Richard Colbeck (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Hansard source

To facilitate the committee making a decision as to whether they do have a cognate debate on this, I seek leave to move my amendments so that they are on the table and we can continue the debate on that basis.

Leave granted.

I move opposition amendments (1) and (2) on sheet 6158:

(1)    Clause 3, page 2 (lines 7 to 11), omit the clause, substitute:

        (1)    Each Act, and each set of regulations, that is specified in a Schedule to this Act is amended or repealed as set out in the applicable items in the Schedule concerned, and any other item in a Schedule to this Act has effect according to its terms.

        (2)    The amendment of any regulation under subsection (1) does not prevent the regulation, as so amended, from being amended or repealed by the Governor-General.

(2)    Schedule 1, Part 2, page 80 (after line 4), at the end of the Part, add:

Renewable Energy (Electricity) Regulations 2001

137  Paragraph 8(2)(b)

Repeal the paragraph, substitute:

             (b)    a by-product (including thinnings and coppicing) of a harvesting operation that is carried out in accordance with ecologically sustainable forest management principles; and

138  Subregulation 8(3)

Repeal the subregulation.

139  Subregulation 8(4) (definition of high value process)

Repeal the definition.

140  At the end of subparagraph 9(1)(b)(ii)

Omit “;”, substitute “.”.

141  Paragraph 9(1)(c)

Repeal the paragraph.

I will not take too much of the chamber’s time but I do want to speak to these amendments. It is pertinent that Senator Wong has said that there have been very few renewable energy certificates generated from the use of biomass under the current regulations. It is quite clear that the current regulations inhibit the generation of renewable energy through the use of biomass.

I think it is fairly obvious that I disagree with Senator Brown and Senator Milne that biomass is not a renewable energy source—it obviously is. That is even demonstrated by some of their pronouncements. I mentioned yesterday that I was in a forest six or eight weeks ago that Senator Brown and Senator Milne would have declared destroyed under the current logging regimes but they now claim that forest as a high conservation value forest.

Interestingly, I note that they also claim, under the maps issued by the Wilderness Society, some pine and eucalypt plantations, so perhaps there is some confusion in their minds as to what a high conservation value forest really is. But that is part of the forestry debate that we do not necessarily need to go through now because are debating renewable energy.

I am disappointed that Senator Brown again used the politics of personal denigration. I suspect I will cop the same but that is the stock in trade that he, disappointingly, tends to operate under. We have seen that happen in Tasmania to senior figures in the forestry sector. The first task is to tear them down and tear down their credibility so that they cannot effectively make an argument. That is the way the Greens tend to operate.

I want to put on the record what is possible and what is happening in other parts of the world in the generation of energy from woody biomass. In 2008 about 27 per cent of Sweden’s energy came from mainly woody biomass. At present the target is to increase this figure to 39 per cent by 2020. Sweden aims to use that to eliminate imports of fossil fuels by 2025.

So there are countries that are actually utilising woody biomass for energy generation. I saw it myself in Finland when I was there last year. The trimmings from their forestry operations are stacked on the sides of the coops, dried there for a couple of years and then used to generate energy in local communities—they do not have the distribution networks that we have here in Australia. In Finland approximately 20 per cent of electricity is produced from biomass derived almost entirely from forestry waste or from timber processing. About 23 per cent of the country’s overall energy supply is now derived from this. Finland aims to meet 39 per cent of its national energy needs from renewable energy sources, including biomass, by 2020.

There is clearly an opportunity here for this. I understand that the Greens have a fundamental disposition against any form of native forest logging, and they put up distorted facts to push the argument that it can all come from plantations. I put on the record yesterday the fact that it cannot and I want to put another example on the table. Two weeks ago I was at a plant in New South Wales that could replace 75 per cent of their current fossil fuel energy source by using waste generated on-site. They are currently using coal in their boilers, unfortunately. They would like to change that. Seventy-five per cent of it can be replaced with bioenergy from wood waste generated on-site in their plant. They do not have to touch another tree; they do not have to touch another twig. That is what can occur in the here and now.

As I said yesterday, in terms of life cycle it is up to 56 times cleaner than emissions based on coal, so there really is an opportunity here for us to provide the opportunity to genuinely utilise biomass in Australia. The current regulations obviously are an inhibitor to that, which is demonstrated by the comments that Senator Wong put on the table. I do not need to go into a long dissertation about the misinformation that the Greens put on the table in relation to the forest industry. That is well understood by many. But I will talk about the opinion poll that Senator Brown talked about, which would have to be one of the most blatant examples of push polling that I have ever seen. Once you actually read what the Greens, through their pollsters, asked, you see that they start with a statement that talks about a certain perspective and then ask a question based on the statement. They do not necessarily just ask a question to get a result. It is very clearly push polling and it needs to be seen for that. It really is worthless in respect of the story that it tells except that it gives Senator Brown something that he can go out and publicly spout as supporting his argument. Quite frankly, it is completely and utterly worthless as an argument because it is quite clearly push polling.

I understand that most likely the chamber is not going to support this amendment, but it is an important amendment and it has been put up genuinely, not because I have been told to put it up by the forest industries, as Senator Brown might want to imply—again, the politics of denigration. It is because I have been out and actually had a look around. I have been to other countries to see what is being done and what can be done. There is an opportunity here and it is going to take a change to the regulations for that to occur. I understand that the Greens do not like that and that they have this philosophical view—that is fine—but I think that there is an opportunity for us to do something positive here. That is why I have moved the amendment, not because somebody else wants me to do it. I have taken the opportunity to study it; I have actually worked in the timber and construction industry and I know that there are waste streams that can be very effectively put to use for the generation of renewable energy, just like they will be in the pulp mill in the Tamar Valley, proposed by Gunns. A significant amount of energy will be generated by that mill from waste product. Senator Brown still does not support the mill, even though it is being transformed from a mix of plantation and native product to purely plantation product. Any suggestion that the Greens will ever support a pulp mill in Tasmania I think is dancing with the fairies at the bottom of the garden. I do not believe that will ever occur, that they will ever support that, because they are philosophically opposed to it. I understand that; that is fine with me. But here is an opportunity for us to put on the table the opportunity to genuinely generate energy in a way that is being done in other places around the world and to make some amendments to allow that to happen in Australia.