Rally for renewables, save solar campaign in pictures

The renewable energy industry and NGOs in Australia staged a series of rallies across the country on Friday to protest against mooted changes to the renewable energy target – which threatens the rollout of large scale renewables and the future of the rooftop solar industry.

The rallies capped a week of activity designed to raise renewables as a serious political issue. It is expected the Abbott government next week will reveal its position on the renewable energy target, following the report from the controversial Warburton review that recommended the RET be stopped at its current level, or allowed to expand to around 26,000GWh at best.

The current target is 41,000GWh by 2020. Labor has said it will not negotiate on this number, but has indicated it may be flexible about the target date. It says it wants no changes to the small scale target, which affects rooftop solar and solar hot water systems (which the gas industry is now trying to close).

It was too early by the time RenewEconomy sent its newsletter to get an exact feel for numbers, but here are a few photos sent through by our readers.

The first is one of the placards at the Sydney rally, held outside Abbott’s electoral office in Manly. Our favourite.

solar rally

 

And there was this about wind energy ….

rally 6

Below, supporters and organisers get ready for the rally for renewables outside the electoral offices of  Prime Minister Tony Abbott, who is currently in New York working up a Coalition to fight the terrorism of ISIS, while his Coalition MPs work on a campaign to fight eco “terrorism” at home.

As the SMH reported on Friday, Abbott told the UN general assembly that the world faced four major crises – but climate change wasn’t one of them. That contrasted with what US Barack Obama told the UN earlier this week, when he said Climate change was the biggest threat.

solar rally 2

And here’s the scene later (below) as the rally for renewables got into full swing in Manly’s Corso ….

rally 5

And in Melbourne, about 200 people rallied outside the offices of Trade Minister Andrew Robb in suburban Bentleigh. Robb once claimed climate change is a “leftist fad” and has constantly complained about the “dodgy” investments that would be pursued by the Clean Energy Finance Corporation.

rally 4

Other rallies were scheduled for the Tamworth offices of the Deputy Leader of The Nationals and MP for New England Barnaby Joyce; the Brisbane offices of Peter Dutton, Minister for Sport, Minister for Health and MP for Dickson; in Adelaide at the offices of Jamie Briggs, Assistant minister for Infrastructure and Regional Development and MP for Mayo; in Perth at the offices of Julie Bishop, Minister for Foreign Affairs and MP for Curtin; in Hobart at the offices of Senator Eric Abetz, Minister for Employment and Leader of the Government Senate; and in Canberra at the offices of Senator Zed Seselja.

 

Comments

6 responses to “Rally for renewables, save solar campaign in pictures”

  1. Andrew Thaler Avatar
    Andrew Thaler

    The Government isn’t listening. Rallies aren’t solving the problem.

    1. Alen Avatar
      Alen

      Rallies and protest are fundamental to our system and even if politicians choose to ignore certain ones, they at least contribute to getting the discussion going and further highlight to those politicians that are wise enough to listen that we are not happy and we want/need a change. The events surrounding the RET have in my opinion been far too under-reported for the degree of impact it is both going to have and has to some degree already had thus far, especially when considering that there is no viable and logical explanation for this (aside from a corruption point of view, protecting current utilities and their outdated business models).

  2. SolarPowerBen Avatar
    SolarPowerBen

    They do listen, but they object! they simply weigh off how much longer they can keep the phlegmatic majority in check with their propaganda before they need to act on anything. They lose their grip on power if they allow power to the people, which is the last thing they want.
    Rallies do work, they only need to be large enough, see the fall and dissolution of former Eastern Germany!

  3. Gordon Avatar

    We had about 100 at the rally outside Barnaby’s office, a pretty good turn out for conservative Tamworth, although some people travelled down from Armidale for the rally.
    Barnaby wasn’t happy when I called out during his talk – he claimed the agreed target was 20%, I let the crowd know it was actually 41000GWh/year

  4. Ketan Joshi Avatar
    Ketan Joshi

    I thought it turned out quite nicely 🙂

  5. CoreyAnder Avatar
    CoreyAnder

    About 100 at Jamie Briggs office in the Adelaide Hills. Jamie is good mates with Joe Hockey so they can mull over the wisdom of monkeying with the RET and upsetting the 80% of Australians (and 70% of LNP voters) who want the RET left alone. the conversation might go like this:
    J – so all those people want us to stop monkeying with the RET.
    J – yeah I know but if we leave it alone LNP donations from the Big Fossils will dry up.
    J – so we should ditch the RET like Big Tone wants?
    J – well, have you got the guts to buck Tone?
    J – no, I’ve been on a diet.
    J – I’ve noticed – and you still want to be leader one day big fella?
    J – Bloody oath! And you keep mumbling grand speeches in your sleep “My fellow Australians..” so I know you do too!
    J – Yeah, it’d be great wouldn’t it, I’ve always known that I’m special and I reckon mummy was right.
    J – so what do we do about this bloody RET thing big fella?
    J – jeez I reckon I’ll go with the peeps and tell Tone he’s got a busted spoke up his arse on this one.
    J – yeah, I reckon you’re right. I wanna be leader but not of the feckin’ opposition. Hey hey, ho ho, fossil fuels have got to go.
    J – Sweet! Hey hey, ho ho, fossil fuels have got to go.
    JJ – Hey hey, ho ho, fossil fuels have got to go.
    J – giz another cigar will ya.
    J – cheers mate – ain’t democracy grand.

Get up to 3 quotes from pre-vetted solar (and battery) installers.