Rachel Siewert (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Treasury Laws Amendment (Prohibiting Energy Market Misconduct) Bill 2019. I wish to make a contribution to this debate because this is an important debate and I'm deeply concerned about where it's going to lead this country in the future. I disagree totally with those that claim that this has nothing to do with climate change. Anybody that thinks that obviously has not been paying attention to the issues around energy generation and its contribution to our worsening climate emergency.

This bill provides the government with new powers to prohibit conduct in relation to energy retail, contract and wholesale markets. It represents the latest round of the government's ideological war on a rational energy transition to renewable energy. It is clear the main motivation for the bill is to enable the government to bully power companies to keep unreliable coal-fired power stations open longer—the first being Liddell. The critical concern for us is the increased uncertainty this bill and the powers contained within the bill create for investors in an already uncertain energy sector.

There were many people and many organisations that presented evidence to the committee to indicate their opposition to the bill and the concerns they had about the uncertainty. A number of legal bodies and policy experts, including the Grattan Institute and the Law Council, have expressed deep concerns. The reality is that pollution is increasing year after year, and electricity prices have continued to rise under this government. I'm particularly concerned about the future of energy production in this country that, if left as is, will continue our climate change emergency.

I'd like to draw the Senate's attention to a report recently released in Western Australia that demonstrates just how much pollution is going up under this government and, particularly, what some people think is a remedy to our climate change crisis—liquefied natural gas, LNG. The Conservation Council of Western Australia report is titled Runaway train: the impact of WA's LNG industry on meeting our Paris targets and national efforts to tackle climate change. This is the first time a report has investigated the full impact of greenhouse gas emissions from WA's LNG, and it's findings are starkly alarming.

The report found that Western Australia's LNG industry is single-handedly cancelling out the entire country's efforts to tackle climate change and carbon pollution. Australia has a commitment, as we know, under the Paris Agreement that requires pollution to be reduced by 26 to 28 per cent from the 2005 baseline year. But the current and proposed LNG projects will threaten this target by adding 41.6 million tonnes of pollution a year. This additional pollution is equivalent to a 61 per cent increase on WA's 2005 emissions baseline and an eight per cent increase on Australia's 2005 baseline.

As a result, WA's LNG pollution is single-handedly breaching the Paris Agreement. While there has been progress by some states in achieving emissions reductions, WA's emissions have risen by 23 per cent since 2003. Emissions from current WA LNG facilities make up 36 per cent of WA's total annual emissions. If the proposed Woodside Burrup Hub expansion is approved, opening up the Browse and Scarborough gas fields, emissions from WA's current and proposed LNG facilities will account for 47 per cent of WA's annual emissions. Pollution from WA's current and proposed LNG facilities, combined, will be as high as the total annual emissions from countries such as Ireland, Sweden, Hong Kong and New Zealand. This, quite frankly, is disgraceful.

Part of the problem is that there are no effective controls on carbon pollution on big polluters like Chevron and Woodside. The WA government's measures to control and regulate carbon pollution from LNG remain totally ineffective at constraining pollution growth from the sector. Our big corporations are able to pollute our country and get away with it. WA's LNG pollution is out of control and having a damaging impact on our efforts to reduce emissions. The rapid expansion of LNG pollution in Western Australia is the most significant industrial driver of carbon pollution increases in WA and Australia as a whole.

The most significant finding from the report is that over the next 12 years the total cumulative emissions from WA's five current LNG facilities will cancel out our entire abatement expected to be delivered under the emissions reduction scheme. We were devastated when we saw this report that was released just last week. Gas, for those of you that think it is, is not our savour. This bill is not our savour. We need real action on our climate emergency, and we need it now.