Brown coal extends rebound, pushing up power sector emissions: Pitt & Sherry

Sydney : Brown coal’s share of the main national electricity grid has surged to its highest level since September 2012, increasing the sector’s greenhouse gas emissions, energy consultants Pitt & Sherry say.The fresh data came as climate change ministers from around the country met in Adelaide on Monday to discuss how state governments might co-operate on emissions.Coal-fired power plants accounted for just under 75 per cent of the supply to the National Electricity Market (NEM) in April, and brown coal – with its higher emissions – accounted for almost 24 percentage points of that total.”The lowest share of coal was 72.6 per cent for last July,” Hugh Saddler, principal consultant for Pitt & Sherry, said. “As soon as the carbon price went away, it started to go up.”
Along with the pick-up in coal, carbon emissions from the NEM, which supplies about 80 per cent of Australian consumers, are on the increase since the scrapping by the Abbott government of the carbon tax last July. On an annualised basis, emissions from the sector have risen 3.1 per cent since the end of June, or 4.6 million tonnes.