The week in green numbers…

85: The percentage of Australia’s 2050 energy needs that the federal government’s Energy white Paper, released on Thursday, believes could be met by “cleaner energy” sources, inlcuding: fossil-fuel-fired with CCS – 29 per cent; large-scale solar – 16 per cent; wind energy and rooftop solar PV – 13 per cent each; geothermal energy – 9 nine per cent; and hydroelectricity and bioelectricity – 5 per cent.

2: The gigawatt amount of total solar PV installations that was reached in Australia this month.

1: The gigawatt amount of new solar power generating capacity installed in Germany during the month of September, 2012.

25,000: The gigawatt-hour amount that Germany’s solar power output rose to in the January to September period, up from 16,500GWh a year earlier.

26: The percentage of Germany’s electricity production that renewables accounted for over the first nine months of 2012.

95 million: The estimated Australian-dollar cost of the 82MW peaking plant that is currently being built in WA by Perth-based Merredin Energy, and which may never be switched on.

15 million: The estimated Australian-dollar amount the above peaking plant might earn for Merredin in its first year, even if it is not switched on.

380: The Australian-dollar amount that it costs to run a 1 star TV for a year.

24: The Australian-dollar amount it costs to run an 8 star TV for a year.

100: The percentage of its electricity that the South Pacific archipelago of Tokelau can now source from solar energy, with the completion this week of the installation of its third solar PV mini-grid system.

100: The percentage of Iceland’s electricity supply that comes from renewable sources: : 75 per cent from large hydro, and 25 per cent from geothermal.

35 billion: The tonnes of oil that is said to be the energy equivalent to China’s untapped reserves of “combustible ice” – or natural gas hydrate – discovered in November 2009, in permanent tundra in the south margin of the country’s northwestern Qilian Mountains.

90: The number of years-worth of energy the above combustible ice reserves are believed to be capable of supplying for the whole of China.