The energy minister, Josh Frydenberg,
says Australia’s electricity sector is looking for stability, “not
necessarily” for handouts, in a signal the Turnbull government is poised
to abandon the clean energy target.
In comments to an energy summit on Monday, Frydenberg pointed to the falling costs of renewable energy as one of the calculations in the government’s consideration of the clean energy target recommended by the chief scientist, Alan Finkel.
Asking whether the falling costs of renewables meant Australia no longer need a clean energy target, which subsidises renewables, Frydenberg said: “Industry is looking for stability, they’re not necessarily looking for a handout.
“What they’re looking for is a settled bipartisan investment climate whether there are subsidies or not.”
The Turnbull government is finalising its new investment framework for energy policy, which it wants to settle during the remaining parliamentary sitting weeks before the summer recess.
Given it faces considerable internal opposition,
it has been clear for some time the government would not adopt the
clean energy target modelled in the Finkel review, and would look to
rule changes in the national electricity market as one of the
foundations of the overhaul.
Frydenberg’s comments to the Australian Financial Review summit on Monday suggest the government is not convinced renewable energy requires ongoing subsidies once the current renewable energy target winds down after 2020.
But asked by reporters in Sydney whether the government had abandoned the Finkel recommendation, Malcolm Turnbull hedged.
“What we are determined to do is to ensure that energy is reliable, affordable and that we meet our emissions reduction commitments that we have made through the Paris agreement,” the prime minister said.
Speaking to the AFR summit, the chief scientist dismissed the point that the falling cost for renewables meant a clean energy target was no longer required.
Finkel told the gathering a clean energy target was a framework allowing an orderly transition away from carbon-intensive power sources to low-emissions power sources.
“It remains a useful tool even if there is an extreme rate of reduction in the price of the new technologies,” Finkel said. “You need a managed transition.”
Speaking immediately after Finkel, the Labor leader, Bill Shorten, called for a truce in the decade-long climate wars, and urged Turnbull to hold the line.
Shorten said it was “troubling” to see signals from the government that they intended to dump the clean energy target. The Labor leader said Turnbull had previously argued the Finkel recommendation had a lot of merit.
“Walking away is the worst possible option. It would leave investors in the lurch, sentence business to more uncertainty, more chopping and changing,” Shorten told the summit.
“It would make Australia’s job harder to reduce emissions.
“If Turnbull caves in to Tony Abbott and a ... rump of conservative backbenchers and walks away from a clean energy target, it will mean continued higher prices for Australian families and Australian industry.
“It is a simple choice that Mr Turnbull faces – work with Labor to deliver a clean energy target that is meaningful, or lock in higher power bills for businesses and families.”
The South Australian Labor premier, Jay Weatherill, said Frydenberg’s comments showed there was “no political will” to fix the energy market from Canberra, and said the states should bypass the commonwealth to correct the “paralysis” in federal politics.
He said the federal government should “simply get out of the way”, and called for the states to work together to negotiate their own national market with one independent oversight body which he said could operate at arm’s-length from government.
“There is no barrier to the states simply taking the Finkel recommendations and implementing them themselves,” Weatherill told the AFR summit.
“Obviously after today we now know that there is no political will to pursue that and we all know why that is; there’s a civil war going on inside the Coalition.
Weatherill said he’d spoken to each other state premier and territory chief minister and said they were “supportive or open” to the states taking the lead on introducing some kind of energy target.
“I think with the new information we got this morning we should take further steps in that direction,” he said.
“First we need to see if it is indeed the end of the clean energy target and if indeed it is, we should just get cracking.”
Speaking after Weatherill the New South Wales energy minister, Don Harwin, called Weatherill’s solution “very much a second-best option”.
He said the NSW government had deliberately “not boxed the commonwealth in”.
“NSW has consistently stated that all options should be on the table and we shouldn’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good,” he said.
“We’ve deliberately not boxed in the federal government and will consider whatever they come back to us with.
He said renewable energy didn’t need subsidies, but did need “certainty”, arguing for the removal of “sporadic and haphazard government intervention” which “does nothing to boost confidence and does everything to increase doubt”.
In comments to an energy summit on Monday, Frydenberg pointed to the falling costs of renewable energy as one of the calculations in the government’s consideration of the clean energy target recommended by the chief scientist, Alan Finkel.
Asking whether the falling costs of renewables meant Australia no longer need a clean energy target, which subsidises renewables, Frydenberg said: “Industry is looking for stability, they’re not necessarily looking for a handout.
“What they’re looking for is a settled bipartisan investment climate whether there are subsidies or not.”
The Turnbull government is finalising its new investment framework for energy policy, which it wants to settle during the remaining parliamentary sitting weeks before the summer recess.
Frydenberg’s comments to the Australian Financial Review summit on Monday suggest the government is not convinced renewable energy requires ongoing subsidies once the current renewable energy target winds down after 2020.
But asked by reporters in Sydney whether the government had abandoned the Finkel recommendation, Malcolm Turnbull hedged.
“What we are determined to do is to ensure that energy is reliable, affordable and that we meet our emissions reduction commitments that we have made through the Paris agreement,” the prime minister said.
Speaking to the AFR summit, the chief scientist dismissed the point that the falling cost for renewables meant a clean energy target was no longer required.
Finkel told the gathering a clean energy target was a framework allowing an orderly transition away from carbon-intensive power sources to low-emissions power sources.
“It remains a useful tool even if there is an extreme rate of reduction in the price of the new technologies,” Finkel said. “You need a managed transition.”
Speaking immediately after Finkel, the Labor leader, Bill Shorten, called for a truce in the decade-long climate wars, and urged Turnbull to hold the line.
Shorten said it was “troubling” to see signals from the government that they intended to dump the clean energy target. The Labor leader said Turnbull had previously argued the Finkel recommendation had a lot of merit.
“Walking away is the worst possible option. It would leave investors in the lurch, sentence business to more uncertainty, more chopping and changing,” Shorten told the summit.
“It would make Australia’s job harder to reduce emissions.
“If Turnbull caves in to Tony Abbott and a ... rump of conservative backbenchers and walks away from a clean energy target, it will mean continued higher prices for Australian families and Australian industry.
“It is a simple choice that Mr Turnbull faces – work with Labor to deliver a clean energy target that is meaningful, or lock in higher power bills for businesses and families.”
The South Australian Labor premier, Jay Weatherill, said Frydenberg’s comments showed there was “no political will” to fix the energy market from Canberra, and said the states should bypass the commonwealth to correct the “paralysis” in federal politics.
He said the federal government should “simply get out of the way”, and called for the states to work together to negotiate their own national market with one independent oversight body which he said could operate at arm’s-length from government.
“There is no barrier to the states simply taking the Finkel recommendations and implementing them themselves,” Weatherill told the AFR summit.
“Obviously after today we now know that there is no political will to pursue that and we all know why that is; there’s a civil war going on inside the Coalition.
Weatherill said he’d spoken to each other state premier and territory chief minister and said they were “supportive or open” to the states taking the lead on introducing some kind of energy target.
“I think with the new information we got this morning we should take further steps in that direction,” he said.
“First we need to see if it is indeed the end of the clean energy target and if indeed it is, we should just get cracking.”
Speaking after Weatherill the New South Wales energy minister, Don Harwin, called Weatherill’s solution “very much a second-best option”.
He said the NSW government had deliberately “not boxed the commonwealth in”.
“NSW has consistently stated that all options should be on the table and we shouldn’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good,” he said.
“We’ve deliberately not boxed in the federal government and will consider whatever they come back to us with.
He said renewable energy didn’t need subsidies, but did need “certainty”, arguing for the removal of “sporadic and haphazard government intervention” which “does nothing to boost confidence and does everything to increase doubt”.
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