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A study by the Australian Renewable Energy Index (AREI) has found that Australia's renewable energy sector produces enough electricity to power 70 percent of the nation's homes.
The first AREI released on Monday found that renewable sources will generate enough power to run 90 percent of homes when projects currently under construction are completed.
The index found that hydro-electricity remained the biggest source of renewable energy in the financial year ending in June 2017, accounting for 40 percent, followed by wind (31 percent) and rooftop solar (18 percent).
Less than two percent of renewable energy was generated by large solar farms.
Solar energy.
Tristan Edis, a renewable energy market analyst, said that the emergence of wind and solar as a "significant source of power" has driven an investment boom in the sector.
He said that the sector was on track to meet Australia renewable energy target of 20 percent of total electricity generation by 2020.
The report also found that 46 large-scale renewable energy projects had created 8,868 full-time jobs in 2016-17, most of which were on wind farms in New South Wales (NSW).
Rooftop solar installations created a further 3,769 full-time jobs in Australia as demand surged.
More than 150,000 Australian houses had solar systems installed in the financial year 2017, Edis said.
"These solar systems will also save consumers 1.2 billion U.S. dollars off their electricity bills over the next 10 years," he told Australian media on Monday.
Mariam Lyons, energy campaigns director for GetUp Australia, said that the "everyday Australian... voting with their rooftops" heralded "the end of the era of big polluting energy companies dominating the market and manipulating prices to fill their own pockets."
(ASIA PACIFIC DAILY)
