This summer we've experienced record bushfires, temperature extremes leading to record air conditioner use and heat-related stress, low rainfall leading to water supply problems; when it finally rained it poured and when a cold front hit, temperatures were colder than those on a July winter's day.

These ongoing events are all symptoms of human-caused climate change that have been predicted by climate scientists for over 20 years. Even urban Victorians have been directly affected with most households losing their power due to bushfires affecting the main electricity feeds from NSW. (Although the bushfires appear to be comparable to past events, they are far more severe. Their severity is being hidden by advanced modern firefighting technology including thermal imaging, and air-crane helicopters.)

The good news is that during these extreme weather events, including the day we lost the New South Wales power connection, the wind power across Victoria and in adjoining SA and Tasmania was producing at near capacity.

Beyond Zero Emissions and other groups are calling for near zero emissions for the stationary energy sector. Wind power is one of the best off-the-shelf technologies that can be quickly utilised along with solar thermal power and hydro to achieve this goal.

The very nature of harvesting wind power means that smaller feeders would distribute power across the state, not leaving the supply system so vulnerable to massive outages where a third of the state's power is unavailable from a single disruption to a feeder.

There have been some great advances in the size and scope of wind farms internationally in the last 12 months, demonstrating wind power's potential for serious integration at high levels into distributed power grids.

"We are calling for the immediate phase-out of coal-fired generation and a switch to solar thermal and wind amongst other renewable sources," said
Matthew Wright, Beyond Zero Emissions campaigner. "A serious project in British Columbia, Canada, will bring 3000 MW of wind onto BC hydro's power grid as part of a single wind farm project. We are calling for just 4 projects of this size, or, as we have previously stated, around 20 wind farms of a smaller size to give us the right mix of distributed generation to power most of Victoria's energy needs," said Matthew Wright, BZE researcher.

The installation of large-scale wind power is the best way to get rid of Victoria's biggest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions, the dirty brown coal power stations in the Latrobe Valley. Large-scale wind is the only technology currently available and can be easily purchased and installed now to reach a goal of near zero emissions in the stationary energy sector. At least 55% of Victoria's emissions come from burning brown coal, more than all the other sectors combined.

"It's low hanging fruit if you want to achieve massive reductions in greenhouse gas emissions in this state," said Mr Wright.

Other projects that have just been announced that are the kind of scale we need include a 2500 MW wind park in California by an Australian company, 1300 MW of wind in the Thames Estuary, a 783 MW wind farm in Texas which is already operating, a 600 MW proposal for the Shetlands to provide 5% of Scotland's power, and a fantastic proposal for Macarthur Victoria that could deliver 550 MW of wind utilising Vestas V90-3MW turbines.

Offshore wind is also gaining pace with projects being announced in Sweden, Denmark, Germany, UK, Ireland and the USA. A Texas project that has just been approved and will commence construction early this year will make available up to 500 MW of electricity to Texas energy consumers.

British Columbia, Canada, 3000 MW wind farm (4 for Vic of this size to go near zero emissions)

California, USA, 2500 MW wind farm (5 for Vic of this size to go near zero emissions)

Thames Estuary, UK, 1300 MW wind farm (9 for Vic of this size to go near zero emissions)

Texas, USA, 783 MW wind farm (15 for Vic of this size to go near zero emissions)

Shetland Islands, UK, 600 MW wind farm (20 for Vic of this size to go near zero emissions)

Macarthur, Vic, Australia, 550 MW wind farm (22 for Vic of this size to go near zero emissions)

Offshore windfarm, Texas, USA, 500 MW (24 for Vic of this size to go near zero emissions)

For comment ring:
Adrian Whitehead - 0403 735 118
Matthew Wright ­ 0421 616 733

www.beyondzeroemissions.org

Beyond Zero Emissions is an independent Zero Emission Minus Climate Change campaign.