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Notice of Motion: Cr Brindley, Hazelwood Power Station

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Notice of Motion: Cr Brindley, Hazelwood Power Station PLANNING AND ENVIRONMENT Agenda Item 6.1 COMMITTE 1 March 2005 NOTICE OF MOTION: CR BRINDLEY, HAZELWOOD POWER STATION Motion 1. That the Planning and Environment Committee recommend that the Lord Mayor: 1.1. write to the Premier, the Minister for Environment and the Minister for Energy expressing its concern with the proposed expansion of the mining lease for the Hazelwood Power Station, especially in the context of the City of Melbourne’s Zero Net Emissions by 2020 policy; and 1.2. raise this issue at the next Capital City Committee. Moved: Cr Brindley Background Attached are copies of articles from The Age Newspaper: · The dirty state we’re in, February 14 2005; · Reprieve for dirtiest power plant, February 14 2005; and · Editorial – with the terminal costs of global warming more apparent the nuclear power option should be debated, February 15 2005. Attachments: 1. The dirty state we’re in, February 14 2005; 2. Reprieve for dirtiest power plant, February 14 2005; and 3. Editorial – with the terminal costs of global warming more apparent the nuclear power option should be debated, February 15 2005 050214 - The Age - The dirty state we're in.txt The dirty state we're in February 14, 2005 - 12:00AM Under a cloud: coal-fired power stations such as the Loy Yang plant in the Latrobe Valley produce 90 per cent of the state's electricity. Related Greenhouse gas emissions Victoria's abundant reserves of brown coal once seemed such a blessing. Now, with scientists warning of the impact of global warming, that's not so clear. Liz Minchin examines the state's power dilemma. Victoria likes to promote itself as a clean, green state, leading the way on environmental initiatives. But the truth is much grubbier. In fact, Victorians are among the worst greenhouse gas polluters on the planet. Every year, each of us is responsible for producing an average 24 tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions; to put that in a global perspective, even the average American produces fewer emissions - 21 tonnes - than we do. And there are no signs of that changing, as more of us move into larger homes and go to work in offices reliant on massive energy use. So how did the Garden State become the Carbon State? A large part of the answer can be found two hours east of Melbourne in the Latrobe Valley, where the coal fires never stop burning. Drive east along the Princes Freeway and, as you approach Morwell, a row of eight tall chimneys emerges over the horizon, pumping out a steady light grey cloud of water vapour, fine ash and carbon dioxide. Advertisement AdvertisementIt's the first glimpse of Hazelwood, the oldest of the valley's five coal-burning power stations, where conveyor belts rumble day and night to feed Victorians' appetite for energy. Every time you flick on a switch, this is where your electricity is coming from. All the coal stations use the same basic process for producing electricity: tonnes of coal are dug up, pulverised and burnt, heating giant water boilers; once hot, jets of steam spurt out of the boiler, turning fan blades connected to a generator. Together with another plant in Anglesea, these plants produce more than 90 per cent of Victoria's electricity (supplemented by small amounts of gas, wind and hydro power). They also produce 55 per cent of the state's total greenhouse gas emissions, about 62 million tonnes a year, equivalent to the exhaust from more than 15 million cars. And each year that figure keeps climbing - between 1990 and 1999, Victoria's total emissions from electricity generation jumped 41 per cent, largely after we joined the national electricity market in the late nineties. On Wednesday the Kyoto Protocol, an international agreement to cut global-warming gases, becomes law. The deal was signed by 128 nations in 1997. Australia is not one of them.There are coal-powered plants in almost every Australian state, but what sets Victoria apart is the type of coal we rely on: brown coal, which is like damp crumbly soil so you have to burn a lot more of it than black coal to generate the same amount of heat. Deep seams of brown coal can be found just about everywhere beneath the Latrobe Valley's grassy slopes and for more than 80 years it has been celebrated as a cheap source of power, helping build a manufacturing industry in Victoria worth $23 billion a year. But today many question whether the benefits of cheap electricity outweigh the costs to the environment. It's a tough job for the Victorian Government, trying to juggle the demands of environmentalists who want swift action on climate change and powerful business interests who want no action at all. According to state Energy Minister Theo Theophanous, the Government has managed to strike a balance between the two positions with its Greenhouse Challenge for Energy paper, which was released two months ago and is open for public comment until Friday. The paper sets out a four-pronged strategy to reduce Victoria's huge greenhouse gas emissions through greater energy efficiency, renewable energy sources, technology to make brown coal "cleaner" to burn, and a national emissions trading scheme. But the coal generators can rest easy; as the paper and the minister make abundantly clear, the Bracks Government has no plans to dramatically change the Page 1 050214 - The Age - The dirty state we're in.txt way Victoria is powered. "I don't make any apologies for the fact that Victoria has about 500 years' supply of brown coal, which will be the future for our children in providing energy to this state," Theophanous says. "That energy will be provided using newer, more efficient and cleaner technologies, and we are committed to helping bring that about." The clearest evidence of the Government's unapologetic support for brown coal is its decision to allow Victoria's oldest and heaviest polluting power plant, Hazelwood, to extend its operating life by 20 years to 2031 by giving it access to more coal. While the deal has not yet been finalised, subject to Hazelwood agreeing to further emissions reductions, Theophanous told The Age he was confident that an agreement would be reached soon. To be fair, there are no quick or easy solutions to Victoria's power dilemma. Using current technology, natural gas is the only other potentially reliable source of power for the state, but there are limited supplies of it in Victoria and huge new plants would need to be built. Renewable energy options such as wind and solar power can't guarantee constant supply, for obvious reasons: the wind doesn't always blow and the sun doesn't always shine. That's not to mention any of the political obstacles, such as the huge community protests that have often greeted attempts to build new wind farms along Victoria's coast. And then there is the n-word - nuclear power, which most politicians, environmentalists and power industry leaders don't even want to say aloud, let alone discuss seriously, despite Australia having 40 per cent of the world's uranium reserves and its widespread use in Europe, Japan and the US. The Bracks Government is strongly opposed to considering a nuclear power plant in the state. Ultimately the Government and electricity industry are pinning their hopes on emerging technologies such as geosequestration, an as yet commercially unproven method of burying greenhouse emissions underground. The Latrobe Valley coal generators were understandably nervous about attracting media attention in the lead-up to the Kyoto Protocol coming into force this Wednesday. But after some hesitation, a representative of the valley's five generators agreed to meet The Age for an interview and tour of the state's largest electricity station. At the end of a long, winding road outside Traralgon, the Loy Yang A plant sits overlooking Australia's biggest coal mine, a massive brown pit 30 times the length of the MCG and 10 times as wide. We're standing at the rim of the pit on what feels like damp soil but is actually the remains of a 30 million-year-old rainforest, which over time turned into brown coal. Mixed among the smaller crumbly lumps of coal are intact logs and trees stumps that, despite their age, could be mistaken for ones felled and buried only a few years ago. Seeing how vast these coal supplies are, it's easy to understand why the Government and industry are so reluctant to give up on a coal-driven future. But even the spokesman for the Latrobe Valley generators acknowledges that their current levels of greenhouse gas emissions need to be cut. "All the generators have been dealing with this, and between 1996 and 2003 more than $400 million was spent on greenhouse gas abatement across the Latrobe Valley," says Loy Yang Power's general manager of power and environment, Richard Elkington, speaking on behalf of the region's generators. "Over that time there was also a 5 per cent reduction in carbon intensity and we planted nearly one million trees collectively." So if the generators are going to the trouble of trying to cut their greenhouse gas emissions, does that mean they believe climate change is a real global phenomenon, which humans are accelerating? Well, not necessarily. "We all have individual opinions about the worth of the Kyoto Protocol or whether at the end of the day any of this is going to influence the climate, but we're dealing with a strongly held view of the public that climate change is real, and therefore that's what we have to deal with," Elkington says.
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