Ian Goodenough (Moore, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The original question was that this bill be now read a second time. To this the honourable member for McMahon has moved as an amendment that all words after 'That' be omitted with a view to substituting other words. If it suits the House, I will state the question in the form that the words proposed to be omitted stand part of the question.

Katie Allen (Higgins, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The world economy is transitioning to a zero net carbon future in a bid to protect future generations from the effects of climate change. Countries with the strongest ambitions in this transition are relying on more renewables and other emerging technologies, such as hydrogen, to get there. As many of us know, Australia has a long and complicated energy history, but it is now emerging at the forefront of renewable technology investment under the leadership of the Morrison government.

Alongside its commitment to renewable energy, the Morrison government is committed to encouraging investment to support the reliability of the electricity grid and improve affordability for energy users. On 30 October 2019, the Morrison government announced the introduction of a new $1 billion Grid Reliability Fund. This fund, to be administered by the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, will support investments in new energy generation, storage and transmission, and investments in infrastructure, including eligible projects short-listed under the Underwriting New Generation Investments program.

The Grid Reliability Fund will unlock private sector investment for clean energy projects. The fund will draw on the energy and financial markets' expertise of the CEFC to make further investments in reliable, clean energy technologies. The benefits of the Clean Energy Finance Corporation Amendment (Grid Reliability Fund) Bill 2020 are, ultimately, threefold. Firstly, it will secure the reliability of the grid. A reliable electricity supply that keeps the lights on is essential for Australian households and businesses. With an anticipated doubling of demand in our electricity sector, our energy mix will require an increase in energy generation that can deliver when customers need it. Providing the Clean Energy Finance Corporation with an additional $1 billion will benefit energy market participants by providing a trusted counterparty for grid reliability investments, allowing the government to crowd in private sector involvement and to leverage its finance.

Secondly, this bill will put downward pressure on prices. It is not enough just to keep the lights on; these lights must also be affordable. This can be achieved by shaking up the energy market and making way for new players. As Liberals, we know that competition is good for consumers. Projects supported by the CEFC and the new generation investment program will also address the concentration of energy generation asset ownership by improving access for new and smaller participants in the market. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission found that these small players often struggle to secure necessary finance due to large customers being unwilling to enter long-term offtake agreements. Additional support for these businesses will put downward pressure on wholesale electricity prices by increasing competition amongst generators. This is great news for Australian businesses and for Australian households.

Thirdly, this bill supports Australia's growing appetite for renewable energy. In 2019, Australia's investment per person in renewable energy was greater than countries such as the United States, Japan and Britain. That's no surprise. We are a large continent with lots of resources, when it comes to wind and sun. Consumers in Australia have got behind this. More than 2.2 million Australians have rooftop solar panels—the highest uptake anywhere in the world. This is, indeed, good news.

As a smart country with a willing citizenry, we are poised to identify new economic challenges and opportunities, particularly for technologies that provide storage and backup to the electricity, industry and transport sectors. This bill supports just that. The Grid Reliability Fund will also support the government's commitment to the Underwriting New Generation Investments program to support eligible and viable projects that are within the CEFC's investment mandate. The bill will not change the CEFC's ability to make individual investment decisions independent of government.

Gradually, coal-fired generators will leave the market to make way for new and innovative sources of energy generation. Many major energy companies are already making this energy transition. They will look to new flexible and dispatchable resources, such as pumped hydro and large-scale battery storage. However, as this transition takes place, gas will remain critical in its role in stabilising the grid, as has been identified by Australia's former Chief Scientist and chair of the Independent Review into the Future Security of the National Electricity Market, Dr Alan Finkel, a constituent of Higgins. This will allow the integration of renewable energies without compromising reliability and cost. In fact, in Dr Finkel's address to the National Press Club in February last year as Chief Scientist, he outlined the orderly transition to the 'electric planet', as he calls it, and that natural gas will play a critical role in that transition.

Around the globe, many nations are using national gas as a stable, cheap and low-emission electricity supply. Indeed, on home turf, South Australia has shifted from coal to an energy mix of solar and wind that sits at around 51 per cent. But, as we all know, when the wind isn't blowing and the sun isn't shining, natural gas supply stabilises the electricity supply in South Australia. We truly are at the dawn of a new and thriving industry, and, with government support from the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, we will unlock these industries and support existing companies to shift to more renewable products and practices and to help new and emerging companies to enter the market.

Last year, I joined some of my parliamentary colleagues and visited the Australian Renewable Energy Agency, often referred to as ARENA. Through ARENA, ActewAGL has received $2.4 million in funding to demonstrate vehicle-to-grid services in Australia. This is very exciting technology. It's still in the research phase but vehicle-to-grid technology is, basically, a battery on wheels that allows electric vehicles to discharge electricity back to the grid or even provide services to improve grid security. If this is to come to fruition, this project will be the first time that a fleet of vehicles using bidirectional charges will supply the grid. It's hard to imagine, but it's talking about converting our fleet of cars on the road to a virtual power plant on the move. This, essentially, means that, in the future, every time we get behind the wheel of an electric vehicle, we'll be adding power back into the grid. This means lower emissions and better electricity security. This is certainly just one step on the journey to creating an emissions-free country, but this is an example of Australian home-grown technology leading the way and something that we as a country should be enormously proud of.

The Morrison government understands that to reach future targets and reduce overall emissions we need to set out a clear pathway for business to thrive, and we are doing this through innovation and technology, not taxes. This is being done through the national Technology Investment Roadmap, a landmark paper that will drive investment in low-emission technology to strengthen our economy and support jobs and businesses. This will become more and more important as we start on the road to economic recovery from COVID-19. This road map will prioritise Australian government investments in new and developing technologies. Deploying the right technology when and where it is needed will allow Australian industry to capture these new opportunities. The road map will focus on some key points. These include developing technologies to support job growth, backing new industries to help regional communities and local economies to prosper, putting Australia at the forefront of research and development, and maintaining our strong track record of reducing global emissions.

Australia's climate action agenda is practical and it's clear-sighted, but it's driven by science and technology. It's driven by a clear understanding that science has come to our aid at many other times in a crisis and it will come to our aid again. There is enormous potential in technologies like hydrogen, carbon capture and storage, soil carbon sequestration, biofuels and resources and energy exports to reduce emissions whilst strengthening our economy. We will focus on technologies where we have a competitive advantage, in partnership with the private sector and like-minded countries.

The Morrison government knows that a shift from our reliance on coal will not happen overnight. The road map outlines key technology opportunities for Australia in the short, medium and long term. In the short term, investment will be key. This will set a strong foundation for a future of lower emissions. In the medium term, energy storage and infrastructure will mean we are set for the future. A shift to electric vehicles will also become tangible, as costs come down as more competitors enter the market. This is about a free-market approach to the EV. Finally, in the long term, we will reach a stage where we are global players in low-emission resource exporting. As Dr Alan Finkel said in his National Press Club speech, and is often prone to say, it's about shipping sunshine as an export.

Business and industry will be poised to move operations like manufacturing to more carbon-neutral practices—there's even a possibility of investing in the development of small modular reactors or molten salt reactors. Indeed, small modular nuclear reactors, at half the construction cost of today's reactors, have been identified as a focus for US president Joe Biden's new climate tech R&D agency, ARPA-C. In contrast, those opposite have dismissed nuclear energy as a fantasy. If we are going to get to a zero net carbon future, why have one arm tied behind our back?

Last year the government released its first annual Low Emissions Technology Statement, and this is a key milestone of the road-map process—it's the first in Australia's history. It identified the following priority stretch goals, and these are important because they provide a pragmatic way to understand how technology will underpin the transition. The first of those five stretch goals is clean hydrogen at under $2 per kilogram. The second is energy storage electricity for firming at under $100 per megawatt hour. The third is low-carbon materials, including low-emission steel production at under $900 per tonne and low-emission aluminium at under $2,700 per tonne. The fourth is carbon dioxide compression, hubs transport and storage at under $20 per tonne of CO2, and the fifth, which is great for farmers, is soil carbon measurement at under $3 per hectare per year. These are all pragmatic ambitions for our country to drive jobs, help our economy and get us to a clean and green future.

It's an incredibly exciting time to witness and be part of the new generation of energy production in Australia. The Clean Energy Finance Corporation will continue to be at the forefront of encouraging investment innovation and bravery within the renewables space. As a scientist who believes in technology and innovation, I commend this bill to the House.

Josh Burns (Macnamara, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Clean Energy Finance Corporation Amendment (Grid Reliability Fund) Bill 2020. I do so echoing the position of the member for McMahon and following the contribution of the member for Higgins. I know there are others across the aisle who are receiving a lot of heat from their electorate and a lot of demands to be a part of some of the solutions around climate change and lowering our emissions, but the reason why they have no credibility and why the small group of MPs on the other side of the House who dress themselves up in modernity are so uncomfortable is that they keep bowling up bills like this. I'm going to go through this bill and go through the amendments that the Labor Party is going to put forward, and I'm going to reiterate the point that, if the Labor Party is unsuccessful in getting our amendments through this place and through the Senate, we will not be supporting the bill.

The Clean Energy Finance Corporation was a creation of the Gillard government—a proud legacy of the Gillard government—and it was designed, as you may guess, to finance clean energy. It got this fancy name because it was really designed to boost renewables and low-emission technologies in Australia. The other thing it was meant to do was to do this in a way that made money, in a way that was economically viable. Its projects were to stand up with the support of the Clean Energy Finance Corporation in a way such that the corporation wouldn't just be expending but would also be getting a return on investment.

This bill that is before the House goes to the very fabric of what the Clean Energy Finance Corporation was all about. This bill contains amendments to make it so that it doesn't invest in just clean energy or low-emission technology, and it does it in a way that tries to remove some of the financial requisites in order to fund projects. They want to turn the Clean Energy Finance Corporation into the 'not such good investment on any sort of technology' corporation. They want to take the 'clean energy' and the 'finance' out of the Clean Energy Finance Corporation. It would be laughable if it weren't so shocking. It is clear why this small group of so-called modern Liberals are so uncomfortable with their position on climate change; it's because the government keeps bowling up bills like this.

The first thing to point out is that, since the corporation's inception, the federal government—the coalition—have, at every stage, tried to undermine the Clean Energy Finance Corporation. They have attacked it at every opportunity, and this is just the latest iteration. The first thing we are opposing in this bill is the provision relating to ministerial power. This bill seeks to introduce provisions that mean that, instead of the corporation having to make investment decisions based on factors like whether or not a project involves clean energy or is financially viable, the minister will have the power to supersede the Clean Energy Finance Corporation. We didn't hear anything from the member for Higgins about the ministerial power amendments in this bill, and I'm sure we're not going to hear anything from subsequent speakers about why it's such a good idea to give the current Minister for Energy and Emissions Reduction power to overrule and intercept the Clean Energy Finance Corporation.

We have seen time and time again why this government can't be trusted to manage the taxpayer funds of Australia. We saw the sports rorts saga where, instead of funding eligible sporting clubs, ministers intervened and funded clubs based on where they fit in the marginal seat spreadsheet, in collaboration with the Prime Minister's office. We've seen this minister for energy be far more distracted with interventions and downloads from the City of Sydney website, creating wars with Clover Moore. Most recently, we've seen the Minister for Home Affairs use his ministerial discretion on the Safer Communities Fund—the fund that is literally designed to protect our vulnerable communities. This is something I have a lot of experience with, having been involved in the design and also the rollout of some of the iterations of this program and having some of the vulnerable communities in my electorate. These are communities that are deemed at risk not by the whim of a minister but by our policing agencies and by our intelligence and security agencies. Instead of funding the eligible projects under that program, ministerial intervention resulted in the current Minister for Home Affairs investing in projects based on the seat's marginality. If a seat can be the basis on which a minister makes a decision, who knows what sort of ministerial intervention there will be in regard to the Clean Energy Finance Corporation!

I think that one of the biggest indications is the fact that this government wants to insert gas into the Clean Energy Finance Corporation capable technologies. I absolutely reiterate the words from the member for McMahon: gas has a role. It is a feature. Those who work in our gas production and gas pipelines are good and great Australians who work hard, contribute to our economy and do noble work. But what we're talking about here is whether or not the Clean Energy Finance Corporation should invest in technology that isn't clean or low emissions technology. It's a fact of science that gas is not a low emissions technology; it is an emissions intensive technology. While it still has a role to play in our economy for the foreseeable future, it is a fact that it shouldn't be underwritten by the Clean Energy Finance Corporation. We will move an amendment to say that the ministers should not be able to intercept the decision-making of the Clean Energy Finance Corporation and that this is a body that should be independent from government and should be making decisions based on strict criteria around whether or not it achieves low-emissions standards. We, on this side of the House, believe that gas should not be a part of that.

The final amendment really grinds my gears. To be honest, I think we all expected this government to attack the 'clean energy' part of the Clean Energy Finance Corporation—that would be true to form—but the finance bit really tells you a little bit about where this government is at. Not only are they wanting to tackle the clean energy bit and take the 'clean energy' bit out of the Clean Energy Finance Corporation but they want to soften and lower the financial requirements around positive returns from the Clean Energy Finance Corporation. Let me get this straight: they want to make a reform to the Clean Energy Finance Corporation by taking out the standards around clean energy and they want to do it in order to make it so that it doesn't get proper returns on investment. You couldn't make two more terrible changes to an act that is literally designed to do the exact opposite. The finance corporation is named in a way that is designed to show what it's all about, and this government wants to change it. They want to remove the 'clean' bit, the 'energy' bit and the 'finance' bit. They're leaving 'corporation' though—thank goodness! Or maybe they're not; who knows?

We, on this side of the House, say that the Clean Energy Finance Corporation should stick to its original principles as set out by the Gillard Labor government. It is a fund of government to help drive new and exciting technologies that are going to create jobs. We know that tackling climate change, taking action on climate change, is going to create jobs in this country. The new industries that are going to power Australia and help us develop into the next century are going to be jobs from the moving and low-emission technology that we are talking about today. What this government wants to do—and what will be the legacy of this government—is remove the requirements around clean energy and remove the requirements around the financial return in a way that gives the minister responsibility on the decisions. Well, it's hardly surprising that the minister wants those things taken out for his decisions. He wants to make decisions that result in bad financial outcomes and that don't invest in clean energy. That sums up this government pretty well: bad financial decisions and not investing in clean energy.

The final thing I want to say as I wrap up is about a comment made by the member for Higgins around nuclear energy. I'm guessing the member for Higgins doesn't flag that too often in her conversations with her local environment groups, but I can certainly say that, while we stand open on this side of the House to look at the technology advancements of nuclear technology as they unfold, right now the only technology that nuclear energy has are the large-scale nuclear reactors. That's the only thing that is there now that we can safely look at. If we were to build a large-scale nuclear reactor in Australia, it would take at least 15, maybe 20, years. It would cost somewhere in the vicinity of $10 billion to $15 billion. It's not viable. Ziggy Switkowski has had a look at this in great detail, and we have had a look at this as part of our environment and energy committee. It is just not feasible.

The Clean Energy Finance Corporation is a wonderful reminder of the need to look for the projects that are cheaper, that are more cost effective and that are going to give us that rate of return. Nuclear energy isn't even in the conversation. It's the most expensive form of energy, and that hasn't changed even without all of the technological advancements.

But the other thing to say about nuclear energy is that small modular reactors, which are obviously the talked-about emerging technology, are something that those on that side of the House like to fawn over. Well, they don't exist. If anyone can point me to a factory that's building modular reactors in the world right now, I'll buy your lunch. It doesn't exist. Small modular reactors aren't a thing yet. They might be in a decade—small modular reactors may become a thing. At the moment, NuScale has just pushed back its rollout of its first prototype to the end of the 2020s; it may even be to the start of 2030. It was meant to be delivered in 2026. They're often the prime example of this sort of modular prototype of a nuclear reactor that can be built in a factory. But, unless you're talking about the nuclear reactors that exist on submarines—and those are not 'modular'; they're just small reactors—they just don't exist. And they certainly don't exist without a military or government budget; I can assure the members of this House of that simple fact.

Those opposite come at this debate obviously uncomfortable from the pressure that they're feeling from their electorate, but they need not look at their electorate to realise why they're uncomfortable. They need to look at the legislation they keep bowling into the House of Representatives. The reason those modern Liberals on that side are so uncomfortable with the state of play of this government is: when we're talking about the opportunities of government, when we're talking about legacy in this place, when we're talking about the future of the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, what is their answer? Their answer is to rip out the 'clean energy' bit and to rip out the 'finance' bit and to give the current Minister for Energy and Emissions Reduction free rein to make bad decisions that don't lower emissions and that reduce your financial return on investment in energy. It couldn't be a worse return.

So, unless the amendments that are moved by the Labor Party pass this place, we will not be supporting this bill. And we stand ready to fight the awful legacy that is being left by this government which has no faith and no belief in the Clean Energy Finance Corporation.

Dave Sharma (Wentworth, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It's a pleasure to talk today on the Clean Energy Finance Corporation Amendment (Grid Reliability Fund) Bill 2020, but first I did want to thank my colleague the member for Macnamara for his concern for my welfare and wellbeing and I did want to assure him and others opposite that I'm entirely comfortable and relaxed—in fact, enthusiastic—about the government's energy policies and I feel entirely comfortable, relaxed and enthusiastic in explaining and articulating those to my constituents.

I think this is an important bill but, to understand why we are here, it's important to understand the journey, the story of how we got here, and it's the story of the energy transition that's underway in Australia. I know that this inflames passions amongst many people, but, to me, it has a sense of historical inevitability to it. It's like many of the industrial or energy transitions that humanity has been through before, in many iterations of our history.

This journey in Australia is underway at quite a remarkable rate. It was just a few weeks ago that the Clean Energy Regulator estimated that a record amount of seven gigawatts of new renewable energy capacity was installed in Australia last year. That is a record. It beats by 11 per cent the figure for 2019, of 6.3 gigawatts, and that 2019 figure was itself a record, beating the previous record of 2018, and on it goes. The increase in renewable energy capacity in Australia is underway at an exponential rate.

It has been, by and large, a solar installation boom that has driven this new record—notwithstanding the fact that COVID-19 restrictions did impact on the ability of solar rooftop installations to continue throughout last year. We're now in a situation in Australia where 2.2 million Australian homes, or roughly one in four Australian homes, have solar, which is the highest uptake of household solar anywhere in the world. In fact, in 2019, the last year for which these sorts of figures are available, Australia deployed new renewable energy capacity at least 10 times faster per person than the global average and four times faster per person than market countries such as Europe or the United States or China. It was 10 times faster than the global average and four times faster than OECD countries. In 2020, Australia invested $7.7 billion, or $299 per person, in renewable energy. This places us ahead of countries like Canada, Germany, Japan, Korea, New Zealand and the United States on a per-person basis. In fact, Australia now has the highest solar capacity per person of any country in the world, at 644 watts per person, and the highest wind and solar capacity of any country outside of Europe, at 804 watts per person. These are all good stories.

Over the last quarter of 2020, the share of renewables in the national electricity market—the main electricity market taking in most of the eastern states of Australia—exceeded 30 per cent, which is another first. In 2020, a record 53.6 terawatt hours of electricity was generated from renewables, including rooftop solar, in the national electricity market. Again, this is 16 per cent higher than the previous record, which was set in 2019. The strong investment in renewables is forecast to continue. Australia is projected to deploy an additional 24 gigawatts of rooftop solar by 2030. That's on top of the 6.3 gigawatts we installed in 2019 and the seven gigawatts in 2020. That will mean a tripling of the nation's small-scale solar generating capacity over the course of a decade.

The important lesson from all of this, I think, is that progress here is not linear; it's exponential. If you look at the years 2007 to 2013, for instance, when those opposite were in government, the policy imperative to switch to renewables was just as high but the technology was not as cheap, not as widely available and not as commercially competitive. In that six year period we managed to install a total of 5.6 gigawatts of renewable energy capacity—5.6 gigawatts over six years. Last year we installed seven gigawatts, the year before that we installed 6.3 gigawatts and in the next six years we expect to install another 24 gigawatts.

The story is positive elsewhere too. In the year to June 2020, emissions fell three per cent to their lowest level since 1998, and our emissions now are nearly 17 per cent below our 2005 levels. If you want to compare that figure to elsewhere, the OECD average for emissions reductions across the same period is nine per cent; in New Zealand it's one per cent and in Canada it's less than one per cent. As members here would know, our Paris emissions reduction target is 26 to 28 per cent below our 2005 emissions levels by 2030. The year is 2021, and we are already down 17 per cent on our 2005 levels; we are more than halfway there. It's clear to me that we will be able to meet our Paris emissions reduction target and that we will be able to do this without use of our Kyoto credits—which, I hasten to add, were legitimately earned by virtue of the fact that we beat our 2020 target by 459 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent.

This energy transition that is underway in Australia—and it is a remarkable story of transition—is not being driven by government fiat, new taxes or the exhaustion of fossil fuels. Like nearly every other major economic and energy transition that we've been through in our history, as a species, this transition is being driven by the availability and affordability of new technology, by commercial imperatives, by consumer appetite and by investor sentiment. The bill we are debating and discussing today, the Clean Energy Finance Corporation Amendment (Grid Reliability Fund) Bill 2020, is another step in this direction.

It was in October 2019 that the government announced the introduction of a new $1 billion Grid Reliability Fund. This fund, which will be administered by the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, will support investments in new energy generation, storage and transmission infrastructure, including eligible projects short-listed under the Underwriting New Generation Investments program. The CEFC Grid Reliability Fund bill will amend the Clean Energy Finance Corporation Act 2012 in order to implement and create the Grid Reliability Fund. Specifically, it will establish a $1 billion Grid Reliability Fund through a new special account, to be administered by the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, and allow for permits for regulations to expand this appropriation in the future so we can put more money into this fund. It also establishes a new category of Grid Reliability Fund investments, which are to be funded from this GRF special account. The GRF, the Grid Reliability Fund, will enable the Clean Energy Finance Corporation to invest in additional energy generation, storage, transmission and distribution infrastructure and grid-stabilising technologies. This will provide, over time, for greater affordability, reliability, stability and security of the electricity system, ensuring that, as we transition to more renewable energy in the grid, we combat intermittency and we ensure that the power provided is reliable and affordable. Providing the CEFC with an additional $1 billion will benefit energy market participants by providing a trusted counterparty for grid reliability investments and allowing the government to leverage private sector involvement and investment.

The Grid Reliability Fund will help ensure that Australia's world-leading deployment of renewables is integrated and backed up. As I said, it will support private investment in storage and transmission infrastructure and new reliable energy generation. As Australia recovers from COVID-19, affordable and reliable power will be critical to growing the economy and creating new jobs. Equally, for our survival as a nation and a species, it is important that we continue the transition to a lower emissions future. Australia's experience throughout this has been that, when new technologies become economically competitive, households and businesses rapidly adopt them. We are seeing that firsthand with renewables right now. On an energy-only basis, costs have fallen rapidly, and we've seen $30 billion invested in renewable energy since 2017. As I said earlier, Australia is now deploying new wind and solar 10 times faster per person than the global average and four times faster per person than places like China, Japan, the United States and Europe. One in four Australian households have solar panels on the roof or elsewhere around the home. In 2019 the share of wind and solar in Australia's electricity grids was more than double the global average, and it is projected to rise rapidly in coming years.

Of course, all of this renewable energy in the grid brings new challenges. While there's no shortage of investment in clean energy, the government has identified a lack of investment in the dispatchable generation needed to support the increase of intermittent generation. We need more flexible backup generation and storage, pumped hydro, batteries and, yes, gas to balance and integrate high shares of renewable energy. By focusing on getting the cost of new technologies down, we won't raise the cost of incumbent technologies, like coal and gas, that continue to play an important role in the energy mix.

The Grid Reliability Fund will work alongside the government's Technology Investment Roadmap to ensure affordable and reliable energy for all Australians while reducing our emissions. Eligible investments will include energy storage projects like pumped hydro and batteries, transmission and distribution infrastructure, grid-stabilising technologies and other eligible projects identified in the government's Underwriting New Generation Investments project. Importantly, the fund will not divert the CEFC's existing $10 billion allocation away from clean energy projects. The Grid Reliability Fund is $1 billion on top of that.

Some examples of projects that the Grid Reliability Fund could support in New South Wales include the creation of renewable energy zones, like the proposed Orana REZ; upgrades or extensions of the transmission network to support improved interregional trade and the reliability of grid stability; and dispatchable generation projects, like the UNGI short-listed Armidale pumped hydro project or the Port Kembla gas project. In Tasmania, projects that could be supported include the Marinus Link and the Battery of the Nation renewable pumped hydro projects. In South Australia, projects like Project EnergyConnect, the Baroota Pumped Hydro Project and the Reeves Plains gas project could be supported. In Victoria, projects could include improved transmission infrastructure projects, like the proposed VNI West project, and dispatchable generation projects, like the Bairnsdale gas upgrade or the proposed Dandenong power station. In Queensland, projects could include new transmission projects, such as CopperString 2.0, and dispatchable generation projects, like the proposed Cressbrook reservoir pumped hydro project near Toowoomba.

I know those opposite have difficulty with gas. They have difficulty with fossil fuels more generally. It's the case at the moment that coal continues to provide roughly 60 per cent of our power generation in Australia, and, whilst that percentage will undoubtedly lessen over time, it will remain an important part of our energy mix for the future. Anyone who follows this issue closely and invests it with the seriousness it deserves understands that, until such time as large-scale storage projects come down in cost, particularly battery technology or potentially hydrogen, we are going to be relying on gas to play more of a role in firming our grid and to allow the transition to a cleaner future, where renewables play a bigger role. That's the simple fact. The Chief Scientist, Alan Finkel, has laid this out quite clearly. Until at least 2030, possibly longer, we will need gas as a stabilising force within the grid to allow us to put more renewables into the grid and ensure that intermittency does not become an issue.

Fundamentally, I am an optimist about our ability as humans, as a species, to overcome some of the challenges that are placed before us. I don't think this is by any stretch the greatest challenge we've faced. There was Thomas Malthus's prediction that famine was an inevitable part of the human condition and would permanently limit the population of the earth. When Thomas Malthus wrote this in 1798, the world's population was 800 million people. Today it is 6.7 billion people, and on average they are much better nourished and much better fed, with much better life expectancy and a much better quality of life. Or there were the worries in the 1990s about the rapid depletion of the ozone layer. When the ozone hole was first discovered in 1982 it caused panic at the time, and rightly so, but today—you'd have to look this up because it's not in the news any more—the hole in the ozone layer is the smallest since it was first discovered in 1982.

Mr Bandt interjecting—

Because we did do something about it—I take the interjection—just as we are doing something about CO2 emissions in Australia.

Mr Bandt interjecting—

I take the member for Melbourne's interjection. As I say, this is not an argument for complacency; it is an argument against the counsels of despair that we hear too often in this debate, including from people such as the member for Melbourne.

Based on our ingenuity and our innovation as a species, I believe that getting the world to net zero emissions by 2050 is achievable. I would like to see Australia do it. I'd like to see us do it sooner if possible. As the Prime Minister said in his Press Club address earlier in the week, we need to focus not on the what but on the how. It will ultimately be the commercial availability of technology that drives this—our success in engineering new industrial methods, our ability to create renewable liquid fuels, our vision in reengineering our transport system, our success in creating new carbon sinks in the soil and elsewhere. These are fundamentally practical challenges of the sort we have overcome many times in our history. If we solve for these, we solve for net zero. So let's focus our efforts here.

Adam Bandt (Melbourne, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This is a slush fund for big gas corporations. That's what the Clean Energy Finance Corporation Amendment (Grid Reliability Fund) Bill 2020 is. The government that says, 'Technology, not taxes; we've got to let the market decide,' is about to open up the $10 billion that exists in the Clean Energy Finance Corporation and make it available to big gas corporations.

We know that gas is as dirty as coal. We know that methane, which leaks and is released into the atmosphere when you start fracking under good farmland and land across Australia, is up to 86 times more potent than CO2 as a greenhouse gas. We know that, if we unleash the gas in the Beetaloo Basin or in other places around Australia, we can say goodbye to making our contribution to giving our kids a safe climate to live in. We know that the technology is there now, with renewables and storage, to drive a clean energy revolution.

But what does this bill do? This bill comes in and says, 'Let's make public money available for gas corporations.' I notice the members on the other side have gone very quiet about this. For all their free market rhetoric, they cannot wait to shovel billions of dollars out the door to give to their mates in the gas corporations—the same corporations who turn around and donate to them. The biggest gas corporations in this country over the last few years brought in about $50 billion in revenue and paid zero tax. They did make some donations. They made donations to the government and they made some donations to the Labor Party, but they paid zero tax.

You would think the starting point with big corporations that are contributing to wrecking our planet should be, 'Pay some tax on the massive superprofits you are making and contribute a bit to the cost of dealing with the climate crisis.' But, no, this supposed free market government, that says it loves technology and won't want to interfere in the unleashing of technology, is about to take the Clean Energy Finance Corporation and the $10 billion that is there to drive the uptake of clean technologies in Australia and make it available to dirty, polluting gas and toxic methane. How is it going to do that? This bill changes the definition of what counts, effectively, as clean energy and what counts as low-emissions technology and expands it to explicitly include gas.

Let's just think about this for a moment. We have been told that the decisions we make in the next 10 years will determine whether we get the climate crisis under control. It is a matter of science that we are rapidly heading towards the edge of a cliff. If we go over that 2030 cliff, you can have all the 2050 targets in the world you like, and all the aspirations of getting there, but it will be too late. By that point, climate change will have become an unstoppable chain reaction and we won't be able to rein it in. On current forecasts, which the government blithely accepts, by the end of the century, during my daughter's lifetime, we are heading for an Australia that will be heated by more than four degrees. In a four-degree world, there is carrying capacity on this planet for a billion people. Going from 7½ billion people down to one billion people is an extraordinary amount of war and devastation and conflict. That is what is facing us. On the government's forecasts, that is the temperature we are heading towards unless we act in the next 10 years.

That is why, in the next 10 years, we need to massively invest in renewables and come up with a plan to put coal and gas out of the system. But what's the government doing? The government brings on a bill and says, 'We want to change the definition of clean energy to include gas.' President Biden and his climate envoy, John Kerry, have got it right. They've said that, at this stage, new gas infrastructure is not only going to end up as stranded assets but is massively counterproductive and will get in the way of us tackling the climate challenge. They've said very, very clearly that there is no space for new investment in gas if we want to stay within our carbon budget and avoid going over that climate cliff. That's what the United States government has said and it is what scientists have said. And they are right.

And what does this government do? Instead of coming in and saying, 'Let's have a plan to phase it out,' they're saying, 'Let's take public funds and give them to the gas corporations that pay no tax at the moment and make massive super profits.' This is a subsidy for big corporations that pay no tax and pollute and kill our planet. Why are they getting this money? It's because they make donations. They make donations to the Liberal Party, the Labor Party and the National Party—millions of dollars of donations—and they get their way.

What's even more astonishing is that the Clean Energy Finance Corporation is making a profit at the moment. It is investing in clean energy technologies, and that's the future. And it is making a return to government. This government wants to turn a profit-making Clean Energy Finance Corporation into a venture that invests in losing money on gas. The government knows that public subsidies for gas are the only way gas is going to be profitable, so it is turning a profit-making corporation into something that is going to start losing money on its gas investments—because it wants to bankroll them, and it wants to bankroll gas investments. The government knows that no-one in their right mind is looking at investing in new fossil fuel investments, so they come to the government with their hand out and this government of largesse and donations and subsidies for big corporations is giving money to them. It is not asking these big corporations to pay more tax. Instead, it is giving them massive public subsidies.

I'm waiting for the spirited defence from the member for Goldstein about why there are massive subsidies going to big corporations in his supposedly free market. I'm not hearing very much. All the free market 'technology, not taxes' rhetoric dissolves into dust when it comes to subsidising their big corporate mates. Big corporations have too much power over politicians. They exercise that power through political donations and, in return, they get things like this bill—a massive multibillion-dollar slush fund for big gas. And yet people wonder why the cost of going to the doctor keeps going up or why, when you send your kid to a public school, you get hit with all these voluntary school fees, and what is meant to be a free education turns out to be far from it. Why is everyone else having to pay more? Because these big corporations get away with paying no tax. And, instead of rectifying it, the government is about to give them even more public money.

So we are going to move to amend this, to stop this being turned into the minister's slush fund for gas. We will move to amend this. This government has never seen a fund that it didn't rort. This government loves rorting. The minister in question, the minister for energy, has a very dubious relationship with figures and data. So we are going to move to amend this bill so that the minister does not have the power to tell the independent Clean Energy Finance Corporation how to spend its money and so that the minister cannot come along and say, 'I am going to define gas and maybe even coal as a low-emissions technology.' We are going to stop the minister from being able to do that. And we are going to say to the minister that, if he really wants to take public money and put it into a new coal- or gas-fired power station, as he is regularly on the front page of various papers saying he wants to do, he should come back with a separate piece of legislation. The Clean Energy Finance Corporation is the 'Clean' Energy Finance Corporation. Don't try and use it as another slush fund for corporate mates to funnel money back to gas corporations. That is what he is proposing to do.

This Clean Energy Finance Corporation was set up by the Greens and Labor in the power-sharing parliament of 2010. This government has tried to destroy it. This government tried to wipe out all of that legacy. The only time pollution in this country meaningfully came down was when the Greens, Labor and Independents worked together and put a price on pollution and put in place the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, put in place the Australian Renewable Energy Agency and put in place things like the Carbon Farming Initiative. It has worked. The government tried to get rid of the CEFC. The government does not want this body to exist. The government does not want there to be a profitable government owned organisation that helps clean technologies expand. This is what the Clean Energy Finance Corporation does. It was established to say, 'When these new technologies that are invented pass the proof-of-concept space and turn out to be viable propositions, we will use public funds to help them grow and become self-sustaining businesses.' And it has worked. The CEFC has invested $8.2 billion of public money to generate $29 billion of new economic activity to support jobs and infrastructure and to bring new clean energy technologies online.

The technology that the Prime Minister loves talking about doesn't come out of nowhere. It comes out of organisations like the CEFC supporting researchers and businesses to take their ideas and turn them into viable commercial enterprises. That is what the CEFC is there for. Because renewables are the future and the fuel is free, the CEFC by investing the money has made $1.7 billion in profit from carefully chosen investments, money that actually goes straight back to the government's bottom line. So the CEFC is using public funds to take really good ideas in the renewables and clean energy space and help grow them into viable and thriving businesses. It makes money for the government, because when the businesses make money they pay some back. It is a terrific idea, and that is why the Greens, Labor and the Independents established it.

The government wants to repeal it. It has tried time and time again to repeal it. Because it has been unsuccessful in repealing it, it is now coming back with a different approach. The different approach is to say: 'We know that the public likes renewables and we know that this thing set up by the Greens, Labor and the Independents has been a roaring success and the public wants it. We can't repeal it anymore, so what are we going to do? We are going to change it. We are going to make the money available to the gas corporations. We are going to make it so that there's less money available for renewables and more money available for dirty fuel.' The thing that needs underlining is that the government is now hanging onto the CEFC and ARENA and saying, 'Look at these wonderful things that we are doing.' President Scott Morrison is telling Joe Biden, 'Don't worry; I have the CEFC and ARENA here'—

Luke Howarth (Petrie, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Youth and Employment Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member did not refer to the Prime Minister by his correct title.

Ian Goodenough (Moore, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Please refer to the Prime Minister by his correct title.

Adam Bandt (Melbourne, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thought I did. The Prime Minister is telling Joe Biden we've got all these wonderful things. He doesn't tell him that we tried to repeal them. What he doesn't say is that the only thing this government, in all the time since it's been elected, has that wasn't a Greens or Labor idea is its Emissions Reduction Fund, which has saved barely 200 million tonnes of abatement over its lifetime. The CEFC alone, last year, brought in 250 million tonnes. And the government's Emissions Reduction Fund involves the public paying the polluters whereas things like the CEFC make money by growing new technology and new businesses.

Why on earth would you want to tinker with that and take money away from renewables and make it available to the gas and coal and dirty fuel corporations? There can only be two answers. One is that you don't seriously believe in climate change—and we heard from the Deputy Prime Minister that he doesn't care what happens in 30 years time. He doesn't care if we go over that cliff and our kids are left to pick up the mess. So we understand why the government is moving this bill. It is because they don't care what's going to happen in 30 years time. The only other reason you'd do it is that your big corporate donors have asked you to. Those big corporate donors, that pay zero dollars in tax, aren't being asked by this government to pay their fair share. Instead, they're being given more handouts. It's time to say enough of the handouts for the big corporations. The big corporations and the billionaires need to pay their fair share of tax. They need to pay a bit more so that everyone else can pay a bit less. That's going to start by amending this bill.

Tim Wilson (Goldstein, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It's not often I get to start a speech in this chamber by saying, 'I'm about to get a free lunch!' because the member for Macnamara put out a challenge that any member who could come in and explain where a small modular reactor was being developed or utilised in the world today would get a free lunch. I went and did the research. Lo and behold, there is a floating SMR, Akademik Lomonosov, in the north-east region of Russia, right now, and it's used for the purpose of water desalinisation—the power of technology utilised to build the future and hydrate the planet and desalinate water. So, member for Macnamara, Elwood Bathers is a great restaurant in your electorate and I can't wait for the lunch!

It must be a difficult conversation for the member for Macnamara. He fits in as part of the science deniers on the Labor side of politics, who deny the science behind nuclear power and don't want to engage in understanding the power of these technologies. Don't get me wrong. As bad as the member for Macnamara is, he's not as bad as the ineffectual Marxist member for Melbourne, who's a science denier on genetically enhanced food and a science denier on nuclear power. And Senator Hanson-Young, in the other place, is now talking about how the Greens party is being infiltrated by anti-vaxxers, vaccine deniers, who are starting to look at the Greens party and go, 'They really don't like science technology, progress and building the future of this country.'

The focus of this government is to bring the future forward and build jobs and opportunities for Australians.

Hon. Members:

Honourable members interjecting—

Tim Wilson (Goldstein, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I hear the derision they throw towards gas. Clearly, the Marxist member for Melbourne has never been to a factory in his life. Go out the back of the Goldstein electorate and to parts of Hotham and parts of Isaacs and go to those factories that melt metals as part of their business. Do you know what fuel they use to melt the metal? It's gas. So you can rant and rave as much as you want about how you can't support it, about how you can't have it as part of the economy, but it's a critical part of the manufacturing base, including to do things like build components for electric cars. That's exactly what they do. But you can't do it. What are you going to do? Are you going to melt metals with the burning flames of what comes out of wind power or solar power? It's simply absurd. We've got to look at a mix of technologies. What we're trying to do in this bill is build a reliable energy base for the nation, and we should be holding on to that. When the Marxist member for Melbourne gets up here and says that he's so antinuclear and won't support it under any circumstances, even though he says there is a climate crisis, it shows you that he's prepared to shove other things in front of it and it's a dishonest statement. He doesn't actually believe it. He is not committed to it. He's an antinuclear activist who's not actually campaigning on climate

Debate interrupted.