Gas plan up in smoke

The lights have gone out on the City of Sydney’s plan to power Green Square.

The City has shelved its plan to go ahead with trigeneration gas plants at Green Square, citing cost and policy uncertainty.

Liberal City of Sydney Councillor Christine Forster said Council’s decision to indefinitely defer the Green Square project was a vindication of what she has been arguing for a long period of time.

“It has been shown that the Green Square project was not economically viable, hence the Lord Mayor has had to back down and announce that the City of Sydney will not be going ahead with it,” she said.

The Council plan, which would have powered, cooled and warmed Green Square using renewable gas, was dumped last week. The unlikely future of the federal carbon price was identified as causing uncertainty.

“The City decided the project involved too much legal risk and cost uncertainty, in addition to its capital contribution – exactly what I have been saying since last year’s election campaign,” said Ms Forster.

Council argued that the supplier, Cogent Energy, could not provide a price under the Council’s price ceiling of $25 per tonne of carbon dioxide. City of Sydney CEO Monica Barone said that despite the delay, the expertise amounted for Green Square would be redeployed for future projects.

“The economics of trigeneration at Green Square don’t stack up now, but we will do everything we can to lobby the state and federal governments for regulatory reform,” she said.

“All the research, technical material and scoping we have done so far will be used to pursue trigeneration systems in our own buildings and for future trigeneration precincts across the city.

“Council will soon consider a development application by Cogent Energy for the building that will house a future trigen plant in Green Square, that if approved, will be valid for up to five years.”

Dr Donald Payne, a technical expert with Direct Energy, said that the Council’s decision showed that trigeneration should only be part of Sydney’s energy mix.

“Trigeneration is highly costly on its own and the amount of it slated exceeded what could be run on renewable bio-gas. It is more appropriately used as part of a portfolio of solutions which includes both renewable energy and energy efficiency,” he said.

Despite economic and policy uncertainty, Council has maintained plans to install trigeneration in its own buildings – including Town Hall House, Sydney Town Hall and the Queen Victoria Building.