Posted on 19 June 2009
- Waves around Australia and hot rocks beneath
it have the capacity to power Australia
into a clean energy future and provide thousands
of new jobs, according to two new reports
from WWF.
Power to Change: Australia’s
Wave Energy Future estimates the the wave
energy industry will create 3,210 jobs by
2020, including jobs in local manufacturing
and maintenance. By 2050 this figure is
expected to grow to 14,380 jobs.
The report was prepared
with the assistance of the Carnegie Corporation,
whose CETO wave energy demonstration plant
in Western Australia is regarded as a world
leader in harnessing the oceans to provide
clean, baseload renewable energy.
“Australia has the largest
and most consistent wave energy resource
globally and at least 35 per cent of our
current baseload power needs could be generated
from the Southern Ocean," said Carnegie
Corporation Managing Director Dr Michael
Ottaviano.
Meanwhile, Power to
Change: Australia’s Geothermal Future, a
report prepared in collaboration with the
Australian Geothermal Energy Association
(AGEA), predicted that more than 17,000
Australians could be employed in the geothermal
energy industry by 2050.
“When it comes to geothermal
energy, we truly are the lucky country,”
said Paul Toni, WWF Program Leader for Sustainable
Development. “The energy stored in hot rocks
near the Earth’s surface in Australia is
a thousand fold what we use each and ever
year.”
A key advantage of geothermal energy in
the shift to a low carbon economy is the
ability to take up some fo the employment
slack from declining fossil fuel industries.
“The geothermal energy
industry provides opportunities for workers
to move from industries like coal, oil and
gas into clean energy jobs, as much of the
technology and expertise is transferable
from one to the other,” said Susan Jeanes,
Chief Executive of AGEA
Both technologies are
expecting a boost from Australia’s so far
fitful moves to putting a price on carbon
emissions. They would also benefit from
a freeing up of the Renewable Energy Target
scheme to embrace more technologies.
“Renewable technologies
are the nuts and bolts of Australia’s clean
energy future,” said WWF-Australia CEO Greg
Bourne.
“What we are seeing
here is the birth of new industries that
will provide tens of thousands of jobs and
a technology and expertise that we can export
around the world, as well as renewable energy
to power Australia.”
