North Island National Grid at near Capacity

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#2758248 10-Aug-2021 22:42

colinuu:
What is behind the gas production issues? Is it anything to do with the govt shutting down new exploration some time ago, or something else?

Gas stocks have been in (slow) decline for decades. Existing rights granted are good for 35 years. The cessation of NEW exploration permits has nothing wherever to do with gas supply today or for the next 30 years.

But we do need to stop burning the stuff.

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I've been on Geekzone over 16 years..... Time flies....

alexx

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#2758269 11-Aug-2021 00:37

Are we still selling cheap power to the Tiwai Point smelter? From my understanding, the likelihood that Tiwai Point will close, deters the construction of new power generation, because if and when that load is removed, we'd have an excess of generation capacity and prices might drop.

#include <standard.disclaimer>

mattwnz

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#2758274 11-Aug-2021 01:06

alexx:

Are we still selling cheap power to the Tiwai Point smelter? From my understanding, the likelihood that Tiwai Point will close, deters the construction of new power generation, because if and when that load is removed, we'd have an excess of generation capacity and prices might drop.

Don't they lose too much of the power through the lines? I think the problem with that hydro station is it's location. It is in the wrong place to be used for much else. Maybe we should be increasing the population of NZ down there instead of Auckland. But people don't like the climate as much down there.

mattwnz

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#2758275 11-Aug-2021 01:10

dantheperson:

I don't see us ever putting in any significant hydro. Back in the day the environment suffered but it was for the greater good.

Today, the environment suffers and it's for the benefit of the shareholders.

It would have to be the government doing it, but who has any faith that in a few years some rightwing government wont flog it off?

It probably shows that the government need to do the building of new hydro. Treat it as an emergency situation, and just do it. If they sell it off, then it will be taken to the polls. People voted national in based on them selling it off. That is just what happens. I purchased some shares when they floated, and they have done quite well over the years. But not enough for a deposit on an overpriced NZ shack. But also remember that everyone in Kiwisaver can also benefit from them floating power companies.

morrisk

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#2758280 11-Aug-2021 05:56

Would a facility like the Hornsdale battery farm in South Australia be of some use to cover the situation that happened?

It has the ability to be adding power into the grid at the flick of a switch. No waiting for 6 - 10 hours for Huntly to fire up.

tdgeek

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#2758297 11-Aug-2021 07:13

Handle9:

Don't get me wrong. The grid having to load shed is a major incident - it should never have to happen.

The difference between this and a major grid event is the potential for physical damage caused by insufficient supply and subsequent frequency collapse. It really doesn't bear thinking about, it could take months to repair.

Fair enough, I see what you meant now, frying some infrastructure would be major

tdgeek

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#2758299 11-Aug-2021 07:16

mattwnz:

Don't they lose too much of the power through the lines? I think the problem with that hydro station is it's location. It is in the wrong place to be used for much else. Maybe we should be increasing the population of NZ down there instead of Auckland. But people don't like the climate as much down there.

From past threads here on that topic I thought it was do-able, at about a 600 million cost. Which is not much. I might be wrong though

elbrownos

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#2758319 11-Aug-2021 08:31

alexx:

Are we still selling cheap power to the Tiwai Point smelter? From my understanding, the likelihood that Tiwai Point will close, deters the construction of new power generation, because if and when that load is removed, we'd have an excess of generation capacity and prices might drop.

$35 per MWh. An absolute bargain.

frankv

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#2758512 11-Aug-2021 11:30

mattwnz:

alexx:

Are we still selling cheap power to the Tiwai Point smelter? From my understanding, the likelihood that Tiwai Point will close, deters the construction of new power generation, because if and when that load is removed, we'd have an excess of generation capacity and prices might drop.

Don't they lose too much of the power through the lines? I think the problem with that hydro station is it's location. It is in the wrong place to be used for much else.

Manapouri power is sold cheaply to Tiwai Point because (a) the lines cost is small, and (b) they have a large, steady demand. If you had a factory situated close to Marsden Point that consumed *large* quantities of diesel all the time, you would get that diesel at a very good price.

There is a bottleneck in National Grid in the lower North Island, and less so in the Cook Strait cable, and Manapouri isn't well-connected to the grid anyway. So Manapouri power can't easily be moved to the northern half of the North Island where the demand is. IIRC it was estimated to cost $600M to fix. I don't know how much of that has been done yet, although Transpower is close to finishing doubling the capacity of the link from Southland to Benmore (the southern end of the HVDC link aka the Cook Strait cable).

I wonder if using one or more of the Waikato River hydro stations for pumped storage would be economic?

mattwnz

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#2758617 11-Aug-2021 14:33

frankv:

mattwnz:

Don't they lose too much of the power through the lines? I think the problem with that hydro station is it's location. It is in the wrong place to be used for much else.

Manapouri power is sold cheaply to Tiwai Point because (a) the lines cost is small, and (b) they have a large, steady demand. If you had a factory situated close to Marsden Point that consumed *large* quantities of diesel all the time, you would get that diesel at a very good price.

There is a bottleneck in National Grid in the lower North Island, and less so in the Cook Strait cable, and Manapouri isn't well-connected to the grid anyway. So Manapouri power can't easily be moved to the northern half of the North Island where the demand is. IIRC it was estimated to cost $600M to fix. I don't know how much of that has been done yet, although Transpower is close to finishing doubling the capacity of the link from Southland to Benmore (the southern end of the HVDC link aka the Cook Strait cable).

I wonder if using one or more of the Waikato River hydro stations for pumped storage would be economic?

600 million is cheap in todays money, it is about the price of putting 450 houses in Auckland. They should just do it.

ShinyChrome

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#2758618 11-Aug-2021 14:39

mattwnz:

600 million is cheap in todays money, it is about the price of putting 450 houses in Auckland. They should just do it.

I believe that was the conclusion the last Transpower report came to, that it was still a worthwhile investment

wellygary

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#2758622 11-Aug-2021 14:49

frankv:

I wonder if using one or more of the Waikato River hydro stations for pumped storage would be economic?

Unlikely.. There is actually very little real storage in the Waikato system, with pretty much everything being Run of River...

Taupo itself has a mandated range of only about 1.5 metres, and if you try to make it deeper there are whole lot of Motel campground owners Owners who will complain when their customers get flooded out :)

MBIE took a desktop look at a potential pumped hydro using Taupo as the lower reservoir and pumping up to a smaller higher dammed river, but concluded it would be small and would not help that much as no water from Taupo is ever wasted (there is no spillway).. it all has to go out through the Waikato dam system..

https://www.mbie.govt.nz/dmsdocument/11961-hydro-generation-stack-update-for-large-scale-plant-pdf

RedactedRetracted

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#2758627 11-Aug-2021 15:04

Bit of a radical idea perhaps, but has there been a serious look at providing incentives for things like large industrial plants setting up shop in the South Island (i.e. closer to generation)? It's my understanding at the moment that transmission costs are distributed based on usage, rather than proximity to generation. Perhaps a change there would be worthwhile in the long term? There is a significant 'social cost' (along with the infrastructure and associated economic costs of urban sprawl) of centralizing everything in a few big cities, so perhaps some policies to encourage things to be spread around a bit more would be beneficial.

wellygary

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#2758632 11-Aug-2021 15:23

RedactedRetracted:

Bit of a radical idea perhaps, but has there been a serious look at providing incentives for things like large industrial plants setting up shop in the South Island (i.e. closer to generation)? It's my understanding at the moment that transmission costs are distributed based on usage, rather than proximity to generation. Perhaps a change there would be worthwhile in the long term? There is a significant 'social cost' (along with the infrastructure and associated economic costs of urban sprawl) of centralizing everything in a few big cities, so perhaps some policies to encourage things to be spread around a bit more would be beneficial.

Lets see what becomes of this first
https://www.southerngreenhydrogen.co.nz/

Also its highly likely the Fonterra will get pushed to transition a couple of really big dairy factories in Southland/Canterbury from Coal to electricity. Two of the large ones could gobble 1/3 of the smelter's output
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/business/422440/how-meridian-fonterra-and-tiwai-point-s-electricity-are-linked

The idea there will be huge amounts of cheap power after Tiwai closes is not really based on anything solid...

RedactedRetracted

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#2758641 11-Aug-2021 15:31

wellygary:

RedactedRetracted:

Bit of a radical idea perhaps, but has there been a serious look at providing incentives for things like large industrial plants setting up shop in the South Island (i.e. closer to generation)? It's my understanding at the moment that transmission costs are distributed based on usage, rather than proximity to generation. Perhaps a change there would be worthwhile in the long term? There is a significant 'social cost' (along with the infrastructure and associated economic costs of urban sprawl) of centralizing everything in a few big cities, so perhaps some policies to encourage things to be spread around a bit more would be beneficial.

Lets see what becomes of this first
https://www.southerngreenhydrogen.co.nz/

Also its highly likely the Fonterra will get pushed to transition a couple of really big dairy factories in Southland/Canterbury from Coal to electricity. Two of the large ones could gobble 1/3 of the smelter's output
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/business/422440/how-meridian-fonterra-and-tiwai-point-s-electricity-are-linked

The idea there will be huge amounts of cheap power after Tiwai closes is not really based on anything solid...

I was thinking even outside of the whole Tiwai question, as it seems to me (from what is very much a layman perspective) that there is a lot of future generation capacity in the south, but little demand, and very little future generation capacity in the north, which has quite a bit of demand, but at the moment there's no incentive for a business to be based in the South Island as they're paying exactly the same transmission costs regardless.

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