The Illawarra renewable energy zone was declared a year ago, generating 43-billion dollars in potential investment.
Category
📺
TVTranscript
00:00 A year ago the possibilities here seemed endless and exciting, but a year after the Illawarra
00:07 was declared a renewable energy zone, interest has cooled.
00:11 The Illawarra res has not been getting the resource commitment from the NSW State Government
00:17 that the other more advanced resses has.
00:19 Around the state, dozens of res projects are in various stages of development. The Central
00:24 West has almost 40, New England, the South West and the Hunter have several in the works.
00:30 But not a single project is in the pipeline for the Illawarra res.
00:34 Earlier this month it was announced the Russell Vale Colliery north of Wollongong would close
00:38 and questions resurfaced about the region's future beyond coal.
00:43 Darrell Best has spent 43 years as a coal miner in the Illawarra.
00:47 There aren't alternatives. When I was working in a coal mine and you looked around and you
00:52 heard that there was a renewable energy zone that had just been established, you think
00:55 well what does that mean? Do we go and work where? What is it?
01:02 Renewable energy zones were set up to power the state towards net zero by 2050.
01:08 What has been the big congestion point in the system before that is making sure the
01:12 network capacity, the grid capacity is up to taking the energy from where it's being
01:17 generated to where it's being used.
01:19 Many of the industries expected to emerge here are long term such as offshore wind,
01:23 green hydrogen and green steel. But without tangible renewable opportunities, workers
01:28 may be forced to look elsewhere.
01:31 We have to develop new industry for these people to go into and those industries are
01:36 going to be renewables because that's the future.
01:38 A future that appears uncertain in this renewable energy zone.
01:42 [BLANK_AUDIO]