Feed-in laws welcome
ACT Greens MLA Deb Foskey today welcomed the introduction of a feed-in law in to the Assembly today, which guarantees for 20 years to buy back solar energy from home providers at a high tariff.
“The ACT Greens have been proposing feed-in laws for the ACT since 2006. And since then we have been pleased to see MLA Mick Gentleman take the initiative inside the majority Labor Government” Dr Foskey said today.
“It is important that we build a community commitment to de-centralised renewable energy generation and build the solar energy industry here in Australia.”
“I note that ActewAGL was not initially supportive of this approach. That might be because it could take dominance of the market away from that one business.”
“The strength of this scheme as proposed is that it offers a substantial fixed tariff which is guaranteed for 20 years. Having feed-in laws is one thing, but having an effective scheme is another.”
“I also welcome Mr Gentleman’s attempt to address the equity issues that the proposed scheme first threw up. I look forward to scrutinising the Bill more closely to see if it delivers on this front.”
“I’d also like to remind people that we need an integrated planning and development approach that includes massively improved efficiency in our houses and appliances, as well as the production of more renewable energy. For these laws to be effective, we need to revisit the Territory Plan which currently allows overshadowing of adjoining houses so long as they get a minimum 3 hours sunlight in part of their living area.”
“Otherwise we will see too much of this new solar energy being used to power unnecessary air-conditioning and heating” Dr Foskey said.
