A Coalition government has vowed to detonate most of Australia’s efforts to decarbonise its economy “within 30 days” of winning power, including stymying the advance of renewable energy, supporting nuclear power plants and scrapping the emissions-curbing industrial policy it introduced into law.
Dan Tehan, the energy and emissions reduction spokesperson, said in a media release on Wednesday that “Australians are sick of being lectured to about the energy transition. What they want to hear is how energy will be made cheaper.”
“For the last four and a half years, energy policy has been driven by ideology, political targets and government picking winners rather than by the basic realities of keeping the lights on and Australian businesses competitive,” Tehan said.
The Scrap Net Zero (Cheaper Energy) policy, which sets out set out eight ways a Coalition government would “take a chainsaw” to Labor’s policies, has provoked immediate outrage across industry and green groups, and variously decried as “a brain fart” and a “breathtaking act of economic self-harm.”
The centrepiece of the Coalition’s plans would be to repeal the Climate Change Act 2022, and in doing so, remove the legislated net zero emissions targets – and presumably the 2030 target and the recently announced interim target of 62-70 per cent below 2005 levels by 2035.
The safeguard mechanism would also go, ditching an architecture to reduce carbon emissions by big industrial polluters that the Abbott Coalition government legislated in 2014. The Albanese government later amended the act to give it some bite, and is expected to release its response a review of the scheme early next year.
“The safeguard mechanism imposes costs on Australia’s productive industries which has driven jobs offshore reducing our manufacturing capacity and led to massive industry assistance programs to prop up some industries,” Tehan said in his release.
A Coalition government would also seek to revoke four offshore wind energy zones across the Hunter, Illawarra, Southern Ocean, and Bunbury regions because, Tehan claims, “there is no social licence and no community acceptance” for them.
Left intact would be the offshore wind zones off Victoria’s Gippsland and the Tasmania coasts, presumably because the Victorian Opposition and the Tasmanian Liberal government presently support them.
Also ditched would be the government’s New Vehicle Efficiency Standard Act of 2024 that Tehan says has “impacted on vehicle choice and pricing in the Australian automative sector.”
“Australia should have an energy system built around three non-negotiable principles: affordability, reliability and security,” Tehan said. “Everything else should be secondary.”
- The only nod towards reducing emissions would be a renewed push to support nuclear energy, despite the unpopularity of this policy when proposed by former Coalition leader Peter Dutton in the run-up to 2025 federal elections. A Coalition government would seek to repeal all legislative prohibition on the energy source.
“Nuclear energy is emissions free and can provide a constant source of electricity to power industry, data centres and meet the future energy demands that renewables cannot meet and for when coal capacity is reduced,” Tehan said.
Tehan, who is due to speak later today at an Australian energy forum in Sydney, said renewable energy developers would be forced to follow a “code of conduct” to ensure they earnt “their social license from the community that they operate in.”
The Coalition plans come as the two biggest states by population, Victoria and NSW, prepare to go to the polls in November and March, respectively. The Coalition opposition in both those states has sought to reverse course on some of the pro-renewable energy plans in those jurisdictions.
The oppositions – whether at state or federal level – will have to explain how their policies will actually lower energy prices and meet “affordability” goals, since solar and wind, backed up by storage have repeatedly been shown to be cheaper than alternatives by the CSIRO and commercial entities themselves.
Tehan said a federal Coalition government would redirect the Australian Energy Regulator “to have primary regard to affordability and reliability which will put households and businesses at the centre of regulatory decision-making.”
Emissions, however, have to be factored into power plans according to the national electricity laws. Any effort to excise that requirement could be blocked by a single state or territory.
Tehan’s push to dismiss climate policies in general comes as Australia – and much of the world – braces for the impacts of a monster and record-breaking El Niño in the Pacific.
The event, likely enhanced by warming sea-surface temperatures because of global heating, may well result in drought and severe bushfires in the coming summer. Parts of Indonesia and Papua New Guinea are already experiencing weather extremes.
Prosecuting such policy reversals may become more challenging in the months to come for Tehan and the rest of the conservative right.
Renew Economy has sought comment from the office of climate change and energy minister Chris Bowen.
As Renew Economy noted here, One Nation intends to demand a Royal Commission into the cost of the energy transition, a figure that varies between $900 billion and $1 trillion. The Coalition’s plans may be aimed at dealing the Liberals and Nationals into the climate and energy debate.
The Australian Conservation Foundation’s head of political advocacy, Gavan McFadzean, said the Coalition had “basically declared it has no climate policy”.
“You can’t be anti-renewables and pro-energy reliability, because renewables with storage is the most reliable and affordable form of energy, while nuclear is the most expensive and would need to be publicly funded,” McFadzean said.
“To commit to slow the renewables transition is a breathtaking act of economic self-harm that would increase climate pollution and abandon jobs and investment in the future low-carbon economy,” he said.
“The Coalition is essentially deserting households that want to lower their cost of living and carbon footprint by embracing renewable energy.”
Climate Council chief executive Amanda McKenzie described Tehan’s announcement as a “brain fart of a policy will send power bills through the roof.”
“Propping up clapped-out coal plants will add hundreds of dollars to household bills. Then there’s the eye-wateringly expensive hundreds of billions for a nuclear fantasy on top,” McKenzie said.
Indeed, relying on coal plants extending their lives – as Queensland proposes – may increase the likelihood of breakdowns as equipment ages.
“In a world that is increasingly volatile, the Coalition’s plan to increase Australia’s reliance on foreign oil and limit Australians’ access to more efficient vehicles would make us more vulnerable to future global shocks,” McKenzie added.
“This is a recipe for more insecure and costly energy and transport – it makes no sense at all.”
Independent Member for Kooyong, Dr Monique Ryan, dubbed the Coalition’s plan “dumb, dangerous, and desperate climate denial which would make energy more expensive and unreliable”.
“Australians have embraced clean energy because it works. We’ve spent years investing in rooftop solar, electric vehicles, household batteries, and home electrification because these technologies save money and reduce emissions,” Ryan said.
“The Liberals’ retrograde attempt to appease the Nationals and woo One Nation voters would drag the country backwards.”
Farmers for Climate Action, a group representing more than 8000 farmers across Australia, said it was “deeply disappointed” with the Coalition’s “crazy” plans.
“You can’t say you’re looking after farmers while you axe pollution reduction policies, when we know more pollution means more fires and droughts, more climate change, and higher insurance costs,” said Peter Holding, a Harden sheep and crop farmer and FCA spokesperson .
Tim Buckley, director of think tank Climate Energy Finance and a former managing director of global investment bank Citigroup said “this iteration of the Coalition’s energy policy pamphlet belongs in the bin fire with every previous iteration.”
“This will make the 2028 federal election yet another referendum on whether Australia will stay in alignment with the global consensus of the Paris Agreement and the climate science,” Buckley said.
“This alignment is imperative to ensure Australia’s energy security and prosperity in the emerging net-zero world economy.“
Renew Economy contacted Tehan’s office to clarify whether the Coalition’s latest policies implied a plan to pull Australia out of the Paris agreement.
To join more than 29,000 others and get the latest clean energy news delivered straight to your inbox, for free, click here to subscribe to our free daily newsletter.
