David Fawcett (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I, too, rise to take note of answers to questions asked by coalition senators. My own question to the Minister for Foreign Affairs I will come back to in other forums as I understand more about what the government has actually announced, but I do welcome her assurance of their continued opposition to the referral, for example, of Israel to the ICJ by the United Nations, which I think is a positive step.

I turn now to cost-of-living pressures, which was the focus of the first question. That's the thing that constituents are talking to me about in South Australia, particularly through phone canvassing, surveys and responses that we're getting from people. I'd just like to draw the Senate's attention to some reporting in the Australian this week concerning the GenCost report and the CSIRO and the admission by CSIRO and their chief energy economist. The reporting in the Australian highlighted—and the CSIRO has now confirmed—that the GenCost report, in making the claim, which is often referred to by Minister Bowen and by advocates for variable renewable energy, that wind and solar are the cheapest forms of power, does not take into account all of the associated and consequential costs in terms of firming and the overbuilding of transmission lines et cetera for those distributed systems to work.

What that means is that the work of experts such as the OECD and the IEA, who issued a report in April last year—for those who are interested, I think it was page 35 in the report—shows through good, solid economic and engineering analysis that, without taking into account those systems costs, you cannot fully understand a comparison of different ways to supply energy. In fact, what the OECD and IEA found is that a reliance on a high penetration of variable renewable energies such as wind and solar in fact drives prices up as a nation seeks to constrain carbon emissions. The graph that is, if you like, the pinnacle of their analysis shows very clearly that, as we move beyond 2030 towards net zero in 2050, the cost of achieving that—in fact, they claim it is probably unachievable relying on wind and solar—will become unaffordable. We see that lived experience in countries such as Germany, which has probably the highest penetration of wind and solar in the OECD. They also have the highest prices. If the rhetoric was correct, a high penetration of wind and solar would be driving their prices down, but that is not the case.

What the OECD and IEA clearly show—and the GenCost report, which is so relied upon by this government and other advocates for a total reliance on variable renewable energy—is that you need a firming supply of power, which is either hydro, particularly if you have fast-flowing rivers, or nuclear energy as the other option which is zero emission, and, despite the assertions, is actually not the most expensive form of power. That report shows very clearly, in a comparison of levelised costs, that long-run nuclear plants are actually cheaper than many forms of variable energy. By the time you take into account the systems costs, including transmission and firming, they are cheaper. That is why, as we look around the world, in the United States, Europe and the Indo-Pacific region we see nations investing again in nuclear power, because they recognise that, to reduce emissions and have affordable power, we need to make that change. That's why Canada—particularly the province of Ontario, with 19 reactors—has the cheapest power in the OECD. The combination of hydro nationally and, in Ontario, the 19 reactors actually drives the price down for both business and consumers. That's why the coalition is calling for a sensible discussion about removing the prohibitions on nuclear power here, so that our agencies such as the CSIRO and industry can do the detailed economic and engineering analysis to demonstrate, once and for all, that it is a viable option. Then we allow the market to make those decisions. That's the positive agenda of the coalition to reduce prices for Australian households and for businesses, which guarantees not only lower emissions but jobs and affordability into the future.