Snowy Hydro CEO Fired, Santos Greenwashing, Dominion Capacity Factor Controversy, Port of Albany Wind Assembly Site Stopped

The Uptime Wind Energy Podcast

When companies lose money they often fire their CEOs, but is that what happened at Snowy Hydro? Rosemary says politics and pet projects probably had something to do with it. Dominion's CVOW project is the first (and only, so far) to be "paid for by customers of a monopoly who have no choice in their electric supplier." Those customers want assurances that Dominion isn't willing to give. Now Dominion is threatening to kill the project. Another project facing fierce public opposition and delays is The Port of Albany in New York. The EPA and other agencies are withholding permits trying to protect fish and wetlands. And the Australian Securities and Investments Commission is being forced to focus on energy technology as Santos is facing Greenwashing accusations. Is wind in for a rough quarter? Visit Pardalote Consulting at https://www.pardaloteconsulting.com Wind Power Lab - https://windpowerlab.com Sign up now for Uptime Tech News, our weekly email update on all things wind technology. This episode is sponsored by Weather Guard Lightning Tech. Learn more about Weather Guard's StrikeTape Wind Turbine LPS retrofit. Follow the show on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Linkedin and visit Weather Guard on the web. And subscribe to Rosemary Barnes' YouTube channel here. Have a question we can answer on the show? Email us! Uptime 130 Allen Hall: Hi Everyone. We have an amazing show for you this week. Rosemary Barnes: We've got a couple of Australian stories. The CEO of Snowy Hydro has stepped down and we'll talk about a couple of the controversial projects that Snowy Hydro is involved with in the moment and how that might have led to that decision. And then also there is a legal case that's being pushed against Santas oil and gas company for green washing. Joel Saxum: After that we dive into the dominion win offshore project, again, as we've been talking with the last few weeks and some of what the Southern environmental law center is talking about with the capacity factor guarantees and the possibility that dominion may scrap that project Allen Hall: and the port of Albany is behind schedule due to a number of environmental concerns. Allen Hall: I'm Allen Hall and I'm here with my good friends, Rosemary Barnes, and Joel Saxum. And this is the Uptime Wind Energy Podcast, Allen Hall: big controversy down in Australia at Snowy Hydro. And Snowy Hydro is a, a government owned energy utility, and it's a very odd name. Rosemary Snowy, Hydro. I guess it is what it is. It's a hydro storage project, right? Rosemary Barnes: Yeah. So I mean, there's a bit of history. It's an important part of Australia's history actually. Rosemary Barnes: After world War II, they decided to build this hydroelectric scheme. It's, it's huge, you know, as a nation building project and they brought in a ton of immigrants from. Yeah, all sorts of countries, but a lot of European immigrants after the war. So it was kind of a kickstarted Australian multiculturalism. Rosemary Barnes: I mean, we'd already had waves of, of immigrants before that. So it wasn't the very beginning, but definitely lots of, lots of immigrants came and turned the Snowy River in the, the snow mountains. I know a lot of people are surprised to learn that we have snow in Australia, but we. We do and snow mountains, you know, the peaks are over 2000 meters, so that's high enough to get snowed pretty much anywhere. Rosemary Barnes: And yeah, they put in a bunch of dams, a bunch of pipes and a bunch of turbines and made a bunch of hydropower. So that's where the name comes from the snow river. Hydro Hydro-electric scheme. Yeah, snowing Allen Hall: Hydro. The CEO was who his name was. Paul Broad was. Quotes. If that's the proper term in Australia, we would call it fired in America. Allen Hall: And he was closely tied with the previous government that was just voted out. And it seems to be a lot of controversy regarding him in particul...