Power Plan Maps out Route to Follow for 100% Renewable Energy Future

A plan to transform Australia’s energy use to 100% renewable was published by GetUp! and SolarCitizens on Tuesday after a modelling study commissioned by the groups suggested such a transition was technically feasible and would be cheaper than the status quo.

The “homegrown power plan” spells out dozens of policy ideas the two organisations say would achieve a switch to 100% renewable energy while delivering more equitable access to electricity and a fair transition for workers in the fossil-fuel industry.

The groups will lobby politicians to adopt the measures in the lead-up to the federal election.

“The institute for sustainable future research shows it is 100% doable,” said Miriam Lyons, from GetUp!.

“We can take a national electricity market that looks like a battleground where different parts of the power sector fight over who can profit the most from screwing people and the planet and we can turn it into something that can do a much better job of serving Australia’s interest.”

The plan proposes changes in three broad areas: regulations, funding and obstacles to the roll-out of renewable energy.

The plan recommends amending the national electricity objective, one of the main regulatory instruments that governs the national electricity market.

As well as efficiency, reliability and safety, it should include an objective for a “fair” system and one that is “powered by 100% renewable energy”.

“We’re pretty much at consensus that Australia is heading towards a zero emissions electricity sector,” Lyons said.

“The prime minister has said by the end of the century, Labor has said maybe by 2050. People might have disagreements over when we’ll make the transition to a renewable power sector, but nobody is arguing it’s not going to happen at this point.

“But the people with the power to make the decisions day to day, that make a real difference on the ground about how fast renewables can expand, those people are still running with the marching orders that were written for a very, very different system, that was designed to cater for a handful of fossil-fuel generators running one way through the grid.”

The narrow focus of the national electricity objective has led to proposed rule changes being knocked back. That has hampered the expansion of renewable energy, she said.

Among the recommendations for funding the transition is a call for $460m over 10 years to establish what it calls “community powerhouses”.

Modelled on Landcare, which was established in 1986, the funding would help establish 50 not-for-profits that would support volunteers around the country.

They would provide the legal and technical expertise required for small and medium community projects such as farmer-run bioenergy hubs, low-income energy efficiency, or community wind farms.

The report cites evidence from 2013, suggesting that for every $1 spent on community renewable energy, there is a $17 return.

Lyons pointed out that in countries with plenty of renewables, community ownership played a big part. In Germany 47% of all renewable capacity is owned by individuals and communities.

“People want to be a part of the transition,” she said.

The report argues the country needs a ramped-up renewable energy target, aiming for 100% renewable energy by 2030, which it says would amount to about 345 terawatt hours.

That policy would deliver the cheapest renewable energy, predominantly wind and solar PV.

But it would not necessarily deliver the sorts of energy that are needed, such as on-demand or “dispatchable” sources, like concentrated solar thermal, which would be required to create a reliable system.

To deliver that, the report calls for a national roll-out of a reverse-auction, where tenders are sought for the cheapest delivery of the required types of renewable energy.

The authors suggest the government should auction contracts for particular types of renewable energy, where the government will guarantee to pay the difference between the wholesale price of electricity and the winning bid price.

“The ACT’s reverse auctions have been wildly successful,” Lyons said. “It’s also proven to be a successful policy internationally.”

The report found that among the obstacles to the roll-out of renewable energy was the oversupply of cheap, dirty energy from old coal power stations. So it called for a reverse auction where the power stations bid for how much money they would need to be given to shut down.

The lowest bidder wins, and the rest of the power stations would pay for the closure, in proportion to their emissions intensity.

The idea is a modified version of one developed by Frank Jotzo and Salim Mazouz, from the Australian National University, revealed by Guardian Australia last year.

“We’ve held a whole lot of political briefings on the report already and a lot of our allies are keen to pick up parts of the report and run with it,” said Lyons. “We’re asking all of our members to email a copy to their local MP.

“We know the vast majority of Australians want a transition to 100% renewables as fast as possible. Basically the only the thing standing in our way is the fossil-fuel lobby and their friends in parliament.”

SOURCE: theguardian.com - http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/apr/19/power-plan-maps-out-route-to-follow-for-100-renewable-energy-future

Follow us on #climatechangelb to engage with us.

Check the Lebanon Climate Change website: www.moe.gov.lb/climatechange

This segment is brought to you through a partnership between the UNDP Climate Change Team at the Ministry of Environment in Lebanon and the NAHARNET team. The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any party/institution.

Source: Bloomberg/via Getty Images