John MacDonald: The Govt needs some skin in the solar game

Canterbury Mornings with John MacDonald

How would you feel if the Government came out and said solar energy is the future and it was going to throw everything at it?

Because that’s something I think it needs to seriously consider doing.

For me, there would only be one fly in the ointment – I’ll get to that. But it’s not enough for me to say that the Government shouldn’t be ploughing money into solar energy.

Lodestone Energy is in the news today talking about its latest solar farm, which will cover 42-hectares in the Clandeboye area in South Canterbury. There’s also the big solar farm being built near Christchurch Airport, among others in the South Island. Which is brilliant.

But I think our reliance on private operators to get these things up and running is very risky. Which is why I think the Government should be getting some skin in the game, as well.

Now before you start thinking, “what about SolarZero?”, that’s different to what I’m talking about. That wasn’t about solar farms, that was a joint venture between the Government and a private outfit which supplied solar panel kits to homeowners.

But it does show the risk of relying on private outfits because SolarZero went into liquidation and that was it.

I’m not saying that Lodestone Energy, which is behind the solar farm at Clandeboye, is a risky bet. I only want the best for them.

But as anyone in business will tell you, nothing is guaranteed. That’s why we don’t have a solely private health system. Why we don’t have a solely private education system.

If anything, state ownership is —at the very least— a backstop.

And that’s why I think the state needs to get more involved in solar power generation.

The potential fly in the ointment is use of land that might otherwise be used for things like growing food, but I can live with that.

The Government might point to the Christchurch Airport solar farm and say that the Crown has a 25% share in the airport, so it's already investing in solar generation, but that would be dancing on the head of a pin. I’m talking here about the Government allocating money to the construction and operation of state-owned solar farms.

But how would you feel about that?

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