BY JIM GREEN
Labor and the Democrats united with the Coalition to vote down Greens amendments to the Renewable Energy (Electricity) Bill in the Senate throughout the first week of October, even though the unamended bill will accelerate woodchipping.
The stated aim of the legislation is to force industry to source an additional 2% of electricity from renewable sources by the year 2010. But the bill allows burning of native forest woodchips to be classified as renewable energy. Electricity derived from native forests could then be sold at a premium to unsuspecting customers under green electricity schemes.
Greens' Senator Bob Brown said in an October 4 press release, "Labor has voted with the government to accelerate woodchipping. The first cab off their rank is the Tasmanian Labor government's Southwood project in the Huon Valley which will burn 300,000 tonnes of forest woodchips to produce 30 megawatts of electricity per annum to be sold through the Basslink cable into Melbourne, Canberra or Sydney as environmentally friendly."
Brown says the 2% target for additional use of renewable energy sources is misleading. Taking into account projected growth in electricity demand, the target amounts to about 1% of electricity production in 2010.
The Democrats and Labor voted against the Greens amendment to raise the target from 2% to 10%. A Greens' amendment to set targets beyond the year 2010 was also defeated.
Brown said in the Senate on October 4, "So what happens with this very modest target of 1% by the year 2010 is that these unacceptable technologies, such as burning woodchips or damming coastal inlets as tidal power and wrecking the natural environment, will be squeezing out new and currently more expensive technologies, like wind and solar power.
"It effectively puts a brake on wind and solar power when the whole ostensible aim is to put a foot on the accelerator, to give them a real boost. It is a competitive field and, by putting in woodchips and big dams and so on, the newer, better technologies — the greenhouse gas free technologies — get squeezed."
Electricity generation contributed 37% of total national greenhouse gas emissions in 1998. Electricity emissions are currently showing very high levels of growth — 30.6% growth from 1990-98.
Friends of the Earth climate campaigner Tristy Fairfield said the government will use its flawed "renewable" energy legislation as "evidence" of its commitment to combatting climate change at the meeting of parties to the Kyoto greenhouse protocol at the Hague in November.
"It is expected that 65% of the so-called 'renewable' energy sourced under this legislation will come from biomass and large scale hydro-electricity schemes, both of which will cause massive environmental devastation", Fairfield said.
The Australian target for renewable energy compares poorly with the average target of 7.4% over the same period for the 39 developed countries subject to greenhouse gas reductions under the Kyoto protocol.
The penalty for not complying with the legislation will be $40 per megawatt-hour. It may be cheaper for some companies to pay the penalty, rather than meet the targets. A Greens amendment for a penalty of $1000 per megawatt-hour was rejected in the Senate.
The renewable energy bill is scheduled for further debate in the Senate on October 9.