Food and Fibre Great South Coast launch Energy Equality Regional Alliance campaign

Old energy infrastructure means a South West Victorian primary school can’t have airconditioning, while a nearby footy club can’t turn on their oval lights.

Food and Fibre Great South Coast chair, and western district cattle farmer, Georgina Gubbins, says regional Australia will continue to miss out if rules around energy infrastructure don’t change. Picture: ANDY ROGERS

Summers across Australia are getting hotter, but for the students at Narrawong Primary School they can be extra challenging.

The ageing electricity infrastructure in the tiny hamlet on Victoria’s southwest coast means the school is unable to install airconditioning, leaving the kids sweltering during the warmest months.

The irony is just 20km away is the Portland wind farm, one of the largest in Australia producing enough electricity to power 123,000 homes according to Pacific Blue – but the school can’t access it.

Just up the road, the Tyrenderra Football and Netball Club finds itself struggling to keep the lights on at night – literally. The load on the oval’s lights is such that the club can’t run them reliably at night, making the juggle of training times all the more difficult.

“Imagine trying to learn in a classroom where you can’t get airconditioning, that’s a lack of equity,” Food and Fibre Great South Coast chief executive Natalie Collard said.

“How do we make sure all those teams are getting fair time to train and participate? Let alone the business impacts … I think most Australians would be really surprised by the lack of equality.”

Food and Fibre Great South Coast chief executive Natalie Collard says regional homes and businesses are missing out on tapping into the growing renewable energy grid.

The growing frustration over access to a basic service most people in big cities take for granted has prompted Food and Fibre GSC to launch a new campaign to push governments to change how Australia’s energy infrastructure is built and maintained.

The Energy Equality Regional Alliance campaign, launching today, argues the Australian Energy Regulator should have to take into account the social and economic benefit of upgrading infrastructure. At present, the AER’s decisions are largely based on population density, leaving smaller regional and rural towns with ageing services that cannot cope with the capacity most households and businesses require today.

Western District sheep and cattle farmer Georgina Gubbins – who is also chair of Food and Fibre GSC – said unless the AER changed its decision-making, regional areas would continue to miss out.

“If you live in a growing area of Melbourne or Geelong you’ll get upgrades, but if you are in southwest Victoria because of the lack of people on the line, you can’t,” she said.

“We’ve got engineering works that can’t operate machinery at the same time as boiling a kettle.

“Regional areas miss out on the investment, and they also have to pay more yet get a lesser service.”

The alliance is seeking to work with other regional groups and farming lobbies to get the AER legislation changed or, Ms Collard said, “the divide between urban, regional and rural Australia will become even greater”.

“We are really proud to be home to one of Victoria’s first wind farms and one of the largest renewable areas, but it beggars belief that not one of our homes can tap into it,” she said.

“If we’re not able to get these upgrades, we are not able to participate in the renewable energy transition.”