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The bill ‘spells doom’ for species including Tasmanian devil, wedge-tailed eagle and swift parrot, says Bob Brown

A proposal to allow logging access to more parts of Tasmania’s wilderness has sparked calls for federal government intervention.

Related: Speaking for the trees: hope, despair, and regrowth in Tasmania's charred wilderness |

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The South Australian government has announced it will intervene in the national energy market in a $550m plan that seeks to tame the state’s turbulent power supply and prices. The premier, Jay Weatherill, says his government will build a gas-fired power station and Australia’s largest battery storage unit

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Century-old rotating columns fixed to ship’s deck interact with wind to provide forward thrust and could make 10% fuel saving

An ocean-going tanker is to be fitted with a type of “spinning sail” invented almost a century ago in a step that could lead to more environmentally friendly tankers worldwide.

The unusual sails are rotating columns fixed to the deck of the ship, whose interaction with the wind provides forward thrust. The trial is backed by Maersk, one of the world’s biggest shipping companies and Shell’s shipping arm.

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Application for assessment under the EPBC Act - call for public comments open 16 March 2017 to 13 April 2017

Application for assessment under the EPBC Act - call for public comments open 16 March 2017 to 13 April 2017

Wepham Down, West Sussex The hen harrier raises its wings as air brakes, using the wind to lift, stall and loop backwards

A skylark rises up in loud, breathless song, claiming its breeding territory. The bird hovers with vibrating wings, unmoved by the strong gusts of wind. It climbs into the air in steps, each new phrase propelling it further up into the sky, until I can no longer see it. Another skylark answers in the distance.

Fieldfares hop across the grass – they’ll be moving on, returning to northern Scandinavia to breed, within days. Black and white lapwing patrol a bare patch of soil. They feed in quick down-up motions, as if bowing to each other. This large flock will also soon disperse, many returning to the continent, but some will stay here to nest.

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The ship damaged a large area of one of Indonesia's best coral reefs, in an area dependent on tourism.

Global expansion and rapid sales growth lead to major recruiting program to establish local customer support network.

German solar association Bundesverbands Solarwirtschaft expects their number will double to 100,000 in 2018.

The costs of ‘climate-proofing’ are already stretching into the billions of dollars, and as any doctor can tell you, the longer we leave it, the worse the consequences will be.

Victoria's Andrews govt launches $20m tender for proposals to work with state's networks to install up to 100MW of grid-scale energy storage by 2018.

A look at four major policy initiatives from South Australia's bold new energy plan.

Many are proposing the obvious, but wrong, solution to avoiding future price hikes: develop more gas production resources. This path will fail.

Did AEMO allow the S.A. grid to fail. "I don't know", says energy minister, after witnessing measures to protect NSW from possibility of failed coal generator.

Sydney Markets unveils purpose-built 640kW solar car park, taking total installed capacity to 910kW, with more to come.

ZEN Energy unveils partnership with Santos as part of plan to offer cheap "baseload renewable electricity" product to commercial and industrial users.

B vitamins may offer some protection against particulate pollution, a small human trial suggests.

Our government spends 10 times more on disaster recovery than on prevention, but now it needs to think ahead

Talk to any investor these days about climate and energy policy, and the level of frustration is evident.

Current policy paralysis has stalled investment in additional renewable energy generation that is needed to replace ageing infrastructure, with cost implications for all Australians.

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South Australia to build country’s biggest battery storage plant via tender, as well as adding gas plant as “back-up”, creating a new “energy security target” and giving energy minister new powers to intervene in electricity market.

The energy sector was supposed to be the showcase for privatisation and market deregulation. Yet in 2017, this premise is being sorely tested – no more so than in electricity retailing, where competition has failed to deliver on its promise of lower prices for customers.

The latest Grattan Institute report, Price shock: Is the retail electricity market failing consumers?, provides evidence that in the electricity retail sector, the anticipated price reductions have not happened, and innovation has been very slow in coming.

On the contrary, the markets with the least regulation have the highest prices. Australia’s experience is mirrored in the UK, the United States and Canada, and all are struggling to find solutions.

Mixed success

The privatisation of Australia’s electricity retail markets dates back to the 1993 Hilmer Report on national competition policy. The ensuing decade saw a raft of reforms that initially delivered increases in productivity, lower prices and business innovation. But in the decade after that, this progress became much harder to sustain.

The idea was for states to create regulated monopolies in electricity transmission and distribution (poles and wires), while deregulating the retail side (the supply of gas and electricity to customers).

The competition in electricity generation largely delivered lower wholesale prices through the National Electricity Market (NEM). But a mess has since been created by poor or absent climate policy at a federal level, which failed to match the enthusiasm of (some) states for clean energy. The resulting surge of investment in wind and solar happened without due consideration of the consequences for security and reliability of supply. Generating more renewable energy is essential, but failing to integrate it properly with the NEM was negligent.

Meanwhile, in Victoria – the state with most electricity retailers and the longest history of full competition – retail prices have been increasing without apparent justification and retail margins are higher than they should be. The cost to Victorians could be as much as A$250 million a year.

Lazy customers?

Customers are unhappy, and yet we are not seeing a surge of consumer action to get the best deals. So if it’s just a matter of lazy consumers, why should governments care?

Part of the answer to this conundrum lies with the product and its relationship with consumers. First, electricity is an essential service that underpins our daily lives, and switching off is not a realistic option for most consumers.

Second, the products offered by retailers are often complex and the advertising is confusing, if not downright misleading. It is hardly surprising that consumers feel stuck and eventually give up trying to find the best deal, when all too often an advertised 30% discount on their electricity bill doesn’t necessarily mean their bills will be 30% cheaper.

So far there have been few genuine innovations in electricity pricing – even in Victoria which has had full deregulation since 2009. The most common tactic has been a discount for paying on time or by direct debit, although consumers are often frustrated when they discover that at the end of their contract they lose the discount even if they continue to pay the same way.

Meanwhile, products that offer different prices for electricity use at different times of the day have been slow to appear. These products have the potential to deliver major savings, yet the industry has failed to deliver them in a way that makes them easy for customers to understand and adopt.

What to do

When faced with a market failure, governments should consider action. Yet, as with the Australia’s domestic gas market and South Australia’s power “crisis”, they should proceed with caution.

In Britain, the partial re-regulation of retail electricity competition delivered unexpected and perverse outcomes, such as the removal of the cheapest deals. A move to re-regulate prices here could stifle emerging innovation, and would most likely leave some consumers worse off without the guarantee of a better outcome overall. We seem to be driven to a choice between free markets and central planning. Yet neither is a panacea.

There are government interventions that could fix the worst problems without stifling effective competition. They include requiring clearer and simpler advertising, and more transparent and fairer contracts. Requiring retailers to provide data on their profit margins to an independent agency could also help, and could even be in the best interest of the retailers if it fends off more heavy-handed regulation.

The retail electricity market may be fixable, and the benefits of competition may ultimately exceed its costs. We may yet see fairer prices and real innovation. But if not, governments will have no choice but to return to price regulation. The electricity retailers who are used to the current free market certainly won’t want that.

Tony Wood owns shares in several energy and resources companies through his superannuation fund