Australia's Queensland Reverses Policy, Pledges To Keep Using Coal Power At Least Into the 2040s (yahoo.com)
(Friday October 10, 2025 @05:22PM (msmash)
from the how-about-that dept.)
- Reference: 0179746530
- News link: https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/10/10/1748253/australias-queensland-reverses-policy-pledges-to-keep-using-coal-power-at-least-into-the-2040s
- Source link: https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/australias-queensland-reverses-policy-pledges-054614515.html
Australia's Queensland state government said on Friday it would run coal power plants [1]at least into the 2040s , reversing a previous plan to pivot rapidly to renewables and in turn making national emissions reduction targets harder to achieve. From a report:
> The centre-right Liberal National Party won last year's election in Queensland, a huge chunk of land in Australia's northeast where more than 60% of electricity comes from coal-fired plants that are mostly owned by the state.
[1] https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/australias-queensland-reverses-policy-pledges-054614515.html
> The centre-right Liberal National Party won last year's election in Queensland, a huge chunk of land in Australia's northeast where more than 60% of electricity comes from coal-fired plants that are mostly owned by the state.
[1] https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/australias-queensland-reverses-policy-pledges-054614515.html
We're so fckd (Score:1)
by SnotMelon ( 9070565 )
This is how we're so fckd. One of the sunniest places in the world: probs best place for a solar based solution and they're going to stay on coal.
Re: (Score:2)
by viperidaenz ( 2515578 )
In Sydney, that have the problem of too much solar, with prices going negative. Too much rooftop solar back feeding local distribution networks.
The politicians are too far in the pockets of the mining industry to step away from coal.
Idiots (Score:2)
by felixrising ( 1135205 )
Idiots everywhere... They've also been cancelling renewable energy projects there were well down the planning pipeline because of spurious "community opposition".
That tracks (Score:1)
As soon as I read the headline I was wondering what kind of right-wing morons willing to [1]pay extra money [wikipedia.org] to use coal instead of renewables just won an election there.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Levelized_cost_of_electricity
Re: That tracks (Score:2, Interesting)
cheaper power has not eventuated in any place where there has been a large scale shift to renewables. because renewables donâ(TM)t cut it in the early evening so you have to either buy imminently expensive storage or fossil fuel capacity to make up the short fall. i live in a jurisdiction that did this conversion and the power price has more than doubled and we have to import power now.
Re: (Score:2)
The cost of adding storage to renewables is minor enough that it doesn't come close to shifting the price in favor of fossil fuels, so either demand is growing faster than supply where you are, or you're getting ripped off.
Here's data on the effect of renewable power on consumer electricity prices: [1]https://www.theclimatebrink.co... [theclimatebrink.com]
[1] https://www.theclimatebrink.com/p/have-renewables-decreased-electricity
Coal vs batteries (Score:2)
Sure, renewables don't cost much to run. When they are running. A recent report suggests that a 100% renewable grid in Australia would need 3 days of backup to avoid one in 10 year dunkelflautes. The Australian grid averages 24 GW, so 1728 GWh of batteries. That would cost about 75% of Australia's GDP, and would need replacing every 15 years, ie on average a 5% donation of GDP to China every year. Well I guess it's what the young uns want, they'll be paying for it for all of their lives. And of course it wi