Lyn Allison (Victoria, Australian Democrats) Share this | Hansard source

The Democrats will support the amendments moved by the Australian Greens. The problem that we have at present is that there is no significant driver for energy efficiency in this country; electricity is still cheap enough for big corporations to ignore this as being an issue for them. I recognise the problems associated with putting up such complex amendments as these. I also realise that the government is not likely to agree to them. But I also sense that there is deep frustration on the part of non-government members in this place about the lack of progress on this issue. This is an attempt, and I congratulate Senator Milne on it, to put in place measures which could provide that driver.

I will give an example of where big industry does not take up measures which have very short payback periods: cogeneration. Cogeneration is a system for use where, mostly in big manufacturing operations, a lot of heat is generated. Cogeneration can harvest that heat and use it to generate electricity, usually with the use of natural gas and generators. Enormous savings can be made over time as well as energy being fed into the grid. But when last I looked at the figures, only a very small proportion of the potential for cogeneration had been picked up. That is despite the fact, as I said, that the payback period is very short.

As Senator Milne has already indicated, the problem is that businesses make their decisions on infrastructure based on other priorities. If the government were really serious about getting across to them the message that Australia has to reduce its greenhouse emissions massively—by at least 60 per cent by 2050—this would be one very good way of doing that. I would hope that the minister, if he rejects this out of hand, which is what I think we are all expecting, will at least take up some of the ideas and come back to this place in the future with legislation which puts in place something similar. To reiterate, the Democrats, like so many people in this country, are disappointed that there has not been much of an effort at all on energy efficiency. Voluntary measures have not worked up until now, and there is no reason to suggest that they are going to work over the next five or 10 years either. This is a mechanism which would at least ensure that they do.