Antinuclear

The main mechanism is the idea of establishing a Renewable Energy Advocate within the public service: a position that will work with investors and proponents to identify resources that the state has, and a number of actions relating to resource mapping, to network connections and planning processes – this will all be within the role of the Renewable Energy Advocate…. The Advocate would be one person working with a team of specialists within New South Wales Industry and Investment. ….

What sort of renewables projects is the Government hoping to attract to the state? Will residential solar be encouraged with any support in the final plan?

In New South Wales, we’ve had plenty of experience with well-intentioned but poorly-designed clean energy support schemes, so we’re not keen to go down the route of having ad-hoc schemes to promote different technologies. We are ‘technology agnostic’, and our plan does not seek to ‘pick winners’.

We want to attract all types of investment. We’ll leave it to the market to determine what the best proposals are, and we’ll work with those proponents to help them navigate the process.

I see big gains being made in mid-scale or utility-scale solar; that could well be a game-changer. That’s where the costs are changing all the time, and faster than most people anticipated. Wind has always been identified as the cheapest in a large-scale sense, but the cost reductions in the levelised cost of electricity for wind are not as great as in solar, particularly utility-scale solar.

Then there are other technologies that have great potential but still have a way to go, such as geothermal and wave energy. The South Australian Government’s clean energy strategy did seek to pick a winner, and for obvious resource reasons chose wind. New South Wales’ resource base is large – we’ve got lots of everything. We’re not seeking to promote any one technology over another.
Will the final plan propose any solutions for wind project planning laws or regulations to help address the future needs of project developers?

There is definitely capacity to look at amending planning laws to accommodate investment in wind or even utility-scale solar. We’re currently re-writing our state planning laws, and there’s enormous capacity to look at changing laws for our energy projects right across the board and addressing regulatory barriers.

All energy projects generate a lot of community attention, from fossil fuel projects to renewables projects. The answer is not to remove the community from the process. Under our old planning laws in New South Wales, the previous government thought the best idea to get around community concerns was to remove the community from the planning process. That just makes the problems worse. You have to include them genuinely, listen to what they say, and give them real rights in the process.

At the same time, you have to ensure the community is actively armed with information about not just the challenges but the benefits of energy projects. If there is a void of information, it will be filled with misinformation – that’s why the work of the Renewable Energy Co-ordinators in New South Wales is so important, so that we can be upfront and clear with communities on challenges and benefits of clean energy, and not seek to evade consultation.
The Australian Capital Territory Government has unveiled a target for 90 per cent renewable energy by 2020; why is the New South Wales Government’s target 20 per cent by 2020? Is the 20 per cent figure aimed at maintaining consistency with the Federal Government’s Renewable Energy Target (RET)?

Our target is the national target; we accept that we’re part of Australia and part of the National Electricity Market. Our plan is directed towards what opportunities we can promote within the RET.

It’s sensible to turn our minds to what will happen after 2020. We work within the investment framework set up by the Federal Government, and we look forward to seeing what comes out of the Climate Change Authority’s RET Review. I’ll reiterate the message that I’ve received from the industry, which is they want certainty, not constant change. Let’s determine what the future of Australian clean energy is going to be, and then let our thinking be about how we’ll reach that future…….. http://ecogeneration.com.au/news/rob_stokes_on_clean_energy_in_new_south_wales/078646/