Tim Wilson (Goldstein, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Energy policy is rightly the flavour at the moment to make sure that we can deliver reliable and affordable power to Australian households but also to Australian industry. Part of the challenge of doing so is making sure we have a policy that deals with all the challenges facing us. We have to make sure we have investor security to increase supply and we can deliver for households and business. We need to deal with the issues around reducing consumption and increasing demand management to make sure the system is efficient and we can manage peaks when they occur. We also have to look more broadly at avenues for reform to achieve efficiency. Many years ago, I read an article about Frito-Lay, a potato chip company, which you may be a fan of, Deputy Speaker Claydon, looking at their energy efficiency. Don't worry, I like Frito-Lay chips too. It's part of being a parliamentarian. They reduced their energy bill. They found that potatoes they purchased were injected with water and that increased their energy consumption. Making sure we deal with the issues of efficiency is very important. This is one of the issues that Tim Renouf from Wren Industries in my electorate of Goldstein raises with me regularly, particularly around the role of aluminium foil to reduce heat and particularly radiant heat around air conditioning ducts to make sure there is no transfer of heat when there is a high temperature in roofs. In fact, it can reduce it by up to 97 per cent. The critical thing is to look at all of these solutions as part of policy.