I enjoyed the conversation however there was a constant assumption throughout that the solution to the climate crisis is encouraging single family home ownership with rooftop solar and an electric vehicle in the garage.
How does this play out with the millions of people who live in apartments and don't have access to government subsidised solar, charging bays, or electric vehicles? It’s the government donating millions of dollars to people with the most already (single family home owners) and actively making the lives of those that are forced to rely on the grid more expensive.
Where are the hundreds of millions of government dollars in handouts to people who are living a more modest lifestyle (apartment living, using public or active transportation?) and actually doing something to limit their impact on the environment instead of paying lip service by putting solar on a mansion and buying a brand new electric vehicle with decades of embedded carbon?
The money would be far better spent buying everyone an e-bike, building more bike lanes, building more metro lines, incentivising building more medium/high density, affordable, quality housing, etc. The last thing we need is more cars on the road and urban sprawl.
This idea that the "solution" to the climate crisis is the government subsidising people in massive houses with rooftop solar in urban sprawl is not a solution. It won’t solve anything. It will make things worse. The embedded carbon alone in replacing billions of petrol vehicles with electric vehicles will decimate the planet.
I’m amazed that absolutely nothing in the above was discussed in this conversation. The entire conversation was based around big houses and yet more cars. I suspect that it’s because you both live this extravagance and assume that there is no possible way that we could live another way. Your bias is showing
Saul is very convincing - however, I am an electrical engineer, and I don't share his optimism.
I agree that we need to electrify as much as possible in order to shift from fossil fuels, but I am sceptical that batteries can provide the means for shifting to a grid composed of mostly intermittent energy sources.
Batteries are great as a short term power source, but they are quite expensive and short lived, with a very low energy density.
The idea of shipping energy around the country to compensate for supply shortfalls from intermittent sources is good in theory, but if for example, there is a prolonged shortfall in the south eastern states, then Queensland is going to have to supply its own needs, plus NSW and VIC - and recharge all the depleted batteries as well...
This will require muchuch more than the 100% overbuild that Saul was talking about.
We are currently struggling to achieve 100% renewable generation with current demand, let alone the increased demand that will come with electrification, battery recharging, geographic diversification etc.
This will require a lot of solar panels and a lot of wind turbines, all scattered around the countryside, all being maintained and monitored. Add to this, a whole lot of extra grid wiring and a massive collection of batteries.
It seems like a big waste any of effort and resources - when perhaps a few thumping big nuclear power plants would solve the whole problem in one go, without the need for such a big eleborate, complicated (and risky) scheme...
Oh, and by the way, you were asking what do the grid owners put into the system to justify their returns. The electricity grid comprises a lot of equipment spread all over the country.
A lot of this equipment is very specialized with very long manufacturing lead times, and so spares must be kept on hand as insurance against breakdowns. This is a lot of cash kept sitting about idle.
There is also a lot of labour and equipment tied up performing maintenance and breakdown repairs.
It is not simply a matter of "owning it" and having cash rain from the sky.
Hi Josh, I'm excited you've dipped your toe in the the energy relm on Uncomfortable Conversations. I'm extremely concerned about where Australia is heading in terms of so called renewable energy. I'm with Magnus, pretty please with sugar on top can you talk to Chris Uhlmann.
Agree that Saul might be overly optimistic about the current cost of BESS and underselling the scale of transmission infrastructure required but Uhlmann has zero understanding of the technological aspects of generation and a limited understanding of the energy market based upon his interview with John Anderson. We need balanced, nuanced conversation with people in the field
Josh, great interview – but I wish you had explored more deeply the scale of the electrification challenge.
Your guest rightly pointed out the difference between renewables as a share of electricity versus their contribution to total energy use—but I felt this point was underplayed. The distinction is critical and goes to the heart of the energy transition debate.
In the 2022–23 financial year, Australia's total energy consumption reached 5,882 petajoules (PJ). Of that, electricity accounted for just 988 PJ, or around 17% of the total. So even if we transitioned to 100% renewable electricity overnight, we’d still only have addressed a small slice of the broader energy pie.
And that broader pie is still overwhelmingly fossil-fuelled—91% of our total energy consumption in fact. Here's how it breaks down:
Oil: 38.9%
Coal: 25.9%
Gas: 25.8%
Renewables: 9.4%
These numbers make one thing abundantly clear: we are still at the foot of a very steep mountain when it comes to decarbonising not just electricity—but everything else: transport, mining, agriculture, heavy industry, construction. Electrifying all of that is not only technically complex, it's incredibly energy intensive.
This is why it’s important we don’t get swept up in singular narratives about silver bullet solutions. Technologies like batteries are promising, yes—but they are also expensive, immature at scale, and riddled with technical and logistical hurdles. Likewise, nuclear—particularly small modular reactors (SMRs)—might prove transformative, but we need to see genuine advances in cost, deployment, and public trust.
What we must avoid is locking ourselves prematurely into one ideological lane. A wise nation hedges, pilots multiple pathways, and lets markets and innovation do what they do best: evolve, surprise, and solve.
I also wish you’d pushed back harder on the transmission cost assumptions. The idea of efficiently moving wind energy from the coast of Fremantle to Sydney—thousands of kilometres away—without substantial cost blowouts, seems highly optimistic. We know transmission infrastructure is already delayed and over budget across multiple states. Underestimating that cost may create public disillusionment down the track.
Lastly, a conversation that rarely gets airtime is supply chain risk. The majority of renewable hardware—solar panels, batteries, rare earth minerals—relies on a highly centralised and geopolitically vulnerable supply chain, particularly dependent on China. As tensions rise globally, this could pose a serious threat to both our energy targets and our energy sovereignty. It’s not enough to go green—we need to go secure.
In all, a terrific episode—but let’s keep peeling back the layers. The clean energy future isn’t just a story of optimism—it’s also a story of scale, complexity, and resilience.
Looking forward to more conversations that hold space for both ambition and realism.
Another great conversation Josh but why no mention of the carbon footprint and environmental destruction of renewables that require constant “renewal” ad infinitum?
I try to look at more and more data on this subject and it still never adds up, we are 100% electric at home with a 6.6kw solar and Battery, we generate more than we use over the year, but not always when we need it, similar to the Fred example. He mentions using your car battery to take up some of this excess, but I have this nasty thing called work, along with a major percentage of drivers where my car is not at home during the day, so his points begin to fall flat for me. Also like Sauls example of Fred, I am 80% self sufficient, but this means I need 100% of whatever power I need at 20% of the time, but this 20% will be at an unknown time due to the weather, in other words, power generation and power lines have to be set up for 100% of the demand (or 150% based on todays coal power) for me to buy 20% of the time, all of those costs have to be passed on to the customer in that 20% that is sold, and therefore price would need to be 5 times the price. If someone in a heritage listed home or a poor person in a unit complex who cannot get batteries and solar then they have to pay this 5 * price all the time. Then there is also the environmental impact of the plan, solar farms require 400 times the space of a Nuclear or even Coal power station, this is a lot of flora and fauna we will kill in the name of net zero, and wind farms are responsible for the deaths of many birds, bats and insects, and are decimating migratory birds / bats. Whether we like it or not, we should slow down / stop renewables and invest in Nuclear as a zero carbon emission power source we all buy, sharing the cost and keeping bills overall lower than this renewable plan. If you really wanted to be pedantic we could keep coal and offset with greenification projects, If anyone wants to hear another expert on net zero energy, then listen to Michael Shellenberger, just search for his interviews.
Usually in your interviews Josh you push back more, but like wise with the interview with Peter Garret you seem to accept the fantasy of this renewable plan without too much question.
Saul’s arguments are sound at a high level but network management issues to prevent issues like what occurred in Portugal and Spain recently, and were essentially the same as what happened in South Australia 15 or so years ago, need to be considered. There are network management and reliability issues that need to be considered along side the move toward a distributed grid. Most the network equipment would remain the same but additional metering and data acquisition systems would be needed. Certainly existing smart meters that connect directly to supply authorities could go a long way to achieving this. Any of the solutions suggested Saul will required a layer of automation at the network level to assist with management.
Wind and solar will never be the answer, they destroy more then they save. The chinese making the wind turbines and solar panel while they build 300 new coal fired electric plants to build all the solar and wind projects. Then in the USA they destroy mountaintops to erect the turbines or clear cut thousands of acres for solar fields. Right now the only viable solution is the new generation of nuclear plants.
On the other hand complete electrification doesn't sound inviting either. Complete electrification also goes hand in hand with complete control by government. Which is not wonderful, the world for most is choice, complete control is tyranny and enslavement.
Pretty please talk to Chris Uhlmann, former ABC reporter now partnering with conservative media (Sky, Australian) becuase nobody is listening on the left about the true costs of wind and solar.
I agree that charging our cars from our roofs is a smart idea but I think you should have someone on to talk about baseload power. There was no mention of industry and manufacturing. no mention of how other wind and solar pushes have lead to cost blowouts like germany’s energiewend. or the fact that South Australia has the highest renewables penetration has led to an unstable grid.
Josh, your guest never mentioned the capital cost of solar, wind or wires nor the interest on loans for that capital. Were these included in his numbers? And what about the massive subsidies that governments are providing. We are all paying for these through our taxes. Are they factored into his numbers? Without clarity, his declarations are unconvincing, particularly when the Victorian government has just dropped the feed-in tariff for solar owners to $0.04/kWh
I try to look at more and more data on this subject and it still never adds up, we are 100% electric at home with a 6.6kw solar and Battery, we generate more than we use over the year, but not always when we need it, similar to the Fred example. He mentions using your car battery to take up some of this excess, but I have this nasty thing called work, along with a major percentage of drivers where my car is not at home during the day, so his points begin to fall flat for me. Also like Sauls example of Fred, I am 80% self sufficient, but this means I need 100% of whatever power I need at 20% of the time, but this 20% will be at an unknown time due to the weather, in other words, power generation and power lines have to be set up for 100% of the demand (or 150% based on todays coal power) for me to buy 20% of the time, all of those costs have to be passed on to the customer in that 20% that is sold, and therefore price would need to be 5 times the price. If someone in a heritage listed home or a poor person in a unit complex who cannot get batteries and solar then they have to pay this 5 * price all the time. Then there is also the environmental impact of the plan, solar farms require 400 times the space of a Nuclear or even Coal power station, this is a lot of flora and fauna we will kill in the name of net zero, and wind farms are responsible for the deaths of many birds, bats and insects, and are decimating migratory birds / bats. Whether we like it or not, we should slow down / stop renewables and invest in Nuclear as a zero carbon emission power source we all buy, sharing the cost and keeping bills overall lower than this renewable plan. If you really wanted to be pedantic we could keep coal and offset with greenification projects, If anyone wants to hear another expert on net zero energy, then listen to Michael Shellenberger, just search for his interviews.
Usually in your interviews Josh you push back more, but like wise with the interview with Peter Garret you seem to accept the fantasy of this renewable plan without too much question.
I really think this has to address energy consumption in the developing world. They out consume and produce more carbon than the industrialized world. Unless it is an inexpensive solution for India and China, we are not really accomplishing anything.
Yes, but batteries in the electric cars are shit and go titts up like there is no tomorrow, and battery is the key part of an electric car's... Savings are not in the future ... a lot of dead cash in the future.
So far all of them, lithium ion batteries loosing their capacity with every charge and discharge. Predictive modeling shows that in Australian climate they would last 8-12 years. Lower range battery you have, less it will last. Hotter climate you live, less it would last. Hense, the resale value is much lower, comparing to a petrol car that would easily last 30 years.
And how many car manufacturers are using lithium ion batteries? Modern cars are starting to use alternative technologies and lithium phosphate is not the same as lithium ion. There’s a heap of research in this field going on at the moment. Given the relatively early stage of EV development any assumptions about their future use is going to be wrong.
Where’s the market for a thirty year old car? There’s no reason why a EV can’t have its batteries replaced. If you can refurbish a car with an internal combustion engine then you can do the same with an EV.
I enjoyed the conversation however there was a constant assumption throughout that the solution to the climate crisis is encouraging single family home ownership with rooftop solar and an electric vehicle in the garage.
How does this play out with the millions of people who live in apartments and don't have access to government subsidised solar, charging bays, or electric vehicles? It’s the government donating millions of dollars to people with the most already (single family home owners) and actively making the lives of those that are forced to rely on the grid more expensive.
Where are the hundreds of millions of government dollars in handouts to people who are living a more modest lifestyle (apartment living, using public or active transportation?) and actually doing something to limit their impact on the environment instead of paying lip service by putting solar on a mansion and buying a brand new electric vehicle with decades of embedded carbon?
The money would be far better spent buying everyone an e-bike, building more bike lanes, building more metro lines, incentivising building more medium/high density, affordable, quality housing, etc. The last thing we need is more cars on the road and urban sprawl.
This idea that the "solution" to the climate crisis is the government subsidising people in massive houses with rooftop solar in urban sprawl is not a solution. It won’t solve anything. It will make things worse. The embedded carbon alone in replacing billions of petrol vehicles with electric vehicles will decimate the planet.
I’m amazed that absolutely nothing in the above was discussed in this conversation. The entire conversation was based around big houses and yet more cars. I suspect that it’s because you both live this extravagance and assume that there is no possible way that we could live another way. Your bias is showing
Saul is very convincing - however, I am an electrical engineer, and I don't share his optimism.
I agree that we need to electrify as much as possible in order to shift from fossil fuels, but I am sceptical that batteries can provide the means for shifting to a grid composed of mostly intermittent energy sources.
Batteries are great as a short term power source, but they are quite expensive and short lived, with a very low energy density.
The idea of shipping energy around the country to compensate for supply shortfalls from intermittent sources is good in theory, but if for example, there is a prolonged shortfall in the south eastern states, then Queensland is going to have to supply its own needs, plus NSW and VIC - and recharge all the depleted batteries as well...
This will require muchuch more than the 100% overbuild that Saul was talking about.
We are currently struggling to achieve 100% renewable generation with current demand, let alone the increased demand that will come with electrification, battery recharging, geographic diversification etc.
This will require a lot of solar panels and a lot of wind turbines, all scattered around the countryside, all being maintained and monitored. Add to this, a whole lot of extra grid wiring and a massive collection of batteries.
It seems like a big waste any of effort and resources - when perhaps a few thumping big nuclear power plants would solve the whole problem in one go, without the need for such a big eleborate, complicated (and risky) scheme...
Oh, and by the way, you were asking what do the grid owners put into the system to justify their returns. The electricity grid comprises a lot of equipment spread all over the country.
A lot of this equipment is very specialized with very long manufacturing lead times, and so spares must be kept on hand as insurance against breakdowns. This is a lot of cash kept sitting about idle.
There is also a lot of labour and equipment tied up performing maintenance and breakdown repairs.
It is not simply a matter of "owning it" and having cash rain from the sky.
Hi Josh, I'm excited you've dipped your toe in the the energy relm on Uncomfortable Conversations. I'm extremely concerned about where Australia is heading in terms of so called renewable energy. I'm with Magnus, pretty please with sugar on top can you talk to Chris Uhlmann.
Agree that Saul might be overly optimistic about the current cost of BESS and underselling the scale of transmission infrastructure required but Uhlmann has zero understanding of the technological aspects of generation and a limited understanding of the energy market based upon his interview with John Anderson. We need balanced, nuanced conversation with people in the field
Josh, great interview – but I wish you had explored more deeply the scale of the electrification challenge.
Your guest rightly pointed out the difference between renewables as a share of electricity versus their contribution to total energy use—but I felt this point was underplayed. The distinction is critical and goes to the heart of the energy transition debate.
In the 2022–23 financial year, Australia's total energy consumption reached 5,882 petajoules (PJ). Of that, electricity accounted for just 988 PJ, or around 17% of the total. So even if we transitioned to 100% renewable electricity overnight, we’d still only have addressed a small slice of the broader energy pie.
And that broader pie is still overwhelmingly fossil-fuelled—91% of our total energy consumption in fact. Here's how it breaks down:
Oil: 38.9%
Coal: 25.9%
Gas: 25.8%
Renewables: 9.4%
These numbers make one thing abundantly clear: we are still at the foot of a very steep mountain when it comes to decarbonising not just electricity—but everything else: transport, mining, agriculture, heavy industry, construction. Electrifying all of that is not only technically complex, it's incredibly energy intensive.
This is why it’s important we don’t get swept up in singular narratives about silver bullet solutions. Technologies like batteries are promising, yes—but they are also expensive, immature at scale, and riddled with technical and logistical hurdles. Likewise, nuclear—particularly small modular reactors (SMRs)—might prove transformative, but we need to see genuine advances in cost, deployment, and public trust.
What we must avoid is locking ourselves prematurely into one ideological lane. A wise nation hedges, pilots multiple pathways, and lets markets and innovation do what they do best: evolve, surprise, and solve.
I also wish you’d pushed back harder on the transmission cost assumptions. The idea of efficiently moving wind energy from the coast of Fremantle to Sydney—thousands of kilometres away—without substantial cost blowouts, seems highly optimistic. We know transmission infrastructure is already delayed and over budget across multiple states. Underestimating that cost may create public disillusionment down the track.
Lastly, a conversation that rarely gets airtime is supply chain risk. The majority of renewable hardware—solar panels, batteries, rare earth minerals—relies on a highly centralised and geopolitically vulnerable supply chain, particularly dependent on China. As tensions rise globally, this could pose a serious threat to both our energy targets and our energy sovereignty. It’s not enough to go green—we need to go secure.
In all, a terrific episode—but let’s keep peeling back the layers. The clean energy future isn’t just a story of optimism—it’s also a story of scale, complexity, and resilience.
Looking forward to more conversations that hold space for both ambition and realism.
Another great conversation Josh but why no mention of the carbon footprint and environmental destruction of renewables that require constant “renewal” ad infinitum?
I try to look at more and more data on this subject and it still never adds up, we are 100% electric at home with a 6.6kw solar and Battery, we generate more than we use over the year, but not always when we need it, similar to the Fred example. He mentions using your car battery to take up some of this excess, but I have this nasty thing called work, along with a major percentage of drivers where my car is not at home during the day, so his points begin to fall flat for me. Also like Sauls example of Fred, I am 80% self sufficient, but this means I need 100% of whatever power I need at 20% of the time, but this 20% will be at an unknown time due to the weather, in other words, power generation and power lines have to be set up for 100% of the demand (or 150% based on todays coal power) for me to buy 20% of the time, all of those costs have to be passed on to the customer in that 20% that is sold, and therefore price would need to be 5 times the price. If someone in a heritage listed home or a poor person in a unit complex who cannot get batteries and solar then they have to pay this 5 * price all the time. Then there is also the environmental impact of the plan, solar farms require 400 times the space of a Nuclear or even Coal power station, this is a lot of flora and fauna we will kill in the name of net zero, and wind farms are responsible for the deaths of many birds, bats and insects, and are decimating migratory birds / bats. Whether we like it or not, we should slow down / stop renewables and invest in Nuclear as a zero carbon emission power source we all buy, sharing the cost and keeping bills overall lower than this renewable plan. If you really wanted to be pedantic we could keep coal and offset with greenification projects, If anyone wants to hear another expert on net zero energy, then listen to Michael Shellenberger, just search for his interviews.
Usually in your interviews Josh you push back more, but like wise with the interview with Peter Garret you seem to accept the fantasy of this renewable plan without too much question.
Saul’s arguments are sound at a high level but network management issues to prevent issues like what occurred in Portugal and Spain recently, and were essentially the same as what happened in South Australia 15 or so years ago, need to be considered. There are network management and reliability issues that need to be considered along side the move toward a distributed grid. Most the network equipment would remain the same but additional metering and data acquisition systems would be needed. Certainly existing smart meters that connect directly to supply authorities could go a long way to achieving this. Any of the solutions suggested Saul will required a layer of automation at the network level to assist with management.
Wind and solar will never be the answer, they destroy more then they save. The chinese making the wind turbines and solar panel while they build 300 new coal fired electric plants to build all the solar and wind projects. Then in the USA they destroy mountaintops to erect the turbines or clear cut thousands of acres for solar fields. Right now the only viable solution is the new generation of nuclear plants.
On the other hand complete electrification doesn't sound inviting either. Complete electrification also goes hand in hand with complete control by government. Which is not wonderful, the world for most is choice, complete control is tyranny and enslavement.
Pretty please talk to Chris Uhlmann, former ABC reporter now partnering with conservative media (Sky, Australian) becuase nobody is listening on the left about the true costs of wind and solar.
I agree that charging our cars from our roofs is a smart idea but I think you should have someone on to talk about baseload power. There was no mention of industry and manufacturing. no mention of how other wind and solar pushes have lead to cost blowouts like germany’s energiewend. or the fact that South Australia has the highest renewables penetration has led to an unstable grid.
Josh, your guest never mentioned the capital cost of solar, wind or wires nor the interest on loans for that capital. Were these included in his numbers? And what about the massive subsidies that governments are providing. We are all paying for these through our taxes. Are they factored into his numbers? Without clarity, his declarations are unconvincing, particularly when the Victorian government has just dropped the feed-in tariff for solar owners to $0.04/kWh
I try to look at more and more data on this subject and it still never adds up, we are 100% electric at home with a 6.6kw solar and Battery, we generate more than we use over the year, but not always when we need it, similar to the Fred example. He mentions using your car battery to take up some of this excess, but I have this nasty thing called work, along with a major percentage of drivers where my car is not at home during the day, so his points begin to fall flat for me. Also like Sauls example of Fred, I am 80% self sufficient, but this means I need 100% of whatever power I need at 20% of the time, but this 20% will be at an unknown time due to the weather, in other words, power generation and power lines have to be set up for 100% of the demand (or 150% based on todays coal power) for me to buy 20% of the time, all of those costs have to be passed on to the customer in that 20% that is sold, and therefore price would need to be 5 times the price. If someone in a heritage listed home or a poor person in a unit complex who cannot get batteries and solar then they have to pay this 5 * price all the time. Then there is also the environmental impact of the plan, solar farms require 400 times the space of a Nuclear or even Coal power station, this is a lot of flora and fauna we will kill in the name of net zero, and wind farms are responsible for the deaths of many birds, bats and insects, and are decimating migratory birds / bats. Whether we like it or not, we should slow down / stop renewables and invest in Nuclear as a zero carbon emission power source we all buy, sharing the cost and keeping bills overall lower than this renewable plan. If you really wanted to be pedantic we could keep coal and offset with greenification projects, If anyone wants to hear another expert on net zero energy, then listen to Michael Shellenberger, just search for his interviews.
Usually in your interviews Josh you push back more, but like wise with the interview with Peter Garret you seem to accept the fantasy of this renewable plan without too much question.
I really think this has to address energy consumption in the developing world. They out consume and produce more carbon than the industrialized world. Unless it is an inexpensive solution for India and China, we are not really accomplishing anything.
The difference between cost of electricity and its retail price?
Yes, but batteries in the electric cars are shit and go titts up like there is no tomorrow, and battery is the key part of an electric car's... Savings are not in the future ... a lot of dead cash in the future.
Which car batteries aren’t any good? The anecdotally the evidence for car batteries is pretty good.
So far all of them, lithium ion batteries loosing their capacity with every charge and discharge. Predictive modeling shows that in Australian climate they would last 8-12 years. Lower range battery you have, less it will last. Hotter climate you live, less it would last. Hense, the resale value is much lower, comparing to a petrol car that would easily last 30 years.
And how many car manufacturers are using lithium ion batteries? Modern cars are starting to use alternative technologies and lithium phosphate is not the same as lithium ion. There’s a heap of research in this field going on at the moment. Given the relatively early stage of EV development any assumptions about their future use is going to be wrong.
Where’s the market for a thirty year old car? There’s no reason why a EV can’t have its batteries replaced. If you can refurbish a car with an internal combustion engine then you can do the same with an EV.