- Chris Bowen criticized the comment about coal
- He defended renewable energy sources during power outages
Energy and Climate Change Minister Chris Bowen has been lambasted for blaming coal-fired power stations for power cuts while defending renewable energy.
The minister, who was dubbed ‘Blackout Bowen’ because of the outages, pointed to outdated fossil fuel stations as the cause of the state’s power outages.
“This is about what I’ve been saying for a while, that the biggest threat to the reliability of our energy systems is coal-fired power plants,” he said. Sky News on Thursday.
‘The least reliable part of our energy network at the moment is coal-fired power stations.
‘That is just a statement of fact. There hasn’t been a day in the last 18 months when we haven’t had a coal-fired power plant outage.
“Renewables are the cheapest form of energy available to Australians. It would be a disaster for emissions, for reliability and for prices to pause investment in renewable energy and wait for nuclear power to take off in the late 1930s or 1940s.’
There were three expected outages in NSW on Wednesday in preparation for summer, Mr Bowen said, but in addition there were two power stations that simply broke down.
‘That means that we have to make more (renewable) investments sooner. That’s what we do,” he said.
Chris Bowen pointed to aging fossil fuel stations as the cause of the state’s power outages
But critics question whether green energy projects will be able to replace coal quickly enough to meet demand once it is phased out.
“The irony of yesterday’s energy shortage in NSW is that renewables were unable to fill the gap when several coal and gas power stations were out of service for planned maintenance,” one person wrote on social media platform X.
“This has everything to do with ministerial incompetence and nothing to do with coal.”
‘I am certain that if a wider public truly understood the science and engineering involved in the generation and transmission of electricity, it is impossible that they would be so tolerant or ambivalent to the economy-destroying policies and tirades of Chris Bowen ,” said another.
A third pointed to data from Australia’s energy market operators showing on Thursday morning that coal provided almost 60 per cent of NSW’s electricity, while solar generated 27 per cent and wind 1 per cent.
“Oh yeah, Chris Bowen, who needs coal?” they wrote.
Parts of Sydney suffered a power outage on Tuesday afternoon as temperatures rose to the mid to high 30s, while regions in southern NSW were also hit by power outages early on Wednesday morning, leaving 6,000 homes without electricity.
NSW Premier Chris Minns on Wednesday urged residents not to use their dishwashers or washing machines during the afternoon peak.
There were further outages on Thursday morning, with parts of Sydney’s CBD hit by a major power outage that disrupted thousands of workers due to flooding at the substation.
More than 1,000 AusGrid customers lost power in Barangaroo, Wynyard and Martin Place, including apartment complexes and large office buildings.
The outage also knocked out traffic lights in Barangaroo and Wynyard, causing significant traffic delays for commuters entering the city.
Energy market analyst Saul Kavonic has claimed that the phasing out of coal-fired power stations as they reach their expiration date has not been met with adequate replacements.
“The government and the regulator have been asleep at the wheel and only addressed this when the crisis situation arrived,” he said.