Conservatives point to the SA blackout as exhibit A for why we can’t trust renewables. But that’s a load of crap.
On September 28, 2016, South Australia went dark. It felt apocalyptic.
When I lived in the country (OK, the “peri-urban fringe”) blackouts were a regular occurrence. But by that spring I was living in the CBD. You can poke fun at Adelaide, but the CBD is usually a relative hive of light and sound. On that day it was spooky.
My office at The Advertiser had a sort of half-power from generators (enough to flush the toilets and see my colleagues) but as I headed home I was thinking of Mad Max, and zombies, and how to live without a charged phone. I could hear cars and ambulances but no ambience.
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