SA power crisis: Former ETSA chief says state needs nuclear power and renewable energy woes are being watched by the world
SOUTH Australia should switch to nuclear power and is being watched globally as a case of what can go wrong when large-scale renewable energy is fed into an electricity system, a former ETSA chief has said.
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SOUTH Australia should switch to nuclear power and is being watched around the world as a test case in what can go wrong when large-scale renewable energy is introduced into an electricity system, former ETSA chief executive Basil Scarsella says.
The South Australian now runs UK Power Networks which provides power for more than eight million people in London.
It is owned by the Hong Kong-based Cheung Kong Holdings, the same company that runs SA Power Networks.
“South Australia is looked at around the world as to what went wrong and how do you avoid it,’’ said the man who ran ETSA from 1998 to 2005.
However, he also said that “to be fair, they probably lead the world in the percentage of renewables that have been built, which is a good thing’’.
He acknowledged the state’s electricity market had changed markedly since his departure in 2005.
“If I recall correctly, there was only one wind farm and that was down in the South-East,’’ he said.
Mr Scarsella said that while he was not intimately familiar with the causes behind the state’s recent energy troubles, it was inevitable coal-fired power stations would be phased out and be replaced by a combination of gas, batteries, interconnectors, renewables and nuclear power as the world adopted a low-carbon future.
But he also said South Australia should consider adopting nuclear power, as was the case in the United Kingdom.
“We want to be the biggest uranium exporter in the world, but we don’t want nuclear power?’’ he asked.
“I don’t see the logic of that at all.’’
Mr Scarsella said in the UK there was a nice “balance between nuclear, gas and renewables’’.
He said the current mix was roughly 25 per cent to 30 per cent gas, 24 per cent for coal, 15 per cent to 20 per cent renewables and 20 per cent nuclear.
A new $30 billion nuclear plant is currently being built in southern England and others are also on the drawing board to help fill the energy gap as coal-powered stations start to wind down.
Mr Scarsella did not comment directly on the situation in South Australia, or the Labor Government’s $550 million plan to reinject stability into the grid, but noted that since his time in charge, the Port Augusta power station had shut, Torrens Island had aged and previously promised interconnectors had not been built.
And while acknowledging that battery technology held enormous promise, he cautioned that it had not yet been proven on a large scale.
“You have to be careful not to stumble from one problem to the next,’’ he said. “I have not seen it used anywhere to keep the lights on anywhere in a whole state like South Australia.’’