United ‘green’ voice
Wimmera leaders stress a collaborative approach will be imperative for reaching 2050 targets to become a carbon-neutral region.
Following 12 months of planning, Grampians New Energy Taskforce, GNET, has released detailed plans to drastically reduce greenhouse gases in the region.
The document entitled Grampians Roadmap to Net Zero Emissions paves a way forward for all energy users to reduce the collective carbon footprint.
The road map takes a collaborative approach to link five key areas or ‘domains of action’ – energy, buildings, industry, transport and land – subdivided into agriculture and waste.
Highlighting ‘realistic, achievable’ actions, the document looks at how government, industry and community can work more closely to create economic opportunities that also greatly reduce carbon emissions.
GNET chief executive Stuart Benjamin said an all-in approach would be the only way the Grampians region could achieve its carbon-neutral goals.
“We all need to work together. The ultimate goal is if we can work collaboratively and hold hands to maximise efforts, not only can we achieve 100percent reductions, we could achieve it by 2044,” he said.
“What we also do is transform our entire economy to take advantage of those economic opportunities.
“Data shows us if we just do business as usual, we’re only going to achieve a quarter of reductions in our Co2 by 2050.”
Mr Benjamin said the agriculture sector was the Wimmera and southern Mallee’s greatest asset in offsetting carbon.
He said farmers could use carbon as a ‘tradable commodity’ to help offset other sectors such as transport that relied on fossil fuels.
“Farming generates the most Co2 of any industrial sector – yet farming turns out to be the hero because of its ability to take in carbon and turn it into an economic resource,” he said.
“By putting a value on it, we recognise it as a tradable commodity.
“Farming effectively by its very nature takes carbon out of the air and puts it back into a crop or into the ground.
“Not only do we make more money and jobs in the region, but it’s much more sustainable for land use and we’ve reduced our emissions across the entire agriculture sector.”
Mr Benjamin said a priority area highlighted in the document was unlocking grid infrastructure to open the market to more investors.
“Unless we fix transmission, we can’t reach these targets,” he said.
“We’re already producing more renewable energy than we use – there’s lots of other ways we can use renewable energy within the borders of our region.
“Farming generates the most Co2 of any industrial sector – yet farming turns out to be the hero because of its ability to take in carbon and turn it into an economic resource” – Stuart Benjamin
“We can have micro grids and distribute power to new businesses in the region – a lot of energy intensive businesses are always looking for security of their power supply, but also at the cost of power.
“We are about to enter a time where we will see private investors constructing their own transmission assets.”
Wimmera Development Association chief executive Chris Sounness said the document would help the region make more calculated decisions that benefitted the environment and the economy.
“This document digs down and articulates what priorities need to be undertaken,” he said.
“We need to work together as a region. Some things need to be tackled by region and some things are best tackled by individuals – it’s about being complementary to one-another.
“With the cheap throwaway line ‘we want to be carbon neutral by 2050’ – that’s easy to say. But then you become overwhelmed with trying to figure what to do to make it happen.”
Mr Benjamin said the document would give the region a greater voice to champion ideas to state or federal governments.
“Whenever a region has a united voice and clear priorities it makes it far easier for governments to support that,” he said.
“This actually breaks it down into steps that are achievable. It shows how getting to zero is very achievable for our region.
“If we work together, there’s a lot of components in our control that we can make a difference with.”