Gross Feed-in Tariff Petition

My good friends over at Energy Matters have started a small grass roots campaign regarding a renewable energy gross feed in tariff.  It is in the form of an online petition, that I encourage you all to please sign it if you believe in this worthy endeavour to help give a massive boost to the number of installations of renewable energy systems throughout Australia.  Here is the content of the petition;

"Dear Ministers, Senators and Senate Committee Members,

Re: Renewable Energy Feed In Tariffs

We, the undersigned, believe that Australia should implement a nationalised, simple and uniform renewable energy gross feed in tariff system as soon as possible, rather than relying on individual states to develop and maintain their own systems, most of which offer far below what is required  to encourage the uptake of renewable energy systems.

It is crucial that Australia implement a gross feed in tariff model over a net feed in tariff scheme. A net system will only pay on surplus electricity produced, which provides little incentive for home owners and business to make the substantial investment in solar and wind power equipment.

A gross feed in tariff program should  pay a minimum of 80c per kilowatt hour of electricity generation which is fair compensation for the production of clean electricity by privately funded installations. The program should operate for at least 15 years and include an initial 6 month period whereby rebates currently in place are still available to allow the solar industry time to adjust and to stimulate uptake in these troubled economic times.

This rate and commitment will give a much needed boost to investment in and uptake of technologies much cleaner than low-emissions coal, with the added benefit of generating thousands of new jobs in the clean energy sector.

Countries such as Germany, a nation with far less solar resources than Australia, have proved the effectiveness of the gross feed in tariff model for many years. Germany now has the greatest solar power capacity in the world and has generated hundreds of thousands of renewable energy sector jobs due largely to their gross feed in tariff program. Australia is lagging far behind and as a consequence, our greenhouse gas emissions are increasing.

Australia has extensive solar resources and we should be making better use of those rather than focusing energies and investment on the long term viability of environmentally destructive coal-fired power generation.. Emissions controls such as Carbon Capture and Storage require as much as 20 percent of the electricity a power plant generates and the long term safety of such processes is still unproven.

It is only with the full support of the voting public of Australia that the Government will meet its goals of lowering greenhouse gas emissions and the people are ready to play their part if given the proper support and tools to do so.  It is far better, safer and more economically viable not to produce emissions in the first place, and solar energy and wind power offer proven emissions free power generation."

For those of you not familiar with my own opinion regarding the current net feed-in tariff that Victorian State government is currently implementing, have a read of this post, "Feed-in Tariff is a Travesty".  If the state governments can’t get the coal industry monkeys off of their backs, maybe it is time to try a little harder.  Maybe if we get enough signatures on the petition, the Commonwealth Government might stop dancing around the edges of the renewable energy debate and take some affirmative action and implement a gross feed-in tariff. 

A gross feed-in tariff is where the energy-producing household or business (the more the merrier) is paid for all the energy their system produces and not just the electricity fed back into the grid as in a net feed-in tariff.  This is a fair system, and it encourages maximum private investment in renewable energy systems.  The gross feed-in tariff is currently working well in many countries throughout the world and is responsible for a boom of renewable energy into those countries energy mix.

Once again, I humbly ask my readers to help take positive climate change action and join me in signing the petition by either pressing the button to the left or visiting the Gross Solar Feed In Tariff Petition site.  Both Kim and I have signed it for a greener Australia.   Help to stop all the hot air coming out of Canberra, and get some government action happening!  Leave me a comment if you have taken the time to sign.  It would be great to see a huge list of comments for this post!

Gav