Climate Change and Energy Policy

Principles

1. Climate change, caused primarily by reliance on polluting fossil fuels for energy, is the greatest challenge facing humanity this century.  Both its impact and the way it is tackled will have immense ramifications for society, the economy and the environment.  Climate change must be factored into every decision governments make and must be top priority in all decisions about the state’s energy networks.
2. A substantial change is required in energy policy and investments, shifting from a centralised, inefficient, coal-dominated network to a decentralised system based on renewable energy sources and maximising efficiency
3. A “just transition” is required for communities and workers who have traditionally derived income from coal mining operations
4. If this change is made deliberately and supported by appropriate industry development policies, new energy industries can provide high quality, local, state-wide and national wealth creation, export opportunities and other social and economic benefits
5. Governments must have a forward looking internationally acceptable strategy which includes time frames and targets for this transition to renewable energy
6. The principle of ‘polluter pays’ applies to polluting energy generation and inefficient energy processes and products.
7. Our responsibilities regarding climate change are to the global community, to future generations and to other nations as they become the causalities of climate change.
8. Governments must actively support the research, development and growth of renewable energy industries such as wind, solar, small scale hydro, sustainable biofuels, wave and geothermal energy.
9. Nuclear energy is excluded as an option on the basis of its limited supply, its lack of environmental safety and its threat to security.
10. The emphasis and government resourcing of ‘clean cloal’ including the geosequestration of carbon dioxide should be diverted to the development and growth of renewable energy industries.
11. There is an urgent need to proactively plan for climate changes especially regarding strategies for managing impacts on biodiversity, land and water use, disease patterns and lifestyles.

Detail

General

The Greens NSW will work towards:

12. Reducing NSW’s greenhouse gas emissions within a trajectory of binding targets for the next fifty years and beyond that are determined by the latest scientific research to be NSW’s contribution to best global efforts to minimise the chances of dangerous increases in average temperature;

13. Ensuring that no new emissions-intensive investment in generation or large scale industrial processes occurs in NSW;
14. Identifying and implementing an investment pathway to a much lower emissions economy;

The Greens NSW will:

15. Reject carbon capture and storage (CCS – geosequestration as an attempt by coal corporations to greenwash their polluting product. CCS could only ever play a marginal and highly risky role in reducing global greenhouse emissions and has no potential in NSW, given the lack of safe storage sites. The dead-end focus on CCS is effectively undermining the vital transition to renewable energy and energy efficiency;
16. Oppose the expansion of coal mining in NSW and the expansion of coal export infrastructure, including Hunter rail networks and the Newcastle Port. The role of NSW as a global coal-pusher must come to an end  (see Coal Policy for further details);
17. Reject nuclear power because it poses massive environmental, security and economic problems and can never play a significant role in reducing global greenhouse emissions as its lifecycle emissions are too great and resource stocks are far too small;
18. Recognise that the simplistic NEM market reform of the past decade have increased Australia’s greenhouse intensity, making the cheapest and dirtiest power source – Victoria’s brown coal – more competitive. Further, the profound transitions necessary to achieve sustainability require mechanisms other than markets, such as mandatory energy efficiency standards, least-cost planning requirements, binding greenhouse benchmarks and renewable energy targets;
19. Will work to reform the National Electricity Market (NEM) to remove competitive advantages given to pollution-intensive sources such as Victorian brown coal generators and
• Internalise all environmental externalities
• Remove barriers to new low-emissions entrants
• Create and enforce mandatory energy efficiency standards
• Require least-cost planning
• Set binding greenhouse benchmarks renewable energy targets

Fossil Fuels

The Greens NSW:

20. Support the selective phasing out of existing coal fired power stations, starting with the most carbon pollution intensive, while guaranteeing continuity of employment, conditions and access to retraining for all power station workers and financial assistance and targeted industry development for affected communities;
21. Oppose the privatisation of the state’s generators or retailers because of the unacceptable impacts on emissions reduction, employment and household energy bills;
22. Support the strengthening of the Electricity Retailer Benchmarks legislation by increasing   financial penalties for non-compliance. In the medium term the scheme should be replaced by effective carbon pricing and renewable energy and energy efficiency targets, standards and support programs;
23. Will foster the development of sustainable energy industries that will create employment growth in research, development, manufacturing, marketing, installation, maintenance and education that will far outweigh jobs losses in the fossil fuel industry. Industry development and workplace transition policies must be aligned to ensure geographic regions and economic areas bearing the burden of transition, share in the growth of the sustainable energy sector. This must include explicit industry development and industrial relations initiatives;

Renewable Energy

The Greens NSW:

24. Will implement a planned, strategic phase-in of renewable energy technologies including legislated, binding targets that increase over time as a fraction of the state’s electricity generated;
25. Will implement government purchasing initiatives including requiring all NSW government agencies to purchase a minimum of 10% Greenpower rising to rising to 50% within four years, or directly install renewable energy capacity on their buildings. The cost of this could be offset by energy efficiency measures;
26. Will legislate to prevent non-Greenpower accredited electricity products from being sold or advertised as green or environmentally friendly;
27. Support a target of 50% of all operational domestic hot water heaters being solar orother high energy efficiency technology within eight years;
28. Support a state-wide co-generation target for all industrial power use of 10% within eight years;
29. Would fund sustainable energy programs and offset any inequitable social consequences resulting from the shift to sustainable energy;
30. Support alternative renewable energy support policies such as MRETs and/or feed-in laws, particularly in the light of the adoption of these mechanisms in other states;

Energy Efficiency and Conservation

The Greens NSW:

31. Recognise that Australian society wastes a huge amount of energy – in daily lives, in industry and commerce, and in transmission from centralised generation. NSW is particularly wasteful, with one of the highest per capita rates of energy consumption in the world;
32. Recognise that reducing waste through energy efficiency offers major economic, social and environmental benefits, by cutting energy costs and removing the need for new generating capacity. Investing in energy saving technology creates more jobs and economic activity per unit of energy consumed than investing in generating more energy. Since many efficiency gains are available instantly, efficiency is also the fastest way of reducing greenhouse emissions.
33. Will work towards:
• 33.1 Efficiency gains to bring NSW state-wide annual energy usage 15% below current levels within four years and  20% below current levels within eight years;
• 33.2 Requiring all new commercial buildings to meet a minimum 5 star Australian  Building Greenhouse Rating (ABGR);
• 33.3 Implementing a greenhouse trigger that requires all developments with energy related emissions above 10,000 tonnes pa to implement all available energy efficiency measures with a payback time of 4 years or less;
• 33.4 Requiring all NSW Government agencies to take the lead on energy efficiency, imposing penalties for failure to reach targeted energy use reductions, and to be housed in 5 star BGR buildings within eight years;
• 33.5 Restoring and improving the BASIX scheme, requiring high-rise and multi-unit developments to meet the same 40% energy reduction target as free-standing homes, ending the unsustainable and unfair gift to major political party donors;
• 33.6 All renovations to existing housing stock reaching the same 40% BASIX target, with upgrades required for existing sections of buildings being renovated, and the BASIX scheme extended to existing housing stock
• 33.7 Legislating for the accelerated depreciation of energy efficiency projects as a stimulus to their development and implementation
• 33.8 Providing government-accredited technical assistance to identify and implement energy efficiency projects for any company, organisation or individual. This assistance would be free of charge if all projects with a payback of 4 years or less are adopted
• 33.9 Introducing ‘smart’ metering, which measures electricity use and regulate it by demand and time of day, along with new tariff arrangements to encourage energy conservation
• 33.10 Reaching agreement at COAG meetings to expand and increase national Minimum Efficiency Performance Standards (MEPS) for all energy-using products, banning the most inefficient products from sale in Australia and moving towards world’s best practice in standards;
• 33.11 Removing subsidies to energy intensive industries, such as aluminium smelting;
• 33.12 Opposing any exemptions or compensation for the costs of emissions trading for the aluminium smelting industry, while supporting transition funding and employment guarantees for the workforce;
• 33.13 Developing alternative regulatory, educational and market mechanisms to minimise the installation and use of air conditioning.

Electricity Markets and Energy Pricing

34. While recognising that pricing is only one mechanism for reducing emissions, the Greens NSW will work to:
• 34.1 Integrate full environmental and social costs in energy pricing;
• 34.2 Remove hidden subsidies for fossil fuels and pricing signals that encourage inefficiency;
• 34.3 Implement more advanced models of integrated least-cost planning;
• 34.4 Remove off peak electricity pricing for hot water as prices do not include the environmental costs of generation, and unfairly disadvantage solar hot water;
• 34.5 Include the full cost of transmission and losses in prices as current pricing mechanisms unfairly disadvantage local embedded generation such as solar PV, and distributed co-generation;
• 34.6 Introduce tax deductions and allow accelerated depreciation for investment in renewable energy and energy efficiency technologies;
• 34.7 Introduce a fund to improve the energy efficiency of housing stock for disadvantaged people, to offset and prevent the inequitable impact of electricity price rises as full environmental costs are integrated.
35. The Greens NSW recognise that the adoption of a national Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme is a step towards incorporating the environmental costs of energy generation into the price signals. However markets are inherently unfair to small participants such as households and are unlikely to produce the profound change in the energy industry required to address climate change.  We are also concerned that the design of the scheme is flawed and will not result in the profound change in the energy industry required to address climate change.  We are also concerned that the design of the scheme is flawed and will not result in reducing emissions in the medium term.
36. The Greens will monitor the development of the DPRS and will move to ensure that
• Low and middle income households receive adequate protection from increased prices in the form of assistance in reducing demand and monetary compensation;
• Industries such as aluminium smelting that are dependent on the consumption of large amounts of electrical energy are not protected from the costs of emissions trading or compensated;
• Targets are set in accordance with the latest understanding of climate science to minimise the chances of dangerous increases in global average temperature.

Peak Oil

37. The Greens recognise the evidence that the global supply of oil is reaching or has reached its maximum and that growing demand and declining supply will lead to escalating prices and increasing scarcity with severe adverse consequences for all sectors of the economy, including urban and regional transport, food supply and the delivery of goods and services.
38. The Greens recognise the contemporary profligate use of energy by minority world countries is unsustainable in the future regardless of alternative energy sources that may be found.  A fundamental component in addressing Peak Oil is the need to reduce dramatically energy consumption for both static and transport use.
39. Avoiding the risk of a disintegrating society and a dysfunctional economy requires:
• Urgent planning for petroleum scarcity, including restructuring the economy to be less dependent on the availability of oil;
• Reserving oil supplies for the delivery of essential and emergency services and the production and distribution of food;
• Preferential access to liquid fuels for those for whom public transport options are not feasible;
• Recognition that the current rate of increase in air travel is placing unsustainable burdens on the climate and the supply of liquid fuels;
• Substantial and urgent investment in public transport, cycling and pedestrian facilities, fixed raid and maritime transport of goods and the development of alternatives to travel and transport.