Four key environmental battlegrounds on the agenda as Australia’s parliament resumes | Australian politics

Rather than disallow the entire regulatory change, Labor resolved on Monday that this time it will attempt to strike out just one section – section 7 – relating to the tech roadmap so Arena cannot be used to fund CCS and gas-based hydrogen projects. It will not contest the government’s push to expand Arena into areas such as transport and industrial efficiency. The Greens have a similar position. It is unclear where One Nation stands.

There was some dissent within the opposition over its position (dissenting backbencher Joel Fitzgibbon repeated his view that Arena should be allowed to fund CCS and gas-fuelled hydrogen) but it was a minority view. Labor says it supports CCS, but funding it through Arena would reduce support for renewable energy.

If Taylor’s regulatory change this time survives the Senate in full it may yet face a legal challenge. A Liberal-led committee found Taylor’s first attempt may have been illegal as it went beyond what the parliament envisaged when it created Arena. Industry group the Smart Energy Council has previously said it would head to the courts if the regulatory change was not disallowed.

Changes to national environment laws

There is an even longer-running dispute is over whether the government will be able to change the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act.

A once-in-a-decade review last year chaired by the former competition watchdog head Graeme Samuel found successive governments had failed to protect Australia’s environment and recommended a complete overhaul of the system.

Samuel recommended the introduction of new national environmental standards and an independent assurance framework to ensure developments complied with the law. He said it would allow more decisions over developments affecting the environment to be transferred to state and territory governments.

The Morrison government has been pushing to do the second bit – deregulate the environmental approval system by handing decision-making powers to the states – since last year, but hasn’t been able to get its legislation through. A bill that was drafted before Samuel finished his review was blocked by the Senate.

It now has a second bill that sets out a framework for national environmental standards and creates an environmental assurance commissioner role within the environment department. The proposed legislation has been criticised for not adopting Samuels’ proposed standards and instead just mimics protections in the failing EPBC Act.

Both bills are due to be debated in this sitting period. To date, Labor, the Greens and key crossbench senators have opposed them on the grounds they do not live up to Samuel’s recommendations and ensure environmental protection improves.

The South Australian independent senator Rex Patrick is working on amendments to the bills after consulting with environmental groups and industry. He says he won’t support the government’s proposed standards but the status quo works for no one. “It may not be possible but I’m trying to find a way through the impasse,” he said.

Using the green bank to underwrite gas power

Government plans to transform the Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC) – sometimes described as the country’s green bank – has largely dropped off the radar over the past six months following Coalition infighting over whether coal-fired power should qualify as “clean”. Publicly, they remain unresolved.

Legislation was introduced to parliament that would give the CEFC – a sister institution to Arena that lends to market-leading projects that cut greenhouse gas emissions – responsibility for a long-promised new $1bn “grid reliability fund”. The fund would underwrite new flexible electricity generation that can be called on when needed, including “fast-start” gas-fired power plants, pumped hydro and batteries.

The change would make it explicit that the green bank could support gas-fired power (on the grounds the fossil fuel would “support the achievement of low-emission energy in Australia” by backing up solar and wind) and make it exempt from a requirement that every CEFC project must deliver a financial return for taxpayers. It would also give the energy minister the power to direct the CEFC to look at investing in particular technologies.

Critics said climate funding should not be used to support fossil fuels. The plan quickly disappeared from parliamentary debate after Barnaby Joyce – then a mere backbencher, now the deputy prime minister – proposed an amendment that would allow the CEFC to also invest in coal-fired power.