Prime Minister Stated Labor’s Stance on Renewable Energy is Political Claptrap

The Guardian reported that Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has branded the Labor’s position on renewable energy as ideology and political claptrap while attempting to brush off questions about why he glorified the state of South Australia as a leader in renewable energy during the federal election but criticised the state over it reliance on wind power last month.

The prime minister was asked by the shadow climate minister, Mark Butler why he supported clean energy in South Australia during the campaign only to use an extreme weather event to play politics after the election.

PM Turnbull doubled down on his political attacks, telling parliament Labor treated renewable energy as an “ideological” issue rather than a technological issue. The prime minister stated that there are many sources of electricity and there is intermittent renewable, there is hydro and many forms of fossil fuel generation. There resources have many characteristics and what everyone should do is to take away the ideology and the political claptrap that the Labor Party surrounds policies and focus on these objective.

Labor’s pursuit of the prime minister in question time follows his decision to link the statewide in SA explicitly to the state’s use of his renewable energy. Conservatives calls it the “wake up call” for state leaders trying to hit completely unrealistic renewable targets.

A report by the Australian Energy market Operator about the huge blackout pointed to extreme weather as the prime cause of multiple transmission system faults and then resulted in the statewide power outage.

Labor then followed up by asking the prime minister to present the government’s policy to support the development of renewable energy projects after 2020. The government is thinking about different elements of its climate policy framework over the medium, term because of a guarantee to review its Direct Action policy in 2017.

The prime minister, responding to the renewable target after 2020, said that Australia’s commitment to the Paris treaty would require substantial reductions in emissions up to 2030. He also said the Paris targets would be met “partly” by renewable energy targets and partly by other measures. The prime minister said the national RET was set at 2020 and the whole climate policy will be addressed and reviewed in the course of next year.

Click here to read the full story on The Guardian

Featured Image Credit: The Guardian