Coalition’s Canavan forgets he’s backing nuclear, calls for new coal power as election looms

The Coalition just can’t kick its coal habit, with renegade Nationals senator Matt Canavan ignoring the new nuclear talking points to return to his favourite hobby horse: to build new coal power plants.

Canavan made his oft-repeated pitch for new coal power on X, citing a move in Wyoming, USA, to gift $10 million in taxpayer funds for a new coal power station.

But the Australian politician’s contribution to the energy debate was pooh-poohed by Matt Kean, the former New South Wales energy minister and current chair of the Climate Change Authority.

“It appears there is a new update to the Coalition’s energy policy for the coming election: new coal fired power plants in Australia to complement the nuclear power plants. It will be interesting to see the full details on this new “coal first” policy,” Kean deadpanned on X.

The Coalition is taking a pro-nuclear policy to the federal election this year. It claims it could be possible to push the operational lifespan of existing, ageing, coal power stations in Australia out into the 2040s in order to build seven nuclear power plants with operational lives starting in 2035.

The last coal power station is forecast by the Australian Energy Market Operator to close in 2038, but it warns that trying to manage these ageing fossil fuel beasts remains the biggest threat to grid reliability.

The cost of building new coal is around double the price of wind and solar, even with storage and transmission, according to CSIRO’s GenCost report, which compares the cost of building probable and existing energy sources, as well as nuclear, which is even more expensive.

Canavan might be beating the drum for nuclear, but he has never abandoned his old school leanings towards coal. For example, last year he demanded a Senate inquiry recommend the Capacity Investment Scheme be opened to new coal power.

The Senate energy committee did not take up the opportunity to recommend Australia pivot to a coal-first future. 

Canavan’s latest inspiration comes from Wyoming, where a Republican politician tacked a $10 million grant to build a new coal power plant onto the back of a tax bill.

State representative Scott Heiner has earmarked the cash, which comes in the form of a gift rather than a loan, to an as yet unnamed company to build a coal power plant in Wyoming, although nowhere near his electorate in the south-west because “there’s no coal mines down there anymore”, he told Cowboy State Daily. 

The last coal power plant built in Wyoming was Dry Fork Station, which was commissioned in 2011, while the last to come online in the US was the Sandy Creek Energy Station in Texas in 2013.