Street Lighting

The Hon. M.C. PARNELL (14:47): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking a question of the Minister for Climate Change about street lighting.

Leave granted.

The Hon. M.C. PARNELL: Members may have seen the article in InDailyyesterday which was around a dispute between the Local Government Association and SA Power Networks about the rollout of energy-efficient LED street lighting. According to the article, the Local Government Association chief executive Matt Pinnegar has complained that SA Power Networks' new tariffs to replace old streetlights with LEDs did not represent value for money and that it would be prudent for councils to delay taking up the offer. The quote attributed in the article to Mr Pinnegar is:

We caution council members about entering into agreements with SA Power Networks that are not value for money and that continue the unsatisfactory monopoly arrangements for street lighting.

The relevance of this to the climate change portfolio is that these new LED lights achieve energy savings of up to 70 per cent on conventional globes, and according to the article there are nearly a quarter of a million streetlights in South Australia. The bulk of them, 203,000, are controlled by local councils, and 36,000 are controlled by the state government. My questions of the minister are:

1. In relation to the state government's 36,000 streetlights, how many of those have now been converted to low energy LED globes?

2. As Minister for Climate Change, what are you doing to broker a deal or to impose a solution so that South Australia can benefit from these new efficient technologies that reduce our carbon footprint?

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER (Minister for Sustainability, Environment and Conservation, Minister for Water and the River Murray, Minister for Climate Change) (14:49): I thank the honourable member for his most important question. Of course, as most honourable members will be aware, if they are following the media reports on this, there is a bit of to-and-fro, at least according to the reports, between local governments, the LGA and SAPN, in regard to their negotiations for replacement of lightbulbs. I am also aware of some splendid programs, I think financed by the CEFC, the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, with the Geelong council, where they have entered into a relationship to replace their street lighting with more energy-efficient and less carbon-intense globes as well.

In general, I think it is a jolly good idea. I will not be imposing myself or interpolating myself between a commercial relationship between local government and their streetlight providers (in this case South Australian Power Networks). However, I will advise the council at this stage that the government is talking to the Adelaide City Council, in the first instance, about how we can work together on our streetlight program within the city, but this question more generally, of course, should be directed to minister Mullighan in the other place.

I will say this: it is important, if we are going to achieve some of the goals that we have set for ourselves as a city and as a state in terms of carbon neutrality, that we address the issues where they are created and they are created, of course, in energy consumption in the city and also in the built environment in terms of the energy that our buildings utilise in construction, but also in their everyday maintenance. These are the issues we need to confront. About 40 per cent of our emissions (within the City of Adelaide at least) are from that energy component. The other large chunk (around about 40 per cent, again) comes from transport issues.

The differential ownership of the streetlights is a bit problematic for us in this state. As the honourable member said in his opening remarks, some of these streetlights are owned by councils, some are owned by government, but some of the councils have a relationship with South Australian Power Networks, who actually own it or lease those facilities out to council and charge them a significant amount to do so.

I am aware, through discussions on a range of topics with the LGA recently, that this topic came up and they broached with me, in particular, their dissatisfaction with their commercial relationship with South Australian Power Networks over this. This is a matter for councils and the LGA may well feel that, as a peak body representing councils in this state, it is in their interests to pursue that with South Australian Power Networks, so I wish them well in that. In regard to what we are doing in terms of light globes, I will just say to the honourable member: watch this space.