After federal efforts to expedite decisions to add more wind farms as well as solar projects to electrical grid, clean energy projects are being approved at a rate now twice that of prior years.
After increasing spending in the prior year’s budget to reduce backlogs and expedite granting of environmental approvals, the federal government now claims that investment in renewable energy has increased.
According to list of renewable energy projects, which includes anything from modest solar farms to the enormous Star of the South wind project that will be erected on the Gippsland coast, applications for new projects have increased from 64 to 95 since the federal election in May.
Tanya Plibersek, the minister of the environment and water, will release the report and claim that the new federal administration has resolved delays to renewable projects that occurred under the Coalition during the previous nine years.
That entails starting and finishing projects.
Australia now has a clear policy to combat climate change and cut emissions for the first time in ten years.
The government’s backing for energy projects, notably 116 coal seam gas wells in Queensland that Plibersek approved in February as a component of an ongoing Santos project in the Surat Basin, has drawn criticism from the Green Party.
Given that government estimates list of fossil fuel projects in federal “pipeline” is less than half of the 116 projects Greens have said, the number of active projects in renewable sector has now outnumbers the number of coal and gas projects up for approval by federal authorities.
The projects range from connecting renewable energy sources to energy grid in Queensland as well as NSW to the massive 445-megawatt Aldoga solar farm in Queensland along with the Goyder South wind farms, generating a combined 412 megawatts. They also include the 90-megawatt Port Hedland solar project in Western Australia and the 540 kilometres of transmission line in EnergyConnect eastern project in NSW.
Plibersek stated, “we are reforming our laws to deliver even clearer, faster decisions while also better protecting our environment.”
Later this year, when Plibersek seeks support from the Greens and other crossbenchers to pass amendments to Environment Protection and the Biodiversity Conservation Act, the law that grants the minister the final say on whether projects receive approval, subject to the courts, a significant decision in parliament is anticipated.
Greens environment spokesperson Sarah Hanson-Young advocates for a “climate trigger” to ensure that fossil fuel projects can be denied when their carbon emissions are considered part of the approvals process. Environmental groups responded favourably to the draft EPBC revamp last December.
The decision to spend $117.1 million to expand resources to the Department of Climate Change, along with department of Energy, Environment, and Water to speed up decisions is credited in part for the approvals more than doubling from five to eleven in the ten months following the election, according to the government.
Chris Bowen, the minister of climate change, declared that the government was giving “policy certainty” to meet the aim of producing 82% of electricity from renewable sources by 2030.
Since the election, the number of applications still awaiting final clearance has risen to 95. They now include substantial offshore wind projects like Star of the South, which could supply 20% of Victoria’s electricity requirements.
