Australian household electricity prices may be 25% higher than official report

The International Energy Agency (IEA) may be underestimating Australian household energy bills by 25% because of a lack of accurate data from the federal government.

Power price pain is worse than we thought. 

The Paris-based IEA produces official quarterly energy statistics for the 30 member nations of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), on which policymakers and researchers rely heavily. But to provide this service, the IEA relies on member countries to provide it with good-quality data.

Last month, the agency published its annual summary report, Key World Statistics, which reported that Australian households have the 11th most expensive electricity prices in the OECD.

Read the piece by the Director, Carbon and Energy Markets at the Victoria University, Bruce Mountain, on The Conversation - “Australian household electricity prices may be 25% higher than official report.”

This tool could let companies make greener choices

Researchers have devised a more accurate way to predict and measure the impact products have on the environment.

Understanding how products
 can be greener.

Using a process called life-cycle assessment, companies often test the environmental impact their products may have—as well as the impact of producing the components, such as corn or sugarcane, that go into those products. This kind of assessment, however, often lacks detail about how the products affect natural resources such as land, water, and biodiversity.

The researchers tested this new LCA, called Land Use Change Improved Life Cycle Assessment, or LUCI-LCA, by evaluating the potential environmental impacts of two bio-plastic products that could come from sugarcane grown in Mato Grosso, Brazil, or from corn grown in Iowa. Their approach—which includes more accurate data about the regional land composition than the traditional LCA—came to different conclusions about which option would be more environmentally responsible. The group reports the results in Nature Communications.

“The size and reach of multinational companies is stunning, on par with that of many nations,” says Gretchen Daily, professor of biology at Stanford University and senior author of the paper. “When we think about how to bring human activities into balance with what Earth can sustain, corporations have a major role to play in decoupling economic growth from environmental impact.”

Read the story on the University of Melbourne’s Futurity website - “This tool could let companies make greener choices.”