<
https://reneweconomy.com.au/just-plain-wrong-bowen-takes-aim-at-renewable-naysayers-says-82-per-cent-by-2030-can-be-done/>
"Federal energy minister Chris Bowen has emphatically reaffirmed his conviction
that Australia can hit its renewable energy target of 82 per cent by 2030, and
says claims that it can’t be done are “just plain wrong.”
In a speech at the
AFR Climate Summit in Sydney on Wednesday, Bowen said he
wanted to tackle the subject of the national target “head on, and early,”
sending a message to critics and naysayers.
“I often read in newspapers, including in the
Fin, that 82% by 2030 can’t be
achieved,” the minister told the Summit.
“It can. It’s not inevitable, it’s not easy. In fact it’s a stretch, as it was
intended to be.
“But those who sit around in 2025 and say ‘it’s all too hard and we should give
up’ are, with respect, just plain wrong.”
Bowen says the “fundamental error” behind claims that 82 per cent renewables
cannot be achieved comes down to a failure recognise that already implemented
government policies are yet to have their full impact.
He offers the Capacity Investment Scheme as an example of this, the latest
tender for which was launched just last week, days after announcing the winners
of most recent generation tender.
The newly expanded Capacity Investment Scheme (CIS) is now seeking 40 gigawatts
of new wind, solar and storage, to deliver the bulk of the new capacity needed
to reach 82 per cent renewables by 2030 – double the current levels in just
five years.
As
Renew Economy has reported, the battery storage component of the CIS is
working well, with a new batch of 16 projects awarded underwriting agreements
in the latest tender and developers having little difficulty in proving their
business case and landing finance.
Large scale wind and solar projects, however, are taking longer to gear up. No
new wind projects have reached financial close yet in 2025, and few of the wind
and solar winners of the first CIS generation tender late last year have
progressed.
In an interview on a recent episode of
Renew Economy’s
Energy Insiders
podcast, Bowen said he was happy with the way the CIS was playing out and
confident of the role it would play in achieving the 2030 target.
“It’s massively oversubscribed, which shows me that the pipeline of projects is
big and strong, and that’s why, one of the reasons why we extended it from 32
gigawatts to 40 gigawatts,” Bowen said.
In his speech on Wednesday, Bowen once again defended the CIS as “massively
successful,” while also stressing that it is a long-game policy."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
