Greens MLC Robin Chapple today praised the ongoing Sustainable Energy Association of Australia Energizing South East Asia Conference being held in Perth this week, citing it as an excellent example of the booming renewables sector.
"Industry nation-wide is champing at the bit for leadership on renewable energy policy, and the community is demanding real action on climate change. This conference brings together the cream of the renewable energy industry and offers to provide that leadership," Mr. Chapple said.
"It's now up to the State and Commonwealth governments - especially the former - to grasp the olive branch of policy leadership that SEA and this conference offer."
Mr. Chapple said that the Barnett Government's record on embracing renewable energy was lacklustre.
"This is a government which refuses to even properly measure the greenhouse gas outputs of the State, which are on track to be more than double our Kyoto obligations."
"This is a government which refuses to even contemplate more than 20 per cent renewable energy for the State past 2020. Mr Barnett appears to be content to lock WA into a dirty energy future even as the renewables sector emerges as a boom industry."
"As we move towards a historical carbon pricing mechanism nationally, Mr. Barnett has the temerity to announce in Parliament that his Government's biggest contribution to reducing emissions is his encouragement of vast new LNG processing projects - which will likely push this State's emissions past 120 million tonnes per annum of CO2e."
"If only the State Government had the same level of innovative vision I have witnessed at this conference."
"The vision of this Government will be tested in the next session of Parliament when the Greens' Renewable Feed-Tariff Bill will be debated. This Bill will rejuvenate the popular but tragically underfunded incentive for householders to produce rooftop solar energy, and I am hopeful that the Government will agree that this is a plan worth backing."
For more information contact Robin Chapple on 0409 379 263 or 9486 8255
