Target go-ahead raises green energy hopes

Age
Thursday 20/8/2009 Page: 4

THOUSANDS of employees in the renewable power sector were celebrating yesterday after the Government's renewable energy target bill passed through the Senate. After recent delays over the energy target slowing the Australian market, yesterday's deal was a "great will for the renewable energy industry", said Steve Garner, general manager of Keppel Prince Engineering.

"The Clean Energy Council talks about unlocking $28 billion worth of projects and we're looking forward to hopefully getting under way to build some of those in the not-too-distant future," Mr Garner said. "We're looking at possibly increasing our workforce by somewhere between 100 and 150 people and expanding our facilities, given that the projects start to flow."

Laurie Mallia, chief executive of Modern Solar, was also relieved to have new business confidence after yesterday's decision. "If this uncertainty had gone on any longer and we had lost a bigger%age of staff, when the bill would have been eventually passed there would have had to be a retraining or re-recruitment process and so forth. This now means that we don't have to do that."

However, Mr Mallia said a lot more could be done to boost renewable energy. "We as an industry in Australia have the highest sunlight in the world, the highest radiation in the world and we should be world leaders in renewables and particularly solar energy and we're simply not. "We're thanking the Government for what they have done assisting the industry, but I think there should be a lot more done - a lot more serious initiatives put in place."

Adrian Ferraretto, managing director of Solar Shop Australia, said he was looking forward to "getting back to business", following a hard past 10 weeks after the renewable energy rebate was wound up early. "Previous to them pulling the rebate, we were filling up to 450 units a week and we're down to less than 10 a week," Mr Ferraretto said. "For all our employees, it means they can come into work tomorrow knowing that the solar panel industry has got a.., very bright future."