THE supply of reliable power in Australia has become a political minefield that has provided our major political parties with two clearly different objectives.

On one hand the Government has decided that “renewables only” is their way of providing electric power for the future.

The opposition is taking a longer-term view by adding nuclear power to their mix of methods to provide long term base load supply.

The reality of the issue we consumers face is that within the next ten years, some 90 percent of the present coal fired power producers will become obsolete and cease that supply.

The question that needs to be answered is: How will the present methods of providing electricity be replaced with reliable and economically viable long-term supply?

The best estimates for renewables production come out at 98 percent.

So, there is a small gap appearing that needs to be covered and so far that query hasn’t been answered.

On the other hand, the cost, time frame and safety issues surrounding nuclear are yet to be quantified, but it does provide reliable base load and continuous supply for the long term.

Politically the worst possible situation is running out of supply, causing regular but predictable blackouts, and of course the community’s reaction to each event.

Of course, it could get far worse than that if we could no longer turn on the lights, cook our meals, watch our TVs, work our computers, recharge our mobile phones or even our electric vehicles.

The immediate issues are the time it takes to replace our dwindling coal fired providers, plus the unknown but feared cost and safety issues of the alternatives.

It is probably already too late to have a productive replacement strategy provided without supply shortages but whatever the outcome, it needs to be planned and provided now.

Our community finds it easy to be highly critical of the supply issues we are facing but very few are saying what will be acceptable to them to keep the power supply flowing so our comfortable lifestyle can continue with little or no cost increases.

So what alternatives are available to us to provide continuous supply?

Pumped hydro is one, increased use of gas is another, battery supply and storage on a grand scale is yet another option, plus offshore wind farms.

Even community groups getting together to go off-grid with their own solar and battery setups could also be considered.

The fear that again we will all be faced with short-term thinking by political parties looking for a one sentence or five-minute solution is the answer that I fear most.

By John BLACKBOURN