PRIVATE MEMBERS' BUSINESS
Ms CHANEY (Curtin) (11:41): I thank the member for Forde for this motion. Last month, I released a report called Clean Power: securing WA's future prosperity. It was built on a year of work, conversations with more than 50 industry leaders and energy experts, and survey responses from 2,300 Western Australians.
WA is at a fork in the road. One path keeps us doing what we've always done—digging and shipping, and propping up fossil fuel dependency for as long as it lasts. The other path decarbonises our economy, diversifies what we export and captures more of that value here at home.
Trying to do both comes at a cost. WA has to decide whether its future is as a petro state or an electro state. I think the answer is obvious.
WA has the sun, the wind, the land and the minerals to be an electro state powerhouse. Green iron alone could grow from a $4 billion export industry today to as much as a $170 billion industry by 2050, supporting close to 20,000 new jobs. We have active projects across eight clean export industries already.
There's urgency here, too. WA's mining, transport and agricultural sectors are between 67 and 98 per cent dependent on imported diesel. When the 2026 Iran war sent oil prices spiking, that dependence stopped being a theoretical risk and became a live one.
WA is the only state with rising domestic emissions, with downstream emissions from our fossil fuel exports running at roughly 13 times our domestic footprint. What we do in WA doesn't stay in WA. It shapes global emissions outcomes as much as it shapes our own economy.
There was broad agreement from the people I talked to across WA. Business and community are ready to move towards a prosperous future built on sun and wind. They can see the opportunity.
What's missing is a strong federal and state government commitment to move at the same pace. The federal government's Future Made in Australia agenda has been a valuable start, but there is much more to do, and it needs to be done much faster. My report identifies eight broad policy priorities.
Today I want to touch on just one: de-risking clean industry investment. Existing capital is not getting to the projects and the stages where it's most needed, including first-of-a-kind technologies and development-stage funding. WA's pipeline of clean energy projects is largely at the pilot and proposal stage.
Project proponents cite, as their primary barrier to progress, the demand certainty or offtake agreements needed to reach financial close. Without strong financial commitments or forward momentum in the next six to 12 months, WA risks losing these projects entirely to other countries with more favourable conditions. Supply-side funding already exists through a suite of government investment funds like the National Reconstruction Fund, which the member has highlighted; the Clean Energy Finance Corporation; and tailored funds like the Green Iron Investment Fund.
These bodies have been critical to Australia's clean energy transition so far, But WA's clean industry proponents consistently report struggling to secure finance in the stage past seed capital but before FID. Projects making the leap from demonstration to commercial deployment report being unable to obtain federal equity investments or concessional loans because the risk is judged to be too high.
The billions already allocated need to reach projects earlier and accept the higher risk that first-of-a-kind projects entail. The goal must be to crowd in and de-risk private investment, not replace it. Proponents have asked for concessional finance and equity to arrive one to three years before FID, rather than at FID.
Yet many of the government investments have return thresholds that preclude this level of risk taking. This is partly why the NRF has only allocated about $2.5 billion of its $15 billion in funds. Not every project supported by government will succeed.
If it did, government is likely to be crowding out private investment instead of crowding it in. To establish new industries, it's necessary for the government to adopt a higher risk threshold. Programs like the NRF show government understands this direction.
What the motion should really be about is pace. WA doesn't need more announcements. It needs the settings that let private capital move with confidence, sovereign investment vehicles willing to take on early-stage risk, and a government prepared to back the projects that get us from good idea to final investment decision.
The opportunity in front of WA won't wait for the next term of government. Business and the community are ready, and it's time government matched them.