In Australia?

Almost all power companies are already doing combinations of these, while shutting down coal-fired stations - they just aren't economical to run: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-09-06/electricity-markets-st...

They are all have large renewable generation. See here for the mix: https://www.aemo.com.au/Electricity/National-Electricity-Mar...

Yeah, but investors in coal would be hard to find in a free market as they are not cost effective without government subsidies.

Fossil fuel subsidies in 2015 were 6.5% of global GDP. That's quite a lot of money. Coal subsidies were about half of that.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305750X16...

There's plenty of investor interest:

Pump Hydro in disused mine: https://www.sbs.com.au/news/pumped-hydro-in-queensland-ready... (more details: http://www.genexpower.com.au/the-kidston-pumped-storage-hydr...)

Solar Thermal Generation: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-08-14/solar-thermal-power-pl...

Solar/battery combination: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-10-31/sanjeev-gupta-joins-sa...

Solar/Wind combination: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-10-03/yorke-peninsula-batter...

Ah, the idiotic libertarian response. Just the other day I got a small cheque because I'm an investor in a local solar scheme.

Renewables work, have very modest maintenance requirements, and the intermittency can be managed. It's ridiculous that Australia isn't getting at least 30% of its energy from solar.

"Got a check" isn't the same thing. Somebody subsidized that check I think. We also have cities subsidizing aluminum recycling, which pays nobody and has no ecological benefit.

I'm just practical about what theatre I endorse, and what I skip.

Of course, but the coal is on a favourable tax regime and the nuclear plants won't be built without subsidy either. Hinkley Point C is guaranteed a price of £92.50/MWh regardless of the market rate.

Aluminium recycling is actually has lots of ecological benefit. It uses about 95% less energy to recycle aluminium than it does to produce it. In terms of subsidies to recycling you've chosen the item that would always be recycled no matter what.

Don't forget the price of carbon. There's billions of $ of profitable business done in these areas recently.