It seems strangely appropriate that on the same day as AEMO launched its report into Australia’s energy future and its need for dispatchable generation, and the federal government declared its devotion to ageing coal technology, that the nation’s wind and solar resources should put on a bit of a show.
This graph is taken from RenewEconomy’s popular NEM-Watch widget, provided by the folks at Global Roam, but focuses entirely on the renewable energy resources.
Being a windy and a sunny day around the nation, this snapshot at 1pm eastern states time shows strong output of both wind and solar in all states.
It’s not a solution, but it is tempting to think that the Australian grid, in the not too distant future, will have eliminated the black and brown and large amounts of red that normally feature in the NEM-Watch widget, and instead feature blue, green and gold. There’s some way to go, but this is what it might look like.
Update: Oops, didn’t explain that well. After seeing the feedback we should clarify that we chose to eliminate the coal and gas generation in the grid at that time. It was just an exercise to show what blue, green and gold looks like – but with much more capacity of course (and storage).
