Councillor Chris Harris

Several major daily newspapers have reported that Senator Bob Brown and The Greens want to stop Australian coal mining and exports within three years.

Kevin Rudd and John Howard have gone ballistic, labelling this ‘a kneejerk reaction’.

It’s a shame none of them bothered to check their facts. Bob Brown’s actual press release (see below) clearly says we need to develop a PLAN within three years, hardly a kneejerk reaction.

The press release:
9th Feb 07

Australia should develop a plan, in the next three years, to reduce and phase out coal exports, Greens Leader Bob Brown said today.

“Neither the Howard Coalition nor Rudd Labor will tackle our biggest cause of climate change - burning coal. Both the parties support burning more, not less,” Senator Brown said.

“This is an extreme position considering the massive economic and environmental crisis the world is facing. The nation should rapidly transform to being the world’s largest exporter of solar power technology, other renewable energy options and energy efficiency technology - creating thousands of jobs and a multi-billion dollar export income in tandem with the replacement of coal,” Senator Brown said. Read the rest of this entry »

Climate change is the single greatest threat to Australia’s way of life. It’s mostly caused by pollution from three sources: transport, power (electricity) production, and food production.

However there is a ready solution to one of the causes, power production, responsible for roughly a third of climate change. This clean power solution is not being used due to a failure in market regulation and government; it’s called ’solar thermal’.

The technology is proven in Australia using Australian technology (at the Liddell power station in NSW, pictured), and there are two companies able to provide it (Solar Heat and Power and Wizard Power).

Most investment in these solar thermal power stations is overseas where they have operated for some 20 years. Spain, Portugal, China and the United States have or are building solar thermal power stations. Those countries have created markets that pay more money for clean power, so that’s where the stations are being built (1).

There is no technical reason stopping all our power being clean, from the sun. The reason solar thermal is not being used is due to market and red tape failures of governments.

Chris Harris’ plan is to remove the market failure and red tape. To do this, Chris is looking for investors from the public and the private sector to build the first solar thermal station to meet the needs of Sydney City (about 6 million MWh a year, or a 1 GW capacity power station) by 2010, and to demonstrate to governments, the public and the market that solar thermal power can provide base load power and should become the major source of power in Australia within the next ten years.

The source of the power for solar thermal power is the daily heat of the sun. Solar thermal technology cuts climate change because it does not use coal, a principal source of climate change pollution. Solar thermal can provide ‘base load” or daily power needs; with storage it also meets night time power needs.

The Greens Party has representatives at local, state and federal levels of government across Australia. By initiating these proposals and seeking support for them throughout the Greens Party Chris is able to affect polices at local, state and federal levels.

A short history of solar thermal power

Most of the world’s electricity comes from turbines driven by steam. The heat for that steam comes from coal, gas or nuclear power and in some places solar thermal. Solar thermal power stations can replace coal and nuclear simply by using the sun’s heat, and can continue to use the turbines and infrastructure which exist already. Read the rest of this entry »