"Hydrocarbon Energy Achieves Everything You Take for Granted" and Net Zero Would Take Us Back to the 12th Century
Australian auto expert John Cadogan works hard at offending as many folks as possible (including me) when he uses his videos to dispense truth about various auto related subjects and his latest regarding Australian EV projections. He’s a funny fellow, though, and always worth watching. Some background is essential to this one before viewing, though.
Cadogan takes on something called the Australian Energy Market Operator or AEMO for short. It is, largely, the equivalent of our regional transmission operators (RTOs) in North America, except it also controls the natural gas system. It has a really awful website here, which is designed to obscure what anyone might be looking and it took me several minutes on the site to find the report titled “2024 Electricity Statement of Opportunities” that is referenced in this article referenced by the old curmudgeon Cadogan at the outset of his video.
Here is the meat of that story:
The Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) has added to the recent woes of the battery electric vehicle market by dramatically reducing, almost by half, the projected take-up of BEVs in the Australian car market.
AEMO said in its latest forecast document, the 2024 Electricity Statement of Opportunities (ESOO), that the lower than expected uptake of BEVs by Australian car buyers would take pressure off power generators to meet EV charging demand.
The lower expectation for BEV sales comes at a time when Australians are seeking to avoid the inconvenience of charging point shortages, queues and long waiting times and on-going range anxiety by buying hybrids in record numbers.
So far this year more hybrids have been sold than were sold in all of 2023 (99,652 YTD July 2024 vs 98,439 FY 2023)…
AEMO said that it was now expecting that there would be four million BEVs needing to be charged from the grid and/or rooftop solar by 2O34. Last December AEMO was forecasting seven million BEVs requiring charging by then.
I decided to find and dig into the report a bit myself and after 20 minutes of fruitless searching of the site, I found this:
Residential consumption is forecast to grow from uptake of EVs, electrification, and new dwelling construction, offset by additional and larger capacity rooftop PV installations
Under the ESOO Central scenario, underlying residential consumption is forecast to increase by almost 25% over the next 10 years, from approximately 55 TWh in 2023-24 to 70 TWh in 2033-34.
EV uptake continues to be a major driver of this growth, contributing almost 8 TWh per annum from about 4 million residential EVs (or approximately a quarter of residential passenger vehicles) in the ESOO Central scenario by 2023-2034. In other scenarios, 3 million to 6 million residential EVs are forecast to add up to 15% of residential consumption (equivalent to 6 to 11 TWh a year) over the same period.
Growth in the EV forecast is tempered relative to the 2023 ESOO to reflect updated road transport data from the Bureau of Infrastructure and Transport Research Economics (BITRE) that shows longer vehicle lifetimes, leading to lower new sales and slower EV uptake. Further, the New Vehicle Efficiency Standard (NVES) – legislated in May 2024 and to apply from 1 January 2025 – provides flexibility in meeting emissions reductions, and the updated forecast better recognises emissions reductions opportunities in non EV sales, resulting in lower forecast EV sales than previously anticipated.
EVs aren’t selling, in other words, and such sales as do happen, only happen due to seriously expensive subsidies, indicating the whole model is completely untenable, which is why those previously pushing EVs are quietly saying there may be a better way.
Now, here’s what Cadogan has to say about that:
Enjoy!
#EVs #JohnCadogan #AEMO #NetZero
"longer vehicle lifetimes, leading to lower new sales and slower EV uptake."
The reason for longer vehicle lifetimes is because everyone is holding on to their reliable old gas vehicles.
As to the 12th century - well maybe further back than that. But there are only so many caves and too many people. I like my team’s position - we know which bathroom to use and know how to use guns.