Page 3798 - Week 14 - Thursday, 10 December 1992
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Again I have to say that if we get people to pay for this renewable energy in a mandated proportion from these particular sources, even if the technology is not at an efficient price to provide it at that level, people are going to get upset about the fact that their energy costs have risen. We are going to be saying to them, "That is because we want this particular source, but you have to pay extra for it". It is not going to assist the process of getting this kind of technology up and running. I urge the Government at least to delay implementation of this recommendation until it can satisfy itself that the technology is well established and capable of delivering competitively and at a reasonable price; otherwise we are putting the cart before the horse.
I do not wish to detract from the advances that have been made in renewable energy technology in recent years. They are obviously very impressive, and we have made enormous improvements in recent years. I read in the report, for example, that solar heaters in houses can provide 90 per cent of the household hot water of an average home, and that is excellent. It is worth noting, even so, that in the same paragraph we are advised that it would take something like five years in the average household for the savings to pay off the capital outlay on solar technology. It is still very expensive. We have to accelerate the technology without pushing up the costs to the extent that people begin to resent the kinds of changes that are taking place. That will retard the energy that is coming from the community at the present time to see change in this area.
The other question of great interest arising from this report is that of energy efficient housing, and there has been a great deal of discussion about that. The Minister for the Environment has had a lot to say about energy efficient housing in recent weeks. Those of us who have visited energy efficient housing would recommend heartily to people building homes that they should take on board the important technology, the important concepts that are now available.
We must also acknowledge that energy efficient housing, particularly at the time when one is building one's house, does come at a cost. It is an up-front cost, admittedly; but it does come at a cost. When you build a house and you build in all these factors which will reduce your long-term energy costs, you have to put more money up front. I know that at present people are finding it very hard to get the money together to buy homes in the Territory. First home buyers are particularly hard pressed. We are in the middle of a recession, money is scarce, and any measure that significantly adds to the cost of building new homes has to be looked at very carefully by any government or assembly.
We have to ask ourselves: Are all the elements that are referred to in the recommendations strictly necessary? The recommendations are quite important. They have not fudged the issue as much as I thought might have been the case. It would have been very easy to fudge this issue and say, "We must educate more; we must think more about these issues". What we have done in this recommendation is say that we should incorporate into the ACT Building Code the energy order provisions set out in the Draft Energy Guidelines of June 1992 promulgated by the Planning Authority. That is a very positive, very direct step. The third recommendation is:
incorporate mandatory energy efficiency standards for houses and commercial buildings in the ACT building code, the standards to include factors such as insulation of walls and ceilings, thermal mass and double glazing.
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