This is the Leigh Creek Coal Mine in northern South Australia. Big isn’t it? In 1980, they moved the whole town of Leigh Creek to expand it.
It supplies brown coal to the Northern and Playford Power Stations in Pt Augusta. That’s Playford, below.
This is the number of tons of carbon dioxide equivalent from those two power stations, every year:
5.37 million
The coal reaches the power stations with this train, the longest coal train in the world. It shifts about 2.5 million tons of brown coal per year. That’s about 6,900 t per day, EVERY DAY, being moved 260km from the mine to the power stations. That requires a train 2.8km long, with 161 wagons.
This is the Beverley Uranium Mine, also in northern South Australia. Thanks to Heathgate Resources for the first image, and Heathgate Resources and Australian Geographic for the second.
It mines, processes and packages uranium oxide (U3O8) for export and use in power stations all over the world. In 2007/2008, it produced 719 tons of uranium for export. None of it is used in South Australia, because we have refused to introduce nuclear power.
This is a Merrell Chart messenger bag.
With a total capacity of 24 L, there is sufficient space in this bag to carry enough uranium oxide to replace the Leigh Creek Coal Train for a day. With some room left over for your iPad, wallet, keys, and probably a copy of The Lord of the Rings.
Do you know anyone who might find this interesting? If so, please forward them the link.
Have a great weekend!
| Annual coal output Leigh Creek (t) | 2,500,000 |
| Av. daily coal moved by train (t) | 6,849 |
| Energy content brown coal (GJ/t) (range: 10-20) | 15 |
| Total daily energy being moved (GJ) | 102,740 |
| Approx energy content U3O8 (GJ/t), once through a light water reactor (range: 420,000- 675,000) | 500,000 |
| Amount of U3O8 required per day (kg) | 205.48 |
| Density of U3O8 (kg per L) | 10.9 |
| Volume of U3O8 required (L) | 20.55 |
“This is the number of tons of carbon dioxide equivalent from those two power stations, every year:
5.37 million”
Is it?
3.6 million per annum from the Northern Power Station
1.77 million per annum from Playford
Both have emissions intensities in excess of 2,600g of greenhouse gas per kWh, compared to our state average of about 720g.
The site Carbon Monitoring for Action (www.carma.org) is good for this kind of thing.
yeah but how big a dork would you be wearing that bag?
Yes,and that triple header coal train is running on imported diesel fuel.
So you can add the cost of that plus the CO2 produced to the equation.
Obviously a lose,lose situation.
And that Playford power station is an obvious candidate for a tsunami wipeout.
Strange,I don’t see any Greenpeace banners hanging from the stacks.And no demonstrators picketing the gates.
What,no commited greens in SA? You’ll have to get Sarah Hansen Young onto that.She should be able to import some from somewhere.
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Ben, a superb visualization!
Thanks John! Amazing isn’t it?
Just don’t try lifting the satchel by the strap once you have the 400kg in there.
Totally. I think the good people at Merrell would have a strong case in refusing to replace it.
The density you have assigned U3O8 is actually that of uranium metal.
You are correct. I should change to 10.3kg per L for the oxide. This will mean the satchel only does one day of the coal train. Thanks for pointing it out, I will correct the post accordingly.
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There’s nothing quite like speculation & dreaming.