Helen Dyer

Thanks Alan:

Significant coal-to-liquid project in production in Ningxia
The world's biggest single coal-to-liquid (CTL) project went into production Wednesday in northwest China's Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region.

The project, undertaken by a subsidiary of the state-owned Shenhua Group, consists of homegrown technology, equipment and materials, breaking the longtime foreign monopoly in CTL core technology. China has rich coal resources but lacks oil and gas. Currently more than 60 percent of its oil is imported.

The project drew an investment of about 55 billion yuan (7.9 billion U.S. dollars). It is able to turn more than 20 million tonnes of coal to 4 million tonnes of oil products annually, including 2.7 million tonnes of diesel, 980,000 tonnes of naphtha petroleum and 340,000 tonnes of liquefied gas, according to Yao Min, deputy general manager of Shenhua Ningxia Coal Industry Group Co. Ltd.

Read more: http://english.cri.cn/12394/2016/12/28/3441s948438.htm

Energy bills soar in shift from coal power stations

Electricity companies have begun hiking consumer prices around the country, blaming the closure of coal-fired generators and the increased cost of renewable energy for higher-than-predicted increases of more than $130 this year.
EnergyAustralia and AGL have increased electricity tariffs in Victoria by $135 and $132 on average for the year respectively — greatly exceeding state government modelling that concluded bills would rise by $27 to $100.
The Victorian price rises will flow from this week but the companies’ customers in other states, including South Australia and NSW, face a yet-to-be announced price rise in June.

Read more: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/mining-energy/energy-bills-soar-in-shift-from-coal-power-stations/news-story/f04ff69323c798fc05097e98defa858e

And some excellent comments too:

Australia has the resources, but apparently not the intelligence or the will to be amongst the lowest energy producers in the world.

Prime Minister Turnbull was reported recently as saying: "Energy prices are high enough already and we should not be doing anything that increases them in the future.” He did some ‘buck passing’ at the same time however by saying that electricity prices are largely within the responsibility of state governments.

The cost of electricity is so important to Australia’s economic well-being that the Federal Government must examine all possible means to minimise prices nationally including legislative measures, but for a start it should abandon its futile Renewable Energy Target and renounce the hair-brained Paris Climate Change Agreement.

Bob of Brisbane.

The particulate matter from power stations in Australia is already largely captured. The ‘carbon’ erroneously referred to is carbon dioxide, a colourless gas. It’s a cunning ploy to make the emissions from our power stations sound grubby. The ABC contributes to the deception by showing shots of water vapour coming from cooling towers when talking about ‘nasty’ emissions. The images are made to look dark and threatening by taking the photos looking into the sun.

Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at 09:27 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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