The Australian Energy Policy Debacle

Frank Milne ()
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Frank Milne: Queen's University

No 1540, Working Paper from Economics Department, Queen's University

Abstract: For the past 20 years, Australia has introduced policies encouraging and subsidizing renewable electricity generation. Since the election of the Australian Labor Party government in 2022, these policies have been accelerated. We show that international evidence of the heavy cost of renewable energy projects has been ignored. Cost-benefit studies show that these projects cannot be justified with any reasonable price for carbon dioxide emissions. Consequently, the Australian economy has suffered greatly increased prices for electricity provided by the grid. In turn, this has increased the rate of deindustrialization in key industries, contributed to a cost-of-living crisis for consumers and made the country more strategically vulnerable.

Keywords: Renewable Energy; Cost-Benefit; Net Zero (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: H54 Q2 Q3 Q4 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 56 pages
Date: 2025-10
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