Let’s just get on with it and really tackle climate change

Chloe Munro has received an AO for her work in climate change, water and energy. Picture: Wayne Taylor.

Chloe Munro works from the simple rules “if you can’t measure it you can’t manage it” and in her case she likes “roles where I can see the outcome”.

This has led her into the carbon club where she has transferred her past life as a state and federal bureaucrat and Telstra executive, among other roles, into a non-executive career centred on the energy industry.

One of her first jobs when the Scottish-born and UK–educated Munro came to Australia in 1996 was to help manage the Victorian energy privatisation for the Kennett government.

This involved some careful management of a process run by then treasurer Alan Stockdale to ensure public policy was being met as consultants like Peter Troughton and then CS First Boston advisers John Wylie and Andrew Leydon were determinedly pursuing the endgame.

Her roles since have included being a member of Alan Finkel’s 2016 review of the future of the National Electricity Market.

She also serves on the board of KKR-owned carbon project developer Green Collar, along with work with Monash University solar-based Impact Investment funds backed by the Lieberman family.

From this base she has firm views on where we should be headed.

Like many in the carbon club, Munro is just getting on with the business, but laments the fact that from a “policy point of view the lack of leadership is evident”.

This is a clear comment on federal government policy, and as the former head of the Clean Energy Regulator she is in a position to judge.

“The fundamental problem with carbon is it is free,” she said, noting that “business is getting on with it but there is no real incentive to act”.

“You need policies to drive employment and the government’s failure to commit to a target is a serious problem,” she said. “It makes it difficult to work on something if there is nothing.”

Asked what she would do if she was in the chair, Munro said the first step was “to make electricity zero-carbon, then electrify everything and add hydrogen to replace LNG”.

Policy today, she said, was “too focused on the adequacy of generation”.

Munro is a big supporter of the Energy Security Board’s work and thinks the government should back its work on market design of the integrated system.

“Climate and energy need to be integrated,” she notes, adding: “Energy is the domain of the states and we need to work with them.”

Munro is optimistic on the quality of people in government and industry, and having first landed in Australia 25 years ago, is devoted to the local lifestyle.

After studying maths and philosophy at Cambridge she worked as an investment banker in the 1980s with Leopold Joseph, which has since been acquired.

Her eclectic career took her to Kenya, “where every litre of water used is carried on a woman’s head, so you understood the value of water”.

Climate became a reality when working with a client who was a plant breeder needing to know just what varieties were needed in 20 years’ time.

She worked with the New Zealand Treasury before being recruited to Melbourne to work with the energy department during the privatisation.

Having worked in the markets and for government, she had an understanding of how both worked together and was recruited to Telstra by Bill Scales.

After serving through the Ziggy Switkowski and Sol Trujillo eras at the telco, she headed back to government as the chair of AquaSure Victoria’s desal plant.

She served as boss of the Clean Energy Regulator from 2012 to 2017, covering the terms of Greg Combet and Greg Hunt as energy ministers.

Munro said she was “never afraid of my future” and “I like taking on roles where I can see the outcome of what I am doing”.

In politics that is not always in your control, as Munro learned.

That, she said, was why she started working on the board of bodies like Green Collar: “because I admire people who are just getting on with it”.

Today’s column and one earlier this week on Market Advisory Group founder Raphael Wood are the start of a regular series on the people who are leading Australia towards a carbon-neutral future.

They have an eclectic background but some have also worked together, with Wood working with Munro at the Clean Energy Regulator.

The Carbon Club series will aim to look at the people who are working on cutting emissions, explaining what they do, how they got there, and what they think about the future and how to get there.

Google on notice

After the ACCC’s stunning victory against Google on Friday, the issue now is what if anything Google does to change its policies and offer easy solutions to those wanting to protect their privacy.

Google is an advertising company whose business is built on collecting your data, so it probably isn’t going to do much at all.

When your advertising business is based on collecting data from people you won’t exactly want to avoid them giving it to you, so the last thing you want to do is make it easy for them to avoid Google.

This much is clear from its response to Friday’s news. The court rejected many of the ACCC’s broad claims.

Google said: “We disagree with the remaining findings and are currently reviewing our options, including a possible appeal. We provide robust controls for location data and are always looking to do more — for example, we recently introduced auto delete options for location history, making it even easier to control your data.”

From its perspective, the ACCC is delighted to have won its case and noted Google is now aware it is being watched and the courts are prepared to rule against it. Google made much of the ACCC’s targeted victory for a subset of consumers prepared to protect their privacy.

Fair point but for a change the ACCC was actually being smart with litigation by narrowing down its target, in stark contrast to previous consumer losses in Medibank and TPG.

Its barrister Kate Richardson SC deserves some kudos here, as do lawyers Norton Rose.

Corrs Westgarth represented Google and is also acting for Apple in the case against Clifford Chance-advised Epic Games.

Depending on the outcome of its appeal, the Epic case is potentially headed to the US, because while it is under Australian law it involves two US companies with a contract reached in the US.

If the US court wanted to hear it the ACCC could not intervene and the ACCC is considering whether to join the Epic appeal.

Google noted there was no breach of privacy found in its case, which is not surprising given it was taken under Australian consumer law for misleading conduct.

The Office of Australian Information Commission, which regulates privacy laws, has its first matter against Facebook wending its way through the courts with the next hearing on May 7.

ACCC boss Rod Sims noted in the Google case: “Consumers were led to believe that ‘location history’ was the only account setting that affected the collection of their personal location data, when that was simply not true.”

The question now is whether Google’s behaviour changes.