Rowan Ramsey (Grey, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

My colleague reminds me that that was completely wrong—and, in fact, the upgrade has only just been completed in the last 12 months. No sooner had we completed that upgrade to Victoria than Port Augusta shut down, and we found out that it was not sufficient. Even when it is working correctly it is not sufficient. I emphasise this fact by pointing out that in the 2016 calendar year the average spot price in South Australia was a bit over double Victoria's—about $104 per megawatt hour. Now, remember, I was just talking about what drove Alinta out of business, and that was the $45 per megawatt hour. So once we removed that base load generator the price doubled. We are running at double Victoria's price.

A lot of people have raised with me the issue of reliability in South Australia, and they are very right to point to it. But it is an absolutely secondary issue. It is a secondary issue because electricity in South Australia has become so expensive that investors are leaving the state. Our young people are leaving the state. Businesses that were planning to expand are not expanding. Those that can relocate do so, and even those that are using vast amounts of electricity are questioning their operating practices and their reason for being in that space. There are a number of things we can do about that, but it will not be a return to coal for South Australia; I am very confident about that. We do not have high-quality coal reserves; we have brown coal, which is inherently a higher production platform for CO2 emissions. So it will be gas and it will be renewable.

Gas is an absolute problem at the moment. I am very pleased that the Prime Minister convened a meeting of people in the gas industry to try and work out how to bring about better domestic supply. That was only caused by scare merchants propagating an argument against tight gas—that it is unsustainable. It has been Science Week in Canberra, and I met with some people from CSIRO who understand the science of hydraulic fracturing. These are absurd arguments that are propagated by the green Left, who are just totally opposed to fossil fuel in any shape or form.

We have so many challenges in front of us, and a lot of the answers to them will be renewable. But I say to the South Australian government: no more renewable unless—and I underline 'unless'—it includes storage.

Question agreed to.

Federation Chamber adjourned 12:58

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