Conclusions
This paper has assessed the policy, regulatory and institutional
settings for renewable energy in Australia. The assessment suggests that
the existing policy, regulatory and institutional settings are
characterised by a general lack of political constituency for redressing
climate change challenge, thereby piecemeal policy efforts for promoting
renewable generation, significant regulatory uncertainty, and limited
institutional capacity.
The assessment also suggests that this lack of political constituency is
essentially a reflection of the broader electricity and socio-economic
policy settings, which have historically favored cheap and abundant
indigenous coal for power generation, to serve wider socio-economic
priorities and agendas. In such environments, issues of climate change
have become subservient to wider socio-economic priorities. The
inefficacious renewable energy policy, regulations and institutions are
therefore ‘natural’ outcomes.
It is therefore reasonable to argue that effort to defossilise
electricity generation through, for example, promoting renewable
generation is more likely to bear fruit, if there is a national
consensus to develop a low-carbon economy. The formation of this
consensus will clearly require a considered accommodation of various
affected interests through political bargaining processes.