ABC Brisbane: Proposed Solar Plant for Chinchilla - Matthew Wright

A proposed solar plant based on out-dated technology for the coal seam gas fields at Chinchilla is the latest in a series of issues confronting locals in the area. While the rest of the world has moved ahead on other more efficient energy systems, it's claimed that this decision is either -1. a lost opportunity or 2. an excuse to justify coal seam gas operations - due its gas backup functionality.

As you'd expect the reasoning behind this latest venture on solar energy has raised big questions with people like the organisation, 'Beyond Zero Emissions'. Executive Director is Matthew Wright...

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Transcript

Steve Austin: Now a proposed Solar Generating Plant, mixed solar, based on technology, from partly used in the coal seam gas fields in Chinchilla, is the latest in a series of issues confronting locals. The rest of the world is moving on to energy systems that are more energy efficient. Apparently according to my next guest, the French owner nuclear giant Areva, which has already announced they are building a solar plant out at Chinchilla, is not something that they celebrate. Now before I speak with Matthew Wright, the Executive Director of Beyond Zero Emissions, let me just briefly play you, what Anthony Wiseman from Areva told me on Monday night of this week.

Andrew Wiseman: A solar plant uses the energy from the sun, but instead of what people are more commonly aware of, is that PV system, that usually sits on people’s roofs, this actually takes that energy from the sun, and concentrates it on a boiler tube which has water running through it, and it heats it up so that it produces steam, and then we use that steam and we put it through a steam turbine to create electricity.

Steve Austin: What’s the Gas component of the thermal/gas hybrid plant?

Andrew Wiseman: So the Solar/Thermal system that we use is, basically a boiler, it boils that water. And when the sun isn’t shining, we would like to be able to use that steam turbine. So to be able use it, we need a supply source that will produce steam, and so we’ve installed gas boilers to create that steam, so that we are able to use that steam when the sun is not shining. This is a generator that will operate predominantly in daylight hours, so you’re talking a capability that operates for 22 or 24% of the hours in a year. Where as a coal fired power station, is a 24/7 base load power station. So, they have different purposes, and the purpose of this plant, is to operate you know, when people actually need that daytime power, and it matches it very well when there is high demand in the system such as that, that’s is driven by air conditioning demands.

Steve Austin: So when it’s not at that 22 or 24% generating power, it’s be running on gas?

Andrew Wiseman: It could be that’s right. We have the capability to operate on gas, so if the system requires the power, we are able to supply it.

Steve Austin: Explain it a bit for me. What are you getting, from the federal government to do this power plant, when it will cost more than a coal fired power plant?

Andrew Wiseman: Well, this is really a beachhead in the solar/thermal industry for Australia. We’re establishing…

Steve Austin: So you’re getting tax write offs, or what is it?

Andrew Wiseman: Well we receive a capital grant. So the Commonwealth Government are providing us with $465 Million.

Steve Austin: Right.

Andrew Wiseman: And the Queensland Government is contributing $75 Million.

Steve Austin: Okay, and what percentage of the overall plant cost is that?

Andrew Wiseman: Ah, that’s ah, a little bit over 1/3 of the cost of the plant.

Steve Austin: Anthony Wiseman, who is the Australian spokesperson for Areva. Now the group, Beyond Zero Emissions says they’re pretty unhappy with this, or less than impressed with this new announcement. The Executive Director of Beyond Zero, Matthew Wright, has kindly agreed to join me this evening, Matthew thanks very much.

Matthew Wright: Thank-You Steven.

Steve Austin: Matthew, what’s the problem with this plant? It looked like it had a number of the boxes ticked, solar you know, supplying to the grid, using gas out of the ground when they can’t supply it because of the diminished sunshine. What’s you’re concern about it?

Matthew Wright: I guess our concern is that, we need to move to renewable energy as a global, you know, around the globe we need to move to renewable energy, and that’s the general direction. Australia is a bit of a laggard. But in terms of calling this a beachhead, they built solar thermal plants in the Mojave Desert in California in the 1980’s that still operate today. And they are linear systems that are backed up by gas. So there is nothing new there that is a 30 year old technology.

Steve Austin: So this is a beachhead that’s 3 decades old?

Matthew Wright: Yeah, that’s what I’m saying. And funnily it’s actually by a nuclear company that are desperately diversifying out of nuclear, and into wind and solar, and snapped up this company relatively cheap, because everybody else had been doing the research and development into solar thermal in Spain and the U.S, and Areva was kind of the last cab off the rank to get this technology. This technology is in Spain and the U.S are far advanced, they’re 24 hour solar plants, they are base load plants, so they run solar power around the clock, and they way they do that is by having integrated thermal storage.

Steve Austin: How can they be, just explain it a bit more, how can they be 24 hours, when there’s not 24 hours of sunlight in the day?

Matthew Wright: Well the beauty is, that you can think easily of the day having, let’s go, 8 hours of work, 8 hours of play, and 8 hours of sleep. Well the 8 hours of work, think of that as the time the suns out. And the 16 hours that your sleeping and playing that’s when the suns down. So what you do is collect three times the amount of solar energy during the day, than what you would use during the day, and you keep two times of it for night.

Steve Austin: How do you store it? What are you storing it in?

Matthew Wright: Well, they’re giant tanks like grandma’s thermos. So big thermos flasks, but the thermos flask instead of having water in it, it’s got industrial fertilizer, fertilizer from a farm, so molten salt, and they store the heat in the molten salt, and basically what happens, is the suns energy is converted into the molten salt as heat, and then anytime day or night when they need power, they run water past the salt, it flashes to steam, it converts to steam, and then drives the same turbine that a coal gas, or a nuclear plant uses.

Steve Austin: Alright, so this, beachhead technology that the Australian tax payer, is paying for 1/3 of this, both the Federal Government, and the Queensland State Government a third of the total cost of this project, and it’s actually old technology from a company that’s desperately trying to get out of nuclear from your point of view?

Matthew Wright: Yeah exactly. And ah…

Steve Austin: At least it is some solar though isn’t it?

Matthew Wright: Well, I think we could say that, but really I think if we are going to be using public money, we want to be getting down the cost curve. So getting renewables towards parity with where coal is today in terms of pricing. We need to get as close to that point as possible. So we need to be putting public money into things that are going to drive the innovation and get us there, and get us to the new renewable energy powered economy.

Steve Austin: Now why doesn’t this do that? Clearly the Federal Government and the Minister responsible would be Martin Ferguson, clearly he would see this as, this would be something he would want to celebrate and trumpet. The Queensland Premier Anna Blight has given a big tick to this; they have put in millions and millions of dollars?

Matthew Wright: Well because it doesn’t have storage, and it doesn’t run at night. So therefore, it supports the old adage that the sun doesn’t shine and the wind doesn’t blow, and everything needs to be backed up by a fossil fuel power plant, but a gas plant, or a coal plant, and it’s just not the case anymore.

Steve Austin: So I just want to understand why the Federal Government would have put so much money into this, and the State Government, into something that you are arguing is old technology, and is old thinking if you like. Have the Governments been poorly advised? Or have they been misled? Or is it that they are too beholden to resource companies that resource for energy in this case coal seam gas?

Matthew Wright: Look, it’s hard to say, but I think it could be a combination of those. I mean, I can’t read anybody’s mind, and nobody can. But cynically some people think these projects of solar flagships have been announced in Chinchilla, which is right in the flashpoint of the coal seam gas fight that’s going on in rural communities, and the same goes for Moree, where they announced the sister project, the BP Oil Company’s photovoltaic project which again, is a project that only works when the suns out. So in the Australian Community now, there was, until recently, much of the work of some campaigners and scientists to get the news out there, that they’ve moved on around the world, and they actually have the ability to run renewable energy power on demand. The Australian community loved sola and wind, but always realized that you needed a coal or gas fired plant to back it up. But that’s just not the case. It hasn’t been for a few years. And this actually, sort of, reinforces that old message, which means, we have a justification to continue coal and gas extraction. There’s no justification anymore. We can actually move to 100% renewables, and that’s what’s happening globally.

Steve Austin: So the State Government, and the Federal Government have been hoodwinked, or worse?

Matthew Wright: I think that they’re influenced heavily by the fossil fuel industry, which obviously pays royalties, and makes donations to political parties, so there’s those two places where they buy their influence, and you know with so much resting on governments being able to deliver schools, and hospitals and things like that from the revenue that they get from royalties, they really are quite beholden to the fossil fuel companies. So you’re not likely to see decisions that set up the future, to be without fossil fuels. But if we continue with fossil fuels, we have got all the health problems that go with fossil fuels. Like increased respiratory disease, there’s the issue with climate change where obviously you’re driving dangerous climate change, and then affecting communities, coastal communities, creating geo-political security risks. These are all things that happen if you maintain the fossil fuel sector. And this is about propping up the fossil fuel sector.

Steve Austin: Matthew Wright the Executive Manager of Beyond Zero Emissions is my guest. So Matthew, I have had many people tell me privately that, renewables, that the new technology, Solar, Wind, Wave, although that’s not really here in Australia, can’t meet base load power. You’re saying that all the examples from around the world, is that we absolutely can?

Matthew Wright: Yeah. So, if you go to Spain, there is about 10 plants operating that have integrated thermal storage. There’s 50 of them under construction out to 2013, it’s a$20 Billion U.S rollout. So not just a few solar panels in a quick announcement, there’s a serious of industrial scale rollout going on in Spain to re-power their economy. In the U.S, the Obama Administration has just given loan guarantees to about 12 Solar Thermal plants. Most of those have thermal integrated storage. A couple of plants: Rice, California, Snowper, Nevada, Arizona by a company called Solar Reserve that’s researched, that’s the fruition of 30 years research that’s been done by the U.S Department of Energy. These plants run 24 hours a day. They’re big. They’re 150 MW, they’re 10MW, and you can just keep stamping out more and more of them, just like a coal plant has multiple smoke stacks, you can put five of these in a row and you’ve got the same output of a coal plant.

Steve Austin: Why… I mean look, help me out here, why would the Federal Government back something like this that, you know if it goes to ¾ of the time it needs to be generated by gas, which for a range of reason, is a carbon emissions technology, when the government is trying to reduce carbon emissions, why would they go for something that releases carbon gasses?

Matthew Wright: Well it’s hard to say whether the government is trying to reduce emissions, because they’re constantly issuing more gas extraction and exploration licences, while at the same time announcing they’re going to be implementing a cap on emissions. So you can’t really be issuing licences for exploration. I think the Queensland Government has like a $750 million target, to try and sell $750 million worth of gas exploration licences over the next year. So if you have actually got those kinds of targets, you’re not that serious about reducing emissions. So I think this is about ticking the box saying yes it’s solar, and then being sort of conciliatory and saying oh, we’ve got a bit of a, it gives a bit to the gas guys, it gives a bit to the solar guys, and we create this wedge by putting a solar plant in the middle of a flashpoint of a massive community campaign that says that yes, you’ve got a solar plant, and the fact is you need gas to back it up.

Steve Austin: Yeah, its only got to be solar only 22% of the time.

Matthew Wright: That’s right. As opposed to 75% of the time, which is what plants in Spain and the U.S do. So 75% of the time, times six and a half thousand hours a year, more hours than the average in New South Wales with their coal plants. These plants run around the clock, delivering reliable secure base load to run the Spanish, or the California, Nevada economies.

Steve Austin: If your ever in Queensland, I would love to speak with you about those Spanish solar plants, because I haven’t heard that from anyone else. And people who are connected with power generation, keep telling me that alternatives like solar can’t generate base load power, and you’re telling me they can, and they are, they’re doing it around the world today, as we speak.

Matthew Wright: Yeah, absolutely. And, look it’s simple as doing a web search, you can see a video of the power plants, you can tour them. I’ve been to Spain on three occasions, and two at the Spanish Solar Thermal plants. I’ve been to about ten facilities. I’m going to the U.S to see them. But those countries are net importers of fossil fuels so, there’s a real move to get out of that, whereas Australia is a net exporter of fossil fuels, so we’re hoping that our markets don’t dry up. So there’s different thinking in countries where those ones that are importing fossil fuels to those that are exporting. So we’re sort of in denial on the move to renewables, while many other countries in the world have energy security issues, and they want to move as quickly as possible.

Steve Austin: You’re a troubling interview Matthew Wright. I mean, troubling is a nice… I mean it has a backhanded compliment. In a sense that on one hand, the Australian Government says, we’re going to have a carbon tax because they want to help big producers or electricity generators switch to clean technologies. And on the other hand, they underwrite, give away tax payer dollars to carbon producing technologies.

Matthew Wright: Yeah, absolutely. In fact, the problem is that they have redefined the words ‘clean technologies’, that’s why I like use ‘renewables’. They try to stick gas in there as a clean technology, and it’s not, it’s dirty. In fact, the BP deep border horizon was an oil and gas well. You know, that’s gas, and gas, in terms of coal seam gas, is shocking for communities. They pump salty brine out of the ground, that’s full of uranium, cadmium and that’s got heaps of heavy metals in it, mercury, and they’re trying to evaporate that in evaporation ponds all over Queensland and New South Wales. It’s terrible stuff, and this unfortunately creates a solar plant that can’t really be useful to the grid, unless it has that gas backup capability. So what we need is a solar plant that’s useful to the grid, just like the coal or gas plant is, but without the environmental degradation that a coal and gas plant comes with.

Steve Austin: Matthew Wright is the Executive Director of Beyond Zero Emissions. Just explain who Beyond Zero Emissions is. What’s your vested interest Matthew Wright?

Matthew Wright: We’re actually a not for profit research group, so we’re a charitable institution, and we are a bunch of people who work in industry. A bunch of people work in the fossil fuel sector, and the young people who want to design the future they want to live and work in. So they’re doing research on a pro-bono basis, to show how we can transition each sector of the economy to completely de-carbonize. So we’ve got people who work, or did work in an Exxon Mobil refinery, or for BHP Petroleum, or they might work in the current electricity supply sector, and they’re the people who want to work in a new economy. So that’s obviously it’s not everybody who works in those sectors, some try and hold on to the way things were, but others are actually trying to design that move, and that’s what our pro-bono research organization is.

Steve Austin: I’d be grateful if you could keep in touch, because we’re going to be hearing a lot of these announcements here in Queensland, if not nationally. And to hear that this is not actually a beachhead technology, it’s definitely 30 years old, is somewhat troubling.

Matthew Wright: Yeah, look, it’s a pity that the technology without storage is something that has been around for a very long time, and it’s proven its not such a big deal we’ve had to wait so long for the announcement if that’s what they wanted to go with. The storage technology they started construction, in the modern way for plants in 2007 in Spain, so we’re about 4-5 years on now before anything happens here in Australia. And they’re just finishing plant, after plant, after plant, with huge molten salt storage tanks that deliver base load so, you know, I’d like to see that in Australia. Why can’t we as Australians have the same thing that they have in California, or in Spain. It’s pretty simple, just give us the same.

Steve Austin: Matthew Wright thank you.

Matthew Wright: Thank You.

Steve Austin: Matthew Wright is the Executive Director of Beyond Zero Emissions.

Transcript by Matthew