Andrew Bolt: Finally, proof that net zero is bonkers

A report by Net Zero Australia reveals what the government won’t tell us – that Labor is leading us down the road to ruin.

We must thank Net Zero Australia for being so honest in its report on what it will take to do what the Albanese government insists we must to stop global warming.

Read this and weep.

I’m not talking here about a report by people, like me, who think global warming is a massively exaggerated problem and that attempts to “stop” it are both useless and a grotesque waste of billions of dollars.

No, Net Zero Australia is a massive private project by true global-warming believers – headed by Professor Robin Batterham, backed by universities and helped by activists such as Tim Flannery’s Climate Council, the Australian Conservation Foundation and billionaire green entrepreneur Andrew Forrest.

The organisation actually backs net zero, but what’s great about its report is that it tells you what the government won’t. That is, the government’s own plan to cut our emissions to net zero by 2050 is bonkers. Ruinous.

Net Zero Australia is backed by Tim Flannery’s Climate Council. Picture: AAP

Not that this report says that, of course. All it does is very honestly explain exactly what Australia must do to get to Labor’s target.

Are you really ready for this?

This report and its earlier modelling says we must find another $1.5 trillion in investments in just the next seven years to be on track to cut our net emissions to zero.

By 2060, we’ll need $9 trillion, or six times what the entire Australian economy produces in a year.

And we’ll have to pay for it despite losing two of our three biggest-earning exports – coal and gas. They must go, says the report.

We’ll also have to find, train and pay 800,000 experts to do this switch to green power – eight times more than we have now.

We’ll also have to carpet an area about three times the size of Tasmania or more with wind and solar farms, judging by the NZA’s maps. Farmers must cut their emissions to zero or even “negative zero”, making food more expensive.

The Albanese government’s plan to cut emissions to net zero by 2050 is bonkers. Picture: Gary Ramage

You’re probably shouting “Enough already!” But it isn’t, says the report.

The government will also have to make people switch from gas appliances to electric and from petrol cars to electric – at a cost we can only imagine.

As well, we will have to build many massive batteries – with more storage than any we have today – for when the wind doesn’t blow and sun doesn’t shine. But one of the most stunning things about this report is the faith it puts in “let’s pretend”. As in, let’s pretend we can make this gigantic switch by using largely untested or underdeveloped technologies – and they’ll work brilliantly.

For instance, the report says we’ll need many more schemes to catch and bury carbon dioxide emissions, when the biggest we have – at the Gorgon gas field – has struggled for years to work as it should.

It says we’ll have to use and export lots of hydrogen, when the problems with using this highly volatile and expensive gas at scale have not been solved.

It says we’ll need more firming mechanisms to stabilise an electricity system running on unreliable wind and solar, when experts warn this is a massive technical challenge.

It says we’ll probably need lots of offshore wind farms, yet there is a worldwide shortage of the machines and experts needed to build them.

Australia will have to find, train and pay 800,000 experts to switch to green power. Picture: Zoe Phillips

In fact, prices for almost everything green have soared, including for offshore farms, for the new web of transmission lines linking all the new solar and wind farms; and for batteries for electric cars.

And if you think I sound too pessimistic and carping about these bright new technologies, know that I have watched the last lot of green schemes crash or cost a lot more than promised.

Consider this: the geothermal plant backed by the Rudd government collapsed; wave generators sank; greener electricity costs more, not less; and Malcolm Turnbull’s Snowy 2.0, meant to be our biggest storage of green power, costs 10 times more than promised, with doubts now it will ever be finished.

Still, thanks to Net Zero Australia for at least pointing out what it will take to do what the Albanese government wants – spending money we’ll never afford, finding hundreds of thousands of experts we won’t have, destroying exports we live off, and relying on new technologies we don’t know will work.

The final, colossal joke? For all this pain, the gain to the climate will be zero. We’re just too small to make any difference that anyone can measure.

But Labor is too crazed with global warming to see it’s leading us to an utterly pointless disaster. Perhaps voters now will.

Originally published as Andrew Bolt: Finally, proof that net zero is bonkers