Victoria is leading the renewable energy revolution

My passion for the environment was inspired early in life by my parents.

In particular, my mother instilled a strong sense of responsibility, including both collective and individual accountability with regard to human impact on our precious planet.

While the impact of human influenced climate change is already having a significant, negative impact on weather patterns and ecosystems, our Victorian Government has been tackling these pressing issues head-on.

We have world-leading emissions reduction targets: 75 to 80 per cent by 2035 and net zero by 2045. With these targets, Victoria’s economy will be decarbonising at one of the fastest rates anywhere in the world.

We have delivered the largest annual increase in renewable generation of any state, ever, with renewable generation growing by 3.6 terra-watt hours in 2021.

Our first renewable energy auction is bringing online at least 800MW of capacity.

Our second renewable energy auction was announced in October 2023, with six massive new projects around the state, delivering 600MW of new renewable capacity.

We will be using this new energy to help meet our commitment to power the entire government operations with renewable electricity – every police station, school, hospital and metropolitan train.

Victoria is also the home of big batteries, with the largest big battery in the Southern Hemisphere, and a number of other big batteries spread across our state.

We are also supporting neighbourhood batteries that will store solar power at the local level, providing it back to households in the evenings when they need it.

Our offshore wind targets are leading the country – bringing 2GW of offshore wind online by 2032, 4GW by 2035 and 9GW by 2040. This will ensure that Victoria is the home of offshore wind.

We are also leading the nation in helping reduce the amount of energy we use.

We have helped more than 200,000 Victorians install solar on their roof, thanks to our landmark Solar Homes program, which is our $1.3 billion program to help 770,000 households install solar PV, hot water or a battery. 

We recently published the Gas Substitution Roadmap. We are the first state to undertake this vital work, which will drive down the cost of living and cut our usage of fossil gas.

The roadmap details our approach to substituting fossil gas to help achieve Victoria’s emissions reduction targets through energy efficiency, electrification, and increased use of alternative gases such as hydrogen and biogas. It shows the incredible opportunity to cut household bills by moving to electricity, with modelling showing that households can save over $1200 a year by going all-electric.

The Victorian Energy Upgrade (VEU) program has delivered incredible outcomes – helping more than two million households and businesses to cut their bills, saving the average household $120 and the average business $3700 a year. The VEU supports more than 2200 jobs a year across the state – in both metropolitan and regional Victoria.

To achieve Victoria’s renewable energy target of 95 per cent by 2035 we need to be bolder and faster, and that’s why we are bringing back the State Electricity Commission – accelerating the energy transition, pushing more renewable energy into the system, driving down emissions and generating thousands of jobs. •