Sid Sidebottom (Braddon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

In rising to speak on the Australian Renewable Energy Agency Bill 2011 and the cognate bill, I say good morning, colleagues, and it is terrific to be here with you discussing what is so absolutely crucial to our economy, our community and, indeed, to our planet. It is part of our global responsibility to be talking about a clean energy future, most especially in relation to our clean energy package. One of the fundamental parts of that package is the creation of the Australian Renewable Energy Agency, ARENA.

I was very pleased yesterday to have heard the opposition spokesperson, my friend the member for Groom, support this legislation. I find that very heartening for a number of reasons. One is that I know personally that he does support it and I suspect that he very strongly supports our whole clean energy package. He was within one vote of securing something similar a number of months ago from those on the other side, yet you would never know that if you listen to them speaking about the legislation since. I suspect that he is a strong believer in the package because he knows the creation of such an agency is required to bring about a cleaner energy future.

Secondly, I suspect that the support on the other side of the chamber means that they do not really have an intention to roll back this legislation in the future. I strongly suspect that will not occur and that they know it. But I do welcome it.

Thirdly, as the member for Groom understands—and certainly our ministers responsible for introducing the clean energy future package understand—such an agency makes sense: it is rational, it is practical. What it really does is consolidate the decision making around clean energy proposals into a single body, incorporate the expertise that currently exists in a number of other bodies associated with renewable energy projects and their application throughout Australia and consolidate the ability to decide on new projects and the allocation of funds which currently exist or are not allocated as yet. So I do commend the opposition on their support of this really important, practical, sensible, realistic and appropriate legislation.

ARENA, as the new agency in the Department of Resources, Energy and Tourism portfolio, will incorporate initiatives previously administered separately through a range of bodies, including the Australian Centre for Renewable Energy, the Australian Solar Institute and the Department of Resources, Energy and Tourism. The collective have done a remarkably good job as they evolved the various renewable energy projects, and of course the huge potential that still exists within renewable energies, and their expertise will be incorporated in ARENA. I find that very heartening. ARENA will have an independent decision-making board appointed by the Minister for Resources and Energy and it will also have a CEO appointed by the Minister for Resources and Energy on the recommendation of the ARENA board. ARENA's role will be to allocate funding to renewable energy and enabling technology projects. The Department of Resources, Energy and Tourism will provide administrative support to ARENA. The legislation before us also deals with the governance arrangements in relation to ARENA.

The establishment of ARENA will not delay the delivery of existing initiatives, and the Renewable Energy Venture Capital Fund application process continues, as will the rollout of the Emerging Renewables Program, while ASI, the Australian Solar Institute, will continue to deliver its existing programs. Upon its establishment, ARENA will take over responsibility for these initiatives. ARENA will manage the $3.2 billion investment in renewable energy investments to promote research and development, demonstration, commercialisation and deployment of renewable energy projects to improve the sector's competitiveness. Around $1.7 billion in uncommitted funding from a range of consolidated programs will be available to the ARENA board to invest in new renewable energy projects such as large-scale solar, geothermal and ocean. It will also include projects that potentially involve renewable energy related transmission infrastructure investments between now and 2020.

This funding will be allocated in accordance with the funding strategy developed by the ARENA board. ARENA will fund projects that will help increase the deployment of renewable energy and drive down its costs in an Australian context. It will complement the new Clean Energy Finance Corporation. ARENA will oversee existing government support from the following initiatives and will have responsibility for managing the unallocated funds from these initiatives—for example, the Solar Flagships Program, the Australian Solar Institute, Low Emissions Technology Demonstration Fund (Solar), Renewable Energy Demonstration Program, ACRE Solar Projects, Renewable Energy Venture Capital Fund, Australian Biofuels Research Institute, Emerging Renewables Program, Geothermal Drilling Program, Second Generation Biofuels Research and Development Program and, finally, Connecting Renewables Initiative. That is the purview of this legislation. As I said before, it is a consolidation of the ideas, technologies, funding, expertise and investment in research and development related to Australian renewable energy.

While I am on that really interesting topic of renewable energy, you cannot think renewable energy unless you think of Tasmania. We are the renewable energy capital of not just Australia but our wider region.

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