Seven years ago, on this day, May 9, 2016, South Australia weaned itself off coal (sort of).
At 9.40 am local time on Monday May 9th the turbines at Alinta’s 520 megawatt Northern Power Station at Port Augusta disconnected from the grid for the last time.
https://theconversation.com/goodbye-northern-lights-hello-sunlight-58219
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 407.9ppm. As of 2023 it is 420ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was
South Australia which had long been dependent upon coal for electricity [first imported, and then its own filthy stuff] had started moving away and taking advantage of policy incentives at the national level for the creation of more and more wind power in areas where the wind was reliable. The Labor government under Mike Rann had basically figured out how to take advantage of policy and physical opportunities…
What I think we can learn from this
These symbolic moments like the last flight of Concorde are useful pegs for historians wanting to impose some order on the inherent messiness of history. South Australia is going to be by at the forefront of the energy transition. Whether it can store huge amounts of electricity as required – when the sun doesn’t shine and the wind doesn’t blow – remains to be seen
What happened next
There was a blackout in South Australia that had nothing to do with renewable energy, which was certainly useful to idiots who wanted to blame everything on the new technology in order to continue with business as usual – same old story!
South Australia is continuing to innovate in terms of policy around renewable energy. The emissions keep climbing at a global level. Remember that…
What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.