The impact of the war in the Middle East is likely to reshape the global economy for years – is this the moment for Australia to change the way it thinks about energy? Post your questions now for our climate and environment editor
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The US-Israel war on Iran has cause a surge in fossil fuel prices – again. A similar thing happened after Russia invaded Ukraine. Then it was gas, now it’s petrol and diesel.
The war has triggered a fuel crisis, and led to a surge in people considering buying electric cars. Meanwhile, a recent report found Australian federal and state governments will pay or forgo A$16.3bn in fossil fuel subsidies this financial year.
We’re a pretty significant way along that path already. More than 4m Australian households have solar panels. That’s comfortably more than a third of all homes. That’s going to keep rising. Batteries and EVs aren’t as widespread, but are growing. There have been 290,000 household batteries installed since July under a federal subsidy scheme. EVs were 13% of new car sales last year – and we may see that jump given the fuel crisis. There are a lot more models available than a couple of years ago.
So, yes, it’s not hard to imagine a future where a majority of people are generating and storing energy at home and using it to charge transport. That would be great, obviously. It should mean a cleaner, healthier and ultimately cheaper daily life for the people who can do that, and diminished power for big energy companies. A big rise in battery use at times of peak electricity demand – in the evenings, mostly – should lower costs for everyone by taking stress off the grid at these times.
A significant threat. Electing and installing leaders who will not start wars.