Boardrooms, Not Cabinets: Where the Big Bets on Australia’s Clean Power Must Happen

After a lost decade of incoherent energy policy, Labor’s first three years have restarted the clean energy engine. Renewables’ share of the National Electricity Market jumped from 35 percent in 2022 to 39 percent in the March quarter of 2024; the Safeguard Mechanism finally put a floor under carbon prices; and the A$22.7 billion Future Made in Australia (FMIA) package tied industry policy to decarbonisation.

That is critical—but it is not enough. While the private sector often bemoans public policy shortfalls, it can no longer be used as an excuse for inaction. Public policy can light the runway; only private capital can fly the plane. The next phase of Australia’s energy story will be decided less in Parliament House than in boardrooms, investment committees and venture sheds. Canberra’s role is to set clear targets and remove friction; the market’s job is to place the multibillion-dollar bets and deliver, at pace, the infrastructure, products and services that will carry us to net zero prosperity.

Below are three priorities where private leadership will make or break success.

1 | Electricity generation & transmission: Double the speed of the renewable build out

Where are we at currently?

The government has announced a goal of achieving 82% electricity from renewable sources by 2030 and created the Capacity Investment Scheme (CIS), which offers long-term contracts for large solar and wind farms. The private sector has responded: >20 GW of new projects were proposed in Q1-2024.

Progress has also been made on transmission networks. The Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) continues to play a vital role in understanding future requirements, identifying that up to 10,000 km of new transmission would be needed by 2050, equating to A$16 billion of investment. This may even prove conservative as a “green exports” scenario would require almost twice that amount of transmission. The Government’s Rewiring the Nation has correctly signalled the importance of investing in transmission. The focus on renewable energy zones and industrial precincts is also a practical way of reducing pressures on transmission.

Despite this progress, much remains to be done. Annual build-rates still hover around 3 GW; getting to 82% needs nearer 6 GW. Costs of transmission have ballooned and project timelines slipped. For example, EnergyConnect, the 900 km transmission line connecting NSW, Victoria, and South Australia was originally estimated to cost $2.1 billion, but that has now increased to $3.6 billion—a 75% increase. Many of the key transmission corridors and renewable energy zones spend ~80 weeks in state-federal regulatory limbo and the first Renewable-Energy-Zone schedules are already a year late. Australia needs to way of both doubling the speed of deployment and halving costs to make the clean energy transition both timely and affordable. While doing both may seem unrealistic, there are some practical things that can be done.

What the private sector must now do

1. Co‑create certainty with government. While the CIS is helpful, it is no certainty that successful projects will reach financial close. It is crucial for entities such as the Clean Energy Investor Group (CEIG) to engage in the future design of the CIS auctions, and pledge equity commitments for successful players.

2. Take ownership of approvals speed. Establish an industry run Transmission Acceleration Council that publishes quarterly scorecards of projects and agency performance—naming delays and celebrating fast track wins.

3. Open-source success. Open-source the Central West Orana REZ model—land access templates, community benefit terms and EPC contracts—so every new zone can build on it rather than starting from scratch.

4. Back grid-tech pilots. Utilities and asset managers should jointly fund trials of composite conductors, dynamic line rating and digital twins, then petition the AER for performance-based rewards when the tech proves up.

2 | Household energy: Beat New Zealand in the Trans-Tasman household energy efficiency contest

Where are we at currently?

Australia is a global leader in rooftop solar, but we are a cellar-dweller when it comes to household energy efficiency. Australia’s 11 million homes contribute more than 10% of Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions and energy costs represent a significant share of household budgets. The majority of Australia’s homes were built without full consideration of Australian climates and energy efficiency, and most were built before the introduction of minimum energy performance requirements. The numbers bear this out. While heat pumps remain an oddity in Australia, about 45% of households in New Zealand use them. Similarly, while only about 11% of Australian households have high-performance windows (for thermally efficient homes), it is >93% in the UK, and even New Zealand has it in 75% of households. Research by Victoria’s State Electricity Commission has identified opportunities to reduce household energy bills by 62% by upgrading homes (particularly those built before 2003) with better insulation and electrifying appliances and heating. While there have been state-level efforts to support this (e.g., phasing out of gas in ACT), much remains to be done.

What the private sector must now do

1. Champion tougher building codes. Builders, developers and product suppliers should co-draft cost benefit and workforce plans that allow state ministers to embed higher NatHERS targets in the 2026 National Construction Code.

2. Create an Australian household electrification incentive scheme. This should go beyond just the current focus on batteries to focus on items with best economic return (e.g., ceiling insulation, heat pumps, roller shutters) and learn from the failures of international programs (such as the UK’s Green Deal) with simplified financing structures, strong engagement with the supply chain, and more effective communication with consumers. The private sector should take the lead in its design.

3 | Clean energy superpower: Halve the cost of giga-scale renewable energy generation and double capital deployment rates

Where are we at currently?

The Future Made in Australia (FMIA) program and other efforts have rightly put a focus on how Australia could be a renewable energy superpower, with opportunities ranging from green iron through to sustainable fuels. The Federal Government has also provided unprecedented recent public funding to the clean energy transition, including an increase in total investment capacity to $32.5 billion for the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, $15 billion for the National Reconstruction Fund, and $22.7 billion through the Future Made in Australia Act — with $7.1 billion directed to the Australian Renewable Energy Agency.

Becoming a clean energy superpower has two critical underpinnings: 1) Ensuring Australia actually has the lowest cost of renewable electricity (rather than just potential); and 2) Boosting the speed and scale of capital deployment from government, private and institutional investors.

Research by Cyan Ventures has found that access to low-cost renewable energy is important for capturing up to ~80% of clean tech value opportunities. In short, if we don’t have the lowest cost renewable electricity, then Australia’s chances of becoming a clean energy superpower are dead on arrival. The good news is that our research has also shown that Australia can achieve globally competitive renewable energy costs by 2035, with solar costs falling by up to 61%, wind by up to 51% and grid-connected BESS by up to 31%.

What the private sector must now do

Making this happen requires several things:

1. Go Giga Scale and Go Off Grid. These cost reductions will not be achieved in an already highly congested national electricity market. Giga-scale off grid solutions are needed in areas which can harness Australia’s best renewable energy resources, with large availability of land, and ease of transmission to offtakers. This will mean building these sites in new locations (e.g., Northern Territory, Western Australia) with underwriting support from government to stop the ‘chicken and egg’ issue of whether the demand or supply comes first.

2. Automate Automate Automate. Given these locations will be in remote regions far from population centres, Australia needs to exploit every opportunity for automation. These includes solar racking systems with automated deployment such as Australia’s 5B and remote monitoring systems.

3. Don’t try to do it all ourselves. Australia will need international partners in many of the value chains to make this happen. For example, despite strong domestic innovation in flow batteries and perovskite solar cell technology, we need access to large-scale manufacturing processes in places like China to drive down costs.

4. Create “developer‑as‑a‑service” models. First-of-a-kind (FOAK) plants aren’t just bigger prototypes—they’re miniature infrastructure projects that have to be engineered, financed, and permitted to the same standard as a highway or LNG terminal. That calls for skills most tech-centred project teams lack: sophisticated project-finance modelling, offtake and hedging negotiations, supply-chain contracting, and community-licensing know-how, all woven together under tight delivery schedules. Recognising that gap, Rocky Mountain Institute, Third Derivative and Deep Science Ventures launched Mark1 in the United States in September 2024 as a “developer-as-a-service” platform. Mark1 parachutes veteran project-development talent—commercial structurers, EPC managers, and market analysts—into FOAK climate-tech ventures, taking co-developer equity to shepherd them from lab success to bankable steel in the ground. Australia would do well to create a similar platform in key areas such as sustainable aviation fuel and green iron.

Making the private sector the heroes of our clean energy story

The next decade belongs to Australia’s entrepreneurs, investors and industrial leaders willing to stake capital on the country’s decarbonised future. If they do, government will not be the hero of this story; it will be the referee, timekeeper and—occasionally—the medic. The scoreboard, and the rewards, will belong to the private sector.