I am amused by the fact the climate denialists are shouting from the rooftops that coal is reliable.
Just last week we in NSW were worried about possible blackouts because two units for coal fired power stations were being serviced ( the servicing is more frequent these days because they break down more often). and two units actually broke down.
This is not a new phenomenon. A very long time ago I had to write an essay on electricity pricing in NSW.
One of the more interesting things I found out at the time ( around 1982) was the fact NSW had a lot more power stations than it needed. We only found out a lot later the reason was that units were breaking down in hot weather so more stations meant no blackouts despite most nights having way too much power and thus we had very very low offpeak prices.
Thus we can state units in coal fired power stations break down frequently and do so more often as days get hotter.
When you add the 8 years it takes to build the damn things and then the price that would be needed it is easy to see why the private sector is not interested in coal fired power.
Whoopsy
I forgot to mention that coal fired power like nuclear power is baseload power that is it is on 24 hours a day. At present it is only profitable at night. It gets blitzed during the day by solar power. When energy is done by private enterprise they want dispatchable power not baseload power.
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