Tag Archives: coal

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11 September 2017, Renew Economy, AGL calls Coalition bluff on Liddell, focuses on solar, wind and storage. AGL Energy has called the bluff of the federal Coalition over the future of Liddell, pointing out that the ageing coal plant is unreliable, and stating its clear focus is on replacing the capacity with renewable energy and storage. CEO Andy Vesey agreed to take the government’s proposal to extend the life of the coal generator or sell it to the company board, but that commitment is likely to be nothing more than a face-saver for a Coalition government pushed into the realms of stupid by its desperation to appease its right wing and the Nationals. There is no way the AGL board would approve a proposal not favoured by Vesey, and the CEO clearly has other plans afoot, and they are all about renewables, peaking plants and storage. “Short term, new development will continue to favour renewables supported by gas peaking,” Vesey said after a meeting in Canberra with prime minister Malcolm Turnbull, energy minister Josh Frydenberg, and deputy prime minister and Nationals leader Barnaby Joyce. “Longer term, we see this trend continuing with large-scale battery deployment enhancing the value of renewable technology. In this environment, we just don’t see new development of coal as economically rational, even before factoring in a carbon cost,” Vesey said in a statement. And he made clear in this statement that Liddell would retire, as planned. “Following today’s meeting with the Prime Minister, we have committed to deliver a plan in 90 days of the actions AGL will take to avoid a market shortfall once the Liddell coal-fired power station retires in 2022.” And for good measure, he tweeted that line …. “once the Liddell coal-fired power station retires in 2022.” Read More here

 

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11 September 2017, Renew Economy, The Turnbull-Frydenberg investment bank: Bullying, cronyism and Captain’s picks. Bullying, cronyism and Captain’s picks instead of policy. There is almost universal agreement that carbon policy is or should be a Federal issue. That is clearly something that the Federal Government should be involved in as it involves Australia’s international status and obligations. But that is the one area that the Federal Government is not touching. Despite Finkel, despite our COP 21 obligations, the Federal Government does nothing. No electricity policy, no vehicle emission standards, no policy in other areas of the economy responsible for half of Australia’s emissions. Perhaps the very worst thing, of the many to choose from, about the Liddell negotiation is the gross misuse of the AEMO report. This is only possible because the media is too busy, to put it kindly, to do its homework. The definition of a “problem” is when forecast “Unserved Energy (blackouts)” exceeds the desired reliability standard. That is not the whole story, but if you want one metric, it’s that. unfortunately, AEMO didn’t draw its graph relating to NSW all that clearly. We have attempted to do better, using the .xls data that AEMO provides. AEMO does not forecast a problem and if more renewables are built, the standard will be easily met. Read More here

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9 August 2017, The Guardian, Glencore’s Wandoan coalmine wins approval from Queensland government.  Glencore’s multibillion-dollar Wandoan coalmine proposal has been granted mining leases years after it was shelved amid falling commodity prices and a ramped-up global response to climate change. On Tuesday Queensland’s natural resources and mines minister, Dr Anthony Lynham, approved three 27-year leases covering 30,000 hectares for the first stage of its $7bn mine near Roma. Doubts about the future of the Wandoan mine had lingered since 2012, amid falling thermal coal prices and a poor market outlook. The approval has enraged environmental groups, who say the government is prioritising a flailing coal industry over communities and putting the state’s agricultural industry at further risk. “For many years local farmers have been fighting this coalmine,” an Australian Conservation Foundation spokesman, Jason Lyddieth, said on Wednesday. “We know that digging up coal and burning it is polluting our air and fuelling climate change. “The Queensland government needs to get serious about preparing for a carbon pollution-free world. It needs to get serious about our water, our land and our air.” Greenpeace said the approval showed the government was more interested in propping up the fossil fuel industry than protecting communities and the environment. “We can either have a healthy planet and thriving Great Barrier Reef or we can have new coalmines, not both,” said a climate and energy campaigner, Nikola Casule. “Our politicians must abandon their coal fetish and instead harness the renewable energy revolution to protect Australian communities and position Australia as an industry leader in this rapidly growing sector.” Read More here

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28 July 2017, Reuters, U.S. coal exports soar, in boost to Trump energy agenda, data shows. U.S. coal exports have jumped more than 60 percent this year due to soaring demand from Europe and Asia, according to a Reuters review of government data, allowing President Donald Trump’s administration to claim that efforts to revive the battered industry are working. The increased shipments came as the European Union and other U.S. allies heaped criticism on the Trump administration for its rejection of the Paris Climate Accord, a deal agreed by nearly 200 countries to cut carbon emissions from the burning of fossil fuels like coal. The previously unpublished figures provided to Reuters by the U.S. Energy Information Administration showed exports of the fuel from January through May totaled 36.79 million tons, up 60.3 percent from 22.94 million tons in the same period in 2016. While reflecting a bounce from 2016, the shipments remained well-below volumes recorded in equivalent periods the previous five years. They included a surge to several European countries during the 2017 period, including a 175 percent increase in shipments to the United Kingdom, and a doubling to France – which had suffered a series of nuclear power plant outages that required it and regional neighbors to rely more heavily on coal. “If Europe wants to lecture Trump on climate then EU member states need transition plans to phase out polluting coal,” said Laurence Watson, a data scientist working on coal at independent think tank Carbon Tracker Initiative in London. Read More here