In October this year, the Australian Senate created the Select Committee into the Resilience of Electricity Infrastructure in a Warming World.
The purpose of the committee is to examine the current role of various storage technologies and localised distributed generation to provide Australia’s electricity networks, and assessing their resilience in withstanding the growing intensity and frequency of extreme weather occurrences which are spurred on by global warming.
The Committee in particular highlights the following areas for review;
- recommend measures that should be taken by federal, state and local governments to hasten the rollout of such technologies in order to:
o create jobs in installation, manufacture and research of storage and distribution technologies,
o stimulate household and business demand for storage technologies,
o anticipate the rapid deployment of localised distributed generation through changes to market rules,
o drive the reduction in technology costs through economies of scale, and
o seize on the opportunities to be a global leader in deploying storage technologies because of Australia’s high fixed electricity tariffs and significant penetration of rooftop solar; and
- any other relevant matters
CFA has been asked to make a submission on this matter to the Senate Committee. Results will be released when the committee reports on the 24th March 2017.