Climate change is clear and present
by Tony Wood
The storm that ripped across Victoria on Tuesday brought down major power lines, tripped generation plants, and left half-a-million Victorians without power. It created a further storm of political blaming, as well as considered and ill-considered causal analysis, and proposed fixes.
Alongside urgent system repair, it is timely to address what this event means for Victoria’s and Australia’s transition to a low-emissions energy system. To do so requires understanding where we are now and where we are going.
For decades, the core of Victoria’s power system has been a small number of big, low-cost power stations fuelled by brown coal in the Latrobe Valley and connected to Melbourne, and regional cities and towns, via a network of transmission lines. That network also connects Victoria with South Australia, NSW, and Tasmania. It was built to meet the reliability requirements of the time and to be able to withstand external shocks such as hot weather and severe storms. It did this well, and for most of us, the level of reliability has been just fine.
But things are changing. There are three changes of great importance to our energy system, our economy and our very lives. First, the climate is changing, and it is bringing more wild storms, floods, heat waves, and bushfires. The physical, social, and economic consequences are already upon us. Second, addressing climate change is more complex and costly than many might have wished, but the alternative – not addressing climate change – is much worse. And third, the economic and social value of a reliable energy supply has never been greater, meaning any disruption is much worse.
Tuesday’s violent storm ran through Victoria with two separate but dramatic outcomes.
Wind gusts of close to 160km/h destroyed six transmission towers on the major 500-kilovolt line west of Melbourne. That line connects the Latrobe Valley power stations in the state’s south-east with the rest of Victoria and through to South Australia. The tower collapses sent such a strong shock through the grid that the 2200-megawatt Loy Yang A power plant, 250 kilometres away, shut down in self-protection. While that undamaged plant was at least partly back operating within hours, it was necessary to cut off power to about 90,000 consumers until that happened.
The storm didn’t finish there. It brought down trees and power lines across a wide swath of the state, leaving 500,000 people without power. That number was still in the tens of thousands by Thursday night.
What did we learn from this event? Three conclusions are not debatable. First, this was not the first time that a storm has brought down transmission towers in Australia, and such events are becoming more frequent, as is the intensity of extreme weather generally. Climate change is clear and present.
Second, the destruction was not related to the transition to renewable electricity or recent moves to build more transmission in the state to support more renewables. Power outages would not have been less extensive with more coal or even nuclear generators.
And third, allocating blame to fallen transmission towers and sensitive power plants may be technically accurate, but is unhelpful when people without power just want to know when it will be restored and what is being done to avoid it happening again.
The plan for revolutionary changes to our power system has been poorly communicated and badly implemented. Yet, we cannot abandon the commitment to a low-emissions grid.
Once power is restored, the priorities are clear.
Given the age of the failed towers, the replacements should be designed to be more resilient to the storms that are coming. The cost of putting transmission lines underground has been considered unjustified except in very narrow situations. But, as the cost of more frequent failures continues to mount, this conclusion should be re-examined. The results should be clearly communicated to a frustrated public.
The longer-term priorities bring more optimism. Planning and building a low-emissions power system based on renewables, with supporting transmission infrastructure and complementary storage, brings greater resilience to extreme weather. The result is a system that depends far less on individual transmission lines for large parts of the country and is therefore more resilient. We saw that when the failure of the 500kV line was able to be covered through existing 200kV lines that also connect the west and east of the state. The government, its agencies, and the industry must do a better job working with regional communities to deliver this plan.
Renewable energy generated in towns and households, supported by batteries, will enable such systems to disconnect from the grid and run in isolation for a time, possibly backed up by local, fossil-fuelled generators.
The technologies to design and implement such a plan are available and won’t cost the earth. Our political leaders need to grasp this opportunity, work closely with industry, and communicate the plan and its consequences unceasingly.
This week’s crisis is too big to waste.