Power is “power”: Can you do without it?
We’re very dependant on power these days; If you don’t believe me go and turn the mains electricity off to your house and see how interesting your life gets, or doesn’t get; We can do without it of course, we just don’t want to. Prior to us inventing it, or at least domesticating it, we did without it. The Romans didn’t have it, Alexander the Great didn’t have it, the Chinese didn’t have it and nor did the Egyptians, Vikings, Mayans or Neanderthals. These people or cultures all achieved amazing things, all without electricity. Still, it’s difficult to imagine life without electricity. No steemit…What would I do with my spare time!?
Having established the importance of the resource we call electricity, produced at massive cost in financial and environmental terms, I also feel it is one of the most wasted resources we have along with water. It’s mind-boggling really. Computers left on, lights burning 24/7 heavy industrial and manufacturing wastage, high-energy usage appliances like flat panel screens and excessive refrigeration and air conditioner usage…The list goes on. Sure, we are more aware these days with campaigns to educate us in ways of reducing our footprint on the planet and it’s resources but I see power wastage all over the place.
My wife and I try to do what we can to reduce our power usage and therefore cost. We have installed a solar collection system that pushes unused power back to the grid, we turn unused appliances off at the power point, turn off lights and televisions when not in use and even charge our laptops, phones, ipads and remote controls during the day when we are generating solar power. We have reduced our quarterly power bill from $650 to $200 every 3 months. That’s a cost saving of $1800 per year through the effective deployment of a structured and ongoing power plan.
Yesterday on our way back into Adelaide from Whyalla we stopped in at Port Augusta some 300km north of Adelaide. I wanted to go and have a look at the new solar farm under construction 12km out of the small town. The drive out there is interesting as it’s a fairly poor dirt, gravel and red bull-dust road. I’d suggest that it’s not suitable for the average family car but my 4x4 truck ate it up. I enjoyed the rough drive actually. If you hate your car and love stone chips feel free to take your standard vehicle out there.
On arrival at the site it’s clear to see that it’s in the early stages of construction and that it’s going to be immense! In fact the 300MW solar farm is going to be the largest in Australia. The Bungala site is some 800Ha in size. That’s huge. The first two stages should be complete around the end of 2018 and is being constructed by Elecnor from Spain. They also built the 57MW Moree, NSW and the 21MW Barcaldine, QLD projects. The Bungala project is being built in a battery-storage- ready condition.
There’s hundreds and hundreds of meters of fencing, massive pylons ready for the high-voltage lines to carry the power and of course rows and rows of frames being constructed to hold solar panels. The image in this post is of one of the tall power transmission towers. It’s big. Really big.
The commencement of construction for this solar farm is welcome news for the local community who will benefit through employment and increased spending in the town and is a massive step in the right direction for developing clean and renewable energy for the country. It starts just as a 212MW wind farm was announced. The farm to be constructed 15km west of Port Augusta at Lincoln Gap begins construction in 2018.
It’s great to see the government making some efforts towards the development of renewables when it comes to power. With the fossil fuel solution quickly becoming untenable the transition to renewable energy is essential. The solar and wind combination provides balance between the two power-generation sources and with the addition, in the future, of storage hopefully there’ll be ample clean power for everyone at affordable prices.
Design and create your ideal life, don’t live it by default
@galenkp
Any effort that goes towards using less power is admirable. Whether it is by individual homesteaders, concerned citizens, corporations or governments, it all deserves a pat on the back.
If small scale folks like us use less then there is less need for these bigger projects.
Possibly less need, but I think the major power users are not the mum’s and dad’s. It’s heavy industry and manufacturing, retail, and government facilities and infrastructure like hospitals, miltary, street lighting etc.
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