Extreme Weather Conditions

The Hon. T.A. FRANKS (14:59): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before addressing a question to the Minister for Climate Change on the extreme weather event.

Leave granted.

The Hon. T.A. FRANKS: As we know, we are in the midst of an extreme weather event in this state that saw our state have a power blackout over the course of last evening and, indeed, some parts of our state continue to be without power. I note that some, in both political and media circles, have claimed that this event was caused by too much wind power, and South Australia's reliance on renewables and in particular on wind power.

Given that this is a one in 50 year storm, and indeed Tony Wood, the author of the Grattan Institute report, which has been relied on in recent weeks by people attacking renewables in this state, has said that it was not the wind power that caused this blackout, what is the minister's response to those who have called for an independent inquiry? What is the minister's response to how this state will tackle climate change into the future? Does the minister expect to see more extreme weather events in the near future?

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER (Minister for Sustainability, Environment and Conservation, Minister for Water and the River Murray, Minister for Climate Change) (15:00): I thank the honourable member for her most important questions. I am rather disappointed in some of the responses to what has been happening in our state over the last 24 hours.

The Hon. G.E. Gago: They should apologise to the South Australian public.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: Indeed, the Hon. Gail Gago hopes, probably forlornly, that some of these people should apologise to the South Australian public about some of their comments. It is sad that some people have sought to politicise a severe weather event for their own political ideological ends, when this government and the state, our emergency services volunteers and our police are all about community safety and getting through this event with no great damage to the state or to our community, and trying to keep people safe.

As the Hon. Tammy Franks said in her introduction, I am advised that the storms are a one in 50 year event, highlighting, I think, the unusual but very significant nature of what we are experiencing right across the state. These storms caused something that, I was told at a briefing with the Bureau of Meteorology at EMC last night, saw, across the whole storm front, more than 80,000 lightning strikes right across the state. These storms impacted our power network and resulted in power being lost—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: I am very capable of making the comment myself. Can members please stop chatting behind the minister while he is giving his answer because it is very hard to follow. Minister.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: These storms have impacted our power network and resulted in power being lost across the state. Both ElectraNet, the owners of South Australia's transmission network, and the Australian Energy Market Operator, the regulator who operates the national electricity market, have made it clear that the power outages were as a result of these damaging and unprecedented storms. In a statement ElectraNet has said:

The storm has caused significant damage to the transmission network…Current information indicates that three out of the four transmission lines moving power between Adelaide and the north of South Australia, and 23 towers across the network have been damaged.

The Hon. D.W. Ridgway: I thought it was only 22.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: Well, this is a quote I am repeating in parliament, Mr President. I'm not going to correct it. It may very well be correct itself. I am also advised that the federal energy minister has acknowledged that the severe storm is the cause of the loss of power across the state.

As I understand it, when pressed on ABC radio, the Leader of the Opposition himself, the member for Dunstan, finally conceded the outage was a result of the storms. Of course, this has not stopped him and others of his state colleagues, the singing circus he has behind him, blaming renewable energy generation. In fact, they were very quick to jump into that. They might like to get acquainted with some of the facts.

Again, as the Hon. Tammy Franks mentioned in her explanation, energy market expert Mr Tony Wood from the Grattan Institute told ABC News:

There's no evidence to suggest this was caused by too much wind power, or the dependence on wind power, or anything else, or would have been any different if any of the power stations that had been shut down earlier this year had still been operating.

If you've got a wind farm or a coal-fired power station at the end of a transmission line, and that system either is taken out by storm or is forced to shut down to protect itself from a storm, it doesn't matter what the energy source is.

It is pretty clear to me that those opposite in this chamber and in the other place have had their heads stuck well and truly in the sand and that they clearly have a vendetta against renewable energies. They miss no opportunity whatsoever, even when it is not in the state's interests, to get on that bandwagon and attack renewable energy.

Clearly, they are not really worried about the facts of the matter. They are not really worried about giving the public correct information. All they are interested in doing is pushing that wheelbarrow of theirs that wind energy is bad, and they will take any opportunity, regardless of the facts of the matter. Regardless of the expert opinion that is trying to inform the public, they get on the bandwagon and try to obfuscate matters for their own blind political and ideological ends.

The Hon. D.W. Ridgway: The energy minister was told 14½ years ago that too much wind was a risk.

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: I am reminded—

The Hon. D.W. Ridgway: I was on the committee.

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: I am reminded that the last time they attempted this was in July. The state opposition has been accused of making up the numbers and feeding made up numbers to a media outlet which, to their shame, published them without fact checking, in an attempt to discredit wind energy. As one outlet said of the state Liberals' spectacular stuff up at the time:

…the errors were so bad that they might have been funny, were it not for the fact that so many in the conservative side of politics, and mainstream media too, accept them at face value.

It is time to stop this blame game and attacks on clean energy. It is time to get behind the government and our community when we are trying to deal with this unprecedented weather event. It is not just me saying this. Noted commentators right around Australia are starting to kick up on this. I refer to an article in The Guardian:

Is this a new low: politicians using a natural disaster to push a fact free agenda?

Unburdened by evidence, anti-wind campaigners used the South Australian blackout to kick off a debate about renewables while others waited for facts

Not them, not the opposition. The article goes on to say:

Normally natural disasters are off limits to politicking—

Normally, Mr President, to most decent politicians—

at least in the period straight after the event. So it was pretty awful watching politicians and commentators pushing their anti-renewables message on the back of a once in 50 year storm that hit South Australia and knocked out the electricity grid.

These baseless claims led bulletins despite energy industry experts, upon actual analysis of the situation—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order! The minister has the floor.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: I will repeat, Mr President:

These baseless claims led bulletins despite energy industry experts, upon actual analysis of the situation, reporting that there was no evidence that renewables are in any way linked to the power outage.

The outage is more likely to have something to do with the 80,000 lightning strikes and the winds that knocked over 22 transmission poles. Who knew violent storms could knock the power out?

I guess there was a little sense of irony in that sentence, or sarcasm perhaps. It continues:

It is hard to imagine how coal fired power would have remained on without a grid for the electricity to flow through.

A pretty simple proposition, ignored by the Liberals opposite. Continuing:

Just before the grid shut down, renewables were not offline. Wind energy was busy producing almost 1,000 Megawatts of electricity. The problem was not a lack of renewable power, but a storm-ravaged grid that couldn't get it to the consumers.

There is more, but I will not bother quoting any more. People can look it up for themselves, those who are minded to do so.

The Hon. R.L. Brokenshire: You seem a bit upset.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: Well, I am upset, the Hon. Mr Brokenshire, because people have been exploiting a situation for their own personal interests and disregarding the interests of the state. I can only again point very briefly to another article, in The Sydney Morning Herald:

South Australian blackout 'nothing to do with renewable energy': experts

I will just briefly outline a few sentences. This is of some historical significance:

In August 2003 in the US state of Ohio, a single overloaded power line touched a tree limb and short-circuited.

The cascading electricity outages that resulted plunged 50 million people into darkness, including millions of consumers in Canada, and became the biggest blackout in North American history.

A subsequent investigation stressed that the king of all blackouts was a 'grid issue' not an issue of power generation.

Energy market experts—

The Hon. J.S.L. DAWKINS: Point of order: we have reached that eight-minute mark again, which the minister seems to like getting to every day, and it is reducing the amount of time for questions.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: What number? Give me the number of the order.

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. J.S.L. DAWKINS: I ask the President to ask you to conclude—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: The point of order will be heard in silence. Minister, get to your answer.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: I have a very good answer, Mr President. The honourable member, in introducing this point of order, couldn't refer to a standing order number for you because there is none.

Members interjecting:

The Hon. J.S.L. Dawkins: Well, it's eight minutes, the length of time you can take for—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order! The reason it takes so long is because there is so much interjecting.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: Exactly. The quote continues:

Energy market experts on Thursday said South Australia's statewide blackout during a once-in-50-years storm was similarly nothing to do with that state's mix of power generation and high reliance on wind energy.

Hugh Saddler, a senior principal consultant at infrastructure specialists Pitt & Sherry said the SA shut down has 'absolutely nothing to do with renewable energy'.

'It's a transmission system failure. It's a rare event but one that has happened in various places around the world, including much larger events in the US and Canada'...

I could go on even further but honourable members can look it up for themselves if they have an interest. Some people have been saying, 'This has never happened before in Australia. How did it happen in South Australia? It's never happened anywhere else.' I have advice from a press release put out by the Climate Council which, unlike many other releases that are relied on by other honourable members, is actually referenced. It states:

Have storms affected a whole state's electricity supply in Australia before?

Whilst a severe weather event causing a whole state to lose power may be unprecedented in Australia, there have been severe weather related black-outs to hundreds of thousands of people in Australia, such as:

In 2009, more than 500,000 homes without power in Victoria due to a heatwave.

In 2011, more than 200,000 houses lost power in Victoria due to storms.

In 2013, 250,000 homes in Queensland lost power due to storms.

In 2015, 200,000 businesses and households in New South Wales faced extended blackouts of up to a week.

It is just beyond me that members of the Liberal Party would exploit the state's situation right now to push a political ideological view about energy. Hopefully, this might make it simpler for them to understand. We have the fabulous Dr Karl Kruszelnicki, on 891, I think, this morning, asked by presenter Clarke a question about the power outage and he said this:

So when the generator pops it pops and there's nothing you can do about it but also if you have the physical power being ripped out of the ground, mate, you can have your power being made by nuclear or angels, mate, it's not going anywhere if you don't have a tower to carry it…

Maybe that is simple enough for those members opposite in the Liberal Party to understand. This was a systems grid problem. It is something that we are addressing and getting to on behalf of the whole state as we go through this very severe weather event—and it is not over yet. For them to try to exploit this for rank, base political ideological views is an absolute shame on them.

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Does the Hon. Ms Lensink have a supplementary?