Nearly three weeks have passed since January 1, but the exuberance I felt as revellers hailed the new year remains. Normally I could not be bothered staying awake for the occasion, but this year the excitement was such that I could not sleep. For it is less than a year now until 2025, and that means financial relief for every Australian. The annual household energy bill will fall by an average of $275, an assessment based on 2021 energy prices.
That was the solemn undertaking Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Energy Minister Chris Bowen gave us in 2021, just six months before Labor assumed office. Gesturing to the horizon majestically, they spoke of a national energy market comprising 82 per cent renewables by 2030. It will ensure not just a 43 per cent reduction of CO2 emissions by the end of the decade but also result in 604,000 new jobs. Yay!
As of the December quarter, the renewables tally stands at only 40.4 per cent, but you need not worry about progress. We know the government’s forecasts are sound because of the modelling, you see. As Albanese said during his historic announcement, it was “the most comprehensive modelling ever done for any policy by any opposition in Australia’s history since Federation”.
Inexplicably, many doubt the government’s ability to realise this vision, particularly the aspect of energy prices falling dramatically by 2025. Based on the current trajectory, they say renewables will at best comprise 60 to 64 per cent by 2030. Far from falling, the annual household power bill has risen by 45 per cent in the last two years.
Unkindly, the naysayers also cast aspersions on Bowen’s competence merely because he has made an absolute hash of every cabinet portfolio he has previously held. They refuse to acknowledge he is a man who follows not only the modelling but also the science.
Take for example his enthusiasm for offshore wind turbines. When he announced in 2022 six proposed regions to house these giant structures, he declared the areas had “world-class offshore wind energy potential”.
But what of the consequences for wetland creatures and marine life, particularly the effect on fisheries? Asked about this last August in an interview with 2GB host Chris O’Keefe, Bowen drew on the science to inform his audience.
“I can tell you – a lot of people will tell you actually fish life is attracted to wind turbines around the world,” he told an incredulous O’Keefe. “It’s true,” he insisted repeatedly. “That’s what the evidence shows.”
There you have it. The science has spoken. Bowen did not elaborate on the source of this evidence, but undoubtedly it is a respected institution. You know, the think tank known as the Pulled out of the Proverbial Institute. Come to think of it, is that not where the minister gets most of the information that formulate his policies?
Unfortunately for Bowen, Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek was not swayed by his scientific theory that offshore turbines could double as a Walley World theme park for millions of fish. As this masthead reported last fortnight, she has vetoed the Victorian government’s proposed hub for offshore wind farm construction at the Port of Hastings, south-east of Melbourne. The planned drilling and dredging would likely “cause irreversible damage to the habitat of waterbirds and migratory birds and marine invertebrates and fish” in what are globally recognised wetlands, she found.
So confident had Bowen been of approval that he told the APAC Offshore Wind and Green Hydrogen Summit last August that Australia was “firmly on track to have all six [offshore wind] areas declared by the first half of next year”. He also boasted he had given the industry “certainty about the immediate path ahead.”
Certainty? Tell that to Victorian Energy Minister Lily D’Ambrosio. She too deserves censure for committing her state to a renewable energy target of 95 per cent by 2035, but she has a point when she slammed Bowen for failing to co-ordinate nationally the development of offshore wind farms. It would not “magically sort itself out,” she said following Plibersek’s decision.
Neither will the many concerns about the viability and impact of offshore wind farms. A report last September by the European Union’s external auditors warned their expansion “could be detrimental to the marine environment, both below and above sea level,” saying the EU “has not estimated its potential environmental effects”.
It also found the EU’s then target of 61GW offshore renewables by 2030 was “ambitious” and would require a massive €800 billion in addition to the €16.7 billion already invested. But such an injection would be utterly foolhardy given the authors caution the technology “yields ambiguous results” and “the socio-economic implications of offshore renewables development have not been studied in sufficient depth”.
This cannot but have relevance for Australia. At the very least, these findings warrant a suspension of offshore wind farm development in this country pending an informed assessment of the implications. Instead Bowen’s approach is that of a degenerate gambler. As the Sydney Morning Herald reported last week, he “has called on all levels of Australian government to speed up planning decisions for new energy projects and transmissions lines to meet renewable targets set for 2030”.
This is lunacy. The transition to renewables, even if one accepts is viable for argument’s sake, has already proved chaotic, piecemeal, and driven by ideology rather than practicality. Bowen’s refusal even to consider the option of nuclear energy is both petulant and obtuse. Instead of reassessing the 2030 target, he still insists on this folly. Only this time he wants to up the pace and circumvent the normal approval processes. Aside from Australia looking like North Korea at night, what could go wrong?
For Bowen, your money is no object if it means saving his ministerial career. Last November he announced a fivefold expansion of the Capacity Investment Scheme to incentivise companies to increase their investment in renewables. We mugs will underwrite these investments through so-called “contract for differences”, but Bowen has refused to detail the cost of this program, which is estimated to be in the billions. Should we just assume its modelling is the most comprehensive ever done for any government in Australia’s history since Federation?
As for Bowen’s beloved offshore wind turbines, they perfectly encapsulate his ministerial achievements. All at sea and in a furious spin.
More Coverage
Risk that puberty blockers are a trap, not a release, for children
We need a national inquiry into the use of puberty blockers in children.
We need better tech to meet the threat of terrorism
All of the civil agencies who need to play a part in fighting the anti-Semitism and Islamophobic threat are not properly funded to undertake modernisation rapidly.