Energy design a major factor in the escalating cost of electricity

Rod Sims’s view of the world outlines a few contributing factors to escalating electricity pricing but overlooks the two elephants in the room caused by Australia’s obsessive transition to intermittent renewables (“More to high cost of power than the green transition”, 2/12).

These are, first, a poorly designed energy market distorted by subsidies for renewables; and, second, a renewable energy design concept requiring a 100 per cent back-up to allow for low solar capacity factors and long periods of wind drought to maintain supply reliability.

Barrie Hill, Lane Cove, NSW

The Prime Minister’s promises of cheaper electricity and transparency are long gone. The bills keep rising and senior ministers refuse to answer questions.

The Treasurer told us he had beaten inflation but just six months later it is back. Now the Defence Minister announces desperately needed reform of defence only for it to be nothing more than moving deck chairs.

At a time when we need evidence of hard work, we have a bunch of people riding in circles.

Robert Walker, Cessnock, NSW

Australia has high power prices because many people believed the nonsense that the world would fry unless emissions were reduced. They threw away the cheapest and most reliable form of electricity generation and replaced it with junk, without any thought about the consequences.

After 25 years of destruction, the energy system is coughing up blood, power bills continue to skyrocket and businesses close because they cannot afford electricity. Major industries are in danger of closure and the grid gets more fragile daily.

People are beginning to wake up to the fact that none of the people who ram this stuff down our throats everyday has any concept of how an energy system works but they continue to tell us they know best. Reality is showing us that they have no idea.

David Bidstrup, Plympton Park, SA

Powering Eraring

NSW Premier Chris Minns will need to be more than open to the idea of extending the life of Eraring (“New Eraring extension on cards”, 2/12).

If he doesn’t, he will need to immediately start building some new high-efficiency, low-emissions coal-fired power plants or he will end up with no power at all.

Ross McDonald, Gordon, NSW

Up close and personal

The comments made by Jennifer Westacott concerning her experience with anti-Semitism were both heartwarming and confronting (“Fight against anti-Semitic hate deeply personal”, 2/12).

What will be interesting is if the government makes any comments concerning Westacott’s experience and what our government is actually doing to minimise the level of anti-Semitism we are seeing in our country.

John Houghton, The Gap, Qld

Fight economic slide

Judith Sloan paints a gloomy picture of an inflation-prone economy in decline, arising from federal government mismanagement (“ALP energy rebate another hand-out we can’t afford”, 2/12).

How to explain this to a poorly informed electorate, given the already evident decline of their living standards? It is the opposition that should be building a damn­ing picture of government ineptitude and leading the attack. Let’s hope 2026 will reveal a revitalised opposition.

Peter Clarke, Corinda, Qld

Alarm bells on AI

The article about Yann LeCun (“AI pioneer spruiks next year’s model”, 2/12) adds to the increasing disquiet about artificial intelligence but also adds to the confusion about what it is about AI that should disturb us.

On the one hand is LeCun’s position that the large language paradigms that underlie AI are not all that bright and will never get all that much smarter, whereas Nobel prizewinner Geoffrey Hinton’s position is that they will evolve into a superintelligence that will doom us all. The reality is that both can be true at the same time. The architecture of the models is so far removed from the way a biological nervous system is organised that any neuroscientist worth their salt will call out “nonsense” to any attempt to claim that these models are actually modelled on brain architecture. Empathy is beyond their purview. That being said, they are very good at data sorting. They can be programmed (or possibly self-program) to pull triggers: make decisions after a balance of probabilities synthesis. Indeed, they are probably better than humans at making such a synthesis. Therefore they can kill us all if their analysis is that humanity is not worth the trouble.

A biological brain is driven by self-interest and the need to survive. It is entirely possible that AI will reach the same drive from an entirely different direction.

Janusz Bonkowski, Sunshine Beach, Qld