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Speaker 1: Talking of power, let's have a chat about this because

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Speaker 1: the Climate Change Minister addressed the National Press Club yesterday

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Speaker 1: and one of the takeouts from it is the government

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Speaker 1: working to have electric vehicles, charging homes and the grid,

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Speaker 1: so rather than focusing on perhaps securing baseload into the future,

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Speaker 1: whether that be gas or hydro or nuclear, and there's

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Speaker 1: work being done on all of that. I suppose, not

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Speaker 1: so much nuclear by this government, of course, but the

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Speaker 1: other two once cole goes and ninety percent of CARL

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Speaker 1: will be gone in the next few years. But EV's

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Speaker 1: looking to be the answer. How practical is that. Let's

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Speaker 1: put that to Tony Wood, Energy program director at Gratton Institute.

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Speaker 2: Tony, good morning, Good morning, Matthew.

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Speaker 1: EV's the salvation. So we've got to charge them then

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Speaker 1: zap the power back out.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. I guess what this is all about fundamentally, and

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Speaker 2: you all added to this in your introduction is a

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Speaker 2: lot to try to do is match up the way

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Speaker 2: we use electricity and the way we produce electricity. And

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Speaker 2: like most of our lives, we don't use them and

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Speaker 2: produce them at the same time. We often store things

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Speaker 2: in warehouses or whatever. We even store babies in mother's stomach, right,

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Speaker 2: And so the same principle arise in one sense, and

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Speaker 2: that is we're trying to match these two up. And

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Speaker 2: what's what is pretty clear that if you could generate

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Speaker 2: electricity from your roof in the middle of the day

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Speaker 2: when there's plenty of sign in South Australia as a

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Speaker 2: leader in this area, but then you end up producing

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Speaker 2: of all the houses too much electricity. So what do

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Speaker 2: you do if you store it and then you can

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Speaker 2: use when you really want it? Now, how do you

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Speaker 2: store it? You can use it in a home battery,

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Speaker 2: but interestingly you could also use the electricity to just

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Speaker 2: stored in a car battery. And one of the interesting

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Speaker 2: things about car batteries is they tend to be pretty big.

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Speaker 2: You can power most homes for two or three days

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Speaker 2: at least on the car batteries called yeah, yeah, these

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Speaker 2: are big things right now, whether you want to do that,

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Speaker 2: whether you really want to have someone you know, whether

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Speaker 2: you really want to show your car from your back feet.

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Speaker 2: I mean, I know people who've in remote areas who

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Speaker 2: would actually take site and diesel out of their truck

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Speaker 2: to put into their diesel generator when the power's gone out.

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Speaker 2: So it's not crazy now, but there's a huge number

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Speaker 2: of interactions things and some technology things and regulatory things

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Speaker 2: that have to be thought through. The Minister Bowen was

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Speaker 2: talking about that yesterday. But potentially it's really interesting.

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Speaker 1: So do we have no certainly we've got the capacity

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Speaker 1: to charge cars at home, do we have the capacity

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Speaker 1: to get the power out of the car and into

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Speaker 1: the home.

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Speaker 2: Look, if you go into it, most people have got

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Speaker 2: an ev if they talk to their IVY supplied, So

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Speaker 2: you must be joking. Now that's changing. I think Tesla

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Speaker 2: can now do something like that, and I think the

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Speaker 2: Chinese company byd are talking about being able to do

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Speaker 2: that as well. You could do one of two things.

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Speaker 2: You could actually send the electricity if your car is

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Speaker 2: plugged into your home, to supply electricity to your home

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Speaker 2: and say in the middle of the evening or when

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Speaker 2: the power's gone out from the grip if it ever

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Speaker 2: happened because of the storm or something. Or you could

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Speaker 2: also then use that electricity to feed to the grid

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Speaker 2: when it's very valuable, as people already do with electricity

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Speaker 2: from their hounds. Right, So you can technically you can

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Speaker 2: do it. The issue is that a lot of our

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Speaker 2: cars and our home charging systems haven't been sent up

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Speaker 2: for it yet, and there's quite a few things that

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Speaker 2: have to be worked through about you, but there's no

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Speaker 2: reason why we can't do it. The issue of how

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Speaker 2: do we want to do we really want to have

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Speaker 2: our homes and our cars interacting with the grid in

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Speaker 2: that way. I think there's going to be some really

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Speaker 2: interesting conversation to be had.

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Speaker 1: Okay, interesting that someone like Andrew Forest Twiggy Forest has

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Speaker 1: in the last little whale sax some seven hundred of

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Speaker 1: his employees around the country, around the world because green

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Speaker 1: hydrogen has failed to materialize in the way he wanted

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Speaker 1: it to. Some of his projects not coming to fruition.

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Speaker 1: There are some green hydro plants, that hydrogen plants that

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Speaker 1: he's got operating, but not to the scale I think

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Speaker 1: he wanted by this time. So layoff now if he

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Speaker 1: is doing that, if he can't get it to work,

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Speaker 1: is there a hype, for instance, the state government here

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Speaker 1: can get it's green hydrogen plant up and running.

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Speaker 2: Honestly, I haven't stayed close enough to the actual economics

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Speaker 2: of the green hydrogen plant in South Australia. It's pretty

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Speaker 2: obvious that across the board, and not just Triggy Forest,

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Speaker 2: but he's probably the most high profile example of this.

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Speaker 2: Is two things have been going on here. One is

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Speaker 2: that the cost of producing green hydrogen from electricity grid,

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Speaker 2: which is what we need to do, is turning out

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Speaker 2: to be much more difficult and much more expensive than

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Speaker 2: most people anticipated. And that was probably always the case,

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Speaker 2: but no one really ever did the hard numbers on this.

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Speaker 2: And when we did a report on this, Matthew a

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Speaker 2: couple of a few months ago now we said, look,

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Speaker 2: there's too much hypeine hydrogen. We've got to calm this

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Speaker 2: down a bit and be sensible about it. But that

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Speaker 2: doesn't mean, by the way, that the hydrogen isn't worth pursuing,

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Speaker 2: but it's not going to be as quick and as

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Speaker 2: easy as people might have thought. The second big thing

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Speaker 2: is that Trigging Forest and other people are finding I

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Speaker 2: think that even though you can produce green hydrogen, the

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Speaker 2: premium you'd have to get to pay for it is

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Speaker 2: that no one wants to pay for it yet, and

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Speaker 2: so it's very hard to get off takes. So that's

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Speaker 2: why I think he's slowing down. Now. What that means

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Speaker 2: for the South Austrain power station. I really haven't kept

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Speaker 2: close to that. That's you and I was a bit

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Speaker 2: skeptical myself about producing electricity from hydrogen. But you know,

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Speaker 2: maybe the Victorian, the South Australian government, I'm sorry, I

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Speaker 2: can actually be in a position to do that. They

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Speaker 2: obviously have optimism that.

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Speaker 1: They can indeed, so we'll see where that ends up.

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Speaker 1: But you think if fortes Kew, a company like that

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Speaker 1: can't get it up and running, what hope has anyone

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Speaker 1: else given this is their core business, essentially mining and energy.

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Speaker 2: Production, Well it is, and they've also Tookie for Us

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Speaker 2: has been building a facility in Queensland to manufacture electoralizers,

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Speaker 2: which are the machines that basically turn renewable electricity into hydrogen.

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Speaker 2: And he's still expecting that's going to go ahead. A

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Speaker 2: government's always in a slightly different position where they can

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Speaker 2: orchestrate things at the private sector. Fine, hard Now eventually

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Speaker 2: someone has to pay for it, and the South Australian

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Speaker 2: government has made it clear that there was a significant

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Speaker 2: financial support to be coming from taxpayers effectively to get

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Speaker 2: that hydrogen power station off the ground. What happened to

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Speaker 2: that hydrogen where it's only used for producing power, whether

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Speaker 2: it's used for producing green metals, whether it's used for

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Speaker 2: other things in the state, I think remains to be.

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Speaker 1: Seen, all right, and that will happen in due course.

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Speaker 1: I don't know if you've caught up with Jenny George's

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Speaker 1: article in The Australian Today, Tony. She's written a fairly so.

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Speaker 1: This is a former ACTU president, Yeah, Labor member for

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Speaker 1: the seat of Throsby, going back some years. She's now

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Speaker 1: retired from politics, but pretty scathing article about the push

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Speaker 1: to renewable She's saying, we definitely need some sort of

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Speaker 1: base load power moving forward, and the government is deluting

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Speaker 1: itself that things thinks renewables are the sole way to

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Speaker 1: ensure we have reliable electricity in the future.

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Speaker 2: Well, I think renewables. When we're talking about renewables, we

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Speaker 2: are talking about fundamentally wind and solar and they are

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Speaker 2: in committing now. They're very predictable in something that we

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Speaker 2: know what time is, I'm going to come up in

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Speaker 2: one hundred years time. If we're still around right, well,

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Speaker 2: you and I might not be but predictable, but it's intermittent.

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Speaker 2: That means you've got to have things that are there

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Speaker 2: when the wind isn't blowing, the sound isn't shining, and

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Speaker 2: we see an example of that in the South of

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Speaker 2: Australia in the last month when we had very low winding,

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Speaker 2: it very cold, and we had very low output from

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Speaker 2: our wind farms, and that was a bit of a challenge.

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Speaker 2: Right now, that just means we've got to sort that

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Speaker 2: problem out, which means we're going to use short term storage,

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Speaker 2: which is what batteries do very well, and we're also

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Speaker 2: going to need longer term storage, which is producing power.

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Speaker 2: That's where the role of gas is probably the most

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Speaker 2: likely thing to do that. It would mean you're still

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Speaker 2: burning some fossil kills, but you can back it up

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Speaker 2: so you don't have to have things that just run

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Speaker 2: steady all the time. You want things that can balance

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Speaker 2: the different alternatives we're going to use and backing up renewable.

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Speaker 2: So I don't think a real reason why we can't

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Speaker 2: get to high levels of renewables and close down all

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Speaker 2: of that coal. I think the argument that we're going

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Speaker 2: to need gas or something else, and there's a number

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Speaker 2: of things that could fill this task which are going

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Speaker 2: to be necessary to balance a system which is higher renewables,

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Speaker 2: and that's a big task be done. It's very important

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Speaker 2: and Jenny George's right to put to point a finger out.

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Speaker 2: It's important to get the system right. And that's partly

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Speaker 2: also why the federal oppositions is well, nuclear is the answer. Now,

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Speaker 2: I'm not sure that that's an easy answer, and there's

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Speaker 2: other issues associated with that, Michael, but I'm actually but yeah,

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Speaker 2: I think that there's an underlying issue that just having

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Speaker 2: what's more wind and solar by itself does not solve

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Speaker 2: the problem. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Indeed, let me read you a couple of text messages

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Speaker 1: I've gotten in the last few minutes where we've been chatting.

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Speaker 1: Tony Neil says Ourn and Leaf has been able to

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Speaker 1: supply power to the house since we've had it for years.

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Speaker 1: So there's that that goes to what you're saying. Peter's

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Speaker 1: asking the question. I think a lot of people would

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Speaker 1: be asking, how do you charge the car to put

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Speaker 1: back into the grid at night when you're out for

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Speaker 1: the day. So, I mean it does feel like you're

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Speaker 1: rubbing Peter to pay Paul, doesn't it.

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Speaker 2: Well, it is, and that's why it's how you would

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Speaker 2: do that. I mean, personally, most of us do not

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Speaker 2: want to be interacting with our electricity system or all

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Speaker 2: the stuff on a minute to minute basis, right, So

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Speaker 2: you're going to have there are technologies that can do this.

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Speaker 2: So for example, if you're you're at work, your car's

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Speaker 2: park somewhere during the day, maybe you'll be able to

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Speaker 2: charge your car during the day at work. Right. If

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Speaker 2: if you are at home, how many people are, then

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Speaker 2: you could charge your your battery, your house battery, your

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Speaker 2: car battery during the day. But also many people would

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Speaker 2: be familiar with off peak hot water. That was the

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Speaker 2: system which said, look, we want to hit our help

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Speaker 2: water rather than doing it at pea times, if we

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Speaker 2: did it in the middle of the night sometime when

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Speaker 2: there's not so much demand, it would be cheaper. And

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Speaker 2: what we basically did was put it effectively two meters

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Speaker 2: to measure our electricity into the home and our hot

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Speaker 2: orter was heated at night time. Right, same sort of

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Speaker 2: principle here. So everyone's going to have their own individual

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Speaker 2: circumstances and some people it won't work very well, but

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Speaker 2: in other cases it will work fine. And maybe you'll

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Speaker 2: take electricity out of your car battery at six o'clock

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Speaker 2: in the evening. But then your car will charge between

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Speaker 2: midnight and seven am or something like that. Right, I

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Speaker 2: can see lots of possibilities ahead.

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Speaker 1: All right, interesting world, Tony, Thank you, thanks massive. Tony

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Speaker 1: would from the Gratton Institute Energy Program Director,