Following reports of the government's energy roadmap, Leader of the Australian Greens Adam Bandt MP has slammed the plan, declaring it as a cover for an expansion of major fossil fuel projects. While reports indicate the roadmap includes references to green hydrogen, it places a focus on blue hydrogen made with fossil fuels and failed carbon capture technology, it locks in coal and gas, and has no science-based binding targets to reduce carbon emissions over the next decade.
"This roadmap will take us off a cliff," Mr Bandt said. "The Morrison government is accelerating towards climate collapse."
"This technology list is a fig leaf for the continued expansion of the fossil fuel industry. "This roadmap contains no plan to phase out coal and gas. In fact, the roadmap bakes in coal and gas for years to come, subsidising the coal and gas cartels from the public purse.
"Carbon capture and storage is unicorn technology that has already had millions of dollars of public money poured into it.
"This is corporate capture and profit as the coal and gas cartels get access to billions of dollars meant for renewables.
"We already have the technology we need to move to a clean energy economy that exports hydrogen to our neighbours.
"People across the country are demanding a rapid transition to renewable energy, not just putting solar panels next to new gas wells. This approach doubles down on last century's technology, all to suit the coal and gas corporations whose fingerprints are all over this roadmap.
"Across the country, people are crying out for a transformative shift to clean energy, and the hundreds of thousands of jobs it will create.
"If you don't have a plan to phase out coal and gas in the next decade you don't have a real plan for climate action."
