60 Minutes Australia (2017)
Questions on ElonsFAQ asked in this interview (1)
Transcript
0:00CorrespondentWho hasn't been shocked by a recent electricity or gas bill? And who isn't infuriated that power prices have risen so sharply in a country as abundant with resources as ours?
0:13CorrespondentIt defies logic that now some Australians can't even pay for the energy to cook a simple meal. While our fast talking but divided politicians scramble to act. Tonight, Elon Musk, the American billionaire with the brilliant mind, wants to explain how he can help fix Australia's energy crisis.
0:35CorrespondentAnd to prove his point, he's prepared to put his money where his mouth is.
0:46CorrespondentIt's peak hour in Australia.
0:48CommentatorI need a NOS booking.
0:50Industry RepresentativeI can't.
0:51CommentatorThey want a record of it.
0:52PoliticianAnd we'll find out what's happening, mate.
0:55CorrespondentTowns and cities are lighting up, public transport is on the move. And family homes are coming to life inside a control room in Sydney's west. Staff from Transgrid, the company charged with ensuring the lights stay on, work the phones.
1:17HomeownerThe number two tie. And number three tie. 1, 2, 5.
1:20CorrespondentCalling in power from generators all over the state.
1:24CommentatorHalf the population has dinner at 6 o', clock, irrespective, so they do it. The other half have it dinner when it gets dark.
1:33CorrespondentBut keeping Australia's massive east coast power grid functioning has never been so hard.
1:40Grid OperatorIt's a lot like spinning plates and we move from one to the other, solving problems on the power system in real time to keep the lights on.
1:51CorrespondentAnd for so many Australians, power has never cost so much. People are living on yesterday's food.
2:01CommentatorOh, yeah, well, when I have lunch later, it won't be yesterdays, it'll be Mondays on this Thursday. Today,
2:13CorrespondentAustralia is in the grip of a power crisis, crippling costs and unreliable supply. But there's one man who can't understand
2:25Elon Muskwhy Australia is really perfect for solar power. Because it's not too far north or too far south. You could have the entire country be solar powered or some combination of wind, solar, geothermal, hydro.
2:39CommentatorChairs of the electric car maker Tesla Motors are up.
2:43CorrespondentElon Musk is the Tesla man, an American billionaire whose developers developments of electric cars and space rockets is seeing technology push the boundaries like never before. And it's all driven by his belief that if we are to survive climate change, we need to develop renewable energy.
3:08Elon MuskAustralia could actually export power to Asia. There's so much land there that, that you could actually power a significant chunk of Asia.
3:20CorrespondentAnd to prove his point, Musk is building a massive lithium ion battery powered by wind turbines in Jamestown, South Australia. The battery is designed to help stabilise the grid But Musk is also hoping it will be a light bulb moment for the world.
3:40Elon MuskYou have to do these things that really get the world's attention, otherwise they just don't believe you. They don't think it's possible.
3:47CorrespondentWhat do you want the rest of the world to see?
3:50Elon MuskI really want the rest of world to see that you can do. A very large scale, 100 megawatt system is really quite enormous. This is three times more than the next biggest battery in the world.
4:03Elon MuskThat's just a giant, giant jump forward.
4:08CorrespondentHis interest in our energy crisis started last year when South Australia, a state already heavily invested in wind and solar power, was plunged into darkness, the result of a massive storm that saw the state lose power.
4:35CorrespondentElon Musk tweeted headfirst into a national political brawl when fellow billionaire Australian IT whiz Mike Cannon Brooks questioned Tesla's boast that it could help solve South Australia's energy problems by building the world's biggest battery.
4:54CorrespondentWhy did you do that?
4:55Mike Cannon-BrookesThere was no idea of what would happen afterwards. Just more if people make big claims like that.
5:01Elon MuskI'd like to check if they're real. You thought I was joking because I had to check with my team. It's like, I hope I. I didn't really say something super crazy.
5:12CorrespondentWhen you get a return tweet from Elon saying, yeah, what did you think?
5:18Elon MuskSweet.
5:19Mike Cannon-BrookesJust checking his kosher, you know, he said, it's going to happen, let's make it happen.
5:24CorrespondentRight, so these are public tweets.
5:29Elon MuskYeah.
5:29Mike Cannon-BrookesBut in a way that's part of what locks in the guarantee. Right. He's putting his reputation online in a public forum there that, you know, enough noise was then created around it, enough people saw that, that it was like, all right, he better get that done.
5:43CorrespondentCannon Brooks did a crash course in renewable energy and he quickly realised there were plenty of Australians who backed the idea.
5:53Mike Cannon-BrookesI got multiple unsolicited, solicited offers for tens of millions. I think we added up to more than $100 million in offers that came in. It was amazing. It was inspiring as an Australian to see people wanting to solve this problem in a real and meaningful way.
6:07Mike Cannon-BrookesAnd I think they're just sick of the politics on all sides and the ridiculous nature of our energy situation at the moment.
6:18CorrespondentBut Elon Musk's battery plan was mocked by the federal government.
6:23Commentator30,000 South Australian households could not get through watching one episode of Australia's Ninja Warrior with this big battery.
6:30CorrespondentAustralian treasurer Scott Morrison was particularly dismissive.
6:35CommentatorBy all means, have the world's biggest battery. Have the world's biggest banana. Have the world's biggest prawn.
6:41Elon MuskI didn't realize there was this big battle going on. I didn't know.
6:44CorrespondentIt was like Mr. Hollywood's walked into town.
6:47Elon MuskOkay.
6:47CorrespondentAnd it's like, well, you know, do
6:49Elon MuskI see Mollywood
6:52Correspondentmaybe? But our treasurer, Scott Morrison, declared that this was just a shiny, you know, distraction and that, and that it was akin to.
7:03Elon MuskWell, it's shiny.
7:04CorrespondentIt is shiny.
7:05HomeownerAnd it was.
7:06CorrespondentIt's, it's akin to the big pineapple or the big banana. It's just one of those kitsch.
7:11Elon MuskI'm not sure what. Wait, is that a real thing?
7:16CorrespondentThey're a tourist attraction, actually.
7:18Elon MuskOh, look at my. Is it like the world's biggest banana or something?
7:21CorrespondentSomething like that.
7:22Elon MuskOkay.
7:22CorrespondentWhy are you disappointed by that?
7:25Elon MuskOh, I think, you know that we get that all the time. It can be a little disheartening sometimes. Yeah. Yeah, sometimes, yeah.
7:39CorrespondentWhy did the government mock Elon Musk?
7:42PoliticianWell, Elon Musk's battery was a fraction of the size of the Snowy Hydro scheme. It was sold to the people of South Australia as an answer to their woes by Jay Weatherall.
7:53PoliticianWhereas in reality, it is just a fraction of what that state needs.
8:01CorrespondentEveryone is fair game in what is now a high stakes political power play. Electricity, the supply, but particularly the cost, is constantly gnawing away at the federal government and its energy minister, Josh Frydenberg.
8:17CorrespondentThe fact is that politics has failed Australians, hasn't it? We have failed to deliver to Australians for years now an essential service.
8:28PoliticianWell, the Argy Bargie in Canberra over the last decade has not helped lower power bills. In fact, it's created the uncertainty in the market which now industry is demanding be fixed.
8:41PoliticianThat's why the National Energy Guarantee offers us that opportunity. For the first time in more than a decade,
8:50Correspondentthe National Energy Guarantee aims to make the system more reliable and ultimately ease the nation's financial pain. But the savings for households are predicted to be minuscule. We have what's called power poverty.
9:08CorrespondentI'm seeing people who are saying, how can it be that, you know, I'm going to get a miserable 50 cents a week, perhaps, and I'm supposed to applaud that.
9:18PoliticianWell, that's just a Labor Party distraction and distortion.
9:21CorrespondentIs that not true?
9:22PoliticianThat is not true.
9:23CorrespondentSo what will they get?
9:24PoliticianThey will get up to $115 a year saving.
9:29CorrespondentAnd when they say a couple of hundred dollars, truly, you're out of touch.
9:35PoliticianYou'd say a couple of hundred dollars reduction in your power bill means a lot to a lot of people. And it's just the start of what we are seeking to do.
9:46PoliticianUnder the Labor Party, your bills will go up by hundreds of dollars. That's what the modelling shows. No longer are we allowing the Labor Party to pursue an ideological approach.
9:57CorrespondentYou see, they'll hate that politicking. They'll hate you saying that because that's just more politics.
10:01PoliticianWell, the reality is that politics is a battle of ideas. Our idea is a national energy guarantee put forward by the experts. It allows for a greater role for renewables.
10:15PoliticianIt keeps coal and gas in the system. It makes up for the mistakes of the past. And importantly, it lowers power bills.
10:26CorrespondentFor pensioners like Brian and Fay Willett, all this talk doesn't mean much. They still have to tailor their lives around the electricity bill. Thank you. Thank you. Mostly it means meals are basic and require little cooking.
10:43CorrespondentToday it's a bread roll, leftovers salvaged from the local bakery. One thing we need to do is make sure we keep the curtains shut because that's going to keep the heat out.
10:58CorrespondentYou live your life around trying to keep that power price down.
11:03CommentatorYeah, I've never really thought of it like that, but yes, that'd be pretty right. What do you do through winter? We did not use the heater once. We tend to use blankets.
11:15CommentatorPut on two pairs of socks instead of one or wear the Ugg boots.
11:18CorrespondentIt's stuff I presume that before you took for granted.
11:22CommentatorTo some ways it feels like survival rather than living. It seems strange that life is becoming much harder as we get older.
11:40CorrespondentMore than ever, Australians are struggling to pay for their power. A record number of families are on hardship plans or deferred payments. And the rate of disconnections in most states has risen sharply.
11:55CorrespondentFor Elon Musk learning of this growing power, poverty is overwhelming. Cost of power is making it almost a luxury item.
12:09Elon MuskWow, really? I don't realize it's that expensive. Australia has so many natural resources. I mean, even if you go the fossil fuel route, the electricity should be very cheap.
12:22CorrespondentThere are Australians today wondering if they can even turn on their lights. There are Australians today wondering, well, should we go without some food?
12:33Elon MuskSure.
12:37CorrespondentThat's just not something you would ever expect.
12:39Elon MuskI did not expect that.
12:42Industry RepresentativeHmm.
12:45Elon MuskOr quite a.
12:48CorrespondentFor Musk, it's frustrating because for him the solution is so simple and in abundance. In Australia, the whole point of renewable energy is to make for a cleaner environment and frankly, save the planet.
13:05CorrespondentThe majority of scientists are emphatic that we're witnessing dramatic climate change and not to fully embrace renewable energy is suicide.
13:19Elon MuskIt's necessarily true that we will live on renewables. It's just a question of when. In fact, it's in the definition that if it's not renewable, that means it's going to run out at some point and we'll have the choice of cost, collapse of civilization and into the dark ages ago, or find something that is renewable.
13:38CorrespondentSo all of this is about saving ourselves?
13:43Elon MuskYeah.
13:43CorrespondentComing up now.
13:45OperatorYep, boring.
13:47CorrespondentNow, the billion dollar energy business in our own backyard. It's like hidden gold, isn't it?
13:54Industry RepresentativeThey call it the, the new oil
13:56Correspondentand how to slash your electricity bill.
13:59HomeownerThis is it.
14:00Grid OperatorThis is.
14:00Elon MuskThe battery will serve as an inspiration really to the whole world. This is possible.
14:05CorrespondentThat's next on 60 Minutes.
14:16CorrespondentAs Australians struggle to keep the lights on, there's a billion dollar energy business buried in our own backyard. Lithium ion batteries and their ability to store renewable energy have emerged as a massive international best seller.
14:33CorrespondentAnd for Australia, that's great news.
14:36OperatorController is now armed. If you hold down both of those fire buttons and don't forget to look up, then the shot will initiate.
14:46CorrespondentNow.
14:46OperatorYep, firing now.
14:54OperatorWell done.
14:56Industry RepresentativeWell, Liz, what you just fired, in three months, that'll be in China. In six months, that'll be in a battery.
15:02CorrespondentThat's extraordinary. So that, that's, that's a boom.
15:07Industry RepresentativeWell, that's a bank.
15:08CorrespondentThat's a bang. But it's all part of what I think might be a boom.
15:18CorrespondentWhile our politicians, as politicians continue to bicker away about the best way forward, it seems that many investors have already decided where the smart money is. With the insatiable demand for lithium ion batteries has come a new mining boom in Australia.
15:36CorrespondentWestern Australia is now the world's largest producer of lithium, which means that mines like this one at Mount Marion are not only helping to feed a hungry green energy industry, they're also making a pretty penny.
15:56CorrespondentIt's not on the scale of iron ore yet, but the lithium industry is creating new wealth and along with it, new mining entrepreneurs. So this is the final product?
16:09Industry RepresentativeIt is. And that'll get trucked and then on a bike.
16:12CorrespondentChris Reid is the managing director of Neometals, a large lithium mine outside Kalgoorlie. What is the value of the lithium mining industry in Australia?
16:27Industry RepresentativeCurrently, the exports from Western Australia this financial year, we predict will be over a billion Australian dollars.
16:34CorrespondentThis is like hitting gold, isn't it?
16:37Industry RepresentativeWell, it's, they call it the new oil and it is and it might replace it.
17:03Industry RepresentativeAbsolutely. I mean, half the world's lithium batteries are made in China. Half the lithium production is in China, predominantly off Australian feedstocks. For us, the next step is to
17:13Politicianvalue add in Australia and make our own batteries.
17:16Industry RepresentativeLook, I think one day, certainly that can be done.
17:20CorrespondentThis, in your opinion, is an electric revolution?
17:25Industry RepresentativeYeah, look, absolutely. And it's really the format of the batteries has got bigger. They're going in the phones, they're going in the laptops. Now they're in the electric motorbikes, the cars.
17:36Industry RepresentativeAnd now we're going to. The largest format is renewable energy storage.
17:47CorrespondentIn Nevada, America, Elon Musk has a gigafactory pumping out thousands of lithium batteries in a building that only keeps growing. The batteries are to power his electric cars, but also homes, and they're already in use in Australia.
18:06CorrespondentSo this is it.
18:06HomeownerThis is it. This is the battery.
18:08CorrespondentAnd how long does it take to charge?
18:10HomeownerOn a nice Sunny Day from 0% charge, it might take a few hours.
18:20CorrespondentIn Salisbury, South Australia, Michael and Melissa Powney installed a battery to store the energy produced from their solar panels as part of a trial with their local energy provider.
18:33CorrespondentAnd it immediately won them over when their home was one of the few to come through the storm that blacked out most of the state.
18:43HomeownerI suppose I didn't realise the impact of the power cut until we came home and I think we confused the neighbours because our lights were the only ones on the street.
18:53CorrespondentMichael and Melissa now have a one year old son, son Theo, and the expanded family means home appliances are in constant use.
19:04HomeownerThe heater more to keep our baby nice and warm over winter.
19:09CorrespondentThe dryer because it goes through so much more, clothes and all those sorts
19:13Homeownerof things and the microwave, just heating up meals and yeah, it was just, you know, I'm not working at the moment, being on maternity leave, so any savings is beneficial.
19:24CorrespondentThe couple monitors their power with the latest technology.
19:28HomeownerWe've earned just in this month, $32,
19:32Correspondentwhich helps them keep a close eye on costs. Your costs, do you think have been halved?
19:38HomeownerAbsolutely. I think since we've had the solar system in, we would have saved thousands now.
19:44CorrespondentThousands. Oh, well, I guess you can't imagine what it might be like if you didn't have that battery.
19:50HomeownerOh, well, we were seeing electricity bills of over $1,000 before we put the solar in, so I can only imagine what those bills would be looking like now if we hadn't bit the bullet and tried to nip it in the bud when we did.
20:06CommentatorCan you give me an update on that, please?
20:08CorrespondentDespite the government's proposed new energy policy, little will change immediately for Australians grappling with their power bills. And with summer looming, TransGrid CEO Paul Italiano and his staff will also be watching supply.
20:28Grid OperatorSo we have a summer peak demand driven by air conditioning. Air conditioning and air conditioning. Cooling is the biggest driver of electricity demand.
20:39CorrespondentSo when there is a blackout, do you feel you've failed?
20:42Grid OperatorYes. Our role is to keep the lights on. That's what we're here to do.
20:51CorrespondentAnd to keep its customers cool, Transgrid will be depending heavily on coal.
20:56HomeownerWe can run it remotely from both regions.
20:59PoliticianSo on Tuesday.
21:00CorrespondentBut Paul Italiano believes it is time we addressed our renewable energy options.
21:07Grid OperatorThe amount of sun, wind and wave energy that we have available to us is the envy of the world. That if we properly configured our power system, we could have a substantially greater amount of renewable energy in it.
21:24Grid OperatorIn fact, we could lead the world in renewable energy engineering.
21:28CorrespondentSo you can understand why people feel gutted. We are experiencing blackouts and we can barely pay the price. Price.
21:36Grid OperatorNo one would argue that what we are doing at the moment is considered successful.
21:42CorrespondentDo you have solar panels?
21:43PoliticianI don't.
21:45CorrespondentShame on you.
21:47PoliticianIt's a big investment and I've got other priorities at the moment, but certainly I'm watching my power bill regularly.
21:55CorrespondentYou must be shocked.
21:56PoliticianYeah. And we've been paying too much.
22:03CorrespondentIf Elon Musk had his way, the world would be totally powered by renewables and he'd be colonizing Mars. He is a big picture man with big plans. But it might be his push for the modest lithium battery will prove to be one of the more significant steps in this electric revolution.
22:27CorrespondentYou have been seen as a catalyst, somebody that is showing, gosh, there is another way, and that's a great thing.
22:35Elon MuskPeople in Australia should be proud of the fact that Australia has the world's biggest battery. This is pretty great. And that it will serve as an inspiration really to the whole world as well, to say that this is possible.
22:52CorrespondentHello, I'm Liz Hayes. Thanks for watching. To keep up with the latest from 60 Minutes Australia, make sure you subscribe to our channel. You can also download the 9Now app for full episodes and other exclusive 60 Minutes content.