Where does your state sit on Australia's renewables report card?

The Climate Council has issued a ‘report card’ on the renewable energy progress of Australia’s states and territories, grading them on their renewable energy policy settings and performance across indicators such as rooftop solar penetration, large-scale capacity per capita and percentage of renewable electricity.

The report ‘Game On: Australia’s Renewable Energy Race Heats Up’ finds that policy support for renewable energy amongst the states continues to increase. All states, except Victoria and NSW, have increased the proportion of renewable energy in their electricity supply since the Climate Council’s last state update in 2014.

Of all the states, South Australia scored the highest grade (A), followed by Tasmania (B), Queensland, Western Australia and Victoria (C) and NSW (D). South Australia has seen the greatest increase in its share of renewable energy, going from 26% renewable electricity in 2013 to 40% in 2014. But in NSW, Queensland and Victoria, fossil fuels such as coal and gas still account for 90% or more of total power supply.

The territories could not be rated, due to lack of comparable data, but the ACT was singled out for its strong leadership on renewable energy. The Northern Territory performs poorly on a range of indicators and has no policies or targets related to renewable energy.

Climate Council CEO Amanda McKenzie said rooftop solar has continued to grow strongly, with Queensland (29.8%) overtaking South Australia (28.8%) to claim the top spot for percentage of solar households. Western Australia is in third place on 22.5%.

“Rooftop solar is set to become as popular as home insulation,” said McKenzie. “There are now 14 postcodes in Australia where more than half of homes have solar and new housing projects are increasingly mandating solar PV on every home.”

Climate Councillor and energy expert Andrew Stock said state governments have stepped up their support for renewable energy over the last 18 months to try to combat policy uncertainty and lack of investor confidence at a national level. He noted, “The number of states and territories with renewable energy targets has doubled in the last year, while South Australia and the ACT, both already renewable energy leaders, have increased their ambition again on renewable energy.”

There is, however, more to be done, with Stock claiming that restrictive or uncertain planning rules are still holding back large renewable energy projects and that more can be done to incentivise rooftop solar. Additionally, he said, states need to start planning for an orderly closure of Australia’s most polluting coal-fired power plants.

“Australia is already a world leader in rooftop solar, but we have a long way to go in catching up to the rest of the world on large-scale renewables,” said McKenzie. “Renewable energy not only delivers jobs and investment back to urban and regional communities, it is also crucial to tackle climate change, so state governments have everything to gain by creating policy incentives that encourage renewables.”