This article is more than 3 years old

This article is more than 3 years old

Research touted by the resources minister that reportedly suggests Australia can rely on coal to meet emissions reduction has been attacked by experts and appears to have been misreported.

The Australian reported on Tuesday that research conducted by the Department of Industry, Innovation and Science – and commissioned by Matt Canavan, the federal minister for resources – showed Australia could cut its emissions by 27% if it replaced its existing coal power stations with the more efficient “ultra-supercritical” technology.

If true, that would get the country close to its 2030 target, which is a reduction of 28% below 2005 levels.

However, a summary of the analysis seen by Guardian Australia suggests the new coal technology – under a very expensive demolition and construction program – could reduce Australia’s emissions by 12% at most.

In fact, to reduce Australia’s emissions by 27% by relying on reductions in the electricity industry alone, the sector’s emissionswould need to be reduced to almost zero. Australia’s entire electricity sector only accounts for about a third of its carbon emissions.

On the basis of the analysis, Canavan released a statement attacking “people who oppose the coal industry for ideological reasons”.

“Coal has an important role to play as Australia, and the rest of the world, reduce carbon dioxide emissions,” he said. “Australia has the resources to be a low-cost and efficient energy superpower. Access to affordable and reliable power underpins our economy and is the key to long-term jobs in the manufacturing sector.”

But energy analyst Olivia Kember from the Climate Institute said locking in decades of emissions from new coal generators would jeopardise longer-term commitments made in Paris, including reaching net zero emissions in the second half of the century.

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“Australia has committed through the Paris Agreement to achieve net zero emissions. Building new coal stations that can go no further than a reduction of 25% to 34% doesn’t achieve the net zero goal, and would lock Australia into decades of high-carbon electricity while the rest of the world is switching to clean power,” Kember said.

“That’s such a risky outcome that I doubt any financial institutions would even finance investments in ultra-supercritical coal in Australia.”

Australia’s chief scientist reached a similar conclusion in his preliminary report on the future security of the electricity market, which was commissioned by the Turnbull government.

In the report Alan Finkel said: “Owner-investors are exiting emissions-intensive power stations as these reach the end of their design lives. It has been clear from our consultations that no one is contemplating investing in new ones, nor would financial institutions provide finance.”

Rod Campbell, an economist at the Australia Institute, said an ambitious plan to replace all of Australia’s existing coal power stations with brand new ones would drive up electricity prices. And it would do so by more than if coal was replaced with renewable energy.

Campbell pointed to government-funded clean-coal research from 2015, which already showed energy from some new-built wind farms was cheaper than advanced coal power stations. And that report claimed that by 2030, all wind and solar would be cheaper.

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But more up-to-date analysis from the US financial advisors, Lazard, shows that almost all new wind and and solar power is now cheaper than almost all new coal power.

Labor’s spokesperson for climate change and energy, Mark Butler, said Canavan’s intervention was part of an ideological attack on renewable energy.

“For a government that has been so vocal about not picking winners, the Turnbull government seems to be very comfortable picking coal as Australia’s future energy source,” he said in a statement.

“The latest intervention by Minister Canavan trumpeting coal isn’t about securing a reliable and affordable energy future; at its core it is just the latest ideological attack on renewables by a government desperate to draw attention away from the fact it has no plan on energy and climate,” Butler said.



Brendan Pearson, the chief executive of the mining lobby group, the Minerals Council of Australia, welcomed the departmental report saying it showed “new coal generation technologies can reduce Australia’s emissions sharply while providing reliable and affordable energy to households and businesses.”



“It is simply common sense that these technologies be part of Australia’s efforts to meet its emissions reduction targets while maintaining affordable and secure energy supply,” he said in a statement.