Newswire

Fortunately for the Federal Government, it can use a “Leaf” to hide its growing embarrassment at being exposed for suppressing its own report warning of sharp declines in global oil production in five years time.

In 2009, Transport Minister Anthony Albanese’s Bureau of Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Economics (BITRE) published Report 117, which revealed “at some point beyond 2017 we must begin to cope with the longer-term task of replacing oil as a source of energy. Given the inertias inherent in energy systems and vehicle fleets, the transition will be necessarily challenging to most economies aroundthe world”.

While the government has not been able to explain how Report 117 “vanished”, now that it has been rediscovered it’s safe to say that the conclusion was only half right.

Peak oil, that point at which the world’s accessible and commercially viable supplies of petroleum begin to disappear, is a certainty.

A study from the Melbourne Energy Institute suggests that the benefits of solar energy on the National Electricity Market could outweigh the costs of feed-in-tariffs, and could deliver energy cost savings for all customers, rather than an impost as is commonly believed.

The conclusion comes from a draft of the latest update of its study – which also includes researchers from the ANU’s Solar Thermal Group, Beyond Zero Emissions, and Clean Technology Partners – into the merit order effect, which relates to the impact that energy sources with small or zero marginal costs (such as wind and solar) can have on the overall grid by lowering prices.

The merit order effect is considered crucial in the debate around clean energy deployment because it suggests that the cost of incentives – such as renewable energy certificates or feed in tariffs – can be offset by the benefits this energy has on wholesale prices in the NEM. Once a wind farm or a solar farm is constructed with an upfront subsidy, its low marginal cost means that it can bid beneath coal and gas generators into the energy stack. This reduces margins for the coal and gas generators, but it also delivers considerable savings on wholesale prices, particularly solar, as it delivers into the grid at times of higher demand.

Matthew Wright

In the Icy German Winter, during the 12 days of Christmas, Germany installed more than 3 gigawatts of solar PV.

In comparison, for the past two and half years. our Federal Labor Government has been announcing, and re-announcing, its Solar Flagships program. And, as you might have guessed, despite the fanfare, nothing has been paid for or built. (Update, see our story on CS Energy quitting Solar Dawn consortium).

In May 2009, when Energy and Resources Minister Martin Ferguson announced the Solar Flagship program, he claimed the $1.37Bn on offer to build an additional 1,000 MW of solar generation capacity, "was funding on an unprecedented scale for the development of solar power in Australia."

Solar energy benefits the state by providing electricity at much cheaper rates than those of traditional sources, writes Matthew Wright.

It may appear counter-intuitive, but getting millions of solar panels onto rooftops saves more money than it costs. Feed-in tariffs enacted by state governments have enabled ordinary Australians using their savings to build a solar power station at home benefiting the community.

When those solar households who had saved to get their panels installed under the solar feed-in tariff programs export their solar production to the grid, which occurs mostly during higher demand daytime periods, they are given a slightly higher than average retail rate for the electricity they are selling. The prices they have been paid are relatively meagre when compared with the ridiculously high rates paid to big coal or gas power plants.

At the same time that little solar households who have invested their money in a rooftop power station are being paid between 44¢ and 60¢ per kilowatt hour, the old power companies with their dirty belching coal and gas plants are receiving as much as $12.50.