Renewable Energy Bill Passes for Australia

The Australia parliament has just recently passed a new law demanding that 20 percent of the country’s electricity come from renewable energy sources by 2020. This matches the targets that have already been set up be Europe.

This new law is set to quadruple the renewable energy target that was set by the previous government in 2001. This new goal would provide the island with enough clean electricity to power the households of all 21 million Australians. Despite this great news, some officials have already warned that more aggressive cuts in greenhouse gas emissions will still be needed.

This new bill was just passed by the Senate and House of Representatives on Thursday. It came about after the government was able to reach a deal with the main opposition party to increase the government’s assistance to industries that are heavy users of electricity.

Bob Brown, leader of the Australian Greens minor opposition party, said that the new target should be 30 percent and the big polluters were offered way too much government assistance. An independent, Senator Bob Fielding said that the bill will make power way too expensive. He went on to say, “It’s mums and dads that will be subsidizing wind-powered electricity, solar - these are very expensive.”

Right now about 8 percent of Australia’s electricity comes from renewable sources. This includes the hydroelectric generators that were built. Critics are all arguing that this new target will make electricity more expensive.

Penny Wong, the Climate change minister, said: “The only way we’re going to be able to turn around the growth in our carbon pollution … is to put a firm legislated limit on the amount of carbon that we produce and make those who create the pollution pay for it.”

Thanks to www.guardian.co.uk for the above quotes.