Despite Positive Results, Renewable Energy In Australia Faces Local Challenges

Community protests are delaying Australia’s efforts to rebuild its overburdened electricity infrastructure, potentially delaying investments in wind and solar farms (Renewable Energy) that would be needed to replace retiring coal-fired power generation over the next 25 years. The continent sized country has long been blamed for going too slow on renewable additions, besides its high exports of fossil fuels, especially coal.

At the same time, despite one of the highest rates of rooftop solar adoption, energy officials and regulators say that industry needs to promote better awareness of the benefits to communities.  The issue apparently is with large scale utility plants, and the associated transmission infrastructure, which is facing resistance. Ironically, the issue for the National Electricity market (NEM) has also been exacerbated by a coal and gas shortage due high prices and a large part of the generation fleet being offline.

The newly elected Labor government of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese plans to provide A $20 billion in cheap finance so that an additional $58 billion in private investment can be made to build 10,000 kilometers of transmission lines in areas with wind and solar farms. The upgrade for transmission infrastructure was long overdue, and urgent now, thanks to the intermittency of renewable capacity being created. Even though Australia has also given the go ahead for some of the largest ‘Big Batteries’ worldwide to stabilise the grid, among other things.

The new transmission will be required to accommodate the 140 gigawatts (GW) of renewable generation that the energy market operator predicts the market will have by 2050, nearly nine times the current renewable capacity.

However, a new transmission project proposed by AusNet, the Western Victoria Transmission Network Project, the first new transmission project in 30 years, is facing opposition from farmers.

Issues range from an alleged failure to listen to, and act on feedback from locals, and even the routing of these lines in cases.

Another firm, Transgrid, which is planning to build the VNI West project to improve transmission between Victoria and New South Wales, emphasised the importance of timing what would be a multi-year building process on transmission projects. Failure to set up the projects in time could lead to stranded renewable assets, or curtailment at best.

Renewable Industry players also allege that there is a lengthy clearance procedure for transmission projects, which involves regulators determining whether a project should proceed and how much of its expenses may be passed on to consumers through tariffs.

While various projects have been suggested, only one has obtained permission so far: the A$3.5 billion Marinus Link project between Tasmania’s island and the mainland.

60 GW of so-called firming capacity, or three times the market’s current backup capacity, will be required to support all of the new renewable capacity when the sun isn’t shining and the wind isn’t blowing.

Regulators and industry agree that a “capacity market” is needed to encourage the creation of that firming capacity, which would compensate those who have power available for dispatch at any time.

As the world’s largest exporter of coal, and a key player in the gas market, Australia has designed a strategy to pivot to a Green Hydrogen exporter, besides power to Singapore, to maintain its energy exports, and ensure it can build renewable energy capacity well beyond its domestic market requirements.