The outspoken chief of industry body the Australian Solar Council has backed a pledge by the country’s parliamentary opposition party to put in place a 50% renewable energy by 2030 target if elected.
John Grimes, who is also head of the Energy Storage Council for Australia, said yesterday that an expected announcement this weekend from Bill Shorten, head of the country’s federal Labor Party is a “game changer”. A pledge to generate half of Australia’s power from renewables would, Grimes said, be “the right announcement economically, environmentally and socially”.
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“This is a game changer for Australia’s economy, 50% renewables by 2030 will ensure Australia takes advantage of the biggest economic opportunity our country has ever seen – the unstoppable global transition to a clean energy future. Australia will join all of its major trading partners – China, US, EU, Japan, Indonesia and South Korea – in embracing solar and renewable energy,” Grimes said.
“Labor’s commitment means thousands of clean energy jobs, regional development and new economic opportunities across Australia.”
Grimes has frequently been a critic of current prime minister Tony Abbott’s approach to renewables, with Abbott calling for the abolition of the Renewable Energy Target (RET) and blocking the country’s Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC) from investing in rooftop solar and wind among just two examples of recent acts that have drawn strong opposition. The RET was eventually saved, but at a much lower threshold than before. A pledge of 50% renewables by 2030, incidentally, would put Australia's commitment to clean power in line with New York, which recently announced that same benchmark as a state-wide target.
Grimes is by no means alone, with support coming from a perhaps unexpected quarter in April when major utility company AGL laid out its own carbon reduction plan, urged Abbott’s government to do the same and also requested the federal administration consider keeping a subsidy programme in place for solar. Additionally, the chief executive of the Clean Energy Council (CEC), Kane Thornton, said support for solar from local governments was becoming increasingly important in Australia, since the debate at national level had become “corrosive”.
“Politicians ignore clean energy at their peril,” Thornton said earlier this month at the Australian Clean Energy Summit 2015.
The next possible federal election will take place between next year and early 2017. John Grimes had been quoted in The Guardian newspaper recently vowing to use marginal seats to oust Abbott’s government.
