Hunter Energy Limited, formerly Hunter Energy Pty Ltd, was registered on 6 March 2018.
Its current spokespersons appear to believe that cutting down native forest to supply a power plant with biomass is a “closed loop” with no cilmate or environmental consequences.
However, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration; “although the CO2 released from biofuel or bioenergy combustion is assumed to be fully accounted for by the uptake of carbon during the growth of the feedstock used to produce the biofuels or bioenergy…..analysts have debated whether the increased use of biomass energy may result in a loss of terrestrial carbon stocks and foregone future sequestration by natural vegetation. The initial loss of carbon stocks in natural vegetation cleared to grow biomass feedstocks and the foregone future removal of CO2 are not captured in energy sector emissions.”
Dependent on species, it would probably take 25 years for a single tree to store est. 400 to 544 kilograms of carbon dioxide. Eucalypts reaching 8 meters in height might store up to 1 tonne of carbon
So when one is cut down after 25 years and burnt that’s basically how much initial greenhouse gas emissions are released back into the atmosphere from the tree itself – where emissions will remain until 25 years later when hopefully another tree has survived long enough to store a similar amount of carbon.
Multiple that first tree by the up to 1.8 to 3 billion 25 year-old trees estimated to be annually required to feed Hunter Energy’s proposed Redbank Power Station fuelled by biomass and, one begins to see that biomass-generated power is not a closed system at all – it is simply one predicated on at best naked hope and at worst a complete denial of climate change realities regarding Australian native forest tree growth.
Nevertheless, the Berejiklian Coalition Government under blackmail threat by Deputy-Premier and Nationals MLA for Monaro John Barilaro, will push ahead with legislation which allows biomass logging in north east New South Wales.
Logging which would lead inevitably to the destruction of our remaining closed-cover mature native forests.
In this Barilaro will be aided and abetted by NSW Nationals MLA Chris Gulaptis and Nationals Federal MP for Page Kevin Hogan.
BACKGROUND
According to Wikipedia:
On 5 October 2013, Redbank Energy’s wholly owned subsidiary Redbank Project Pty Ltd (Redbank Project) was notified by its secured lenders of the appointment of receivers to Redbank Project, Redbank Construction Pty Ltd and the shares in Redbank Project held by Redbank Project Holdco Pty Ltd,[5] with debts of $192 million.[6]
In Oct 2014, receivers KordaMentha announced immediate closure of the Plant with its remaining assets including the turbine, generator and plant and equipment to be sold.[7]
On 17 September 2015 Redbank Energy (REL) announced that its wholly owned subsidiary, Biogreen Energy Pty Limited (Biogreen), had purchased the land, plant and equipment and water rights owned by Redbank Project for $5 million, but that it intended "to commence the work to raise the funds necessary to recommence the operation of the Redbank Power Station".[8][9]
On 25 August 2016 Redbank Energy issued the following statement to shareholders via the ASX. "In response to shareholder enquiries, Redbank Energy Limited (ASX: AEJ) (REL) wishes to provide the following market update. Unfortunately, REL will be removed from the ASX official list on 29 August 2016. The immediate catalyst for delisting will be the non-payment of the 2016/17 ASX annual listing fee, which falls due on 27 August 2016. The reason for REL not paying the 2016/17 ASX listing fee is because REL will automatically be suspended on 9 October 2016 due to continual suspension." Redbank was subsequently delisted from the close of trading on Monday, 29 August 2016 pursuant to Listing rule 17.15.[10]
On 10 April 2018, Fairfax Media announced that the power plant could be restarted in Q1 2019 to provide cheap off-the-grid power for blockchain mining applications.[11]
Financial Review, 26 May 2020:
The Redbank Power Station in NSW, formerly owned by ASX-listed Redbank Energy and its predecessors Alinta Energy and Babcock & Brown Power, is set for a comeback to the ASX-boards.
This time Redbank will be housed in a new company called Hunter Energy, which was set up by a bunch of former Australian Power & Gas execs, and acquired Redbank in 2018. (It is run by Richard Poole, a former investment banker and Cascade Coal director).
Hunter Energy has turned the dormant Redbank into a "green energy power plant", according to marketing materials in front of potential investors, able to produce enough energy to power 200,000 to 250,000 homes using waste biomass for fuel.
Hunter Energy wants to switch the plant on by the end of this year to provide what it says would be around the clock and reliable baseload power with zero net emissions….
Financial Review, 26 May 2020:
The Redbank Power Station in NSW, formerly owned by ASX-listed Redbank Energy and its predecessors Alinta Energy and Babcock & Brown Power, is set for a comeback to the ASX-boards.
This time Redbank will be housed in a new company called Hunter Energy, which was set up by a bunch of former Australian Power & Gas execs, and acquired Redbank in 2018. (It is run by Richard Poole, a former investment banker and Cascade Coal director).
Hunter Energy has turned the dormant Redbank into a "green energy power plant", according to marketing materials in front of potential investors, able to produce enough energy to power 200,000 to 250,000 homes using waste biomass for fuel.
Hunter Energy wants to switch the plant on by the end of this year to provide what it says would be around the clock and reliable baseload power with zero net emissions….
Echo NetDaily, 26 November 2020:
As glaciers, ice sheets, and the poles continue to melt due to the human impacts on the environment it is bordering on criminal for the Australian and NSW governments to be supporting the increase of CO2 in the atmosphere, let alone clearing and burning trees for biomass energy production.
According to studies being done on the East Antarctic Ice Sheet reported in phys.org it is becoming clear ‘that increasingly warming climate, as expected for the near future, the East Antarctic Ice Sheet could be less stable than previously thought’.
‘The future melting of polar ice sheets and the associated rise in global sea level as a consequence of climate change will have a substantial impact on low-elevation coastal areas.’
Yet the Federal government is promoting a gas led COVID-19 recovery, the NSW government has facilitated the approval of the Narrabri Gas Project, and the biomass Redbank Power Station near Singleton appears to be planning a reboot.
‘The imminent rebooting of the mothballed Redbank Power Station (near Singleton) with north-east NSW’s forests will make it Australia’s most polluting power station and an existential threat to the future of our children and wildlife,’ according to the North East Forest Alliance (NEFA).
According to NEFA Hunter Energy is currently seeking expressions of interest for timber from across north-east NSW to fuel their Redbank Power Station, with plans to restart the facility in mid-2021 fed by native forests to make it one of world’s ten biggest biomass power plants.
‘The claims are that it will power 200,000 homes, which was identified in 2017 North Coast Residues Report as requiring one million tonnes of biomass to be taken from north-east NSW’s forests and plantations each year, with 60 per cent of this coming from private forests,’ said NEFA spokesperson Dailan Pugh.
‘This is sheer madness as burning this volume will release some 1.8 million tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere each year to fuel climate heating, increased droughts, heatwaves, and more intense bushfires, while increasing forest degradation and hastening species extinctions.
‘The community needs to urgently speak up to stop the NSW and Commonwealth Governments from allowing this environmental disaster,’ Mr Pugh said.
NEFA have said that biomass is even more polluting than coal and releases up to 50 per cent more CO2 to generate the equivalent amounts of energy.
‘Then there’s all the CO2 released by machines during logging and in hauling the wood from across north-east NSW to Singleton,’ said Susie Russel from NEFA.
‘It will be a nightmare for rural communities with thousands of extra trucks plying narrow rural roads, crossing small deteriorating bridges, passing through peaceful villages and then roaring down the Pacific Highway to Redbank.
‘This will be subsidized by taxpayers under the pretense that burning trees is renewable energy as the trees will regrow and decades or centuries later take up the carbon released by burning them.
‘We are in a climate emergency and cannot afford to spew millions of tonnes of additional carbon into the atmosphere at a time when we need to be urgently reducing atmospheric carbon, and we need to leave our trees alive to do it as they are the only viable means of carbon capture and storage,’ Ms Russell said.
Mr Pugh continued, ‘Our suffering forest wildlife will be impacted most severely as forest degradation skyrockets with all those previously uneconomic trees taken……
NEFA have said that biomass is even more polluting than coal and releases up to 50 per cent more CO2 to generate the equivalent amounts of energy. [my yellow highlighting]
Hunter Energy, retrieved 28 December 2020:
Upon re-start, Redbank will be one of the largest green baseload renewable energy providers in NSW and the ONLY existing facility capable of providing urgently required green 24/7 baseload power, adding to grid stability.
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