ALL power stations in the Latrobe Valley might be shut down well before 2047 or even 2045, as the official target date for the last of the region’s big polluters, owned by Alinta Energy, Loy Yang B (capacity of 1070 MW), to close.
The Energy Australia-owned Yallourn power station (capacity 1480 MW)is scheduled to close by 2028 and the AGL-owned Loy Yang A (capacity of 2210 MW) by June 30, 2035.
Between them, the two Loy Yangs provide 50 per cent of the state’s electricity requirements.
Loy Yang A also serves as the mainland connection point for the Basslink electricity interconnector cable which runs under Bass Strait, connecting it to the George Town sub-station in northern Tasmania.
The Premier Daniel Andrews was asked, during a visit to Wonthaggi on Friday, to explain how he could reconcile a commitment that 95% of Victoria's electricity will be generated by renewable energy by 2035, repeated in the government’s ‘Climate Action Update’ May 2023, and still keep Loy Yang B open until 2047.
“It’s a privately owned company, so you’ll have to ask them, but how they plan to stay open when they rely on coal from a mine owned by someone else is a matter for them,” Premier Andrews said.
AGL owns the coal mine used by both Loy Yangs.
“They have not announced an earlier date, but they are on record as saying it may be closing earlier,” Mr Andrews said.
“We’ve got to close these old clunkers, and that’s no reflection on the people who work there. We are going to support them with jobs in renewable energy, but these businesses can’t get finance to redevelop. They can barely raise capital for maintenance.”
He said that the new SEC would have a key role in providing reliable power for Victoria and he expected there to be announcements about that in the near future.
The SEC wasn’t about profits, he said, but about service and power, and that there would be more to say about that soon.
Alinta Energy, the owner of Loy Yang B, has previously announced an intention to operate it until 2047. However, the state government has announced a target that 95% of Victoria's electricity will be generated by renewable energy by 2035. It would be impossible to meet this target if Loy Yang B continued to operate in its present form.
The state recently set new renewable energy targets, increasing to 65 per cent by 2030, and 95 per cent by 2035.
They’ve also set an emissions reduction target of 75-80 per cent by 2035, and will bring forward the state’s net zero emissions target by five years to 2045 – the most ambitious of any mainland state.