State begins slow squeeze on emitters

Sydney Morning Herald
Saturday 16/8/2008 Page: 4

THE state's top 232 greenhouse polluters, ranging from BlueScope Steel Steel to the Sydney Opera House, will be forced to cut their emissions from this year under new energy-efficiency laws. The State Government will pursue a naming and shaming policy for big energy users it deems to be wasting power, backed up by court action if they do not make the required cuts.

But the targets so far are modest. The first round, beginning in January, aim to peel back less than 1 per cent of the state's emissions of at least 160 million tonnes of greenhouse gas each year. The first round of efficiency measures will save companies about $40 million on their power bills, the Government says.

Yesterday the Environment Minister, Verity Firth, held the first meeting of her Climate Change Council, a group of climate experts and advocates. In a speech she acknowledged that most of the work remained to be done, and the national carbon trading scheme, to be introduced in 2010, would not do enough to bring down emissions. "The lack of an effective framework for adaption in NSW is a major gap in the state's response to climate change," she said.

NSW had fallen behind some other places, such as California, Ms Firth said. That US state had promoted energy-efficiency programs that saw household power use rise by just 6 per cent since 1980; electricity consumption by NSW residents had shot up 64 per cent in the same period. If NSW had followed the Californian path, household energy bills would be lower by about $115 a year, she said.

Details of how far businesses have to go to cut power are still being decided, although under the scheme Telstra aims to snip emissions from its NSW operations by 5893 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent a year, through simple measures such as switching off lights when not in use.

Flemington Markets will improve its refrigeration and lighting practices to preserve 1185 tonnes, and the Sydney Convention Centre will reduce annual energy use by 510 tonnes with better lighting and air-conditioning. "The sorts of cost savings they can make in their own operations should be enough, but there will be mechanisms to follow up if for some reason they do not comply," Ms Firth said.

Small- and medium-sized businesses would also be encouraged to make cuts under the state plan. On the same day Ms Firth was promoting the benefits of reducing the state's reliance on coalfired power, her counterpart in the Energy Resources portfolio, Ian Macdonald, announced that another coal exploration licence had been awarded.

China's biggest coal-mining company, the state-owned Shenhua Group, will pay the state $300 million for the right to search for coal on 190 square kilometres of the Liverpool Plains, near Gunnedah. The area adjoins another coal exploration zone, where farmers are continuing a blockade to stop coal prospecting by BHP Billiton, which had also made a bid for the licence awarded to Shenhua.