Victoria’s shadow minister for energy, Labor’s Lily D’Ambrosio, has spruiked the benefits of renewable energy in a recently published letter to the editor. It’s the most recent example of the Victorian Labor party speaking about Victoria’s renewable energy policy.
While the opposition has not yet announced concrete proposals when it comes to energy policy, shadow ministers have demonstrated a keen awareness of the problems with the Baillieu government’s energy policy as well as the benefits a flourishing renewable energy sector can provide Victoria.
Yes 2 Renewables will be paying close attention to the Victorian Labor party as it develops its renewable energy policy, so keep your eyes on our Pollie Watch blog posts for updates. We endeavour to track and update the public about important policy developments, but if you have a tip off, get a politician on the record at a public event, or spot something we missed, shoot through an email to leigh.ewbank [at] foe.com.au.
‘Energy lagging’, The Gippsland Times, August 21.
The report of the Australian Energy Market Operator last week reminds us of the investment rewards that come from renewable energies of solar and wind; not to mention jobs for regional Victoria.
Up to 40 per cent of our electricity bills goes to maintaining the transmission and distribution network.
The strong growth in wind energy and solar rooftop panels have contributed to South Australia being able to put off costly upgrades to its distribution network by four years, which means that consumers in that state should eventually get the price benefits.
South Australia has attracted $5 billion in renewable energy infrastructure projects in the last year alone.
Yet the Baillieu-Ryan Government has savagely cut feed-in tariffs for rooftop solar panels and strangled the wind energy industry to the extent that no new wind investment and jobs are likely to be initiated by this government.
These failings are taking regional Victoria backwards under Baillieu.
– Lily D’Ambrosio (Labor), Shadow Minister for Energy
yes2renewables.org 
After Andrews appeared on television gloating over Baillieu’s supposed backflip over CSG, I fired off a quick note suggesting it was a missed opportunity to highlight his party’s pro-renewable position and that he would have been better pointing that out rather than trying to score points.
Good on you Blair. It’s encouraging that people are engaged in the debate and let their elected officials know where they stand on energy policy. Cheers, L
State Labor has generally been good in approving wind farms, and deserve credit for their record. Unfortunately, their colleagues in Federal parliament are also presiding over the botched RET scheme: the glut of Renewable Energy Certificates left over from the “phantom RECs” problem are still hanging around and depressing the price of RECs generally.
This means that developers can’t easily get finance to begin construction on the many approved wind farms that are waiting to be built.
While the Federal government did remove the source of this by splitting the RET into small and large scale, they have done nothing that I can see to remove the legacy of this disastrous policy. They ought to retire an equivalent amount of RECs to the “phantom” RECs that entered the market, or perhaps increase the RET by the same equivalent amount.
Otherwise, the RET is serving as a limit to the amount of renewables developed, as much as it is a support for some to be built. That’s a pretty perverse outcome.