Late
last year Renew Economy's Giles Parkinson pointed out that an increasing number
of businesses as well as individuals are turning to renewables to cut their
power bills. "Time for Australia to wake up ....."
UK
billionaire Sanjeev Gupta plans to build a one gigawatt power system consisting
of large-scale solar, battery storage, pumped hydro and demand management for
the Whyalla steelworks and other big energy users in South Australia. He expects this to reduce his company’s
energy bills by about 40%.
Other
business examples are Nectar Farms’ investment of $750 million in wind and
battery storage for a new glass house and energy park near Stawell (Victoria)
and Zinc Metals, a North Queensland zinc
refiner, which is turning to solar to cut its power bills.
Parkinson
points out that while the cost of solar has fallen by 90% in the last five
years and the cost of battery storage is also dropping, the cost of grid power
has more than doubled.
He
claims this price increase has “little to do with the cost of technologies or
the cost of service”.
“It’s
more about the greed of the incumbents, the monopoly that own the networks, and
the oligopolies that control the wholesale markets and dominate the retail scene, and the totally inadequate supervision
by the regulators,” he said.
“Amid
all this, and with the opportunities that abound in Australia with its
resources in solar, wind, know-how and smart software, and the opportunity for
a major reduction in emissions, what does the consumer get from the politicians
and some of the principal regulators?”
He
claims the consumer gets “complete and utter nonsense” from both politicians
and regulators.
He
refers to the Coalition’s war against renewables which “is based on wild myths,
ignorance and prejudice”.
The
regulators for their part have allowed the National Energy Market to be
“rorted, gamed, manipulated, abused and priced to the point of absurdity where
businesses are now closing and low-income folk are going without food or other necessary
items – and those that can are investing in their own solar power and storage.”
It’s no
wonder energy policy is in such a mess.
- Leonie Blain
This article was originally published in the VOICES FOR THE EARTH column in The Daily Examiner on January 15, 2018.
