Critical minerals
AGL China Coal Critical minerals Decarbonisation Electricity/electrification Energy crisis Hydrogen India & Adani Taxes and subsidies US IRA/EU NZIA et al
OP ED | Keating attack on Origin bid ties big super to petrostate of old
The Australian Financial Review
A better focus for the former prime minister than fending off Brookfield’s ~$30bn of decarbonisation capital that comes with its bid for gentailer Origin would be using his influence to press for reform of the short-term performance test benchmarks that penalise the superannuation industry for investments in future facing, low carbon industries.
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Albanese’s pittance for critical minerals means Australia’s golden opportunity goes begging
Renew Economy
Our op ed on PM Albanese’s state visit to the US. While the visit was touted as a platform for major announcements on investment into an Australian response to the game-changing Inflation Reduction Act, there was a lot of talk, but only $2bn for Australian critical minerals – entirely insufficient relative to the scale of our opportunity to lead the world in processing of minerals onshore. Read our full analysis.
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PM Albanese’s state visit to the US – report card.
Sky News
Tim Buckley wraps PM Albanese’s state visit to the US and the need for a more ambitious strategic public capital commitment to leverage the opportunities of the US IRA, noting the $2bn additional commitment to critical minerals announced is insufficient relative to our massive opportunity as the world’s #1 exporter of lithium and does not adequately respond to the scale and pace of global decarbonisation.
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Tim Buckley on ABC News: Australia joins the critical minerals race
ABC Radio National Drive
Tim Buckley told ABC News that the $2bn announcement by the Prime Minister Anthony Albanese into the sector through low-interest loans for miners and processors is a token response. The US has put US$1,000bn on the table to drive investment in the decarbonisation. Australian government needs to place $100bn public capital support to crowd in the decarbonisation sector, as we need to respond at the speed and scale to the size of the opportunity.
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Tim Buckley on ABC News: The race to Australian made battery technology
ABC TV The Business
Tim Buckley told ABC news that tens of billions of dollars would be needed to set up an onshore renewable battery industry in Australia, to develop the entire supply chain in Australia from critical minerals, to processing and batter assembly, and ideally EV assembly in Australia as well.
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Extra $2b to finance critical minerals ‘lacks ambition’
AAP
Tim Buckley, director of independent public interest think tank Climate Energy Finance, said $2 billion was “a mere token response” to the Biden administration’s $US1 trillion ($A1.6 trillion) industrial and energy stimulus – the biggest in US history.
“It isn’t even a down payment, it is so lacking in courage, conviction and ambition,” Mr Buckley told AAP.
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Five reasons why the government mustn’t cool its heels on an “Australian IRA”
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As Elizabeth Thurbon et al write in The Lowy Interpreter, the Australian Renewable Industry Package is a $100 billion, ten-year green energy transition package proposed by a coalition of groups including Climate Energy Finance, the Smart Energy Council, and the Australian Council of Trade Unions. This was no knee-jerk or panicked effort, but a considered view on a proportionate Australian response to the US Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) – a $520 billion bipartisan bid to secure US dominance in the high-wage, high-tech green industries of the future. The IRA is now sucking a good deal of green energy investment away from Australia, requiring a policy response from Canberra commensurate with Australia’s generational opportunity.
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Canberra Times: Climate Energy Finance think tank wants fuel tax credit scheme limited
Canberra Times
The federal government could save $14 billion by capping the fuel tax credit for large mining companies and use the funds to drive the electrification of the sector, think tank Climate Energy Finance says. The fuel tax credit scheme, which allows businesses to claim for tax paid on fuel used to power machinery and heavy vehicles, will cost taxpayers $37 billion by 2030 unless the government sets a limit on how much they can claim, a report by the think tank says. Report co-author Tim Buckley said the tax credit scheme was the nation’s largest fossil fuel subsidy and one of the biggest in the world.
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MEDIA RELEASE | A new $100bn Australian Renewables Industry Package is critical for our future security and prosperity
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CEF joined The call for a ten-year $100 billion Australian Renewables Industry Package to respond to the US IRA, endorsed by partners including the Australian Conservation Foundation, Australian Council of Trade Unions, Climate Action Network Australia, First Nations Clean Energy Network, New Energy Nexus, Rewiring Australia and the Smart Energy Council.
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Govt pressed to invest $100bn in renewable energy
ABC Radio National AM
Tim Buckley speaking on ABC Radio AM as part of the coalition of industry, business, union and community groups calling on the Albanese Government to invest $100bn over the next decade to compete in the global race to develop renewable energy industries.
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Investors and unions press Labor to invest $100bn to compete in global green economy
The Guardian
At the Australian Renewables Industry summit in Canberra on Monday unions, the renewable energy sector, community and investor groups will call for the package to respond to massive investment overseas including the US’s Inflation Reduction Act (IRA). Climate Energy Finance’s founder, Tim Buckley, said, “we need a far more integrated and ‘big picture’ approach to encourage greater investment, commensurate with the scale of this massive renewables and critical minerals and metals embodied decarbonisation export opportunity for Australia”.
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Labor pushed to create $100b ‘Australian inflation reduction act’
The Australian Financial Review
Climate Energy Finance director Tim Buckley told The Australian Financial Review an integrated approach to investment was needed, to benefit local communities, Indigenous Australians and future workers. “To leave it to the free market is just, in my view, to be deluded,” he said.
“The IRA has stimulated a massive, massive manufacturing boom. The amount of money going into manufacturing in America in the last 12 months is four times the highest level of any previous year in American history.” He said the strict rules of funding attached to programs meant a rethink was needed in Australia.
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