Washing away the base load myth with solar hot water

Greens NSW MP John Kaye said: “The Iemma government is being panicked into electricity industry privatisation and a new, expensive and polluting base load power station by the supposed threat of blackouts.

“There is no capacity gap that cannot be met by increasing energy efficiency.

“Using highly conservative assumptions we found that replacing inefficient off-peak electric water heaters with solar, heat pumps or gas would reduce base load demand to a level where no new plant would be needed for many years to come.

“A ban on the sale of off-peak units and providing interest free loans to cover the increased cost to the consumer of high efficiency units would be a cost-effective and low emissions way of meeting future demand.

“More than 70 thousand electric off-peak units fail each year and need replacing.

“Ensuring that the new water heaters are high efficiency units including gas, solar and heat pumps would cut base load by more than 109 MW each year.

“After three years of replacing worn out off-peak units with new high efficiency water heaters, overnight load would be reduced by more than 327 MW which is the 2011 supply gap that the Iemma government used to justify the Owen Inquiry.

“The total cost to government would be less than $5 million a year.

“Apart from avoiding billions of dollars tied up in an expensive base load plant, our analysis showed that phasing out off peak hot water would save  at least 537 thousand tonnes of CO2 each year.

“The Iemma government put the wrong questions to the Owen Inquiry and will get back answers that drive the state to new base load plants and privatisation.

“The Greens urge the Iemma government to abandon ship on the Owen Inquiry and work with households to reduce demand and emissions,” Dr Kaye said.