#REPLACING FOSSIL WATCH BATTERIES INSTALL#

We need them all working together to make our energy more affordable, reliable and robust than it has ever been. But in a few short years, our millions of households and businesses will operate a vast network of tiny power stations, batteries and flexible loads. The rules of the current system were written for handful of giant coal and gas plants that caused our current crisis. Let’s take it national.įifth: Finally, we need new rules that back households, not fossil fuel companies.Īs the government redesigns the electricity market, it must deliver a set of rules suited not to the world that is passed, but the world that is coming: a world in which most machines in our lives will be electric, where most of our energy will come from the sun, where the cheapest power will be the stuff that comes off our roofs. This program delivered dozens of small-scale renewable projects for community groups like sporting clubs and childcare facilities, returning $13 of benefit for every dollar invested. We could have hundreds more.Īnd at the community scale, the government should pick up the successful Victorian Power Hub program and roll it out nationally. Australia already has a handful of such locally-owned projects. The government could achieve this by unlocking investment in mid-scale, community-owned solar and wind projects with a simple underwriting scheme. To move at the required speed, we need to deliver more of the economic benefits of renewables to the regional communities that play host to them.

Australia needs more renewables, and fast. Labor’s community battery plan should be brought forward, starting with the most vulnerable communities at edge-of-grid locations like Corryong, which is developing its own micro-grid in response to the 2019-20 bushfires.įourth: we need to boost local ownership of renewable energy generation.

Third: we need to secure the grid by accelerating the roll-out of batteries. Nearly every appliance manufacturer that makes gas appliances also makes electric equivalents, so a clear timeline for transition allows for straightforward business planning. The Netherlands is phasing out new natural gas appliances by 2025 and will heat all its 8 million homes with electricity by 2050. But electric vehicles are coming, and a clear timeline and incentives for their adoption will make them cheaper for everyone. With our vast distances and after a decade of bad policy, these timelines are probably too ambitious for Australia. The UK will end the sale of petrol and diesel cars by 2030. Second: the government could also give the market certainty by adopting phase-out dates for the sale of new fossil-burning machines. No-interest loans address this inequity as well as reducing demand on the grid. As it stands poorer Australians are stuck paying higher power bills because they are locked out of renewables for their home, or more efficient appliances.

#REPLACING FOSSIL WATCH BATTERIES INSTALL#

A $10,000 loan for households to install solar, batteries, reverse-cycle air conditioners, solar hot water, electric cooktops or double-glazing would unlock immediate savings for millions of households. This is where the government can step up. And with the price of everything going up, most people don’t have the cash on hand to get into the great electrification savings game. Australians know technologies cheaper to run over the long haul are more expensive to buy up front. That’s why the current moment calls for a comprehensive household and community energy package, led by the federal government.įirst: electrification loans. In fact, at just 2 cents per kilometre, driving an electric car will be 90 per cent cheaper than a petrol one. They want them and cannot fathom why government policy has frustrated their arrival.Īustralians understand once we are driving electric cars fuelled by rooftop solar, it will be much cheaper. That is why they are frustrated when the government changes the feed-in tariffs they have enjoyed.Īustralians also know electric vehicles are coming.

Households and communities – the people who purchase and use electricity – must move to the centre of energy and climate policy.Īustralians know rooftop solar has been a good deal, and only continues to get better. If we are to lower energy bills and meet our climate targets, we really need to think about the demand side. So far, the blame game for the crisis has focused heavily on supply side problems in electricity generation – the unreliable coal power stations, the broken supply lines. These two facts give us both an opportunity for sensible energy reform, and a government that might be smart enough to seize it. Australia has an energy crisis and a new government.

Replacing fossil watch batteries