Energetic Vision

From: Mr Richard D McCure 

Subject: Flinders Island Energy

Date: 13 December 2017 at 10:04:18 pm AEDT

To: mercuryedletter@themercury.com.au

Like Cameron Hindrum  (“Embrace Flinders Island Energy Vision”) letters 13/12,  I was sucked in by the report that Flinders Island is “now being run almost entirely by renewable energy”. But it turns out that “now” refers to the moment when the over enthusiastic journalist put pen to paper;  say at 11.35 on a sunny Wednesday morning as a nice breeze wafted across the island.  For most of the time,  just as in South Australia,  a brace of smoking diesel generators will be taking up the slack.  South Australia,  which owns the biggest battery in the world,  has enough battery storage to power the entire state for several minutes.  The ideal solution for Flinders Island would be connection to the state grid but this is unlikely,  and battery storage may indeed find an application there.  Local gas production or a mini nuclear reactor are off the table at present.  There is no doubt that enormous strides are being taken in the technology of renewable power generation and battery storage.  It is regrettable that the Greens have so politicised the discussion of renewable energy that they have tainted the politics as well  as the science.

Richard McCure     Sandy Bay