Life on the West Island - Hot air

Riven by deep divisions and fights over leadership, the West Island Liberal Party is trying to outflank One Nation with a ludicrous and false “new policy” on energy, which amounts to a bunch of empty slogans and a collection of discredited conspiracy theories. For twenty years, the Coalition has bounced between outright denial of climate change; failing to act on emissions and transmission networks; and deliberate blocking of progress in tackling the climate crisis while in government.

Now it has “gone back to the future” in proposing to subsidise new coal mines and, contrary to the facts, to counter-intuitively reduce power prices by relying on the three most expensive sources of energy - coal, gas and nuclear! As with many previous failed policies, the disguised real aim seems to be to stymie the rapid rollout of a clean renewables network and to discourage investment, in a futile attempt to discredit the Labor government. The true measure of this purportedly new policy is the immediate and searing condemnation of it from the energy industry itself.

The Coalition - or is that COALition? – seems to have adopted their approach from a mix of the tactics of Donald Trump and Pauline Hanson, using lies, conspiracy theories and totally invented statistics to confuse the community and hint at dark conspiracies, with a view to scaring voters. Numerous credible sources have pointed out the true facts and heaped criticism on the empty approach from Sussan Ley and her desperate colleagues.

For example, the International Energy Agency, once known for an anti-renewables bias, now says a more ambitious transition will lower prices. In an analysis of their report under the heading of the Coalition claims pursuing net zero will increase power bills – but in the real world the opposite is true, scientist Patrick Commins points out that West Island power prices have risen less in the past five years than in most other OECD nations, and that our current rates sit in the middle of OECD members.

Added to this is the research of the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis, which found that the main drivers of rising bills are wholesale electricity prices – which reflect the price of power generation technologies – and the cost of the network, which includes things like transmission towers and poles and wires. The bottom line is that renewable energy is not to blame for high power bills. Instead, climbing coal prices have been a key contributor over the past 10-20 years, but on the wholesale side, the really big driver for setting prices is actually the gas price.

The Australian Energy Council, comprised of the chief executives of all the major generators of electricity, including AGL, Origin Energy and Energy Australia, stated this week that the transition to renewable energy was both essential and irreversible. Abandoning the energy transition is untenable given the ageing and increasingly unreliable nature of coal plants that have long formed the mainstay of the electricity system.

Distinguished American Professor Jay Gulledge has written extensively on the numerous benefits of transitioning away from fossil fuels such as coal and gas to clean and less expensive renewable energy sources. In summary, these include:

• No fuel costs: The primary advantage is that wind and solar power have no fuel costs. While fossil fuels are subject to fluctuating international commodity prices, wind and sun are free, making the operational cost of renewables significantly lower over their lifetime.

• Falling technology costs: The cost of solar panels and wind turbines has decreased dramatically, making them cheaper to build than new coal or gas-fired power plants.

• Minimal operational and maintenance costs: Compared with the constant fuel and maintenance required for fossil fuel plants, renewable energy infrastructure generally requires less upkeep and has minimal ongoing costs once built.

• Reduced risk from fuel price volatility: Reliance on fossil fuels exposes energy systems to the risk of price spikes that have occurred in the past. Renewable energy sources are not subject to this type of volatility.

• Lower upstream infrastructure costs: Building a coal or gas plant requires a significant investment in a coal mine or gas field and pipelines. Renewables, while requiring new transmission lines, have a lower dependency on extensive upstream infrastructure.

But beyond affordability, Professor Gulledge outlines the health benefits of moving away from fossil fuels. Writing for The Conversation, he expands on this issue:

Burning coal, oil and natural gas releases tiny particles into the air along with toxic gases; these pollutants can make people sick. A recent study found air pollution from fossil fuels causes an estimated 5 million deaths worldwide a year, based on 2019 data.

For example, using natural gas to fuel stoves and other appliances releases benzene, a known carcinogen. The health risks of this exposure in some homes have been found to be comparable to second-hand tobacco smoke. Natural gas combustion has also been linked to childhood asthma, with almost 13% of childhood asthma cases attributable to gas stoves, according to one study.

Fossil fuels are also the leading sources of climate-warming greenhouse gases. When they’re burned to generate electricity or run factories, vehicles and appliances, they release carbon dioxide and other gases that accumulate in the atmosphere and trap heat near the earth’s surface. That accumulation has been raising global temperatures and causing more heat stress, respiratory illnesses and the spread of disease. Electrifying buildings, cars and appliances, and powering them with renewable energy, reduces these air pollutants while slowing climate change.

The flimsy policy document of the West Island coalition has suffered extensive criticism from experts, commentators, the energy industry and scientists. It is clearly a cobbled together attempt to weave a large amount of hot air into a superficial gloss of a policy aimed at winning back support from disenchanted voters who are fleeing to the Greens, independents and One Nation. If, as is most likely, it fails to do so, it may well mark the final and unlamented collapse of our failing two-party system.