Division of Information Technology, Engineering and the Environment
Institute for Sustainable Systems and Technologies
Institute for Sustainable Systems and Technologies
Martin
Hallowell Thomas
Martin Thomas was founding Managing Director of the Australian
Cooperative Research Centre for Renewable Energy (ACRE Ltd). He is a
past President of the Institution of Engineers, Australia, a Fellow and
past Vice-President of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences
and Engineering, and past President of the Australian Institute of
Energy. He has been Chairman of the Australian National Team for the
International Energy Agency’s Centre for Analysis and Dissemination of
Demonstrated Energy Technologies (CADDET)
His engineering experience has been in power generation including
renewable and sustainable technologies. He has been a Principal of
Sinclair Knight Merz, a director of the Tyree Group, Chairman of the
Olympic Energy Advisory Panel, Chairman of the New South Wales
Electricity Council and Deputy Chairman of Australian Inland Energy and
Water serving Broken Hill.
Currently he is a Director of EnviroMission Limited, a company
established to build the world’s first commercial solar tower. He is
retained as a technology consultant to the Tyree Group and to the ZBB
Energy Corporation.
He was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia in 1993 for services
to engineering and energy management and was awarded an Australian
Centenary Medal in 2003.
Energy is fundamental to efficient and productive industry worldwide. In
Australia it is abundant, low cost (in relative international terms) and
efficiently and reliably distributed. However the greenhouse issue and
the possibility of climate change are challenging that position, while
driving structural change towards a lower net carbon emission economy
and energy system sustainability.
Changes will be achieved in a number of ways: changes in energy sources,
in the efficiency with which fossil fuels are used, large scale capture
and sequestration of CO2 and especially by using energy much more
efficiently. In practice adaptation to climate change and the transition
to energy sustainability will see a combination of all of these
approaches, with the evolution of significantly more efficient and
innovative technologies while continuing to improve those that are
mature. These changes will not occur quickly, or even very visibly, such
is the weight of today’s infrastructure investment. Rather they will
evolve and be market driven, possibly with incentives, over the next
30-50 years and more. The rewards will go to those nations and
industries that plan well - with foresight and knowledge.
The address will discuss how Australian industry, and especially the
electricity supply industry, may be expected to react positively to the
many drivers of climate change; physical, technological, economic,
institutional and political. It will review possible climate change
impacts identified to date and progress made on industry’s present and
future adaptation to them. It will make the point that, as with
financial investments, one of the best safeguards in times of
uncertainty is a broad portfolio of viable technological and policy
options. It will suggest that a more informed knowledge base is crucial
to enable those options to be better evaluated by those responsible for
their formation. It will conclude with an outline of possible
mechanisms, institutional models, research directions and related
strategies towards a much more sustainable energy future.
