[Brad Lockyer]

Prime minister Anthony Albanese and his energy minister Chris Bowen have been accused of hypocrisy surrounding their public announcement of a new fund for renewable energy projects.

The colleagues took two separate private RAAF jets from Canberra to NSW’s Hunter Valley region in order to promote the federal government’s new $1 billion Solar Sunshot scheme. Critics say its not a good look for a program meant to be reducing carbon emissions.

Both planes left Canberra for the Hunter Valley, but after the announcement the PM headed to another location in the Hunter for a different announcement, while minister Bowen’s plane flew on to Sydney.

Opposition social services spokesman Michael Sukkar told radio station 2GB it was a “grotesque use of taxpayers’ dollars.”

“The prime minister is entitled to the use of a private jet and what would typically occur is a minister … would hitch a ride with the prime minister,” he said.

But Mr Bowen defended the move, saying the Hunter Valley airport at Scone wasn’t equipped to handle the PM’s normal plane, and therefore two smaller planes were needed.

“The prime minister has a large jet available to him, that would normally be what we take, the runway at Scone wasn’t strong enough to take a large jet so the air force recommended a decision to use two small jets,” he said.

[Cosmo]

Did either of them need to go the Hunter? It was only an announcement, there was no physical need for either minister be there.
I wonder how much aviation gas was expended by the PM and the relevant minister on sprucing the failed Voice?
And politicians wonder why the public often think they are just an expensive joke.

[Mr Anthony Gale]

At least they were looking at solar power arrangements than the oppositions look at nuclear plants which is more dangerous. No nuclear fall out if there was a large earth quake and no finding a place to get rid of nuclear waste.
Much safer with solar power and wind farms. Would spruce up the coast line with wind turbines dotted around the countryside and in the oceans around the coastline oot at sea.

[Cosmo]

You don’t need to worry about the prospect building an atomic power station or an atomic submarine. We can’t even make our own tin cans of beetroots. About the limit of our ability to mske anything is a few runs or a few goals from kicking a ball around a paddock.

[Couldabeen]

Mr Gale, Sorry, but overall, in both shown and potential danger to life and health, nuclear is the safest form of large scale power generation.
In over 60 years of power generation and over 300 nuclear power stations, there has been only one occasion where a nuclear power plant has caused loss of life from radiation exposure. And only two where radiation was released due to either a natural or man made event.
They have zero emissions which is the goal of the climate change concerns.
The waste concern is a non-problem in reality. Apart from the actual bulk of exhausted fuel rods would fit in the back of an average ute every five years or so. Except that it need not. Those exhausted fuel rods can be recycled and go back to produce more power. France has been doing this for over 50 years.
Thanks to political pressure (originating from the USSR) Australia signed a Nuclear non-proliferation Treaty which forbade the recovery and recycling of exhausted nuclear fuels and destined them for permanent storage. This was to ensure that western nuclear power stations would always have this additional cost hanging over them.
One medium sized nuclear power station provides up to 60 years of 24 hour power regardless of weather and provides as much power as over 2,000 wind turbines and several hundred thousand solar panels.
The environmental cost of nuclear is only a fraction that of either wind or solar with a footprint of only a few hectares.

[Couldabeen]

Cosmo, Correct. There was no need for this photo opportunity at Liddell at all. A look at the company that has been handed $1Billion to establish a new cheaper and more efficient photovoltaic cell manufacturing facility shows that this is a very dubious action.
They have evolved from a development from the UNSW who created a prototype cell that was 30% more efficient than the general cells. The UNSW had been unable to transition to larger cells or consistent efficiency.
The company has been receiving Government funding for several years now and are in the promising the “super” cell mode as they have moved location every year or so. They had a very high profile event with the Prime Minister and Minister for Energy late last year at Kurnell as they established a new factory.
Their greatest claim now is that they will be cheaper by using copper instead of silver in their contact points.
Their new cells claim to be ~20% more efficient than the conventional cells.
To get a return on this $1Billion, they will have to establish an export market and there is no way that anything manufactured in Australia in this industry will ever be able to compete in price with similar products from China. Which may well be where this company relocates to when they’ve run through this grant.

[Liesegang]

Just wonder how many people can fly in these small jets that they used?

[Author]

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