Category Archives: Climate Policy & Planning

Climate Policy & Planning

Does the Government want to solve the energy crisis?

20 Comments

Last week ended with talk of breaking up AGL, along with experinced political journalist Philip Coorey saying:

    It is becoming more apparent the government is as happy to have a fight as find a solution.

A fight over energy all the way to the next election could suit it very well, if the main priority is to “kill Bill”. What it says it wants is “dispatchable baseload”. Cheap dispatchable baseload, and for a sizable rump it must be with coal.

Of “dispatchable baseload”, Giles Parkinson asks is that a thing? Continue reading Does the Government want to solve the energy crisis? →

Climate Action, Climate Policy & Planning

Turnbull to walk away from the Clean Energy Target

7 Comments

According to Malcolm Farr, when the Finkel review appeared, this is what Malcolm Turnbull said about the Clean Energy Target:

    “Well it would certainly work, there is no question it would work and we are looking at it, giving it very favourable consideration.”

Rafael Epstein interviewing Josh Frydenberg on RN Drive replayed Turnbull’s audio, saying also the CET had “strong virtues”. Continue reading Turnbull to walk away from the Clean Energy Target →

Climate Action, Climate Policy & Planning

Turnbull goes feral on electricity

19 Comments

Last week AEMO, the Australian Energy Market Operator produced two reports on future of electricity markets. The Coalition government under Turnbull cherry picked the reports in a way that was almost infantile, going completely feral, politicising the energy policy, making clear that bipartisanship will be avoided at all costs.

On Saturday at the Country Liberals annual conference in Darwin, he said this:

    “I mean, Blackout Bill, fair dinkum, as my old dad would have said, he is so hopeless he could not find his backside with both hands.”

The electricity issue has been folded into his “kill Bill” strategy. Continue reading Turnbull goes feral on electricity →

Climate Action, Climate Policy & Planning

Turnbull’s choice – a clapped out coal burner or a clean energy plan

14 Comments

You guessed it, he chose the clapped out Liddell coal-fired power plant.

AEMO, the Australian Energy Market Operator, said New South Wales may be short of power when Liddell closes, as scheduled, in 2022, based on known plans and government policy positions, federal and state. AEMO had just published two documents – Electricity Statement of Opportunities for the National Electricity Market and Advice to Commonwealth Government on Dispatchable Capability. Apart from the risk of blackouts this coming summer in SA and Victoria, the next pressure point could be in 2022 in NSW with the closure of Liddell.

As David Blowers of the Grattan Institute said, the second report carried a clear message, though not stated directly – the system is broken a bipartisan clean energy policy is badly needed. Continue reading Turnbull’s choice – a clapped out coal burner or a clean energy plan →

Climate Action, Climate Policy & Planning

AEMO sees electricity markets reshaped

19 Comments

While Malcolm Turnbull equivocates on a Clean Energy Target, he has called the electricity retailers to Canberra once again to jawbone them about electricity prices. Yet the industry keeps telling him the single factor most needed to bring electricity prices down is more investment in renewable energy, which would be facilitated by a Clean Energy Target (CET).

Whether the CET is central or not, it is what the industry believes. But Turnbull will not move until he has a report from AEMO on what the future need for ‘baseload’ power will be, which in the minds of hardcore recalcitrants within his own party, means coal-fired power, throbbing away.

Giles Parkinson says Turnbull does not need baseload, he just needs balls. Continue reading AEMO sees electricity markets reshaped →

Climate Action, Climate Policy & Planning

Electricity retailers reap rich rewards

5 Comments

For a billing service that needs to invest no more than renting an office, hiring some staff and buying office furniture and computers, rewards for an electricity retailer are rich indeed. In this post I publish some comments I sent to our local ABC Mornings presenter, Steve Austin, who has taken up the cudgels on behalf of consumers who are hurting from electricity price rises. Austin is fighting the good fight but unfortunately regularly misfiring. Then, while I was writing those comments, information came through of another Victorian investigation, which is a bit of a bombshell.

Sophie Vorrath at RenewEconomy has a post Failed experiment: Now it’s retail arms gaming energy consumers with the grisly details. Continue reading Electricity retailers reap rich rewards →

Climate Action, Climate Policy & Planning

Coal-fired power trade-off for new clean energy target

2 Comments

That is as reported by Simon Benson in The Australian:

    The Turnbull government is expected to take its revised energy policy to the Coalition partyroom early next month with a plan to make a significant investment in cleaner coal-fired power as a counterbalance to also adopting a clean energy target.

    The Australian has learned that Malcolm Turnbull and Energy Minister Josh Frydenberg are working on a compromise deal on coal that would allow them to quell internal resistance to a CET.

Continue reading Coal-fired power trade-off for new clean energy target →

Climate Action, Climate Policy & Planning

Renewables make gas out of date, but coal not done yet

14 Comments

It’s the kind of article we expect in RenewEconomy, but this one by Angela Macdonald Smith is in the Australian Financial Review – Future for gas to be cut short by batteries and renewables:

    The conventional wisdom that gas will play an increasingly significant role in electricity supply as the market switches more towards renewables to back up that intermittent supply source, has largely gone out the window.

    Now it’s a discussion of how much an opportunity gas has before it gets squeezed out of the mainstream generation market by solar/wind and storage – not on carbon emissions grounds, but on costs.

Continue reading Renewables make gas out of date, but coal not done yet →

Climate Action, Climate Policy & Planning, Politics & Government, Sundries

It’s gas, not renewables, pushing up electricity prices

5 Comments

There has been a war about electricity prices reflected in front page headlines. For example:

Continue reading It’s gas, not renewables, pushing up electricity prices →

Climate Action, Climate Policy & Planning

Australia puts the brakes on wind

20 Comments

Wind power, seen as inherently evil by our national government, was in danger of taking over in South Australia. So something had to be done to slow it down, right?

How about if the wind blows strong providing cheap power we mandate that the gas must be turned up as well, so the wholesale price goes up instead of down?

It seems absurd, but that is what has been done. Continue reading Australia puts the brakes on wind →

Climate Action, Climate Change & Sustainability, Climate Policy & Planning

Finkel fail at Inside Story

2 Comments

Two of the best articles on the Finkel Review are at Inside Story – Giles Parkinson’s On climate, the consumer’s vote will be more important than the party room’s and Tim Colebatch’s The devils in Finkel’s detail.

Parkinson highlights the difference between promise and performance. Back in December, when the interim report came out, Finkel’s future looked exciting: Continue reading Finkel fail at Inside Story →

Climate Action, Climate Policy & Planning

Finkel flunks climate targets

9 Comments

Turnbull and Frydenberg kept telling us that the review of the national Electricity Market had to serve three ends. We need energy security to keep the lights on, we need cheaper prices, and we need to reduce emissions. In view of the science outlook on climate change, reducing emissions is a sine qua non, literally ‘without which nothing’ – in short an indispensable element.

Michael Slezak at The Guardian says that Australia’s policies on climate change have become poisoned by pragmatism. Bill Hare from Climate Analytics took a look and was horrified. The cuts modelled by Finkel stick out like a burning coal stack:

Continue reading Finkel flunks climate targets →