I agree with Tony Ryan that today's expensive petrol is terrible for our cost of living (Opinion, June 24).
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But the consensus is that the price spike relates to the global move to find alternatives to Russian oil, not "price gouging".
And I want to reassure Mr Ryan that the "viable back-up" to support renewable is on track. In fact, the independent energy consultancy Rystad predicts that Australia's total utility-scale battery capacity will double this year. And next year the Hunter Valley's privately-owned, world's-biggest $2.4 billion battery should start operating.
Other projects coming on-line soon total more than 20 times the capacity of this giant. That's a lot of back-up.
The new federal government's $20 billion plan to rebuild and modernise the grid will help stabilise the grid and move this cheap power around.
The electrification of our transport fleet will also soon have significant benefits for the cost of living. Electrification of trucks cuts their maintenance and operating costs by 60 per cent. And, like the big batteries, the change is not that far away. The Janus Electric company estimates that by 2030 50 per cent of the Australian road transport fleet will be new or retrofitted electric.It is a rapidly changing world.
There will be bumps along the way but if we can grasp the change we might again hope that we can achieve that all-important rapid drop in the emissions that are dangerously warming our, and our children's, planet.