Renewable Energy Targets are on Track: Emissions Down but not in a Good Way

According to the new Environment and Energy Minister, Josh Frydenberg, the energy policy in Australia can be compared to a game of pass-the-parcel, only in reverse as reported in The Australian.

Instead of hoping for the parcel to land in your lap when the music stops, the last thing you want to happen when it comes to energy policy is to be holding the parcel when it becomes silent.

Instead of hoping for the parcel to land in your lap when the music stops, the last thing you want to happen when it comes to energy policy is to be holding the parcel when it becomes silent.

Victoria and South Australia have recently announced very ambitious renewable energy targets. According to Judith Sloan, Economics Editor of The Australian – Australia will not meet its renewable energy target (RET) by the year 2020. She also added that it won’t get the 33,000-gigawatt hours electricity generated by defining renewable sources as negotiated by Greg Hunt, the former Environment Minister. She also added that the labour target of 45,000GWh by 2020 is a joke.

From where the country is now, halfway through 2016, there is no way that there will be sufficient investment in renewable electricity generation by 2020, given the need to firm up projects and get different approvals to reach the target. At present, Australia is only around the 16,000GWh to 17,000GWh mark.

And by looking at the prices of renewable energy certificates that underpin the RET. She also added that they know the market does not think the target will be met. So this means that energy companies will end up buying RECs at cap price and pass this to the electricity prices. In return, the retail process also will go up even though there’s a big shortfall of physical investment in renewable energy generation.

But to be sure, there will be more wind farms in SA and one or two in Victoria. But at the end of the spectrum, the large energy companies will come to the realisation that wind farms can be more trouble than they are worth.

Click here for the full story on The Australian

Featured Image Credit: Centre for Alternative Technology