Last week saw the collapse of Sun Cable, a pie-in-the-sky $35 billion plan by alternative energy enthusiasts, Andrew Forrest and Mike Cannon-Brookes, to generate solar energy and transport it by cable 4,200 kilometres to Singapore. The taxpayer provided $14 million for the project’s solar system, Australian-developed 5B. But major spending, which amounted to $210 million before Andrew Forrest pulled the plug, came from the two entrepreneurs.
Last week also saw Energy Minister Chris Bowen release his consultation for the disarmingly named Powering the Regions Fund. A centrepiece of this was weaponising the ‘Safeguard Mechanism’ from the emission reporting requirement that the Coalition introduced, into a requirement that the top 215 facilities reduce their emissions by 30 per cent by 2030 or buy carbon credits at a cost of up to $75 per tonne.
Eco-facism is expensive.
Headline is a bit misleading though, only the first paragraph relates to it. The rest of the article is all about those fine people in Canberra.