Overview
- Murray Watt will use a Tuesday address to the Smart Energy Queensland conference in Brisbane to criticise the LNP government’s cancellations of renewable projects and extension of coal operations.
- Queensland recently scrapped a wind farm proposed to power about 500,000 homes after introducing mandatory public consultation for large solar and wind developments.
- Premier David Crisafulli has pledged to repeal the state renewable energy target while keeping a net-zero-by-2050 goal and running state-owned coal plants beyond 2035.
- The government has leaned on the new consultation laws, largely via Deputy Premier Jarrod Bleijie, to can projects, which Watt says signals to investors that “Queensland doesn’t want their business.”
- Watt will cite fifth-generation cattle farmer Tracey Richards, who lost expected turbine income when the Moonlight Range wind project near Rockhampton was shelved, to highlight regional impacts.