SABRA LANE: Turning to the electricity debate, Labor wants to generate 50 per cent of electricity from renewable sources by 2030.
Even on the current bipartisan agreement of 23 and a half per cent by 2020, Dr Finkel says that Australia will be hard pressed at the moment to actually meet that target.
How much do you think it will cost to meet Labor's 2030 target?
BILL SHORTEN: Well, let's go to this issue of renewable energy and there's a range of points. What I'm going to do is explain to people why we think increasing, having a goal of increasing renewable energy as part of our energy mix is important.
Our weather is getting more extreme and unpredictable. We are seeing more weather records being broken almost on a weekly basis in Australia. We can't go business as usual.
Our view about energy in the future is that we need a mix of fossil fuels and renewables ...
SABRA LANE: Again, that was a point that was well made during the election campaign last year. How much will it cost?
BILL SHORTEN: In terms of how we get to renewable energy, we think there's a range of levers which assist from having an emissions intensive scheme and the energy intensity scheme in the energy industry, having a market trading scheme and an emissions trading scheme, looking at the rate of land clearing.
I think the technology in solar power for example is also something which is pretty fertile ground for further investment.
For me the answer to the question about cost is that there is a cost in not acting. When I look at the spread of solar ...
SABRA LANE: Consumers are entitled to know how much it will cost them?
BILL SHORTEN: Well, consumers are already voting with their feet with the expansion of solar panels.
SABRA LANE: And they're entitled to know how much a 50 per cent, you know, a 50 per cent target will cost them?
BILL SHORTEN: Well, our answer is very, very straightforward. We think the cost of not acting is far greater. We don't think we could sustain the cost as the Liberals are saying, of building new coal fired power generation on the scale which Mr Turnbull is saying and we don't think that from insurance to drought to extreme weather events, that we can simply go business as usual.
SABRA LANE: Mr Shorten, we're out of time. Thank you very much for joining us this morning.
