Former governor general joins academics and business leaders urging Turnbull government to decarbonise energy market
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| Quentin Bryce is calling for an expansion of the national renewable energy target as part of the decarbonisation of the market. Photograph: Dan Himbrechts/AAP |
Representatives of the group came to Canberra on Monday to meet the energy minister, Josh Frydenberg, armed with an eight-point plan to drive a sequenced decarbonisation of the national energy market.
The intervention follows weeks of political attacks by the Turnbull government on state-based renewable energy schemes and the government's continuing refusal to say whether it will use a planned review of its Direct Action policy next year to overhaul an emissions reduction framework experts say is woefully inadequate.
The leadership forum on energy transition, led by the Australian Conservation Foundation and hosted by the University of New South Wales, has used the resumption of parliament to call on the Turnbull government to establish national rules, policies, regulations, markets and a basis for investment to drive an orderly transition away from coal-fired power.
As a first step, the group says the government needs to update Australia's national electricity objective "to include a clear goal to accelerate Australia's energy transition towards net zero emissions before 2050, to fulfil our domestic policy objectives and international commitments".
It says the government should consider creating an emissions intensity standard to govern the regulated closure of highly emissions intensive power stations and legislate a market mechanism that would allow a rational sequence of closures, where the dirtiest power stations close first.
It says an alternative to a market mechanism would be an age-based regulation that tightens over time, ensuring the oldest coal-fired power stations closed first.
The group is also calling on the government to extend and expand the large-scale element of the renewable energy target scheme beyond 2020 and introduce economy-wide complementary laws, such as a carbon price, to make companies pay for their pollution.
As well as calling for a rational policy framework to ensure Australia complies with its Paris emissions reduction targets, and investors are given the policy certainty they need to bring on low-emissions technologies, the eight-point plan also emphasises the importance of transitional assistance for coal communities and help for low-income earners by way of compensation for higher power prices.
The group is chaired by Ian Jacobs, the vice chancellor of UNSW, and includes Geoff Cousins, the president of the ACF, Bryce, Jillian Broadbent, the chairwoman of the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, David Thodey, the chairman of the CSIRO, financier Mark Burrows, company director and sustainability adviser Sam Mostyn and Martijn Wilder, lawyer and the chairman of the Australian renewable energy agency.
The intervention is part of positioning by a number of stakeholders ahead of the Direct Action review in 2017, and it runs in parallel to a review being led by the chief scientist, Alan Finkel, of the national energy market, for state and federal energy ministers. It also follows confirmation last Thursday that the Hazelwood coal-fired power station in Victoria's Latrobe valley will close next March.
The Finkel review was preceded by a pitched political battle between the Turnbull government, which launched a rhetorical assault on state-based renewable energy targets after a statewide power blackout in South Australia in September, and state governments, who argue the commonwealth will not be able to meet its international emissions reduction targets without the state RETs.
The South Australian government has signalled it will use the framework of the Finkel review to argue for an emissions intensity scheme for the electricity sector – a form of carbon trading.
A coalition of major business and energy users have already urged federal and state governments to work cooperatively to map out a strategic response to the decarbonisation challenge and have warned investment is at risk.
Links
- Hazelwood closure: Daniel Andrews pledges $266m for Latrobe valley
- As climate disaster looms, Malcolm Turnbull needs to stop appeasing and start leading
- Australian unions call for 'just transition' from coal-generated electricity
- Coal-fired power stations: Senate committee to examine how best to close them
- Chief scientist to lead review into Australia's energy security
- Renewable energy: get your story straight, ACT tells Coalition
- Josh Frydenberg plays down Climate Change Authority call for tougher emissions limits
- Linking Adani coalmine to social uplift in India ridiculous, says conservationist
- Peabody's Australian mines in jeopardy despite minister's advice, says lawyer
- Josh Frydenberg targets Labor candidates opposed to new coalmines
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