Beyond Zero Emissions (Twitter) has launched their "Renewable Energy Superpower" (pdf), looking at how Australia can utilise its full renewable energy potential.

The Brisbane Courier Mail has a look at proposals for high speed rail in Australia - Beyond Zero Emissions finds high-speed rail service sensible and feasible.

IMAGINE boarding a train at Brisbane’s Roma Street at 9am and getting off at Sydney’s Central Station at noon.

Imagine living near the beach on the Gold Coast and commuting to work in Brisbane’s CBD within 20 minutes.

Both could be a reality in little more than a decade, according to a new report which says high speed rail is not only achievable and affordable, but essential to Australia’s future.

Detailed research by Melbourne University’s Energy Institute, think-tank Beyond Zero Emissions and the German Aerospace Center, concludes that a 1799km network linking Brisbane and the Gold Coast to Sydney and Melbourne could be operating by 2025. “This is a faster, better, cleaner cheaper and more convenient form of travel. It is vital to Australia’s future,” Beyond Zero Emissions CEO Stephen Bygrave said.

The report, which took two years to compile, says the total bill including infrastructure construction and rolling stock would be $84 billion – $30 billion less than the cost suggested by an advisory group set up by the Rudd Labor Government – due to plotting a route with fewer tunnels and bridges.

It predicts that 68 million passengers a year would be using the system within five years of the launch, generating $7 billion in revenue in 2030 and an annual operating profit of $4.6 billion.

Zero Carbon Australia's Matthew Wright has a response to a recent competing proposal for 100% renewable energy from UNSW's Mark Diessendorf - 100% renewables, no hot air.

The Zero Carbon Australia Stationary Energy project has paved the way for Australian researchers to contribute their best scenarios for transitioning to a 21st century renewable powered economy in a decade.

When we first set out on the momentous task to write the plan, recruiting dozens of engineers, physicists and scientists, we really hoped that we would create a competition around the goal on who could write the best scenarios for transition. We wanted to see reports like ours being written by state and federal governments, public and private research institutions and universities. We congratulate UNSW for being the first institution to take up the challenge.

As the community partner in the ZCA project, Beyond Zero Emissions welcomes the UNSW’s contribution with its soon to be released scenario for taking the economy to 100 per cent renewable energy.

Before we can discuss the merits of their proposal, we need to consider the two schools of thought on how to achieve a completely decarbonised economy: those who think we should have a fossil fuel powered "transition;" and those who think that transition using fossil fuel “lite” technologies – namely fossil gas – is a diversion, not a shortcut. Beyond Zero Emissions fit into the latter category while the UNSW fit somewhere in between.

Based on what is known about the UNSW plan, the research recommends building gas peaker plants to generate 14 per cent of Australia’s electricity needs. These plants would run on fossil gas – which would include petroleum gas and coal seam gas – and switch to gasified biomass at an unspecified point in the future.

We believe that it is simplistic and naïve to believe that fossil gas feedstock will be replaced with biomass feedstock, and think that future scenarios from universities and environmental organisations will send a green light to oil and gas companies Origin Energy, AGL, Santos, etc, to proceed with their massive expansion of coal seam gas in the food producing areas and forests of NSW and QLD; not to mention their intentions for Tasmania, Victoria, West Australia and their shale gas dreams in SA.

Even if the switch to biomass was contemplated on the studies' proposed scale, BZE’s research team had already looked seriously into biomass burning for the specific task of addressing reduced solar and wind resources in the winter. After diligent analysis, it was decided that a combination of overcapacity and biomass co-firing would be the best, least environmentally damaging and cheapest way to meet the more challenging winter demand.

The UNSW team, by their own admission, hasn’t done the economics on their transition plan, and so Beyond Zero Emissions can’t actually comment on the costs directly. What we do know is that our researchers ruled out the gasification of biomass due to the lack of demonstrated commercial-scale projects, the lack of project pipeline and known cost curves, and the fact that storage wasn’t demonstrated on any scale.

The UNSW use of biogas or biomass gasification was investigated, however research found that no technology existed on the scale needed and the costs quoted were as much as 10 times the cost of transporting biomass pellets. Palletisation as chosen by the Zero Carbon Australia team is a very well known process, with a significant scale industry operating in Europe and the US.
The challenge for the UNSW team is to either size their gas production for the maximum peak demand of their turbines, which I would expect would be in the order of 20-50GW of capacity, or to add storage for their gasified biomass, which is a costly option. The UNSW proposals might combust hydrogen and carbon monoxide directly, or alternatively reform the gasified biomass into methane, but both these options would prove to be very expensive. We are confident that our plan will be cheaper than the UNSW plan if they decide to stick to their choice of gasified biomass.

Gas generation is the most notable difference between the Zero Carbon Australia plan and the UNSW scenario but it’s not the only one.

The ZCA included a significant energy efficiency program, the most ambitious one proposed to date, which shows how we can deliver half the end use energy we currently deliver. How we do that is being comprehensively detailed in the work of the Zero Carbon Australia Buildings plan, which will be published in February next year.

Then there’s our plan to link the main electricity grids in Australia: the Mount Isa mine grid in the north and the eastern seaboard grid with the West Australian grids. This proposed updating of infrastructure is on par with what’s happening in China, in South America, and serious plans to connect North Africa and the Middle East to Europe. Our plan to link eastern and Western Australia with HVDC, creating a national grid, is consistent with the recommendation of Siemens Australia. The cost of this technology has come down since we researched and produced our report.

In his article last month, UNSW's Mark Diesendorf questioned whether Australia has the available labour force to build the renewable energy system, even though it is adequately addressed in the ZCA plan. When the coal industry is set to triple in size, we hear a bit about capacity constraints, but nobody concludes it’s a showstopper. When the gas industry decides its going to build $100, $200 or even $400 billion worth of LNG trains, no one says that it can’t be done because of capacity constraints. Not only does the same logic apply to a rapid rollout of renewables, but workers are crying out for jobs in the renewable powered cleantech economy.

The Climate Spectator has an article from UNSW’s Mark Diesendorf looking at an alternative to the Zero Carbon Australia plan to switch Australia to 100% renewable energy - A cheaper path to 100% renewables.

Australia has enormous renewable energy resources in the form of sunshine, wind, biomass (organic) residues, hot rocks and waves. But is a transition to 100 per cent renewable energy technologically and economically feasible here?

Last year, a ground-breaking study, "Zero Carbon Australia Stationary Energy Plan," claimed that 100 per cent renewable energy is technically possible and would cost about $370 billion.

The core of the ZCA study was an hour-by-hour computer simulation, by Jack Actuarial Consulting, of Australian electricity demand in 2008 and 2009, supplied mostly by concentrated solar thermal power (CST) with thermal storage, and by wind power.

As is inevitable in a first-of-a-kind study of a revolutionary new energy system, some simplifying assumptions were made:

– Western Australia was connected ... to the eastern states with new transmission lines;
– Second-generation CST power stations … were chosen as the principal energy source. These solar stations were given thermal storage equivalent to 17 hours of full power output and so can, in theory, run through the night;
– A daily average was taken for solar energy inputs, although hourly data are much more accurate;
– To compensate for the reduction in sunshine in winter, a vast excess of CST generating capacity was introduced;
– Also for winter, biomass residues were shipped out to the solar power stations to be burned under the thermal storages when necessary.

At the University of New South Wales, PhD candidate Ben Elliston, Associate Professor Iain MacGill and I initiated an independent research project based around some different assumptions, to remove the above assumptions of the ZCA study.

We performed a series of hour-by-hour computer simulations of the 2010 electricity demand in the five Australian states covered by the National Electricity Market. We chose a broader energy mix than ZCA: first-generation CST with thermal storage, wind, solar PV, gas turbines and existing hydro – all commercially available technologies. Gas turbines, which are like jet engines, are highly flexible generating plants ideally suited to supporting fluctuating renewable generation. Some are already being deployed in Australia. They could initially be fuelled on natural gas, however this could be replaced with liquid biofuels produced sustainably from the residues of existing crops.

We found that it is, indeed, technically feasible to supply current electricity demand by 100 per cent renewable energy with the same reliability as the existing fossil fuelled system.
The key challenge is meeting demand on winter evenings. At sunset on overcast days, the thermal energy storages are not full and sometimes wind speeds are low. In our initial simulations, to be presented in a peer-reviewed paper at the forthcoming Australian Solar Energy Society’s annual conference, we used biofuelled gas turbines to fill the gap. This is likely to be lower cost than ZCA’s solution of choosing a vast excess of CST power stations, which would not be used in summer.

However, the UNSW study proposes an even cheaper solution than lots of gas turbines or CST: namely a revitalised energy efficiency program to reduce electricity demand on winter evenings. Furthermore, in a ‘smart’ electricity system it will be easier to reduce demand quickly during periods of low supply.

Both the ZCA and UNSW studies refute the claims by renewable energy sceptics that renewable energy cannot replace baseload (24-hour) coal-fired power. ZCA interprets its results by concluding that CST with thermal storage is baseload.

We interpret the simulation results differently, concluding that although CST can perform in a similar manner to baseload in summer, it does not in winter. However, we maintain that it doesn’t matter. The important result is that our renewable energy mix gives the same reliability of the whole generating system in meeting demand as the existing polluting system.

Although the UNSW study has not yet performed an economic analysis, our scenarios have the potential economic advantage over ZCA’s that they don’t require transmission links between WA and the eastern states and they have a smaller percentage contribution from CST, currently the most expensive component of the energy mix.

It should be emphasised that neither the modelling of ZCA nor UNSW establishes a timescale for the transition to 100 per cent renewable electricity. However, the ZCA study claims that the transition could be made in a decade. That claim is an assumption based on the observations that Australia could supply the raw materials for manufacturing the systems and that solar and wind technologies are suitable for rapid manufacture.

Beyond Zero Emissions has an article on the recent solar flagships announcement by the government, arguing the choice of technology and the combination with gas fired backup is a bad idea - Labor’s Solar Flagships: Smoke and Mirrors…and Coal Seam Gas. The ABC also has an interview with BZE Director Matthew Wright. From a purist point of view having energy storage (and no gas) is the right long term goal - whether or not solar towers are superior to the linear fresnel trough technology I'm not so sure of - but this plant is at least a large scale proving ground for the idea. Either way - in the longer term, the gas will run out and we'll have CSP infrastructure in place which can be extended and supplemented with storage - so its a step forward.

The Federal Government's choice of picking French state owned nuclear giant Areva to build a Solar plant based on out‐dated technology is a move that has surprised the climate and energy security think‐tank Beyond Zero Emissions. The proposed plant near the controversial coal seam gas fields at Chinchilla is a missed opportunity to build Australia’s first baseload solar plant.

“The rest of the world is seizing the opportunity to use low‐cost molten salt energy storage technology to build truly baseload solar thermal power plants” says Mark Ogge, renewable energy campaigner, Beyond Zero Emissions.

“Surprisingly the Gillard government has picked outdated and inferior linear technology with gas backup in a cynical attempt to justify destructive coal seam gas extraction on prime agricultural land in Queensland’s Darling Downs,” says Ogge.

“As people now realise that renewable energy can provide baseload power, the main excuse for coal seam gas extraction evaporates.”

“It is ironic that just as the Spanish unveil the Gemasolar power tower plant near Seville, that runs fifteen hours flat out into the night with molten salt energy storage, providing utility scale baseload solar power to the Spanish grid, the Australian government chooses inferior low efficiency linear Fresnel technology with completely unnecessary gas backup.”

“Spain now has seven baseload molten salt solar power plants up and running. The US is building a 1000 MW solar thermal plant with 6 hours storage, equivalent in size to a large coal fired power station. Solar gas hybrid technology is 30 years out of date, and linear Fresnel technology is far inferior to efficient high temperature power towers.”

The ABC will be screening a segment from a Q&A at the Sydney Theatre Company feauturing Beyond Zero Emissions' Matthew Wright on Wednesday - Greening The Wharf.

Moderated by Tony Jones with panellists including The Hon. Bob Carr, Dr Zhengrong Shi, Graham Bradley and Sam Mostyn.

A 15 minute excerpt will run on 15 February on ABC1 TV as part of the Best of Big Ideas broadcast.

The full one hour will feature on ABC1 TV on Wednesday 16 February at 11am and will also be available through ABC online i-view.

Matthew Wright from Beyond Zero Emissions (authors of the 'Zero Carbon Australia' Plan) has an article in The Climate Spectator talking about the importance of eliminating Australia's dependency on oil (especially in the context of Richard Branson's recent prediction of $200 per barrel oil) - Breaking oil's grip.

A $US200 per barrel oil price by mid-decade is consistent with Beyond Zero Emissions’ internal analysis and will have massive economic consequences for Australia. The issue presents us with an opportunity to achieve multiple outcomes: reduce our impact on the climate, while increasing our economic competitiveness and energy security. We can sandbag our economy from punishing oil prices, but only by equipping our automotive sector for the 21st century and utilising modern electric rail in upgraded national transport and freight networks.

The Australian economy will be importing 80 per cent of its oil by 2015, which means we will be forking out as much as $66 billion for imported oil per year from 2015 (based on Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association figures combined with BZE and Branson oil price predictions for 2015). Although this huge figure is equivalent to a quarter of the Australian federal budget, federal and state energy ministers refuse to acknowledge it, despite several years of trying to bring these facts to their attention. It is a significant economic vulnerability that will only grow in the decade ahead.

The increased cost of imported oil on the horizon is akin to a 'great big tax' on Australian families and already stressed industries. But unlike government taxes that pay for new schools, hospitals, train lines and other critical infrastructure and services, this multi-billion dollar price hike will solely benefit oil-rich nations. Instead of driving the Australian economy into a $66 billion brick wall, we need to get on the front foot and retool the economy for the safety and security of Australian families and industry.

Our government must push domestic car factories to retool for pure electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles. This is the case for leading US car maker GM. The company has successfully retooled its Michigan factories to mass-produce the Chevy Volt at the affordable $41,000 per car (in line with what average cars cost in Australia). There is no reason why Australia can’t do what Michigan-based automakers have done.

Given the rapidly rising demand for electric vehicles, reorienting the automotive industry is a strategic economic move. GE just announced it will aim for 25,000 electronic vehicles (EVs) in its global fleet by 2015. Anticipating increased demand, the European car-giant Renault will aim to produce 500,000 pure EVs per year by 2013. Even with ramped-up production though, EVs are expected to be in short supply globally over the next three to five years.

So what can the Gillard government do to encourage the automotive sector restructuring? There are several options.

The government can leverage existing subsidies to manufacturers to build Australia’s capacity as a green car powerhouse. Fringe benefits tax arrangements combined with government procurement now drives around half of the one million car purchases in Australia each year. This tax could be amended easily to incentivise the purchase of EVs which, given short global supply, are best sources from retooled Australian plants.

The government sector can use its position as the country’s largest car purchaser to ensure demand and help the EV market mature. Investments in R&D can help Australia keep up with the quickening pace of EV innovation. And it can assist the roll-out of critically important recharge stations – the infrastructure that will allow Australian families to meet their travel needs with confidence. These measures will revitalise the domestic car-manufacturing sector and significantly lift sales.

Automobiles are only half of the story, though. Improved renewable electricity powered public transport and freight networks will also reduce the demand for oil-dependent vehicles.

Each Australian car driver travels around 15,000 kilometres per year. To seriously address the coming oil shock we must target 50-80 per cent of all passenger kilometres to be modally switched to electric rail within 10 years. We need to start mobilising the industry today to do this, ahead of the shock.

Australia needs to convert the bulk of these kilometres to public transport. Fast trains between Australia’s largest cities, new metropolitan train lines (like the French and Spanish metros) and adapted freeways and arterials for trains and trams would all see massive upswings in public transport patronage.

Moving increased quantities of freight by train is also part of the solution. Dedicated freight corridors would benefit regional Australia particularly. Moving freight vast distances on trucks will become increasingly costly, so people living in the bush will face increased costs of living if our government fails to plan and respond effectively to the threat of inflated oil prices.

Of course, as with any major infrastructure project, we must account for its climate impacts. A renewable energy electricity system, like the one outlined in the Zero Carbon Australia Stationary Energy report, can power this transport system with no adverse impacts on the climate.

A dollar saved is a dollar earned. With automotive industry restructuring and smart transport policies, Australia can avoid sending up to $66 billion offshore each year. This saving can offset the cost of funding a transport revolution while strengthening our economy at the same time.

Australia’s transport system is currently oil dependent. But it doesn’t have to be. In 2011, Beyond Zero Emissions will release a fully costed plan for a zero carbon transport system. The report will spark debate and inform policymakers about the type of transport Australians need – one that is good for our climate and good for our economy.

THE businessman Graeme Wood has condemned Australia's failure to act on climate change, criticising ''scared'' politicians for a lack of leadership.

Mr Wood, one of Australia's most successful entrepreneurs whose wealth the BRW Rich List estimates at more than $372 million, is a co-founder of Wotif.com.

He said the former prime minister Kevin Rudd was right when he called climate change ''the greatest moral, economic and environmental challenge of our generation''.
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''I see climate change as exactly what Kevin Rudd said it was, and see nothing happening about it. The system is in gridlock.''

Privately, Mr Wood was the biggest donor to the advocacy group Beyond Zero Emissions, which has published a costed plan to shift Australia to a 100 per cent renewable energy supply within a decade.

''It's the only clear plan that's been put out as an alternative to fossil fuels, which challenges all the accepted wisdom about the rate at which we could go to renewables,'' Mr Wood said.

A well-known philanthropist, Mr Wood has committed another $300,000 to follow up work by Beyond Zero, including plans on land-use change and transport, and hopes to obtain more donations.

The SMH has a look at Thursday's launch of Zero Carbon Australia's plan - How to be fully renewable in 10 years.

AUSTRALIA could switch completely to renewable energy within a decade by building a dozen vast, new solar power stations and about 6500 wind turbines, according to a major new study.

The Zero Carbon Australia Stationary Energy Plan - a collaboration between Melbourne University's Energy Research Institute, the environment group Beyond Zero Emissions and engineers Sinclair Knight Merz, puts the cost at $37 billion in private funding and public investment every year for the next decade.

The price tag may make it sound like a pipedream but the scheme earned the endorsement of the federal Liberal MP Malcolm Turnbull who added his support at a forum at Sydney Town Hall last night. ''The work they have done is important,'' Mr Turnbull said. ''It provides the most comprehensive technical blueprint yet for what our engineers, our scientists, can begin to do tomorrow.''

Mr Turnbull contrasted the Coalition's ''direct action'' plan with Labor's policy, which he claimed would lead to longer delays in cutting greenhouse gas emissions. ''I believe our long-term global goal is to very substantially reduce our emissions, a goal that will require almost all of our stationary energy to be produced from zero or near-zero emission sources,'' Mr Turnbull said. ''This report demonstrates we could already be technologically ready to do that.''

The plan has also been endorsed by Australia's former chief scientist Robin Batterham, and a senior official at the International Energy Agency's renewable energy division, Cedric Philibert.

However, the National Generators Forum, which represents power station owners, and the office of the federal Energy Minister, Martin Ferguson, were decidedly lukewarm about the plan when asked about the findings last month. Under the plan, 60 per cent of the nation's electricity would be sourced from 12 huge solar thermal power plants, which use Australian-developed technology to store heat in molten salt, allowing them to operate for long periods when there is no sunshine.

The remaining 40 per cent of the power grid would be filled by about 6500 wind turbines at 23 large-scale wind farms dotted mainly around the coast.

The plan would generate 325 terawatt hours of electricity a year, meeting the nation's entire power demands in the year 2020, if a comprehensive energy efficiency plan is also factored in. Any shortfalls could be made up by biomass energy generation, using a portion of the stubble from the nation's wheatfields.

To properly harness all the renewable energy, the report calls for the unification of Australia's three separate electricity grids and some new transmission lines to link the new power stations to capital cities, at a total cost of $92 billion.

If the cost of completely transforming the energy sector was passed directly on to households, it would add 30 per cent to the average utility bill.

Zero Carbon Australia will be launching their Stationary Energy Plan in Sydney this Thursday.

Thursday 12 August - 6-7.45pm

Sydney Town Hall, 483 George St, Sydney

Featuring:

Hon. Bob Carr - Former NSW Premier
Hon. Malcolm Turnbull - Federal MP for Wentworth
Senator Scott Ludlam - Federal Senator WA
Matthew Wright - Executive Director Beyond Zero Emissions
Allan Jones MBE - Chief Development Officer, Energy & Climate Change, City of Sydney
MC - Quentin Dempster - journalist and broadcaster

Free Entry

You are invited to attend the Sydney launch of the Zero Carbon Australia Stationary Energy Plan.

This cutting-edge plan, the culmination of over 12 months and thousands of hours of pro bono work by engineers, scientists and postgraduate students, is a collaboration between the climate solutions think tank Beyond Zero Emissions, and the University of Melbourne Energy Institute.

This plan is unique in Australia. It is a detailed and costed blueprint for transitioning our stationary energy sector to 100% renewable energy in ten years. The technologies utilised in this plan are commercially available now.

This free public event will cover the details of the plan as well as the state of renewable energy in Australia more broadly. A panel discussion with technical experts will follow the presentations.

Don't miss out!

If you would like to take a look at the report or synopsis they are available here:

Synopsis 16 pages:
http://media.beyondzeroemissions.org/ZCA2020_Stationary_Energy_Synopsis_v1.pdf

Full Report 200 pages:
http://beyondzeroemissions.org/zero-carbon-australia-stationary-energy-plan-available-now-download-or-purchase-your-copy

Phil Hart has a post on the Zero Carbon Australia plan for making Australia's energy supply 100% renewable - Zero Carbon Australia.

The Zero Carbon Australia report attempts to tackle head-on some of the arguments against renewables and to show that they can make much more than a niche contribution to total energy demand. With a target of 100% renewable energy by 2020, clearly this is an ambitious report. While no one suggests this is probable under politics as usual, it shows what might be possible if we are prepared to take a radically new approach.

In the peak oil sphere, there is significant concern about energy return from renewable energy projects. While this report does not explicitly use the term 'Energy Return on Energy Invested' (EROEI), it does provide the numbers for steel and concrete use required to deliver the plan against the current volume of use in Australia. We could get a lot more utility out of those resoures than we do at the moment.

Under the ZCA2020 Plan, it is projected that 2020 grid electricity demand will be over 40% higher than today, from 228TWh/yr up to 325TWh/yr. This increase in electricity demand is due largely to the switch of services currently provided by gas and oil to be supplied more efficiently with, renewable electricity. The increase is significantly offset by ambitious but achievable electrical energy efficient targets.

To meet this demand, a combination of wind and solar thermal with storage are proposed as the primary electricity generation technologies. Biomass and hydro are utilised as backup, supplying about 2% of annual electricity.

The ZCA2020 electricity generation mix has been quantitatively modelled in high detail using real-world data, with the results demonstrating that Australia’s electricity demand can be met by 100% renewable energy.

The data underlying the model are derived from real meteorological recordings of solar insolation at the 12 proposed CST sites, real wind speeds at existing wind farms, and grid demand based on actual demand in the National Electricity Market (NEM). Modelling has been performed on a half-hourly timescale for the years 2008 and 2009.

The Plan’s proposed combination of 42.5 GW of CST and 50 GW of wind provides enough energy to cover 98% of the electricity demand modelled, with the remaining 2% being supplied by existing hydro power (5 GW) and heat from biomass co-firing on 10 GW of the CST plants. This is represented by the small green and navy blue areas in Figure 9.

WorldChanging has a post on a British plan - see here (pdf) - to convert completely to renewable energy by 2030 - A New, Bold Plan for a Carbon-Neutral UK by 2030.

Carbon neutrality by 2030 is the new standard for climate policies, and again the UK is leading North America in the climate debate with a bold national-level proposal about how to get there. The Centre for Alternative Technology just launched zerocarbonbritain2030 (ZCB2030), a collaborative project showing one possible scenario for making the entire UK carbon-neutral by 2030.

ZCB2030 is a well-researched, well-written, and well-designed report on a set of possible pathways to a zero carbon Britain by 2030 (The goal, though bold, is not unique: Alex Steffen called for a very similar position for Seattle, a target which the Seattle City Council has included in their legislative priorities this year; and a variety of other nations and cities are approaching the same target, from Copenhagen to New Zealand). In 384 pages, CAT presents a comprehensive look at the kind of systemic changes needed to achieve dramatic emissions reduction in just 20 years in such areas as farming, energy generation, building codes, transportation planning, and economic frameworks. This report truly addresses the scope, scale and speed of the climate crisis and the solutions needed to create a bright green future.

The ABC has an article on a Melbourne University report on switching Australia to 100% renewable energy (echoing another plan by Beyond Zero Emissions) and relying heavily on solar thermal power, wind power, electric vehicles and an expanded electricity grid - 100pc green energy possible by 2020: report.

There is an accompanying interview at The World Today.

A Melbourne University report says all of Australia's energy could come from renewable sources by 2020 as opposed to the Federal Government's target of 20 per cent.

The Zero Carbon Australia Stationary Energy Plan was launched in Canberra this morning by Coalition Senator Judith Troeth, independent Senator Nick Xenophon and Greens Senator Christine Milne.

Currently, wind and solar power provide less than 1 per cent of Australia's total energy needs. ...

Beyond Zero Emissions executive director Matthew Wright says the 10-year road map focuses on technologies that are already commercially available such as wind and large-scale solar thermal. "The inherent design of a solar thermal plant is that it stores its heat away for night time," he said. "We've modelled that from our 12 solar regions across the country and our 23 wind sites that we get 100 per cent of our power needs, 365 days a year, 24-7."

The report says the goal would also depend on a $92 billion upgrade to create one national electricity grid that would link the renewable projects to the city and urban areas.

University of Melbourne Energy Institute professor Mike Sandiford says cost should not impede the switch to renewable energy. "To do it in 10 years is in many ways akin to a infrastructure roll out of a wartime-like operation in many senses," he said. "But the important point of the plan is that costs are not a real impediment. The total costs of our business as usual comes down to about a cup of coffee per person per day." ...

Professor Sandiford says the plan is also based on a shift towards public transport and electric cars, which he says would offset any projected increases in electricity use.

The Age has an article on Beyond Zero Emissions' launch of their "T10" campaign to switch Australia to 100% renewable power in a decade - Zero emissions possible - at $40bn a year.

AUSTRALIA could move to 100 per cent renewable energy within a decade if it spent heavily on cutting-edge solar thermal and wind technology, according to an analysis released as part of a community bid to redirect the flailing climate policy debate.

The shift would require the annual investment of up to $40 billion - roughly 3.5 per cent of national GDP - with the largest chunk going towards solar thermal power plants that used molten-salt heat storage to allow power generation to continue without sunlight.

The plan by advocacy group Beyond Zero Emissions was outlined at the launch of the Transition Decade, or T10, a grassroots campaign hoping to garner support for dramatic cuts in greenhouse gas emissions. Pitched as a response to the failure to introduce national and state policies to substantially reduce emissions, T10 won support yesterday from the City of Melbourne, the Australian Greens and Victorian Governor David de Kretser.

Launching the campaign, Professor de Kretser said Australia had a responsibility to act.

''If every person in the world generated greenhouse gas emissions per person equivalent to those of each Australian today, the levels would quickly exceed those predicted to cause very dangerous global warming,'' he told more than 1000 people at the Melbourne Town Hall. ''The consequences for planet Earth … would be disastrous.''

Under the Beyond Zero Emissions model, concentrated solar thermal plants at 12 sites across the country would meet 60 per cent of national energy demands. They would be supplemented by wind and photovoltaic solar panels, with existing hydroelectricity and biomass from burning crop remains as back-up.

Beyond Zero Emissions spokesman Mark Ogge said developments overseas had shown the claims that renewable energy could not provide baseload power had no basis.