Page 1963 - Week 07 - Wednesday, 23 June 2021
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I love asking young people big questions. They do not get bogged down in targets or back stories or what ifs; they skip straight to the point. I have worked in the recycling industry for over a decade and I cannot put it any better than my seven-year-old did last night. We need to recycle to save the planet and keep material out of landfill. This is how nature works. There is no waste in nature; only an endless chain of useful stuff. And that is exactly what a circular economy means.
We are doing pretty well on climate change in the ACT. I am proud to be part of a government that is taking such strong climate action. We are the first state or territory in this country to be powered by 100 per cent renewable electricity. We have run community battery trials and we are rolling out big grid batteries. We are providing zero interest loans and incentives for rooftop solar and batteries and more efficient electrical appliances. We are giving up fossil fuel gas. We are not connecting new suburbs to gas and we are helping people make the switch. We are getting people out of their cars by encouraging active and public transport. We are running an EV revolution by changing our government fleet cars and our diesel buses for electric models. We are driving uptake of EVs with zero interest loans, free registration and charging infrastructure.
It is all great news for our planet, and goodness knows we need more of that. But as we transition off these fossil fuels—petrol, diesel and gas—we are creating new waste streams, and some of them are becoming a bit of a problem. Rooftop solar panels are booming in Canberra. The rooftop solar industry has thrived, supported by ACT government policy like the feed-in tariff, innovative reverse auctions and interest-free loans. Solar panels last a long time—my first set have been on our roof for over 12 years—but many are coming to the end of their lives, and what then?
Electrical appliances have been getting more and more efficient over time. We will get more extreme temperatures as our climate changes and, as well as building and insulating better, we need more climate control indoors. But some of our models are getting really efficient. Reverse-cycle heat pumps can transform Canberra’s extreme summers and winters at a fraction of the running cost and a fraction of the carbon emissions of traditional air conditioning and gas heating. There is no easy recycling scheme for old electrical appliances and old gas ones and, as we encourage more people to switch over, we are creating waste.
Our cars, buildings and grids are being transformed with battery technology. Batteries can keep our vehicles moving around town or down to the beach for the weekend. They can stabilise our grid and they can make the solar panels on our rooftops more valuable by storing electricity for use at night. But what happens when they are finished?
All of these useful things are made of precious materials. They have metals like lithium, nickel, silver and aluminium. They contain other materials like plastic, glass and silicone. These are valuable resources and we need to get them back to make more useful things. Some of these resources are incredibly rare and, if we do not recover them, we will run out.
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