News & Resources

The coal-fired power stations owned by the Queensland Government’s Stanwell and CS Energy will never make a profit again after 2023-24. Queensland Conservation Council forecast the future generation, costs and revenues of Stanwell and CS Energy to 2024-25. 

Rooftop solar and large-scale renewable energy are changing the electricity market, pushing wholesale prices down and displacing generation from coal fired power stations.  

Based on our analysis, CS Energy would never have made a profit after this year, even before the explosion at Callide C4. After 2023-24, the Queensland Government owned generators of CS Energy and Stanwell will post an operating loss. This means the Queensland taxpayers will be forced to subsidise dirty coal generation to keep the companies alive.

This report sets out the analysis and assumptions made around the cost and revenue streams of CS Energy and Stanwell including wholesale energy sales, retail revenue, forward contracts, coal revenue sharing, power station maintenance and operating costs. 

Read the full report below:

Recognising that addressing climate change is at the heart of efforts to protect and conserve Queensland’s unique biodiversity and ecosystems, Queensland Conservation Council prepared a 2018 report providing a critical analysis of Queensland’s Climate Transition Strategy and associated emissions reduction and renewable energy targets to determine if current policies and actions are enough to transition the state’s economy to zero net emissions by 2050. 

The five chapters of this report work to answer five key questions, including:

1. How will Queensland’s commitment to zero-net emissions by 2050 be translated into practice?

2. Do published business as usual (BAU) emissions scenarios for electricity and transport provide a realistic outlook on which to base Queensland’s transition planning?

3. What needs to happen to transition Queensland’s energy and transport sectors to zero-net emissions?

4. What are some transition opportunities and challenges facing regions and communities and what can be done
to facilitate a Just Transition?

5. Is climate change legislation needed to get Queensland to zero-net emissions?

Read the full report below!

QCC’s Deputy Chair Sherie Bruce, a proud Arrernte woman of Mparntwe (Alice
Springs) shares the importance of this year’s NAIDOC Week theme, ‘Heal Country’.

NAIDOC Week occurs annually each July, where the history, culture and achievements of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples are celebrated by Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities. This year, NAIDOC Week runs from July 4 to July 11.

The theme for 2021 is Heal Country; which encourages embracing First Nations peoples cultural understanding and knowledge of Country as part of their personal identity and Australia's national heritage. 

The English word ‘Country’ is a belief system that goes far beyond the Western definition. For Australian First Nations ‘Country’ means our family, kin, law, ceremony, traditions, language, nature, and land are all interconnected. Country includes landforms, air, plants, waters, knowledge, and special places. Every community in each Nation has custodial responsibilities to care for their Country and is central to our spirituality and identity. 

Healing is a change, a change in each person and our nation. Beginning with recognition of other cultures different to yours, recognition of Australia’s past history. The Healing continues with accepting that past and walking together with Australia’s First Nations.

Healing Country means embracing First Nation’s cultural knowledge and understanding of Country as part of Australia’s national heritage.

Please take the time to learn more about Australia’s First Nations and support them in protecting and Healing Country.

https://www.protectcountrynt.org.au/
https://www.seedmob.org.au/ban_fracking

Waratah Coal, a company owned by Clive Palmer, is seeking development approval for the new 1,400 MW coal fired Galilee Power Station in central Queensland.  

If it goes ahead, electricity from the Galilee Power Station will cost at least $100/MWh. This is likely an underestimate as it would be extremely vulnerable to increased costs from finance, as fewer investors are willing to back risky new coal, and carbon prices over the four decades of its potential operation.

$100/MWh is already 35% higher than 2020-21 prices and is nearly double the cost of electricity from building new renewable energy and storage.

The Galilee Power Station would emit over 230 megatonnes of carbon dioxide and eat up more than 20% of Queensland's carbon budget to meet our Paris Agreement commitments.

Queensland doesn’t need extra energy or capacity from an inflexible, polluting coal fired power station at Alpha. We need investment in clean and cheaper renewable energy and storage for the future.

Read the full report

Double the previous report, the Queensland Government has just revealed that 680 688 hectares of Queensland’s forest and woodland has been destroyed between July 2018 and June 2019 according to the latest Statewide Landcover and Tree Study (SLATS) data just released. This is over five times the size of Brisbane City Council area (134 270 hectares). 

“This data reveals that deforestation in Queensland is still out of control and is a serious risk to vulnerable wildlife and turbo-charging carbon release and climate change” said Dave Copeman, Director of the Queensland Conservation Council. 

“The huge area of destruction reported means we have probably been underestimating clearing throughout Queensland for years. This time they have used higher resolution imagery and analysis, it is far worse than we had been led to believe.” 

In 2015, the Palaszczuk government was elected to office on the commitment to reverse the Newman government’s weakening of Queensland’s tree clearing laws. Although amendments were passed in 2018 tightening protection, it left critical loopholes open, allowing the widespread destruction of Queensland's ecosystems.   

“The extent and pace of deforestation in Queensland is heartbreaking and we owe it to future generations to stop this climate-wrecking and habitat destroying trend,” Mr Copeman said.  

“The decisions we make today could mean either the survival or extinction of species like the koala or greater glider.” said Mr Copeman. 

“These trees will never have the chance to grow to become the habitats that our Koalas, our gliders, and the other 216 threatened animals so desperately need. 

This imagery puts to the sword the fear mongering on 2018 land clearing amendments to the Vegetation Management Act, when agricultural groups claimed it was a massive overreach by the Queensland Government. 

“We need to tighten the vegetation management act and close these loopholes for good.” said Copeman. “It’s disappointing that beef producer industry groups, such as Agforce, have been falsely claiming there is no deforestation in Queensland, even before this report was released. 

“They are stuck in the past, as the tree clearing practices they defend were abandoned by most of the industry years ago. The future of Queensland's beef industry is zero carbon, deforestation free beef, not the fights of the past. 

Queensland’s accelerating renewable energy pipeline is on track to supply 50 per cent of the State’s electricity demand by 2025, five years ahead of the State Government target.

If Queensland caps ambition to a 50 per cent target it will mean we’ll miss out on new clean manufacturing opportunities in renewable hydrogen, solar panel and battery storage production and the future-proof regional jobs in these industries.

The Queensland Government must match the clean energy ambition we’re seeing elsewhere in Australia and aim to repower our entire system with renewables by 2030. 

Read more 

In 2020, the Queensland Conservation Council (QCC) commissioned a desktop review of the conservation values of State Forests within the South East Queensland Planning Area. In October 2021, this report was provided to the Queensland Government in support of policy commitments to end native forest logging on public land throughout the region by 2024. 

In summary, the report identified 68,543 hectares across 19 state forests suitable for protection as national or conservation parks.

Included in the list of areas recommended for protection is Beerwah State Forest on the Sunshine Coast, earmarked for logging by the Palaszczuk Government in December last year. The proposed logging of Beerwah State Forest has emerged as a flashpoint for community opposition to native forest logging and calls to protect native forests across Queensland.

Read the full report here.

Table: State Forests Recommended for Protection

From 1 July 2022, Queenslander’s electricity bills will increase. Queensland’s wholesale electricity prices have skyrocketed as fossil fuel prices rise and our coal and gas power stations are becoming increasingly unreliable. Queensland desperately needs more investment in renewable energy, guided by a clear and ambitious 10 Year Energy Plan, to bring down prices.

This report outlines how the proposed Wambo and MacIntyre wind farms had been built by 2021-22, Queensland’s average 2021-22 prices to date could have been reduced by $30/MWh, or nearly 25%, by reducing the number of extreme price points and the reliance on gas during lower demand periods.

Wholesale energy costs are the main driver behind the price rises which will see Queenslanders paying up to  $400 million more for electricity in 2022-23 than in 2021-22.

We can’t get back the past three years of limited progress, but we can get out of the cycle of playing catch up to high prices. 

Read the full report here.

Australia's fossil fuel reliance has meant that Queensland has had the highest wholesale prices in the National Electricity Market since late 2021. First outages at coal and gas-fired power stations drove up prices and then fuel was then added to the fire when Russia invaded Ukraine and the international price of coal and gas skyrocketed. While some global factors are outside of our control, it cannot be disputed that our ageing coal power stations are becoming increasingly unreliable. 

Our Webinar: Solving Queensland's Energy Crisis, hosted with Solar Citizens, dived into the details of why Queensland is feeling the crunch and what we need to demand the Queensland Government does to fix it. 

Queensland Conservation Council's Energy Strategist and Renewable Energy Engineer, Clare Silcock, break down the issue and offer solutions to fix it.

Don't forget to sign up to our upcoming actions, including the launch of Queensland CAN: a report underpinning a roadmap for Queensland to create jobs by building climate solutions that cut climate pollution. 

Following the Queensland CAN launch we'll be rolling out a bunch of actions like meeting with State MPs to ask them to support the Queensland CAN roadmap, and sharing the report with the community via events and market stalls - sign up to volunteer here. 

The cost of electricity to Queensland consumers could have been reduced by $102million during the electricity crunch in early February 2022 if Queensland’s government owned electricity generators had just two 100MW, 2 hour, batteries.

These batteries would also have made Qld government owned generators $3million in profit between January 31 and February 4, when heat wave conditions were compounded by unexpected coal and gas power outages. 

The Queensland Government set up a $2bn Renewable Energy and Hydrogen Jobs Fund in June 2021, but none of this money has been allocated in the eight months since. 

Stanwell have publicly announced plans for at least one big battery at Tarong. The money and the plans are ready. We just need the Queensland Government to unlock investment in this first step to a cheaper, greener and more reliable electricity system.

Read the full report.