Malcolm Roberts (Queensland, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Minister representing the Minister for Climate Change and Energy (Senator Wong) to a question without notice asked by Senator Hanson today relating to renewable energy.

The Ukraine conflict does not affect coal fired electricity prices in this country, because our domestic coal fired power stations have long-term price contracts. They are not subject to spot international prices. Fuel prices in coal fired generation are a tiny proportion. Secondly, no country transitioning to unreliable solar and wind has reduced electricity prices. Countries that increased solar and wind increased electricity prices every time. The relationship is approximately linear: more solar, more wind, higher prices. Thirdly, CSIRO projections rely on applying favourable and unreasonable hurdle rates for investing in unreliable and expensive solar and wind costs. CSIRO cost assessments of solar and wind do not include construction costs of the roads, the bridges et cetera coming in, disposable costs every 10 to 15 years—which is three times for the equivalent life of a coal fired power station. New offshore turbines are so big that they have to build ships dedicated to moving them. The cost of the ships is not included. Batteries essential for continuity of supply in wind and solar are not needed for coal. There is an extra $100 billion on solar and wind that is not included in the costings. Grid stability management due to wind and solar being unstable and asynchronous are not included in the costings. And transmission lines, because the distance from the generation sources to the cities where the customers are is so big that the transmission lines are estimated to be an extra $50 billion expense, are not needed for coal fired power. Why are solar and wind still subsidised? Who pays for these subsidies? It is the electricity users. That's what's driving up, in part, our electricity generation costs.

Question agreed to.