run continuously at high utilisation. If a new coal plant generated fewer megawatt-hours than planned, its fixed costs would be spread over less electricity, increasing the cost per unit produced. Could private companies build one? In theory, yes. In practice, no major electricity company has announced plans to finance a new conventional coal-fired power station in Australia. The main reasons cited are: the very large upfront capital cost, long construction times, uncertainty over future electricity market conditions, competition from lower-cost renewable generation and storage. My assessment If Australia's objective were simply to build the lowest-cost new electricity generation, the evidence available today suggests that a new coal-fired power station is unlikely to be the cheapest option. Existing coal stations remain relatively inexpensive because their construction costs were paid off decades ago, but replicating that infrastructure today would require a very large new investment. Unless there were substantial government support or a major change in technology or fuel costs, that investment would probably place upward pressure on electricity costs compared with building a mix of renewable generation, transmission, and storage.

I just read that the 400000 figure for home batteries is just since the rebate, and if you include home battery installations before the rebate, the total is somewhere around the 600000 mark. BYD have announced their new generation of sodium batteries, expected to cost $40 US a KWh and be good for 10000 cycles or approximately 27 years. The point is that whilst we are debating this, battery storage gets cheaper and better, solar panels get cheaper and more efficient, as do wind turbines, not to mention other coming technologies. This argument is often predicated on the notion that renewables cost money and must be paid for, whilst ignoring the fact that new coal is incredibly expensive and requires constant fuel, the cost of which would be borne by the consumer. This, according to CSIRO and AEMO would cost more than our present strategies.

When I post posting re-read the above, I realised they referred to GWh of storage capacity. Not actual GW generation supply (as a reduction of generation to meet peak demand). Still, it's a consequential amount of distributed energy getting stored

According to google... "Australia has surpassed 400,000 home battery storage installations with 11.2GWh of cumulative capacity installed in less than a year "

Into the above arguments, we could factor in the rapid adoption of home batteries. According to one report there are about 400,000 home batteries installed in the first half of 2026. This alone must noticably reduce peak load on the NEM. Consequently, lowering peaking generation and therefore driving down overall retail electricity prices even for non solar householders. Even small home batteries are designed to reduce peak load on the grid. Sure, it isn't a complete transition to 'intermittents'. But the trend is gathering momentum in the right direction.

Does matter as the threads name says it powers it. A few years ago when i was working with wtgs a friend who worked for tge council said that the ACC used completely renewable power. I told her when there is no wind at night the oower was coming from gas 15km down tge road. Not her fault, just had been mislead. One of there supplies was a solar farm at Streaky Bay about 700 km away. The issue is it hides from the public how hard the transition is going to be as we get more intermittent generation on the grid and it takes away from the communitys that host these sites and are really using rnewable electricity. You can't even see a wtg from the adelaide metro area. You can see plenty of instaled gas as you cruise around the NW of the city.

There is a lot more to a grid then just the electricity. Your figures dont allow for storage, artificial inertia, tranmission gt back up. Otherwise Sa would have the cheapest electricity in the country. So you cant give me a country. Sa grid is smallest on the NEM (maybe Tassie) so a big difference to a country

That sounds... spectacle-r.

G, aim, over = Game over.

A guy got pulled over by the police. The cop walked up to his window and asked, "Do you know why I pulled you over?" The guy said, "To check how tall I am?" The cop looked definitely unimpressed and said, "Step out of the car please." The guy said, "So I was right then?"

Signing OFF. Nev

This Place could NOT Be Wetter. Go off the drive and you will be Bogged. . Had my right eye Injected again today in Melbourne. No fun that. . Nev

Men's Shed Tomorrow. I got my old Au Fairmont aircond to work, so I will take it. I Thought the A/Cond Module was Cactus but it wasn't. Got a new alternator and Multi Vee belt tensioner and an electric window fixed. surprised I can still get the Parts. 1998 year build.. Nev

You can Pay over $120/Hr to have an apprentice cross thread your Oil drain Plug or strip the thread by overtightening it.. Nev

Quite some years Back a Toyota Corolla I think had a nut that retained a chain wheel or timing belt drop off and They said book it in Friday and we will fix it. They then found that one oil change period had gone a bit over the time but not the Mileage. No warrantee!!!. How could THAT make a Nut fall off? . They USED to be a Pretty good car. Nev

Many of them drive too fast to be able to stop quickly if something gets out of shape.. My last trip over the Nullarbour (sp) they Bar one, Behaved quite well That's a fairly civilised road. Nev

Heart attacks and cancer take out 1.2M Americans every year, they are America's biggest killers. A lot of that can be put down to their rubbishy, ultra-processed food, full of toxic additives. If you pick up a factory processed food and the ingredients label reads like a biblical text, or an extract from a science article, put it back. The food processing additives are nearly all industrial by-products, or based on petroleum-orgin chemicals. The worst part is buying food that says it has no additives. Not in their factory, anyway. Then you find out they are importing food ingredients from other countries, that have had illegal, un-approved or dodgy additives added, in that other country. Orange juice is an example. You buy Australian-packaged orange juice, it says, "no additives, just 100% orange juice". Then you find out they're importing orange juice CONCENTRATE from Brazil, where additives not approved here, have been added to the concentrate. So you're getting un-approved additives in your juice, yet the manufacturers here, tell you you aren't. Our food labelling system is as dodgy as a 3 dollar note. Another interesting angle is seed oils. RFK Junior, despite his crazyiness, does have some relevant points with his crusade against seed oils. Here's an example. Cottonseed oil is the most common frying/cooking oil used. It's used in every commercial kitchen, cafe and restuarant. Why? Because it's cheap, and no food business will pay a lot more, for better quality oils. The rub with cottonseed oil is - cotton is not recognised as a food crop. Food crops have all sorts of laws banning certain pesticides and weedicides from being used on them. Not so with cotton. Cotton is attacked by hordes of bugs, they love the stuff. So the cotton growers use millions of litres of highly toxic pesticides, and weedicides to assist in cotton growth - and half of them are not allowed in food production. But the cotton seeds are then processed to yield lots of cheap oil, which is then sold as cooking and frying oil. It is idiocy. I read an article the other day, where a cooking guru was lamenting the cooking show chefs, and their lack of attention to good, healthy cooking oils. The writer talked about how the celebrity chefs went to great pains to select premium foods and indulge in celebrated food preparation processes - then they reached for cheap, shitty cottonseed oil, to cook it all in!!

WTF is going on with the trucking scene? This is like a 3rd world country scenario. Yet, the authorities keep imposing more restrictions, more fines, more petty regulations - and this still happens. It must be time to start a root-and-branch teardown on the current system and start looking at driving training and skills levels. If you run up the back of another slowing semi with your truck, you should never have gained a truck licence in the first place. Too many cowboys driving trucks like they're race cars. I get too many truck drivers travelling too close behind me now. In the road train country, they are obliged to keep 200M between road trains, I often see two road trains much closer together than 200M.

At about 3 am on the Hume Highway between Yass and Goulburn, a semi-trailer was pulling into a rest area when it was struck from behind by another semi. This pushed the first one into four others already in the rest area with drivers asleep. The trucks caught fire and were totally destroyed. All drivers walked away with only minor injuries. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-06-30/hume-highway-truck-crash-multiple-vehicles-drivers-injured/106859504

SKEW gears are a bad way to do things There's one in a Merlin that causes engine double Mag outs and is the reason most Countries won't have Merlin engines on the civil register. The Howard Vee Motor is as rough as guts. The 600 cc Jap Motor is a Much better proposition. and they also made a Vertical twin.. I sold MY very nice Howard 2 years ago. Never left out in the Open, but still couldn't get Much for it. . Some KR racing Harley 750's have coned cams as the valves are inclined to make the Combustion chamber more compact and achieve a Higher compression ratio and better gas flow. It Puts a lot of end thrust on the camshafts. From a machining Point of view it's not difficult on a Cincinnati tool and cutter grinder. The cam profile itself is harder to do. You need a Master cam Nev

American life expectancy is not that high and is getting worse. Nev

Heart attack on a stick, like so much American-style food.

I saw a video clip on Facebook the other day where the guy stuck a stick in the end of the Tim Tam, dipped it in marshmallow, and toasted it over an open fire. He also dropped an Oreo into a cup, covered it with milk, popped it in the microwave for a couiple of minutes then ate it.

I loved Penelope Keith.