Brumby tries to blame the weather for Power Outages

Well, if you have seen yesterday's post then this is more of the same. Except for this report from the Sydney Morning Herald.

John Brumby is claiming this is beyond control, because of the weather. Wrong, Mr Brumby.

Sure it is hot - we acknowledge that.
People do not blame the Government for that.

But the planning laws allow sub-divisions to squeeze the maximum possible number of large houses on small blocks. That means NO trees for shade, Mr Brumby. No builder would dream of building a veranda around a new house, because that would be too "costly". So they plan for air conditioners in all new homes.

Mr Brumby and his Government know these simple facts. But they ignore it, and blame the weather.

My eldest brother was born in a Melbourne heat wave. (2 March 1940, I believe, if anyone wishes to check the weather records.) Babies in the maternity ward were draped in moist towels, to prevent them dehydrating. None of this in new, Mr Brumby.

What is new is the way Governments have allowed Business to build buildings (large and small) which regard the climate as the Enemy, to be fought against. Instead of something to be worked within. I wrote earlier this evening, of ancient Roman buildings, with shaded colonnades surrounding a central atrium, with a small fountain in the middle. Buildings like that work in our Climate, but nobody builds them. Even old country farm houses, with their shade verandas work much better than McMansions, with a double garage fronting the street, blocking out light and air.

If one chooses to fight nature, as the Government and business have done, then, there is a cost - and in this case it is air conditioning. Modern houses are build on the assumption that air conditioning will be installed. And air conditioning requires lots of energy.

Electricity supply systems are meant to be built to peak load standards. Clearly they are failing, in Victoria. The system did not fail because there was an explosion in a power line. That is facile rubbish, Mr Brumby.

The system failed because it was overloaded, and it was overloaded because it was inadequate in its design parameters, Mr Brumby. It was inadequate for the task - as you appear to be, Mr Brumby.And yet, in view of this chaos, you still want to build a Desalination Plant in Wonthaggi, Mr Brumby?

This Desal Plant will be the largest single consumer of electricity in Victoria to be built since Rupert Hamer did a dirty deal to allow Alcoa to build the Aluminium Smelter in Portland - and Hamer arranged for the SEC to run electricity supplies all the length of Victoria to power - just to suit his brother, who was on the Board of Alcoa. Ah, those were the good old days!

Back to the present. How are you going to power this proposed Desal Plant, Mr Brumby? How will you run that and keep the lights on in the rest of Victoria, Mr Brumby?
As I said yesterday, it is simply not necessary anyway. Check out the Watershed Victoria website, to see why.