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Does Indonesia have a returns policy? Despite plenty of talk over the years about the Huntly Power Station being switched off, yesterday the big gentailers reached an agreement to chip in for a big stack of coal so they can ensure the lights stay on if we experience another energy crunch like we did last year. As Mike Casey told Ryan Bridge on Newstalk ZB, bringing in more coal is not ideal, but something had to be done in the short term to deal with our rapidly declining gas reserves. And using more solar and building more renewables and using our stockpile of water in our hydro lakes means we might not need to burn it.
As the energy minister, Simon Watts needs to avoid rolling black outs in winter at all costs because that would be an economic disaster. But as climate change minister he should be doing everything he can to ensure we don't need to burn it.
We are going to need a lot more electricity to power all our electric machines in the future and we need that electricity to be cheap if we hope to unlock the economic benefits in our homes, farms and businesses. But we are not going to get either of those things if we have to rely on an imported, expensive fuel to generate it.
Instead, we need to use the big stockpile of water in our hydro lakes more effectively and we can do that by adding much more rooftop solar (which is the cheapest electricity for households); speeding up the fairly slow pace of large-scale wind and solar projects; rolling out more batteries (large and small) to store energy for use at peak times; and continuing to invest in geothermal.
The largest single power plant in Australia today is a 3.3GW plant that runs on coal. But when you add up all the rooftop solar in Australia, it's around ten times that size.
We're seeing plenty of other markets rapidly shift away from fossil fuels for electricity generation and, as Bill McKibben wrote in Rolling Stone recently, "California, the world’s fourth-largest economy, is using 40 percent less natural gas to generate electricity than it did two years ago, simply because it’s built out so many solar farms and battery arrays." This is not a utopian dream. Increasingly, this is economic reality.
How the sun led to higher salaries for teachers in the US and why this should be happening here, too; how "the once-rigid link between economic growth and carbon emissions is breaking across the vast majority of the world" as electrification gives more countries a productivity boost (and how that would allow New Zealand to keep embracing our long, languid summer break); solar continues to weather storms and provide 'free resilience'; Dunedin laundry company Preens goes electric and saves over 300 utes worth of emissions; the company that wants you to drink diesel exhaust; and a wonderful rundown of the Kill Bills tour - and the national electrification opportunity - from one of the tour sponsors.
Read moreDownloadAs gas supplies decline and prices rise, electrification is the best bet, but it's hard for big businesses without government support. Kirsty Johnston talks to Rainbow Nurseries about how it made the switch with help from a grant, and others who are unsure they will be able to keep getting gas. As one busines owner said: "We never considered the risk to the business of not actually having natural gas," one participant said. "We always expect that the price could fluctuate… But we never anticipated maybe having no gas coming from the pipeline." There are ways for the Government to help. And there is a huge amount of new renewable electricity coming on stream, so there won't be a shortage of electrons.
Read moreDownloadMarc Daalder reports on Vector's declining gas network and how it is responding to falling customer numbers. As he writes: "Gas in Auckland is formally past its peak in the latest forecasts from Vector, the city’s only gas distribution business, with new connections set to fall to zero in three years ... From 2029, there would be no new residential or commercial connections – with new industrial connections projected to have already ceased this year."
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