Forewords by CEO and Kelly O’Shanassy

John Grimes, Chief Executive Smart Energy Council

WE HAVE RECENTLY FINISHED meeting with State and Territory Energy Ministers right across the country. Pressing them to fast track largescale renewable projects, and transmission upgrades, so we can get a pipeline of new projects under construction as soon as possible.

The aim is to create thousands of construction jobs right across rural and regional Australia, boosting local economies across the country.

Titanium Partners

In my view

THERE ARE PLENTY OF GOOD REASONS to ensure a climate-positive recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic. The economic and jobs benefits alone justify a clean and smart recovery led by renewables from the wind and the sun.

But for me, the greatest reason is not economic at all. It’s to protect the people we love.

Every single living thing depends on our natural world for clean air and water, soil that grows our food and feeds our bellies and beautiful landscapes to feed our souls. But our natural world is in real strife because of climate change and that means the people that we love are in strife too.

For years our leaders have pitted economic growth against cutting climate pollution. But if we destroy our climate, we harm ourselves. There is no choice between a healthy climate and a strong economy. We can have both by protecting our climate or neither if we destroy it.

Right now, our government leaders are gearing to bounce back to where we came from. But where we came from is pretty bad: deadly bushfires, crippling droughts and a dying reef all driven by planetwarming fuels like coal and gas. Let’s not go back there.

Instead, we have everything we need to bounce forward – the solutions, the technology, the know-how and the capital to propel us to a clean, jobs rich, economically resilient future.

We have also been talking about the large-scale rollout of domestic energy storage systems, to shift solar energy use into times of peak demand and deliver benefits for all electricity users.

We are also keen to target energy intensive industries, such as aluminium smelting, as a priority industry and to make it more flexible while at the same time bank the benefits of cheaper large-scale clean renewable energy.

The thing that struck me during the discussions with Ministers was how proactive all governments were being in seeking out job creation opportunities that also deliver lower electricity prices and greater grid stability for all Australians.

Solar system installations create jobs, but the ongoing legacy is lower power bills for the life of the system.

Young families, retirees and small businesses across the country are eager to embrace solar and batteries, and the legacy is greater household and business electricity bill savings, which in turn is a boost for the entire economy.

Let’s not squander this once in a generation opportunity to rebuild our economy and transition to the benefits of a low carbon future simultaneously.

Let’s use the crisis to do what once seemed impossible.

Kelly O’Shanassy, Chief Executive Officer, Australian Conservation Foundation

We have just 10 years until climate change wreaks truly devastating impacts on all our lives. But we can do a lot in a decade. It took less than 10 years to put human footprints on moondust. And when JFK launched the moon program, NASA had absolutely no idea how to do it. We have the answers in renewable energy.

A climate-positive recovery from the pandemic is our moonshot. Our mission. We will need everyone behind it.

So in these difficult times, any time you feel depressed about the state of climate politics, or sad about climate damage, or simply overwhelmed by the task before us, look someone you love in the eye and remember why we are all doing this.