Today it was Greens Senator Peter Wish-Wilson’s turn to spread misinformation about Tasmania’s renewable credentials in a desperate bid to create the conflict the Greens need to justify their existence.

Firstly, he attacked Tasmania’s nation leading renewable energy projects that will provide the dual benefit of helping Australia transition to a clean renewable economy while injecting billions into the Tasmanian economy and creating thousands of regional jobs.

Tasmanians can be proud of the fact we already lead the nation in renewable energy production, and we are set to be a global leader with our new renewable energy target of 200 per cent of our current needs by 2040.

It’s little wonder the anti-jobs Greens are opposing Marinus Link, the most significant renewable energy project Australia has seen in a generation, given their strong track record of backing renewable energy initiatives one minute, only to oppose them when it suits them politically.

They backed coal, then they changed their minds.

They backed hydro energy schemes, then they changed their minds.

They backed wind farms, then they changed their minds.

The only thing they have been consistent on is opposing anything that creates jobs in regional Tasmania.

Senator Wish-Wilson also falsely claimed that 356,000 hectares of Future Potential Production Forest (FPPF) has been opened up for harvesting, despite the fact that there has been no applications to access this land and that access would still need to be approved by both houses of Parliament.

Finally, the Government rejects the Senator’s simplistic and unscientific claim that forestry management is bad for the climate.

Instead, the Government accepts the findings of the experts, namely the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO), and the International Energy Agency (IEA), that the sustainable management of forests, including a mixed strategy of conservation and timber production, is more likely to be optimal for carbon pollution reduction.

The IPCC Special Report on Climate Change and Land (2019) stated:

“Sustainable forest management can maintain or enhance forest carbon stocks, and can maintain forest carbon sinks, including by transferring carbon to wood products.”

The Tasmanian Liberal Government is committed to renewable energy and sustainable forestry management which can deliver huge investment opportunities, thousands of jobs and a low emissions future.

Tasmania is leading the nation in these areas on so many levels – it is time the Greens stopped this campaign of talking down the state.