Graeme Goodings:
… OOOO. Well, there are claims today that net-zero targets will drive up energy prices by almost 40%. CSIRO data has found baseload power is cheaper than renewable energy. Joining us now is Institute of Public Affairs Research Fellow Saxon Davidson. Saxon, good morning to you. Thanks for your time today.
Saxon Davidson:
Good morning. Thank you for having me.
Graeme Goodings:
These CSIRO figures, they surprise you?
Saxon Davidson:
Not at all. What does surprise me though is that in this year’s GenCost report, the CSIRO have actually added an extra methodology which has revealed that baseload power sources, such as gas and coal, are cheaper in the long run for our energy grid and for consumers than renewables. That aspect does surprise me, but the result from that methodology does not. We’ve known for a long time that increasing the proportion of intermittent to renewables makes the grid less reliable and less affordable for Australians. And I’m not surprised that this has been revealed, but I am surprised in the manner that it has been.
Graeme Goodings:
Now, Chris Bowen is continually telling us that renewable is the cheapest form of power. The sun doesn’t send a bill and the wind doesn’t charge, et cetera, et cetera. And he says that coal-fired power stations are unreliable and are breaking down. So what is the case for keeping coal and gas?
Saxon Davidson:
Well, the case simply is that we need to actually increase and actually bring in new baseload power stations, such as coal and gas, in order to lower power prices or to decrease the rise in power prices for Australians. We actually need to be bringing in new coal-fired power stations. And for our existing fleet, we need to cut the amount of red tape that is actually preventing us from upgrading those coal-fired power stations. In the end, that’s actually why they’re ageing and becoming less efficient is because we have a litany of regulations and red tape on these coal-fired power stations that prevents us from upgrading them and updating them, hence why they become ageing.
Graeme Goodings:
What doesn’t seem to be taken into account is with renewables, there’s a lifespan, life expectancy of solar panels and wind vanes, wind farms and the like. They will have to be replaced and the cost will escalate.
Saxon Davidson:
Oh, absolutely. And this particularly affects regional Australians, particularly with large-scale solar and wind farms in the regions on our farms and in our natural wildlife, because even though the companies put up the cost of actually putting up these projects, what happens very often is that it’s actually the landowners who are then responsible for the disposal or for the waste management of these, to be quite frank, massive infrastructure project, these massive energy infrastructure projects. And this can be quite expensive and also quite damaging to the environment.
Graeme Goodings:
Are we too far down the renewable trail now to turn back or at least firm up with coal and gas?
Saxon Davidson:
I personally think it’s very defeatist to ourselves as a country if we say that we’re too far gone. There’s always something that can be done. And we’re very fortunate as a country to have a litany of natural resources and natural resources relating to energy, whether it be coal, gas, or uranium with nuclear energy. What we desperately need to do, we need to stop the renewable transition. Not only that, but start to reverse the decision-making that has been made in order to reach this energy transition. We need to get rid of the ban on nuclear power and need to desperately invest in energy infrastructure that actually supports baseload power stations. We’ve reached a stage with net zero and with the renewable transition that even though that there have been billions upon billions of subsidies into these renewable projects, they still can’t stand on their own two feet. And there’s been so much meddling and intervention in the energy market that we actually need corrective intervention in order to correct the ship and be able to have our natural advantage back, which is and has been for a long time cheap power.
Graeme Goodings:
Well, Australia is so resource-rich and this, I think, frustrates and annoys so many people is that we have so much uranium, we have so much coal, we have so much gas, and yet we’re exporting it all and paying the price here.
Saxon Davidson:
Well, absolutely. And this is extremely frustrating because as you said, we export a lot of our energy goods, whether it be coal, gas or nuclear, and it’s perfectly okay for our trading partners to use it, but we are vilified here in Australia for wanting to use our natural resources. We are being told that we are slowing down the energy transition for some reason, but we actually haven’t been … This is on the base assumption that what Australians want from their energy priorities or their energy policy priorities is actually net zero, which is simply not true. When you ask Australians what they want from their energy policies, they want our grid to be reliable, and they want our power to be affordable. They don’t want net zero. IPA polling shows that four in five Australians want energy reliability and energy affordability more than they want net zero. And what this tells us is that actually we should be investing in energy infrastructure here in Australia, we should be using our own natural resources, and we should be able to have cheap power because we have all those resources.
Graeme Goodings:
Do you have a thought about Australia trying to woo major data centres to Australia? We know they’re huge consumers of power and huge consumers of water. Would that have a net benefit for Australia?
Saxon Davidson:
I think in the long term, it would considering the technological benefits that it has, but that’s just yet another reason to drop the policy of net zero. If we are going to have these big data centres, then we need reliable power because as you said, they are huge consumers of energy, and you can’t have a data centre run economy in Australia and also have net zero in the same way that you can’t have a functioning manufacturing sector and also have net zero. Net zero isn’t just an energy transition. It is also a huge inhibitor on industries to operate in Australia because at a very base level, emissions is just human activity. And to cut emissions actually means to reduce human activity. So I think that the introduction of data centres into Australia is just another reason why we should abandon the policy of net zero.
Graeme Goodings:
Saxon Davidson, thanks so much for your time, IPA research fellow.
This transcript with Saxon Davidson talking on Mornings with Graeme Goodings fiveAA from 16 July 2026 has been edited for clarity.
