There is no doubt that the war Israel and the United States have launched against Iran will have global economic consequences. While it is difficult to know what those consequences will be, it is hard to see them as positive, and they could be very, very negative.

Already we have seen oil prices spike by 8 percent since last week, and by much more since January.

Oil prices reached above US$100 a barrel with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, but then gradually started to fall, and by the start of the year had returned to their pre-2022 level of US$60.

• READ MORE: Trump claims Iran being ‘demolished’; Tehran warns US against ground invasion
• Australia and the ‘Epstein Coalition’ – invasion of Iran a disaster
• Iran mourns 165 girls, staff killed in school strike during US-Israel war
• Other US-Israel attack on Iran reports

Just before the weekend they had risen to US$70 and now they are almost at US$80. With the Strait of Hormuz effectively closed, they could rise much more.

That is on the price front. There could also, unlike in 2022, be problems on the quantity side.

If it continues to be difficult to ship oil out of the Middle East, then shortages of oil might start to emerge. The countries that will do best in such a situation are those with large stockpiles or plenty of bargaining power.

The Pacific Island countries have neither.

Reliant on 80% oil
The Pacific is also vulnerable because of its extreme reliance on oil. According to a 2022 UN report, the Pacific meets 80 percent of its energy requirements through oil.

Even in the electricity sector, renewable energy sources make only a limited contribution.

There has been some growth in renewable energy as an electricity source. According to analysis by Janendra Prasad at UNSW, the share of renewable energy in electricity production in the Pacific has increased from 17 percent in 2017 to 24 percent in 2023. That is still low, and nowhere near what Pacific governments are themselves targeting (in excess of 80 percent by 2030).

The Pacific is also vulnerable because of its lack of domestic oil production and very limited storage capacity. In fact, Tonga suffered fuel shortages last year due to problems with its fuel depot and a stranded fuel vessel.

With drivers now queuing in Australia and the UK to get their petrol before prices rise or petrol rationing begins, it wouldn’t be surprising to see queues develop across the Pacific.

Governments can tell people not to panic, but it may seem like a rational response given the risks of petrol price rises and rationing.

It is important to clarify that PNG is the “odd one out” in the Pacific. PNG will actually likely benefit from the crisis as it is a large exporter of LNG. The government’s tax and dividend take will increase as LNG prices rise.

PNG oil refinery
PNG also has an oil refinery. And this war will also help the prospects for PNG’s much-delayed and still-uncertain future LNG projects by increasing the value to Asia of sourcing its LNG nearer to home than the Middle East.

So far we have focused on petroleum. But there are also the wider ramifications of the war.

It may lead to an uptick in global inflation, and may even push the world towards or even into recession. An oil shock on its own is unlikely to be enough to lead to a recession, but an escalated, widespread Middle East conflict (or possibly a conflict that extends to Turkey and Europe) certainly could.

Again, PNG will benefit from a further increase in the gold price as investors lose faith in the US, and therefore in the US dollar.

But overall, what is bad for the world is bad for the Pacific. Remittances, tourism, fishing licence fees, aid and investment returns would all suffer in the event of a global recession.

There is a possible upside. If Iran capitulates and, with or without regime change, gives in to US demands, then, with sanctions removed, oil production might go up and oil prices down.

Right now, that doesn’t seem like a likely scenario.

Relevant positives
More relevant are the positives that could limit or to some extent offset the downside for the Pacific.

One is that it is still unclear how long this war will go on for. The shorter it is the less worrying the outcomes.

A second is the positive role Australia can play. Although there are questions about Australia’s own limited oil storage capacity, Australia will be under pressure to share whatever oil it is able to import with its Pacific family.

Third, and longer-term, this crisis, especially if it is long-lasting, might make the world more serious about the renewable transition, not so much to avoid dangerous climate change, but to shore up energy security.

Understandably, for the Pacific, which is highly vulnerable to climate change impacts and whose emissions are negligible at the global level, the focus to date has been on climate change adaptation rather than mitigation.

But the sort of crisis currently unfolding should give the Pacific countries and their funders a stronger incentive to close the growing gap between Pacific renewable energy targets and reality — not to reduce the risks of climate change, but rather to reduce Pacific vulnerability to an increasingly shock- and conflict-prone Middle East.

Stephen Howes is director of the Development Policy Centre and professor of economics at the Crawford School of Public Policy at The Australian National University. Rubayat Chowdhury is a macroeconomist with experience working on monetary policy, growth, and economic development in emerging market economies. He is a research officer at the Development Policy Centre. 

Stephen Howes was recently interviewed on this topic for the ABC’s Pacific Beat programme. This article is republished under Creative Commons.

A former Tuvalu prime minister says while the New Zealand government’s oil and gas plans show it is concerned about its economy, he is more concerned about the livelihoods and survival of the Tuvalu people.

Enele Sopoaga — who still serves as an MP in Tuvalu — says the climate crisis is the “main enemy”.

“There is nothing more serious and more important than that.”

• READ MORE: Other Pacific climate crisis reports

His comments come after New Zealand’s Resources Minister Shane Jones said it was “left wing catastrophisation” to suggest that waters would be lapping at towns in Pacific countries as a result of the New Zealand government’s decision on gas and coal.

Vanuatu Climate Change Minister Ralph Regenvanu called on the New Zealand government not to reverse the ban at last year’s Pacific Islands Forum Leaders Meeting in Rarotonga.

“We call on them not to do it to be in line with Paris, in line with the 1.5 degree target. The science says you cannot [make] new fossil fuels,” he told RNZ Pacific in 2023.

Despite this, the current New Zealand government has backed its plans, which Tuvalu is not happy about.

‘It’s going to sink Tuvalu’
“Go ahead and drill and open up new coal mining or get new gas stations,” said Sopoaga, “but don’t forget that whatever you are going to do, it’s going to increase greenhouse gas emissions, which are going to sink the islands of Tuvalu and kill the people.

“It’s just as a matter of fact, as simple as that.”

Jones was asked by RNZ’s Morning Report how New Zealand’s Pacific neighbours would feel about restarting exploration of oil and gas, and the associated environmental impact.

Jones said the Pacific understood Aotearoa needed reliable energy to generate an economic dividend to then be able to contribute to the Pacific region.

“[New Zealand] keeping the lights on and the hospitals functioning, you can’t hold that type of thinking responsible for the tide lapping around Tuvalu. Come on, give us a break,” Jones said.

Sopoaga called the comments “daft” and “naive”.

“I think it’s a completely stupid idea,” he said.

‘Early demise, rising sea levels’
“It’s just logical — the more you open up new gases and the more release of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere will simply cause the early demise and rising of sea levels that will affect the islands of Tuvalu.

“I would appeal to New Zealand to rethink about doing that.”

Sopoaga was prime minister from 2013 to 2019. He was re-elected as an MP in this year’s election and is part of Tuvalu’s 16-member parliament.

He now wants Aotearoa to stick with its ban on fossil fuel exploration, and to also contribute to the cost of adaptation.

Sopoaga said he wanted to remind Jones that “we are working as a global team in the world”.

“Countries cannot just take up their own initiatives, and then go the wrong way.

“[We can not] go with the national interests of countries, we have to discipline ourselves so that we don’t break up and claim that we are doing what the Paris Agreement and Kyoto Protocol are telling us.

“In fact, the Paris Agreement is a legally binding framework, and you cannot just simply say we open up new oil fields in New Zealand and these will not affect the Pacific Island countries.

“This is a stupid idea,” Sopoaga said.

NZ urged to pacify US/China
New Zealand is sending a political delegation on a five-stop Pacific tour next week.

Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters has recently spoken about New Zealand’s relationship with China.

“We strongly believe that in a mature relationship like ours it is possible to discuss differences openly, respectfully, and predictably. We will continue to share our concerns with China, where we have them.

“China has a long-standing presence in the Pacific, but we are seriously concerned by increased engagement in Pacific security sectors. We do not want to see developments that destabilise the institutions and arrangements that have long underpinned our region’s security.”

Peters has said he is continuing work started by the previous government to consider partipation in AUKUS Pillar 2, but that New Zealand was a long way from making a decision.

“I think the role of New Zealand is to de-escalate and pacify the situation, talk to China, talk to Australia, talk to the US,” Sopoaga said.

“There is no enemy, their biggest enemy is climate change.

“They are only using this [AUKUS] as a camouflage to move away from responsibility and cause global warming. And they want to ignore their accountability, their responsibility to deal with it,” Sopoaga said.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Papua New Guinea began New Year 2023 with sizzling fireworks that lit up the skies.

But our hopes of shrugging off the “power blackout” tag ended just as the year was a few hours old.

An hour into New Year celebrations in the capital Port Moresby, like a perennial remnant, the inevitable popped like a fireworks flare gone bonkers — resulting in an inkiness that lasted into the wee hours of the morning.

• READ MORE: Other PNG power reports

Eleven days into the year, black outs are holding businesses and people to ransom across the country, prompting PNG Power Limited CEO Obed Batia to address the root cause of the constant outages.

According to Batia, the reasons range from aging equipment to high rainfall, vegetation that overwhelms power lines, the refusal of customers to allow PNG Power to trim vegetation and access powerlines, and low diesel fuel.

The creepy crawlies like snakes, rats and bats that can spark a major outage by squatting illegally in a transmitter don’t even rate a mention.

Batia said overgrown trees near power lines are some of the biggest contributors to blackouts, and the refusal of customers to allow PPL workers to cut down these trees add to the problem in many parts of the country.

Resisting cutting trees
He said: “Many customers resist PNG Power officers from cutting the trees and clearing of the vegetation within their properties. We are working with external parties to control this.”

Lae PPL office refused to answer questions asked by the Post-Courier about blackouts in Morobe.

In Goroka, a blackout lasted from Jan 6-8 for 48 hours, coming on for only 30 mins and going off again.

Frustrated consumers urged PNG Power to come clear on why the blackout was continuing.

Chamber of Commerce president Chris Anders said the blackout comes as “the risk of having your business or home broken into” had escalated as criminals took advantage of the blackouts, as they normally hit in the early hours of the morning.

“The lack of announcements from PNG Power on what they are doing to fix the power supply is deafening,” Anders said.

PPL said: “The Power Transformer at Himitovi Substation in Goroka which caters for the Goroka load experienced a technical fault on Friday around 2am.

“The issue was rectified at 7pm on Saturday night and power fully restored for Goroka customers.”

Without power for 8 days
Along the North Coast Road in Madang, a community has been without power for eight days with requests receiving responses that never were followed up by PPL.

Batia said that rainfalls have attributed to low water levels at Yonki and Ramu will see continued load shedding in Madang and Highlands while Lae has been assured of supply from Taraka, Mildford Power Stations, Baiune Power Station in Bulolo and the Munum IPP.

“In Port Moresby, recent system outages were experienced due to technical issues between all generation power stations both at PNG Power and the Independent Power Producers (IPPs),” he said.

“We are working together with our IPP stakeholders to ensure we correct those issues with respect grid control and regulation issues, in order to provide stable power.

“All Highlands centres and Madang have their standby power stations which supplement the load.

“There has been little increase in the water level but not to a capacity for the Ramu Hydropower Station to generate to full capacity yet.

Back to normal for Kokopo
“Gazelle grid has stopped load shedding and the system is back to normal for Kokopo, Rabaul and Kerevat customers,” Batia added.

“In all other provincial centres who run on diesel fuel power stations, our challenge is ensuring our fuel suppliers get supply to our power stations on time.

“When there is late supply, our teams resort to load shedding, which is conserving fuel until the next supply of fuel is delivered.

“Discussions are ongoing with our fuel suppliers to ensure we have an understanding on time supply for our diesel power stations.”

Miriam Zarriga is a PNG Post-Courier reporter. Republished with permission.

Two days after being elected as Prime Minister again in Papua New Guinea, James Marape took his first official trip as the country’s leader while hitting the ground running in groundbreaking clean green energy projects he has been championing over the past two years.

He met with leaders of Fortescue Future Industries (FFI) in Singapore yesterday to progress the talks further.

After numerous questions on the trip to Singapore taken by Marape on Friday afternoon a statement was released about midnight through other social media platforms.

• READ MORE: Other reports on the PNG elections

In the morning, the PM’s Department released the statement at 7.30 am after the country became aware of Marape’s trip to Singapore.

The Prime Minister flew to Singapore to continue important trade and investment conversations, including those on Papua LNG, Pasca LNG, Pn’yang LNG and also to get Porgera and Wafi-Golpu sanctioned.

He said from Singapore that FFI had voiced its intention to partner with Papua New Guinea in a big way to harvest clean green energy from both hydro and geothermal sources and to move into solar and wind energy production.

Currently, FFI has identified and set up project sites in Gulf Province for hydro and West New Britain Province for geothermal work and has been working in these areas since the signing of two important agreements since 2021.

Clean green energy way of future
Marape said from Singapore: “With global consciousness of fossil fuel-induced global warming, clean green energy is the way to move into the future and this meeting follows on the head agreement PNG has signed with FFI to progress investment in this energy sector.”

The Prime Minister also visited the PNG High Commission in Singapore with a view to strengthening it further as a trade and investment office while getting the PNG government to increase trade and investment with the ASEAN and APEC countries.

He said: “The Singapore office will be given more support in that context in partnership with Investment Promotion Authority, the Kumul companies, National Fisheries and Forestry authorities, and our Agriculture and Livestock departments so that it coordinates export and trade into the lucrative Asian market of over 2 billion people who need food and energy, and products PNG can mass produce into the future as we are planning under my government.”

Republished with permission.

In the same year that the government declared a climate emergency, imports of an especially dirty type of coal from Indonesia topped a million tonnes for the first time since 2006.

Last year, 235 kilograms of overseas coal was imported for every New Zealander in order to power homes and businesses. This is also only imported coal; the country also produces coal domestically.

Ninety-two percent of the imported coal was from Indonesia, and the vast majority of that was a low grade, high emissions type – sub-bituminous coal.

• READ MORE: Other reports on NZ’s climate emergency

“Not only are we burning more coal, [but] it’s the dirtiest coal. And it comes from Indonesia where the conditions and the mining is appalling,” said Cindy Baxter, an environmental campaigner.

In recent years, low lake levels meant our biggest electricity generator — hydroelectricity — has produced less energy than normal. Natural gas supply has been inconsistent. Coal has been increasingly used as a fuel of last resort to keep the lights on in our homes and businesses.

It is also the world’s worst fossil fuel, emitting far more greenhouse gases than any other. It produces carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide, nitrogen dioxides, particulate pollution and heavy metals.

Coal imports from Indonesia in 2020 totalled 1.084 million tonnes, or just over one billion kilograms. Australia the only other significant exporter of coal here, sending over about 10 percent of Indonesia’s total, 95 million kilograms.

New Zealand has imported more than a million tonnes from Indonesia only twice in the last 20 years — 2020 and 2006.

Almost all of it last year — 910 million kilograms — was sub-bituminous coal which must be burned in greater quantities to achieve the same energy output.

Government not satisfied
An energy analyst at Enerlytica, John Kidd, said New Zealand’s reliance on this coal has undoubtedly raised greenhouse gas emissions.

“Yes it does. The fact that we’re importing a carbon-intensive fuel into the country and using it domestically to meet demand is carbon intensive. It will be adding significantly to our footprint here,” Kidd said.

On top of that, New Zealand measures and budgets for the emissions of burning of the coal. The emissions involved in getting that coal here by ship are not recorded nor fit into any country’s carbon budgets.

“The carbon miles involved with getting fuel from where it comes from and where it needs to be are generally not part of the equation. But absolutely they would be adding to the footprint involved with a higher coal burn in New Zealand.”

The government — which wants 100 percent of electricity supply to be renewable by 2030 — admits this is not good enough.

“Unfortunately fossil fuels continue to play a prominent role in security of electricity supply due to the structure of New Zealand’s electricity system, especially in providing cover for dry hydrological years, such as we have been experiencing,” said Energy and Resources Minister Dr Megan Woods.

“This government is not been [sic] satisfied with this reliance on fossil fuels and last year we backed up our goal to have a fully renewable electricity grid with a $30 million investigation into solving the dry year problem.

“The NZ Battery project is investigating the country’s potential for pumped hydro, as well as comparator technologies, and is progressing well but will take time.”

Baxter said the government’s aspirational goals on climate ring hollow.

‘Sick of hearing words’
“We’re sick of hearing the words. We need to see it turned into action and the government to stop being driven by industry, the biggest emitters,” Baxter said.

Even before the coal gets on the ship there is already a global environmental cost, including deforestation and the lack of reforestation once the mines are not used.

A journalist in Indonesia, Hans Nicholas Jong, said although there is mining regulation, the government doesn’t consistently enforce it.

“[There are] responsibilities for companies to rehabilitate their mines. Once they have finished operating they’re actually required by law to recover the environment. They’re required to reforest their areas, they’re required to close their mining pits. This is something they haven’t done because basically there is a lack of monitoring by the government, just because of the sheer number of mines.”

Indonesia is one of the world’s biggest producers of coal.

Despite public opposition, he said the government recently revised these laws, relaxing restrictions for mining companies which outraged activists.

“They saw that this new mining law really facilitates the mining industry, at a time when a lot of countries actually want to reduce their coal production and consumption. But here we doubled down on our coal production and consumption.”

Origin kept confidential
Precisely where we get our coal from has been masked by the government.

Since 2012, Stats NZ has kept confidential the type of coal and its origin. The public cannot know where we get our coal from. Importers can request their products be made confidential, which Stats approved in this case. It does release total coal imports.

RNZ sourced this data from United Nations figures.

“It’s indicative of the close relationship that the mining industry has had with our government. To be able to get that sort of information that is available internationally blocked in New Zealand arguing commercial sensitivity … the power of industry in this country over civil society is quite extraordinary,” Baxter said.

Coal makes up a large amount of our electricity. As an example – in the first quarter of this year, 44 percent of Genesis Energy’s total generation was from coal. The company has signed an agreement to receive natural gas from another company Methanex.

Woods said there has been an unexpected reduction in natural gas supply from at the Pohokura gas field, recently the country’s largest.

“At full capacity, Pohokura gas field provides approximately 40 percent of New Zealand’s natural gas supply but over the past 12 months, production from the field has almost halved.

Natural gas production down
“As a result, overall natural gas production is down approximately 20 percent on last year. While this decline has put pressure on the supply of gas for all users, including electricity generators, this is not something anyone could have foreseen and is not a result of Government decisions.

“The market responded as it was originally designed to, which included more use of coal at Huntly power station to provide the dry year cover that gas has previously provided to ensure security of supply.”

She said the energy sector has also committed over $1 billion in new renewable capacity this year alone, including both geothermal and wind energy plants. Another wind farm, Waipipi, opened last month, and the country’s biggest solar farm in Kapuni.

Woods was asked, if coal is necessary, why New Zealand couldn’t import it from a country with a stronger environmental record. She said these are business decisions made by privately-owned companies.

The government is a majority shareholder of each of Genesis, Mercury and Meridian energy companies.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Papua New Guinea’s former Prime Minister, Peter O’Neill, has been committed to stand trial for charges of misappropriation and official corruption

A Waigani Committal Court magistrate Tracey Ganaii yesterday found there was sufficient evidence on the two charges.

They relate to the state purchase of two generators from Israel seven years ago when O’Neill was prime minister.

• READ MORE: PNG police arrest former PM Oeter O’Neill over alleged corruption

Police allege that O’Neill directed payments for the purchase without proper procurement and tender processes, or parliamentary approval.

O’Neill told media outside court that he welcomed the chance to defend the case.

“There was no personal benefit on my part in this case. But there is a suggestion by some of the witnesses that it was official corruption and misappropriation of unbudgeted items. But we have not presented our evidence in court, which we will do in the National Court.”

O’Neill previously defended the US$14 million purchase of the generators as being a necessary step to addressing chronic electricity blackouts experienced in PNG’s main cities of Port Moresby and Lae.

PNG’s parliamentary opposition filed a police complaint about the purchase in early 2014.

The former prime minister insisted that the decision was approved by his cabinet, the National Executive Council.

“Largely, this is a NEC-endorsed decision. The purchase was endorsed by NEC.

“The court thought that there has been differences of timing, and there was sufficiency of that to bring the matter up to the National Court, and we look forward to defending it there.”

This article is republished by the Pacific Media Centre under a partnership agreement with RNZ.

Former Prime Minister Peter O’Neill says the National Executive Council of the then Papua New Guinea government approved the purchase of two heavy duty power generators for PNG Power to solve longstanding blackouts in Lae and Port Moresby.

The allegation against him is that due process was not followed to enable PNG Power to fix this the blackout emergency, he says in a statement.

O’Neill said the case was “highly politicised” and that it had been “influenced and pushed by dark and shadowy figures” behind the scenes wanting to force an arrest.

READ MORE: Other reports on the former PM’s arrest

O’Neill was arrested on Saturday when he arrived back in the country at Jackson’s International Airport after being stranded in Brisbane due to a covid-19 coronavirus lockdown.

He was questioned by PNG police and charged with misappropriation, official corruption and abuse of office and was released on K5000 bail.

O’Neill blamed current Prime Minister James Marape as he had been Finance Minister at the time and had allegedly signed the instrument exempting the process to allow PNG Power to enter into a contract to purchase the generators.

O’Neill questions police independence
O’Neill said if the police were truly independent, charges should be also laid against Marape for not following the process.

Prime Minister James Marape had recently posted on his social media page assuring the nation that the work of the police would not be impeded by him as Prime Minister in the face of many allegations, including himself.

He made the statement due to a purported copy of a Section 61 instrument being released into the public domain and allegations that he was a “player” in the saga.

Marape said he would offer his statements as a state witness and would never use the office of prime minister to stop or encourage police not to carry out their constitutional duties.

In relation to O’Neill’s arrest, Marape said the former leader was innocent until proven guilty.

Papua New Guinea’s former Prime Minister Peter O’Neill was granted bail last night at the Waigani National Court after being arrested by police over his alleged role in the 50 million kina (US$14 million) purchase of two generators from Israel, reports the PNG Post-Courier.

The court after granting bail ordered that he must pay K5000 before close of business tomorrow.

Further orders were that he remained at his Touaguba Hill residence self-isolated until June 2 when the covid-19 coronavirus state of emergency lapses.

READ MORE: Al Jazeera coronavirus live updates – Guatemala angry over covid-19 infected deportees from US

He was arrested at Jackson’s International Airport in Port Moresby by police yesterday afternoon over allegations of abuse of office and corruption.

Assistant Commissioner Crimes Hodges Ette confirmed that O’Neill was brought in for questioning at the Fraud Squad office in Konedobu upon his return from Brisbane, Australia.

ACP Ette said that all covid-19 protocols were strictly observed when O’Neill was brought in for questioning.

Israeli generators deal allegations
Police allege that:

• O’Neill directed payments for the purchase of the two generators from Israel without due consideration for procurement processes as required under the Public Finance Management Act as purchase of the two generators was not approved by the National Parliament; the purchase did not go through tender processes;
• there was no legal clearance from the State Solicitors for such payment; and
• O’Neill directed the National Executive Council to convene and approved the payment of K50 million for the generators after the purchase was made.

Ette said there was “reasonable evidence of misappropriation, abuse of office and official corruption”.

ABC Radio Australia reports that O’Neill led Papua New Guinea for seven years, before quitting in 2019 after a string of high-profile resignations from his government.

Police attempted to arrest O’Neill in October last year over a different issue.

He denied any wrongdoing and said it was a “political witch hunt”.

Police withdrew that warrant after O’Neill challenged its validity in court.

• Earlier Peter O’Neill arrest story

Papua New Guinea’s former Prime Minister Peter O’Neill has been arrested after arriving back in the country.

Police say O’Neill was arrested on suspicion of misappropriation, abuse of office and official corruption, regarding the purchase of two generators from Israel.

The Police Assistant Commissioner of Crimes, Hodges Ette, confirmed the MP was brought in for questioning yesterday afternoon in Port Moresby after flying in from Australia where he has been for much of the year.

READ MORE: Al Jazeera coronavirus live updates – Far-right protests in Spain over lockdowns

• Bat-linked illness studied in New Caledonia

While anti-fraud police investigators have sought him for questioning for months, O’Neill was reportedly unable to return to PNG since March when border closures were implemented as part of the country’s covid-19 state of emergency.

The allegations against the Ialibu-Pangia MP relate to a purchase he made as prime minister in 2013 involving two 15-megawatt generators for PNG from an Israeli company, LR Group.

PNG’s parliamentary opposition filed a police complaint about the purchase in 2014.

Police allege that O’Neill directed payments for the purchase of the two generators from Israel without due consideration for procurement processes as required under the Public Finance Management Act.

Purchase not approved
The purchase of the two generators was not approved by the national Parliament, while police allege that the purchase did not go through required tender processes, nor was there legal clearance from the State Solicitors for such payment.

O’Neill is alleged to have directed the National Executive Council to convene and approve the payment of 50 million kina (US$14 million) for the generators after the purchase was made.

Ette said there was reasonable evidence for misappropriation, abuse of office and official corruption.

The former prime minister, who lost power to incumbent prime minister James Marape a year ago, is being allowed bail.

He is expected to be quarantined at his own residence for the next 14 days after the interview, as required under PNG’s covid-19 emergency measures for all citizens repatriating.

• This article is republished by the Pacific Media Centre under a partnership agreement with RNZ.
• If you have symptoms of the coronavirus, call the NZ Covid-19 Healthline on 0800 358 5453 (+64 9 358 5453 for international SIMs) or call your GP – don’t show up at a medical centre.
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As it seeks to diversify its sources of fuel, India is looking to get in on the ground floor of coal mining in previously unexploited deposits in Indonesian-ruled Papua.

In exchange for technical support and financing for geological surveys, officials say India is pushing for special privileges, including no-bid contracts on any resulting concessions  a prospect that could run foul of Indonesia’s anti-corruption laws.

The details of an Indian mining project in Papua are still being negotiated, but Indonesia’s energy ministry welcomes the prospect as part of a greater drive to explore energy resources in the country’s easternmost provinces.

READ MORE: Strategic partnership between India and Indonesia

In future, the ministry hopes mining for coking coal will support the domestic steel industry, while also bringing economic benefits to locals.

Rights activists, however, fear the launch of a new mining industry could deepen tensions in a region where existing extractive projects have damaged the environment and inflamed a long-running armed conflict.

Indonesia’s new coal frontier
When Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Jakarta last month, joint efforts to extract and process Indonesia’s fossil fuels, including coal, were on the agenda.

India’s interest in investing in a new coking coal mining concession in Papua can be traced to 2017, when officials from the Central Mine Planning and Design Institute (CMPDI) and Central Institute of Mining and Fuel Research (CIMFR), both Indian government institutes, met with Indonesia’s Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources in Jakarta.

The bilateral plan was announced by then-ministry spokesman Sujatmiko after the first India Indonesia Energy Forum held in Jakarta in April 2017. “The focus is on new territories in Papua,” he said.

To follow up, the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources sent a team to India in early May. The current energy ministry spokesman, Agung Pribadi, who was part of the delegation, told Mongabay that officials from state-owned energy giant Pertamina, major coal miner PT Adaro Energy, and state-owned electricity firm PLN also joined the meeting.

The Indonesian team presented research outlining the potential for mining high-caloric content coal in West Papua province, and lower-caloric coal in Papua province.

According to the team’s report, only 9.3 million tons of reserves have so far been identified. By contrast, Indonesia as a whole expects to export 371 million tons of coal this year. However, the true extent of coal deposits could be larger, said Rita Susilawati, who prepared the report presented during the meeting and is head of coal at the ministry’s Mineral, Coal and Geothermal Resources Centre. “Some areas in Papua are hard to reach due to the lack of infrastructure. We were unable to continue the research,” she explained.

During the visit, Indian and Indonesian officials discussed conducting a geological survey in Papua, Agung said. India would finance the survey using its national budget. With Indonesian President Joko Widodo prioritising infrastructure investment, the energy ministry has few resources to conduct such surveys.

Expected privileges
Indonesia also anticipates benefiting and learning from India’s experience in processing coking coal.

In exchange, India expected privileges from the Indonesian government, including the right to secure the project without a bidding process, Agung said.

Indonesia denied the request, and the talks were put on hold. Approving it would have been too risky, Agung said, since the bidding process is regulated in Indonesia. “We recommend they follow the bidding process or cooperate with a state-owned enterprise,” Agung said.

India’s ministry of coal did not respond to an emailed request for comment.

Energy and mining law expert Bisman Bakhtiar said there was still a chance India could get the rights to develop any resulting coal concessions without having to go through an open bidding process. “It can proceed under the G-to-G (government-to-government) scheme by signing a bilateral agreement,” he said.

This form of agreement would supersede the ministerial regulations requiring competitive bidding, Bisman explained, although he said any such agreements should emphasise that any projects must be carried out according to local laws.

There is precedent in Indonesia for G-to-G schemes bypassing the open bidding process, Bisman said. For example, multiple projects have been carried out on the basis of cooperation agreements with the World Bank and Australia. In another instance, Indonesian media mogul Surya Paloh imported crude oil from Angola via a bilateral cooperation agreement with Angola’s state-owned oil company Sonangol.

Draft law
A draft law currently being discussed in the House of Representatives could also smooth the path for India. It says that if there is agreement between Indonesia and a foreign government to conduct geological studies, the country involved will get priority for the contract.

However, this would still require the country to meet market prices. “We called it ‘right to match.’ If there are other parties who offer lower prices, then they should follow that price,” Bisman said.

Another option would be for India to appoint one of its local companies to work with Indonesian private sector giant Adaro or state-owned coal miner PT Bukit Asam. Such a deal could be conducted as a business-to-business (B-to-B) agreement, and would be legal according to Indonesia’s Energy Law.

Or, Indonesia could assign a state-owned firm like Bukit Asam to work with India based on a memorandum of understanding (MOU) signed by both countries.

“But all these options have a potential risk,” Agung said. “They can be categorised as collusion by the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK).” He said a conventional bidding process should be prioritised.

Bisman said India needed to consider other risks, such as the social and political situation in Papua. The region is home to an armed pro-independence movement and has faced decades of conflict around the world’s largest and most profitable gold and copper mine, Grasberg, owned by US-based Freeport McMoRan.

‘Land grab’
Despite the presence of the mine, Papua remains Indonesia’s poorest province, with some of the worst literacy and infant mortality rates in Asia. Indonesia’s National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM), a state-funded body, has characterised Freeport’s concession as a “land grab,” for which the original stewards of the land, the Amungme and Kamoro indigenous people, were never properly consulted or compensated.

The Indonesian energy ministry’s own research says that any project must take into account the impact on Papua’s indigenous peoples, and must factor in specific local concepts of land ownership, leadership and livelihood.

Franky Samperante, executive director of rights advocacy group Yayasan Pusaka, said he was worried about the plan. “It is way too risky,” he said, pointing to the social and environmental fallout of the Grasberg mine.

“There should be communication between the mining company and indigenous Papuans,” he said, warning Jakarta to carefully calculate the social, environmental and national security impacts.

Local indigenous people need to be meaningfully involved in the decision-making process, he said, especially since the mining would occur in and near forests where indigenous people live and gather and hunt their food.

• More coal mining stories

Celebrating 100 years of oil shale mining may represent a proud moment for Estonia, but this doesn’t compare to what the country has lost, many environmentalists say.

The backbone of Estonia’s electricity production may have allowed the Baltic nation to escape from beneath the Soviet yoke and become energy self-sufficient post-independence in 1991, but most observers remember that this has come at a cost: the environment.

“In terms of ecology it’s a total disaster. From the point of view of state economy this is something to be proud of,” says Professor Mait Sepp, research fellow in physical geography at the University of Tartu.

“We have lost our wetlands, we have lost our streams.”

Many of Estonia’s environmental organisations agree, with more than 15 percent (504.6 km²) of the country’s Ida-Virumaa region severely damaged by the oil shale industry.

Mihkel Annus of the Estonian Green Movement says the sector still stamps the largest ecological footprint on the nation, despite European Union (EU) regulations.

’40 years like a volcano’
Perhaps the greatest reminder of this footprint will be the country’s ash mountains, huge piles of solid hazardous waste that mar Estonia’s relatively flat landscape.

“These will probably stay as the remnants of our fossil-fuel dependent past for centuries from now, as well as the land that has been excavated and already been exhausted,” says Annus.

Harmful to the environment due to the poisonous gases and various contaminants they emit into surface and groundwater, these mountains are not only viewed as an ecological disaster.

They have also dealt a blow to the country’s pockets.

It cost the government more than 36 million euros (about NZ$44.4 million) to close the infamous ash mountain in Kohtla-Järve, which stood approximately 170m above sea level before it was closed and made environmentally safe in 2015.

Estonia’s current environmental headache is the Kukruse ash mountain, which one official from the Ida-Viru County government describes as a 40-year-old “volcano”.

Hardi Murula, head of development and planning for the county government, says they have been engaged in ongoing talks for the past three to four years on how best to “neutralise” the mountain, but that no consensus has been reached.

“No one can guarantee during the restoration process that the pollution can be stopped.”

The closure of ash mountains throughout Ida-Virumaa is largely seen as positive despite the challenges, with one of the mountains in the former oil shale town of Kiviõli converted into an adventure centre in a joint industry-government project.

Piret Väinsalu of the Estonian Fund for Nature says the restoration of land is rather impossible, however.

“You can try to restore it into something, but it will always be there as a ‘heritage of oil shale age’.”

Legacy pollution
But government, industry and environmentalists do not see eye-to-eye on the source of this environmental damage.

Minister of Environment Marko Pomerants says much of the environmental impact is related to “legacy pollution” of the Soviet-era.

“Fortunately, most of the major negative effects are a thing of the past and the current oil shale sector has remarkably reduced its harmful practices for the environment.”

He says environmental concerns today largely involve emissions, although these have decreased since 2002.

Timo Tatar, head of the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Communication’s energy department, agrees.

“Talking about environmental damage, one can say, that oil shale environmental impact has significantly decreased due to heavy investments into new combustion technologies as well as emission control.”

Official 2014 data by the European Commission shows Estonia currently stands as the second highest emitter, per capita, of greenhouse gases in Europe, however, and its far from carbon-free history occupies a blight on their climate change record.

Although the EU’s Emissions Trading System allows the country to sell-off its emissions because they are lower than the country’s massive levels at 1990, things are far from rosy, especially in the wake of the 2015 Paris climate change agreement.

In light of this, environmentalists Annus, Väinsalu, and their colleague Aleksei Lotman, a marine conservation expert with the Estonian Fund for Nature, do not share officials’ view.

Although they agree the oil shale industry is “very much less polluting” than it was 30 years ago, they say making oil shale “environmentally friendly” is not enough.

To call current improvements by the oil shale industry so is “over-optimistic to say the least”, Lotman says.

A question of commitment
They are therefore critical of industry and government and feel both have failed to act effectively.

Väinsalu, who serves as the Estonian coordinator for the international non-profit network EKOenergia in her role with the Estonian Fund for Nature, says the government does “just enough” to be on a good list for Estonia’s European partners, while it simultaneously supports oil shale interests by lobbying for greater industry exemptions.

“Instead of understanding the need to find an alternative route and exit the oil shale era our government just supports the industry in every way possible.”

Eesti Energia, Estonia’s state-owned energy enterprise, refutes such claims and says it has taken several steps to reduce the environmental impacts of its operations.

“Today we can produce more energy from oil shale than in the past with less environmental impact,” says Eesti Energia.

Eesti Energia says introductions in new technology have been responsible, although physical changes have also occurred.

Among these was the 2008 closure of the ash field at their Balti power plant near Narva, in Estonia’s east.

The project took three years to complete and resulted in 570ha being made safe for the environment.

In 2013, Eesti Energia’s sister company, Enefit, opened a 17-turbine wind park on the former ash field.

“Our main focus lies in replacing fossil fuels with cleaner fuels,” Eesti Energia says.

The company adds it already does so through its use of water, wind, and biomass.

Annus, however, as a member of one of Estonia’s most influential environmental organisations, feels industry may not have been as cooperative as it makes out.

“Whether they would make their processes more environment-friendly voluntarily, is questionable.”

He says this is because the oil shale industry has been put under increasing pressure by tightening EU regulations.

“They have been forced to take action to meet the set concentration values of emissions, changing the technology of landfilling of solid and hazardous waste, limiting water pollution, and so on.”

Annus adds much of Estonia’s oil shale industry happens behind closed doors, which further calls into question their transparency.

“A lot of the region has also been blocked off from the public eye.”

Kaja Peterson, director of the Stockholm Environment Institute Tallinn Centre’s (SEI Tallinn) climate and energy programme, says Eesti Energia has, in fact, been rather open.

“I think Eesti Energia has been very flexible because they reformed and created a new sister company, Enefit Renewable Energy.”

She points out, however, that Eesti Energia is gradually transitioning to renewables and oil shale, unfortunately, still forms the majority of their operations.

Fossil free future?
This seeming unwillingness on the part of officials to divest from oil shale has led to serious doubts about Estonia’s renewable future.

While the government and oil shale industry remain positive, environmentalists and researchers are sceptical.

They claim there is no direct investment or clear political will in renewables by the government, only some will to diversify.

“There have been measures to promote sustainable energy, but the indirect subsidies for fossil fuels have still been greater,” Annus emphasises.

Annus feels Estonia is lagging behind a large portion of their EU counterparts and trendsetters, while Tatar and Pomerants celebrate Estonia reaching its Renewable Energy Directive target – 25 percent of renewables in final energy consumption – well before the 2020 deadline.

“Since the political target has been achieved there is no political motivation to increase that,” Peterson says.

Peterson’s colleague, Lauri Tammiste, SEI Tallinn’s director, says the shift to a low-carbon economy remains on the official agenda.

He highlights plans by the government to reach 50 percent of renewables and lower CO₂ emissions by 2030, although there will be a challenge.

“The main issue is, how to actually deliver these goals and ensure successful transformation with biggest possible environmental, economic and social benefits.”

When asked whether Estonia would have a fossil free future, Sepp was adamant he would not see change in his lifetime.

“No. Not in the near future.

It’s very convenient to use this old system. You have one system which works and to build a new one …. takes a lot of money and a lot of effort. Some very critical changes must happen to change this system.”

It seems clear, for the time being at least, that Estonia’s energy future remains far more carbon intensive than environmentalists would like.

Feature article by Kendall Hutt; photos by Essi Lehto and Lukas Rusk. The assignment was part of the Inclusive Journalism Project collaboration between journalism schools in New Zealand and Scandinavia.

By Peter S. Kinjap in Port Moresby

Papua New Guinea’s LNG petition for Hides PDL1 landowners has been reviewed in a weekend meeting chaired by Mineral Resources Development Company managing director Augustine Mano in Port Moresby.

But there was no positive outcome through this meeting on Saturday and talks will resume tomorrow.

Those present at the meeting were A/Secretary Department Petroleum and Energy David Manau, Community Affairs Manager of Kumul Petroleum Ian Maru and other officials.

Since 2014, the usual maximum LNG flow rate from PNG LNG Marine Terminal in Port Moresby to ships has been reduced from 12,000 cubic meters/h to 6000 m3/h on Friday when loading for the 221st shipment took place.

When asked about this reduction by half of gas exports, the marine supervisors at the terminal said this was because landowners at Hides had closed valves.

Company officials did not comment about this.

Although the company is suffering greatly, say sources, it plans to shift this cut to stakeholders, including the PNG government and landowners.

‘Good response’
It was not reported in mainstream media that valves had been closed, but landowner sources confirmed that Hides PDL1-7 valves had been shutdown until a “good response” was given.

In the meeting, no new items were discussed, just the same issues as discussed in Hides earlier this week with the government delegation led by senior ministers.

In Hides yesterday, a state team visited again in an attempt to reopen the valves while negotiations were taking place in Port Moresby but failed.

• Local PNG leader sets deadline to start LNG negotiations
• Don’t use force to resolve LNG shut down, warns PNG opposition
• Benefits sharing
• Landowners shut down LNG project

The world seems particularly chaotic this winter. The climate news is diabolical, with fears about melting of the Arctic permafrost and the ancient ice stores of the Himalayas. There is a Royal Commission into the brutal treatment of children in prison in the Northern Territory.

And that is before we get to ISIL terrorism and other mass shootings in Europe and America.

There is Britain’s brain-snap exit from Europe and the punchline that Boris Johnston and the other Tory geniuses have no clear plan for it. And there is The Donald – the Republican Party’s candidate for President of the United States of America, Donald Trump.

All these problems require sane collective action, which means democratic use of the power of the state. The good news – and don’t we need some – is that after three decades, our handcuffs are coming off.

Since the 1980s (or even the mid-1970s, according to Michael Pusey) the West has slowly strangled itself and the rest of the world with a political obsession that goes under the name of “neoliberalism” (or “the Washington Consensus”, the Australian version of which Pusey called “economic rationalism”).

During the recent Federal election, Australia took a step away from the naïve adoration of markets and lower taxes. The Coalition had to accept that generous superannuation tax breaks for the super wealthy are not good policy.

Both sides of the aisle heard the message that wealthy property investors are less deserving of tax breaks than first home buyers.

The Coalition may be set on giving a $51 billion hand out to corporate Australia but it is unpopular and may be resisted in the Senate.

It is against this background that we want to put forward a new idea, framed in response to a recently published essay titled Balancing Act, by George Megalogenis, the Australian author and economics graduate. Our idea is that renewable energy provides the perfect act of renewal for the democratic state at this time.

Balancing act
In Balancing Act, an issue of the Quarterly Essay series, Megalogenis pinpoints the driver of much of the malaise in Australian policy making; neoliberalism, or the “open model” as he calls it. He says that it is time to accept that the open model which both sides of politics have implemented over the last 30 years gives us no path to future prosperity and the voters, yearning for long-term vision, want “a return to some form of government intervention in the economy”.

In our response to his Quarterly Essay, we want to briefly explore how Megalogenis’s arguments about the need for state intervention could be used to;

• slash greenhouse gas emissions
• build a reliable consensus in climate politics
• help fix the economic model.

Our argument is that the new conversation about government intervention in the economy provides a way to solve the climate riddle, by moving beyond the “market fetish”.

Megalogenis writes:

The Coalition can’t lay claim to the future until it adjusts to the two big shocks of our age. The first shock is that the version of capitalism favoured by the conservatives is broken… The second shock is that the international community may finally be ready to tackle climate change.

Policy solutions that match the global warming threat require transformation, not tinkering. As Megalogenis rightly points out, these processes of restructuring require governments to stop simply devolving agency to the invisible hand of the market.

The return to regulation in the economy could revitalise the environmental agenda, cutting through the impasse of carbon politics with a healthy dose of nation building in the area of renewable energy. It would replace fifteen years of neoliberal environmental orthodoxy with a new agenda that is both more rigorous and more popular.

Neoliberal environmentalism
Environmentalism from the 1960s until the 1980s was a diverse movement. There were public transport and urban design activists calling for more rational, convivial cities. Conservationists campaigned to protect biodiverse forests from destruction. Greenpeace put its ships in the way of nuclear testing and toxic waste dumping. Deep greens proposed new cultural paradigms to replace consumerism and economic growth.

Then, at some point in the late 1990s, the climate threat became so great that it rightly dominated the environmental agenda in Australia and around the world. This occurred at the same time in history that free market ideology was ascendant. The timing was tragic.

Until this point, environmentalists responded to global warming with tools that had already worked in achieving environmental and other policy progress. These were forms of government regulation: bans on some chemicals and practices, standards on imported and locally manufactured products, incentives for clean production, plans for rational design of cities around mass transit.

Unfortunately, however, greens became convinced that the best and perhaps only way to save the climate was to monetise it. (Or more accurately, to monetise tradeable rights to pollute the climate.) We reduced the complexity of a global system out of control into the mere absence of a price signal.

Rather than build a social movement for transformation, we operated like technocrats. We learned to speak in what the Australia Institute’s Richard Denniss calls “econobabble”. Too tentative to pick winners – solar and wind over coal and gas – we hid behind economic talk of carbon prices and market architectures. It is no wonder the public cooled to global warming.

The emerging criticism of the open economy doctrine now allows us to return to a more rational and constructive conversation. Megalogenis says, “The debate we have to have is on the role of government in the economy”. The practical program he prescribes starts with public investment in infrastructure.

Our view is that the first candidate for this infrastructure development should be the switch to clean energy for electricity and transport. Australia’s economic opportunity here is vast as we have prodigious renewable energy resources which are tragically underdeveloped. We also have the opportunity to create goods for export.

Green industries
Recent announcements in electric vehicles indicate just how rapidly the world will move towards green industries. The Netherlands and Norway are looking to have only electric vehicles sold by 2025 and India has an astonishing goal to replace all of its petrol and diesel cars with electric vehicles by 2030.

If the Paris climate agreement COP21 succeeds, this would require wealthy countries such as ours to decarbonise our energy sector by about mid-century. For long-term assets such as energy infrastructure, achieving a complete rebuild before 2050 means starting immediately with a concerted program of investment.

This is a massive economic undertaking and requires strong government intervention. According to the International Energy Agency, rebuilding a clean energy system by 2050 would cost US$44 trillion globally. (Crucially, it would save US$115 trillion, because fuels such as the sun and the wind are free as well as renewable.)

Giles Parkinson, the editor of RenewEconomy, estimates that Australia will end up spending $130 billion on electricity networks over 20 years from 2000 to 2020. He calls this “pure folly”, propping up last century’s old, dirty, one-way electricity model, when our competitors are investing in renewable energy, battery storage and smart grids that will deliver cheaper, cleaner, more secure energy.

Our mal-investment will be of little use when energy companies like AGL eventually retire their coal-burning plants. Australia cannot afford waste on this scale. Nor can our climate bear the consequences of further delay.

What is needed to transform the energy system is for government to set a clear goal to decarbonise by mid-century and take firm hold of economic levers to make it happen. The National Energy Objective – the foundation of all energy policy in the country – needs to be modernised to include decarbonisation as a goal, alongside secure and efficient delivery of energy.

This greening of the energy and transport sectors would create real investment in long-term, productive assets. It will generate jobs and new industries. It is a perfect example of the kind of government action that Megalogenis recommends.

Upbeat about renewables
The reason that we are both so upbeat about the renewables boom is that it offers everything that carbon politics failed to deliver. Where carbon markets are abstract, renewables are tangible; solar panels and wind turbines you can touch.

Carbon markets created a small number of direct jobs within the banking sector – which is hardly the world’s most loved profession – but building renewables and a smart grid will generate millions of mostly blue collar jobs around the world, according to a recent report from the intergovernmental International Renewable Energy Agency.

Where carbon price schemes are ultimately just another globalised market – like currencies or commodity futures – renewables can be owned and operated by local communities. For example, most of the wind farms in Denmark are local co-operatives. Shareholding or direct ownership of clean energy – especially rooftop solar – gives it an unassailable social license, with electoral support across the political spectrum.

With the rise of smart grid technologies, even urban communities can own their own ‘virtual’ power stations; roof-top solar and household battery power, traded and optimised in real time, providing reliable energy to replace baseload coal.

Energy as innovation
Prime Minister Turnbull has called for innovation. Smart energy is innovation on steroids. Australia already has start-ups making hardware and software that we should export to a world hungry for clean energy. Reposit is building solar and battery storage systems that sell their aggregated energy into the grid, like a virtual power plant. Redflow is developing consumer and utility-scale batteries on the ‘flow’ design, which can provide very high durability energy storage and safety and sustainability improvements over conventional lithium-ion batteries.

A combination of ‘push’ policies that stimulate innovation and ‘pull’ policies that provide stable demand for renewables (and storage and smart grids) would liberate a wave of entrepreneurship for the Prime Minister. These products, services and new business models are more responsible exports than coal and they are becoming more competitive. Even if no top-down mandate for clean energy emerges from the Paris climate agreements, the natural growth of unsubsidised renewables will be worth US$7,800 billion by 2040 according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance.

The most important reason to rebuild climate politics around renewables (as distinct from carbon markets) is the politics itself. Renewable energy has a super-majority of support (70 per cent plus of the electorate), in major markets all around the world. Polling commissioned by the Australia Institute found that three quarters of Australians would support a party that boosted solar and battery storage and 63 per cent are prepared to endorse a national switch from fossil fuels to renewables by 2030.

Even in Australian wind districts, where a vocal minority of opportunistic politicians have whipped up anti-wind farm panic, an amazing majority prefer wind and solar to coal or gas. Detailed polling in ten wind districts in 2011 found 83 per cent of people support wind power. Carbon markets are nowhere near as popular.

Tony Abbott’s ‘great big new tax’ scare campaign killed carbon markets in the popular imagination (assuming they were ever truly popular to start with). Similarly, toxic misinformation makes it impossible to conceive of a bipartisan national carbon market policy in the US. Strange, extreme ideas are also percolating up in the Tory party in England, including paranoid notions that wind turbines cause ‘infrasound’ sickness and death.

Prime Minister Turnbull’s post-election cabinet reshuffle has created a perfect political setup to take a renewable energy leap forwards. Energy Minister Josh Frydenberg has taken on the Environment portfolio. It is a high risk situation for Frydenberg, because the ‘jobs versus environment’ frame through which these issues are seen means he appears to have to choose either energy or the climate. Encouragingly, he recently told a clean energy conference that his job was to “move energy into the environment [portfolio]”.

Conflict or harmony?
As one of us has written in The Guardian:

It depends entirely on whether the two sides of the portfolio – energy and the environment – are set in conflict or in harmony with each other.

… If Frydenberg does not move quickly to capitalise on this innovation, then he is caught between coal and a hard place. He either fails one half of his portfolio or fails the other half.

… Unleashing the renewables revolution is the only way that the new minister can do something significant for the environment and at the same time, build Australia’s energy resources and energy security. This is an opportunity that Greg Hunt never had when he was environment minister.

Renewables are the best and perhaps the only way to save the debate about saving the climate. If Megalogenis is right, then Australia has a narrow window of opportunity to use government intervention to reinvent our economy and rebuild crumbling infrastructure.

The stakes are cultural as well as economic. Dark forces and racist politicians are on the march around the world. Restoring public faith in a collective, democratic space is a protection against the demagoguery that Trump is bringing to the gates of the White House, if not to the Oval Office itself. Clean energy infrastructure is the first and best candidate for a new approach to nation building on a planet in peril.

This article is republished with permission from New Matilda.