It appears the latest proposal from the Abbott government concerning Australia’s Renewable Energy Target has been rejected by Labor.
The Sydney Morning Herald reports the government tabled a proposal to set the target at 31,000 gigawatt hours of renewable energy by 2020, far below the legislated target of 41,000 gigawatt hours.
The Clean Energy Council (CEC) said the offer simply didn’t stack up.
“We’ve made this quite clear and explicit – 31,000 is quite clearly a number we’re not prepared to accept,” stated Kane Thornton, chief executive of the CEC.
It’s understood both Labor and the CEC would agree to a target in the mid-to-high 30’s range.
While Labor is yet to publicly comment on the latest offer, Shadow Minister for Environment, Climate Change and Water Mark Butler was damning of the Abbott government’s treatment of renewables in a speech to Parliament yesterday focused on climate change.
” In spite of the fact that this Prime Minister went to the last two elections promising to keep the existing Renewable Energy Target, which in the large-scale sector was 41,000 gigawatt hours electricity by 2020. In spite of a clear promise to keep that in place, he then launched a shameful ambush on the sector with devastating consequences at the beginning of 2014,” said Mr. Butler.
February 17 this year marked the one year anniversary of the Federal Government launching its review of the RET. The duration of the impasse has had a major impact.
An analysis published in January this year states investment large-scale renewable energy projects in 2014 was down 88 per cent to just $240 million – the lowest level for more than a decade. Australia’s renewable energy investment is now lagging behind developing nations including Panama, Honduras and Myanmar.
The situation is even more unbelievable given the government’s own review showed power prices will be cheaper under a full-strength RET. Late last year, former US Energy Secretary Steven Chu branded the government a failure for “opting to make the cost of electricity more expensive for its citizens”.
While the current situation continues, so too will the paralysis of large scale renewables investment, the jobs it would create and the hopes of cheaper power prices for Aussie battlers and businesses.
