An energy expert has warned the Labor government faces a “really challenging” road to achieving its climate change goals as the clock winds down on the Paris Agreement target deadline.
He acknowledged it was “technically” possible but would be “very challenging”, as to succeed the government would need to achieve its other target to establish 82 per cent renewable energy sources. “If we don’t achieve the 82 per cent, let’s say we get 70, it would still be a big improvement from where we’ve been. But it would also, I think, have an impact on 43 .”The Albanese government has been seeking to achieve net zero emissions through “clean energy” including solar power, wind power and green hydrogen.
He described the reduction in emissions from electricity generation as “in some way the easy part” as the government developed clean energy projects where the transmission grid already had “existing capacity”. “To see how the numbers add up… still seems to me to be very challenging indeed for the government,” Mr Wood said.According to recent projections, only the European Union and UK will meet the Paris Agreement 2° Celsius goal while US, Canada and Japan are set to miss their targets.