Necessity the Mother of Invention: looming blackouts prompt a little action.

Politics is a cruel caper, at the best of times. And, in Australia, power politics is merciless. A decade and-a-half of government intervention in the power market has left Australia with the highest power prices in the world and a grid on the brink of collapse.

The disaster is largely down to distortions caused by the Large-Scale RET – through which $15 billion in subsidies has already been thrown to the wind and sun, with a further $45 billion to be squandered to the same ends – which has rendered cheap and reliable conventional generators unprofitable. The risk of the more populous States – Victoria, NSW and Queensland – following South Australia into Stone Age gloom every time the wind stops blowing has focused attention on the idiocy of attempting to rely upon the weather for power.

In the week…