BB - "Aidan Morrison's article about incorrect financial...

BB - "Aidan Morrison's article about incorrect financial assumptions in the CSIRO report" - IMO Morrison's issues are much worse than "incorrect financial assumption" - as I see it they as evidence of skullduggery and perverted professionalism. As a professional engineer it's almost an article of faith to be professional and truthful - it's a bit like the oath doctors take to work for the beneifit of their patient. In this case it appears to me that the CSIRO is knowingly making unsupportable assumption (even though they are declared in a appendix few read) in a document which will waste Australia (and me as a tax payer with a need to pay my electricity bills) a lot of money on an unwise infrastructure investment. I had expected (possibly naively) that the CSIRO had "integrity" and as such their reports would be of "professional" quality. Unfortunately it would appear that have become "politicized" and simply acquiesce to the political needs of their current master (i.e Chris Bowen). My problem is not only what I perceive as lack of professionalism but also that the CSIRO Gencost report was both skewed and is at odds with experts in the rest of the world (apart from Germany, Austria and Denmark - who all have enormous electricity costs); I guess the need for funding wins the day.

Another issue is the way this Gencost report goes about presenting the argument against nuclear power (i.e it's too expensive) when they mist be well aware of the estimates of companies such as Nuscale (about US4,000/kw) but in previous reports choose to adopt ridiculous high estimates and then say that they got a number of US$16,000/kw from GHD in 2018 and since nuclear is still banned in Australia they wont change it until "The project is due for completion in December 2024. Economic Appraisal of Small Modular Reactors Projects: Methodologies andApplications | IAEA. EFWG (2019) is the most recently available data source" (ref Gencost 2023 footnote page 12). At least in this report they quote (pg 38) $7,500/kw however they must be aware that Nuscale are estimating $4,000/kw. The point is that a strategy of either extending the life of existing generation or substituting it for "replaceable" gas generation would avoid enormous expenditure on batteries and network prior to 2030 and after (assuming SMR's are proven) then swap out the natural gas thermal generation for an SMR (this is waht the USA and China are doing). This scenario would drastically cut expenditure on the network and batteries prior to 2030 and preserve options for the 2030 (i.e use SMR's or (if SMR's prove too expensive) gold plate the grid and buy heaps of batteries/pumped hydro (Snowy 2 may even be working then))

I realize that Sewie doesn't want to know about the flaws in his belief system. I don't know what Sewie has said about the CSIRO's distortions but after I read about him eulogizing a claim that renewables met 100% of South Australian demand for a blink of an eye on windy/sunny Sunday afternoon in April (or October) I just switched off and put him on ignore.

The about is just my personal views but DYOR.