Employment

Australia’s transition to a clean energy future is at risk with a new report indicating the nation’s quickening shift to a grid dominated by renewables has resulted in labour and skills shortages that could deepen as the sector continues to grow.

The Australian Conservation Foundation has urged the federal government to take advantage of the global shift towards renewable energy to unlock hundreds of thousands of jobs and inject billions of dollars into the economy.

Australia’s peak union body has called for the federal government to establish a national energy transition authority to help manage the shift from coal to a grid dominated by renewables.

New research from Stanford University researcher Mark Jacobson outlines how 145 countries could meet 100% of their business-as-usual energy needs with wind, water, solar and energy storage. The study finds that in all the countries considered, lower-cost energy and other benefits mean the required investment for transition is paid off within six years. The study also estimates that worldwide, such a transition would create 28 million more jobs than it lost.

Concerns Australia’s skills shortage will impact the new federal government’s hallmark $20 billion Rewiring the Nation program, as well as the clean energy transition more generally, have been raised at the Australian Clean Energy Summit in Sydney.

Progress on the $300 Eyre Peninsula Link transmission project in South Australia has hit a hurdle with the Communications, Electrical Plumbing Union issuing a statement saying it had shut down the construction due to “appalling” health and safety conditions.

As part of the Smart Energy Conference held in Sydney last week, the Smart Energy Council’s Scott Hamilton ran a session on Australia’s hypothetical energy landscape in 2030. This is how panelists Simon Holmes á Court, Jane Caro, Richard Denniss, Karrina Nolan and Professor Iain MacGill think we’ll be living at the decade’s close.

New figures reveal Australia’s clean energy transition can be transformative for the nation’s regional communities, not only providing low-cost renewable energy but also generating long-term employment opportunities.

The Western Australian Government has announced $1 million in funding for the first phase of a feasibility study into a 600-800MWh battery and green hydrogen industrial hub in the coal town of Collie. The state government has promised the town, which has been powering Western Australia with its two coal mines since the 1880s, a ‘just transition.’ Sunshot Energy, chaired by eminent energy economist Ross Garnaut, is undertaking the study which could deliver a ‘just transition’ to Collie and green ammonia and urea to the agricultural and industrial sectors.

Federal Labor has promised to allocate $22 million to help establish the Lansdown Eco-Industrial Precinct being developed in northern Queensland if it wins the election in May.