Hydrogen Power Plant

The Hon. V.A. TARZIA (Hartley—Leader of the Opposition) (14:34): I will move on to my next question. My question again is to the Premier. Will the government's hydrogen power plant in Whyalla lower electricity prices for businesses and households in South Australia and, if so, by how much?

The Hon. P.B. MALINAUSKAS (Croydon—Premier) (14:35): We were very plain in the lead-up to the state election in 2022 that the principal objective of the hydrogen power plant was to establish a facility that would be world-leading to produce hydrogen, with a view to growing—

The Hon. J.A.W. Gardner interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Member for Morialta, do you wish to leave question time?

The Hon. J.A.W. Gardner: Not really, sir.

The Hon. P.B. MALINAUSKAS: —with a view to establish a new industry. In fact, I remember I spoke at a conference of the South Australian Chamber of Mines and Energy during the course of the election campaign that was recorded and then leaked, presumably; I think it was leaked by the Liberal Party at the time. It was recorded and leaked, which is no particular problem.

The Liberal Party were drawing active attention and criticism to the fact that I explicitly made clear during the course of that speech in that particular forum that the objective of the hydrogen power plant was not to make a promise to reduce power prices across the state but rather a promise to actually build an industry to grow the state's economy in a way that was future facing. That is the principal objective of the policy. We believe the policy will only have a positive contribution in terms of the energy markets and what it can do on power prices, but the principal objective is to make sure that we are setting up the Upper Spencer Gulf for the future that we know it has in front of it.