Tag Archives: solarpv

Coal, climate change, solar & batteries – why Qld Treasury wanted to offload the state’s energy assets

Posted on December 14, 2018 by Gene Tunny

The recent Financial Times report Development bank halts coal financing to combat climate change, reprinted in this morning’s AFR, should prompt some serious long-term thinking from the Queensland government and local governments with regional economies heavily dependent on coal mining, … Continue reading →

Posted in Budget, Mackay, Mining, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Qld Solar Bonus Scheme shows how bad government policy can cost taxpayers for a long time

Posted on June 1, 2017 by Gene Tunny

The Queensland Government yesterday directed its electricity network business Energy Queensland to remove the cost of the Solar Bonus Scheme from its charges until 2020, which will reduce Energy Queensland’s earnings and hence adversely impact the State Budget (see the … Continue reading →

Posted in Energy, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , | 11 Comments

Zombie electricity utilities – upcoming presentation by Professor Manuel Pinho to ESA Qld

Posted on February 26, 2017 by Gene Tunny

The latest issue of The Economist features an excellent article (Wind and solar power are disrupting electricity systems) describing the challenges of integrating renewable energy into electricity systems. It is a timely article, given there is an extensive debate in … Continue reading →

Posted in Energy, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Reforming solar cross-subsidy is good policy, but unclear why $3.4 billion should be locked up in Cost of Living Fund

Posted on October 12, 2014 by Gene Tunny

The Government’s apparent plan to end the cross-subsidy from households without solar cells to those with solar cells, and to fund the feed-in tariff through an explicit subsidy, is a sound one (see Brisbane Times coverage Power bills to come … Continue reading →

Posted in Budget, Queensland Government | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Solar subsidy creates suburban “eyesore” on Gold Coast

Posted on July 18, 2013 by Gene Tunny

In describing how government policies can have strange effects, economic textbooks often refer to the window tax that applied in Britain in France in the 18th and 19th centuries. This tax resulted in a number of households bricking up windows … Continue reading →

Posted in Energy, Environment, Gold Coast | Tagged , , , , , , | 2 Comments