Australia enjoys the dubious reputation of being the world’s fourth-highest coal exporter. This non-renewable fossil bonanza also allows the nation to rely on large, centralized coal and natural gas power stations. In the process, the country has racked up huge carbon debts worldwide.
How Crunch Time Came for Australia’s Carbon Debts
Australia is a vast continent heavily underpopulated by European and American standards. Eighty percent of the people cluster in seven cities mainly on the seaboard. Perth, Adelaide, Melbourne, Canberra, Sydney, Brisbane, and Darwin all benefit from generally reliable supply.
Crunch time awaits smaller settlements inland often 600 miles or more from these mega generators of raw electricity. South Australia infamously experienced the tipping point last year, when a storm knocked over pylons and there were no distributed backups to provide bridging current.
How Tesla Was Quick to Come to the Party
Elon Musk jumped into the gap with a radical suggestion. We can imagine him saying to the South Australia government, “I have a great way to start repaying your state’s carbon debts back. How about I build you guys a 100 megawatt battery farm. And, if I don’t complete the job in a hundred days, you can have the equipment free.
The rest is history, as they say. Tesla completed the job on time using the same lithium-ion technology they use in electric cars, and power walls. We don’t do commercials, but we have to agree 100 megawatts of battery storage is a powerful step forward.
Ten such battery farms equate to a large power station, and it seems we have the capacity to move forward. We already have the tidal, wind and solar resources to start paying back carbon debts. All that is wanting is the political will to make the future happen. We can hardly wait for the moment when we move into a greener global future for the sake of our kids.
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Preview Image: Australian Cities
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