In a show of unity, Australia’s leading energy industry players and investment groups have thrown their weight behind Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s landmark ‘Future Made in Australia’ initiative. Tim Buckley, director of Climate Energy Finance, urged the government to “hold its nerve and deliver an ambitious and coordinated package of budget incentives”, enabling Australia to pivot from its historic over-dependence on fossil fuels to a zero-emissions global trade and investment leader. Read more

Australian Associated Press – Clean energy companies and investors called on the federal government to “hold its nerve” and deliver an ambitious and coordinated package of budget incentives to accelerate the transition away from fossil fuels. In a joint statement, they urged Treasurer Jim Chalmers to use the May budget to encourage investment, as rival economies throw trillions of dollars into renewable energy and clean tech to secure their national interests. “We urge the government to hold its nerve and deliver an ambitious and coordinated package of budget incentives,” Mr Buckley said. Read more

Responding to criticism of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s Made in Australia Act, a group of energy and finance leaders joined forces on Thursday to call for the scale of budget support required for decarbonisation. Australia could not afford to “sit out” the accelerating global transition and needed taxpayer support to unlock the private capital needed for zero-emissions economic opportunities, they said. Read more

Nishtha Aggarwal, an analyst at the independent think tank Climate Energy Finance (CEF), has roundly criticised Australia’s big four banks for touting sustainability rhetoric without following through with meaningful action. “Trumpeting climate action based on the low-hanging fruit of financing minimally green-rated buildings is not enough, and leaves them open to accusation of greenwashing,” said Aggarwal. “They must put ‘their’ money where their mouth is.” An analysis of the major banks’ sustainable finance target (SFT) allocation to date found that a massive 44 per cent of funding was allocated to green buildings. Read more

China has by far the world’s biggest wind turbine production capacity, or 60% of 163 gigawatts (GW) in 2023, says Brussels-based industry association Global Wind Energy Council. China exported about $1.42 billion of turbines and components to the EU last year. The situation in China’s wind turbine sector is similar to that in the solar sector, with massive domestic capacity increases underpinned by extensive government support, said Xuyang Dong, China energy policy analyst at Climate Energy Finance in Sydney. “With a domestic supply glut and world leading technology, China will increasingly seek to export turbines.” Read more

Battery storage is the hot-spot in the Australian renewable energy transition right now, but it has barely touched the sides when looking at its potential. The so-called “Swiss Army Knives” of the renewable energy transition have learned how to make returns in some key parts of the grid, but much of their potential – long duration storage and specific services – remains difficult because either the market does not exist, or because of the lack of funding and support. Tim Buckley joins Giles Parkinson, Founder & Editor of Renew Economy, alongside Paul Curnow from Akaysha Energy and Daniel Burrows from Eku Energy. Read more

John Menadue Public Policy Journal: I joined a large audience in the North Sydney electorate on 4 April at a community forum that Kylea Tink called on “The future of our environment”. The message I took home was that the climate crisis is more urgent than ever. Its impacts are increasingly obvious. Roughly 90 percent of the mining industry in this country is foreign-owned. Not surprisingly, when last year was a year of record profits, it was also a year of record lobbying action. Tim Buckley, Director of Climate Energy Finance, told the Sydney Morning Herald that profits from the export of $240 billion fossil fuels in 2022 led companies to “fund their lobbying efforts to delay climate action and protect their profits”. Read more

Greg Combet’s ascension to incoming chair of the Future Fund is already generating plenty of discussion around the sovereign wealth manager’s role in investing in Australia’s green economic transition, even though he won’t take the reins until July. “They’ve gone from having a climate luddite to a climate evangelist in the chair — so you would expect the fund to have a more significant role and invest more in that area,” said Tim Buckley, director of think tank Climate Energy Finance. Read more

The Federal Government last week announced a $1 billion investment in Australian solar manufacturing in the historic fossil fuel heartland of the Hunter Valley, the Solar Sunshot program. Its establishment at the Liddell coal power plant site is symbolic. The play is designed to boost a regional economy formerly dependent on fossil fuels, and help pivot the region and future workforce into the zero-emissions industries of the future, presenting a stark alternative to the Coalition’s “vision” of a nuclear reactor for every former coal generator site. Read more

Tim Buckley, from Climate and Energy Finance, wrote on LinkedIn that the shadow price of $A105/t by 2030, rising to $A221/t by 2040 and $A420/t by 2050 gives a credible price signal consistent with the cost to Australians of carbon pollution for all new energy infrastructure assessment and approvals. Buckley also says it shows the likely trajectory of carbon emissions pricing as strongly upwards over time, consistent with the International Energy Agency (IEA) modelling. “It’s past time the polluters paid,” Buckley wrote last year when assessing the NSW government’s proposed shadow carbon price, a mechanism that would have knocked controversial gas projects such as Narrabri on the head. Read more

Tim Buckley, the founder and director of Climate Energy Finance, says Solar Sunshot puts Australia in the global cleantech race, while also rebuilding its sovereign manufacturing capabilities and bolstering energy security and economic resilience. “Sunshot and these related initiatives are important steps in a uniquely Australian response to the US Inflation Reduction Act – the $1 trillion “green new deal” that is turbocharging cleantech re-industrialisation in the US and attracting a tidal wave of hundreds of billions of dollars of private capital,” Buckley says. Read more

Tim Buckley is director of Climate Energy Finance, a public interest think tank. He said more action could be taken to further lower energy prices in the meantime. Buckley suggested some ways that electricity bills could be lowered while also helping Australia achieve its necessary net zero targets. For example, he mentioned induction cooktops and water heaters and these aspects can really reduce the cost of living pressure and permanently alleviate these problems through accelerated deployment. That means getting away from the high, expensive methane gas that Australia has been addicted to for the last 30, 40, 50 years. Buckley believes there must be a coordinated government campaign to help consumers get through this cost-of-living crisis. Read more