Peter Khalil (Wills, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Climate Change and Energy. How is the Albanese Labor government working to deliver reliable electricity? Are there any threats to this approach?

Chris Bowen (McMahon, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Climate Change and Energy) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank my friend for his question and his very strong leadership in his electorate and here in Canberra as well on matters of climate change. Last week the Albanese government did announce a very significant step to ensure that our transition to renewable energy is more orderly and faster, and that's necessary for a number of reasons. Of course we all know that renewable energy is very good for emissions, but this is also a vital step to ensure the reliability of our energy system. After a decade in which four gigawatts of dispatchable power left the grid and only one gigawatt came on, we knew that we had to act to ensure that new energy is introduced to the system before old energy leaves. The previous government had an approach of leaving it until after coal-fired power stations closed. We take the approach of getting the investment on ahead of those changes.

This is important for reliability because the average age of Australia's coal-fired fleet is 33 years. Inevitably, after many decades of service, coal-fired power stations increasingly encounter issues. In fact, today, as we speak, there are nine coal-fired power stations across Australia with one or more units out of action. That equates to about 3.8 gigawatts of power we do not currently have access to. If we'd had a better regime in place to get more investment on earlier, we wouldn't be so reliant on that increasingly unreliable source of energy. Now, this is very important for Australian industry. It's important for Australian households. That's why the announcement last week has been so broadly welcomed not just by climate groups, not just by energy groups but by the Australian Industry Group, by the Energy Users Association of Australia and by the Australian Aluminium Council, who referred to this announcement as being crucial for Australia's energy future.

As important as last week's announcement was, it was not, of course, the only important announcement. In fact, last year, working very closely together, the minister for resources, minister for industry, the Treasurer and I announced the gas code, which is necessary. Now, there has been a disallowance moved in the Senate by the Greens. They say they don't like gas. They want to rip up the only regulation of gas. This code requires new gas supply to be supplied to Australia. If they succeed in ripping up the gas code, the gas can still be extracted and sent overseas. That's the big genius move by the Greens party. We don't know the views of the opposition. They haven't declared their view. It's up for a vote in a few hours. But we know they like a gas led recovery. The Greens also apparently support a gas led recovery—just not one that's in Australia.