Posts by BenWilson
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Hard News: It was 30 years ago today, in reply to Lilith __,
Yes, it was a surreal moment, quite outside of anything I'd experienced before, to have an economic policy decision announced with the immediacy of a disaster or war newsflash. It couldn't wait for the news hour? It was, after all, news, and would have been the number one item, and would of course have had Muldoons leer for us to cringe at one more time.
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Hard News: A wretched editorial, in reply to Russell Brown,
I can think of no reason that she, of all people, should not be allowed to speak her mind.
Nor can I think of any reason why a big news outlet shouldn't cover it, since it was actually a very popular news item, something watched and rewatched by a lot of people. It wouldn't matter if Billingsley had nothing interesting to say at all, there would still be public interest in her saying it. The number of worthless know-nothing interviews that we get all the time from people just because they were trivially involved in some news item is huge. How can it be anything but big news to get an interview from the very person involved in a majorly controversial item?
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Hard News: Going solar?, in reply to Andrew C,
Is there a cost to the electricity supplier (or network supplier) to take excess power out from a house and put it back into the distribution network?
Yes. They do need altered infrastructure if the amount of that power gets large, which it could if there’s a huge growth in home PV.
But. There is also a lowered transportation cost, in theory, since the power is being produced nearer to where it’s being used. And obviously the power is, itself, of value. It’s power they don’t have to supply from elsewhere.
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Hard News: Going solar?, in reply to David Haywood,
Curious about using an idea like that in conjunction with tankless heating. The tankless unit would be right next to the shower. Presumably it would improve the overall flow of the system dramatically to get pre-heated water coming into it, and any issue with fluctuating temperature is controlled automatically.
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Hard News: Going solar?, in reply to David Haywood,
Russell, sorry not to have replied earlier but have had bad cold followed by possible “mild” influenza – also looking after children with same.
You too, huh?
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Hard News: It was 30 years ago today, in reply to Josh Petyt,
Some minor quibbles
Yup, although loans were heralded before being introduced, and banks jumped in well before. I was offered a tuition fee loan in 1990. It was a hit, the line into the bank's sign-up booth was as long as many of the other orientation queues were in those days.
My point is that it was a decade in which the whole way that we seemed to see things changed dramatically, when a marked wealth and power shift happened.
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I was 12, getting ready for high school, which couldn't come soon enough. It was clear even to a kid that it was pretty momentous to have got rid of Muldoon. The rejoicing was near universal. I went to Selwyn College (despite living in Herne Bay) the next year, a school known for its liberality and strong arts culture, and was surprised to find that the nations population, even down to the schoolchildren, were not universal in their support for Labour.
In a very odd microcosmic way, that school symbolized to me a very real political shift in progress. A very large group of kids who lived near me had unaccountably chosen this particular school and we commuted 150 strong via multiple buses from Richard Prebble's electorate, through the heart of the wealthiest suburbs of NZ to a school in Muldoon's electorate. By the time that commute was over, Herne Bay was the number one suburb, Remmers had been toppled, and Prebble was doing his years in the wilderness before gravitating to ACT, and Muldoon was dead, and I was facing being the lucky first year to pay for it's entire tertiary education by borrowing money for it, courtesy of the guy who in 1984 was quizzing my friends on his TV game show.
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Hard News: Going solar?, in reply to Alfie,
You may feel that electicity prices will drop in the future, but I can’t see that happening.
I can. But it will be solar supply causing it. Every one of you guys going solar is good for me too, because that's one less person competing for the hydro, and even some increased supply when it's extra sunny.
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However, the only fuel source fast enough to run a zero-storage system is gas
You think? I've used electric versions that were OK. You don't get huge pressure, but I don't want huge pressure. I almost never want it to produce scalding hot water at a high flow rate. For boiling water, there's the stove and kettle. For showers, colder water is better. For baths, yes, a higher flow rate would make pouring the bath quicker, but a bath isn't a quick thing in the first place, quite aside from being an outrageous luxury :-). For other purposes: Dishwashing: I want to be able to put my hands in it. I tend to use lukewarm. Washing machine: It's a machine. I don't care how long it takes. Dishwasher: Same comment.
I'd happily give away the hot water cylinder one day, when my budget stretches to it, without wanting to have gas in my house.
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Hard News: Going solar?, in reply to Moz,
the fixed supply charge is less than the cost of providing the grid
Therein lies the solution. The fixed supply charge should be the same as the cost of providing the grid. Which would, incidentally, be fair – passing on the real cost, rather than slipping it into the usage charges which fluctuate with the price of power.
And, of course, it’s not like the power supplied back into the grid is of no value. It’s being purchased wholesale from solar owners, and sold retail to the person next door. There’s complexity in the storage/smoothing of the fluctuating supply, but there is presumably a hugely reduced transportation cost. I bet this complexity is quite substantial, even, but really, if a bloody power grid company can’t handle it, then perhaps they could mandate that the suppliers have some level of smoothing of their own (but they would have to pay them more for that high quality power). Really, it seems to me like something that they would want to do, rather than complain about having to do.
TLDR version: Do they want to lose their monopoly? Because acting like home solar isn’t coming is a sure way to do that.
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