Campaign urges switch to renewables

A campaign that could lead to farmers, businesses and households being paid for electricity they generate from renewable resources went on-line last month.

Renewable Energy Feed In Tariff-NZ (REFIT-NZ), a non-profit society, was due to launch a citizens-initiated referendum and website on April 30.

REFIT-NZ spokeswoman Charmaine Watts says farmers and other businesses could recoup the cost of generating their own power – and make money – if electricity supply was regulated to favour ‘feed-in tariffs’ (FITs) from local generation by wind, hydro, methane/diesel or solar.

“We’re calling for ‘energy democracy’,” she says. “We want the Government to legislate a feed-in tariff, which gives everyone a chance to profit economically, environmentally and socially by producing, using and selling renewable energy.”

A FIT is a regulated payment electricity retailers must make to any farm, business or household generating electricity from renewable sources. The FIT rate is several times the normal retail rate, speeding payback of capital costs and spreading the cost over all consumers.

FITs is widely used in Australia where the feed-in tariff varies from 20 cents/kWh in Tasmania to 60 cents/kWh in Victoria. In Germany, where generous FITs were introduced in 1991, there has been a dramatic growth in the renewable energy market, chiefly solar.

A Singapore expert in renewable energy says New Zealand is trailing the developed world on ‘people power’, when it could generate all its electricity from renewable sources within 20 years with the right support from government.
In Wellington last December, National University of Singapore associate professor Benjamin Sovacool said that NZ could be a world leader in renewable energy, becoming 100 percent renewable by 2025, with a reliable configuration of renewable plants.

“FITs require all consumers to pay a little bit extra, but it costs the government nothing,” he says. “Even more compelling, FITs save consumers and power companies money because they displace coal or natural gas generators. In 2007, for instance, Germany’s FIT cost customers about three billion euros, but saved them about nine billion euros in displaced fuel costs, lower levels of imported fuel and cleaner air.”

REFIT-NZ solicits farm and business members at $100 per year and individual members at $20. Charmaine says the trust will be raising funds for NZ’s first costs-benefits analysis of a NZ FIT. Info: www.refit.org.nz

Charmaine Watts in front of 480 watts of BP Solar PV panels, part of a total generation system of 1.5k watts which includes a 1kW small wind turbine.