by Michael Smith (Veshengro)
In “The Lead south Australia” Andrew Spence wrote:
CONNECTING new housing estates to their own private electricity grids fuelled by renewable energy is the cornerstone of ZEN Energy's plan to put power back in the hands of consumers.
The company has launched ZEN Communities – an “end to end” service from power generation through to networks and retailing to deliver low cost renewable energy direct to entire communities.
ZEN Energy Director of Innovation Richard Turner founded the company in South Australia 11 years ago and has overseen its evolution from solar panel installer to Australia's first dedicated “community energy provider”.
What we are seeing here is, to a degree, the “small is beautiful” approach as it was suggested many decades ago in the book by the same title by John Seymour.
However, we need to go further than private energy grids to community-owned, to people-owned, energy grids, for energy from renewable sources, and renewable sources here does not just mean solar, or wind, but also methane gas from digesters, which can be used for cooking and heating as well as for generating electricity.
Only when the people themselves are in control of their own energy production will we be getting somewhere but that, obviously, is not something that our governments and the corporations would like to happen for people who are independent of government and corporations simply cannot be controlled.
It is for that very reason that, despite all the government rhetoric, red tape makes it very difficult for people to set up their own power system on their homes or in their localities. I mean, really, come one, we just cannot have people do their own thing and be the master of their own energy production.
© 2015
In order to build an adequate low-carbon 21st century energy system that scientists have said is necessary to stave off the worst impacts of climate change, a new report argues that the world must look beyond large-scale, centralized renewable projects—such as industrial solar and wind farms—and take up efforts to build more democratically-controlled and decentralized power grids.
