Chapter 9 : A Distortion of the Market

I propose that farmers are only allowed to buy water from the pipes that reach their land with green energy produced on their farms. So forget about paying for water with cash, it's not allowed. Yes, the grid would need to be decentralized and upgraded to accept all this new green power. But that must happen anyway in this renewable energy age. The electricity grid needs to decentralise and it’s doing so slowly. 

Where is green energy investment going at present? It's going where the grid already exists. And it already exists where the land receives a reasonable amount of water. So the farmers and investors are seeking windfall gains from the existing electricity infrastructure. No extra water is being pulled inland. We need to see this as an opportunity to build a whole new class of infrastructure. Setting up this framework of infrastructure and regulation will force water inland.

An argument could be put forward suggesting that in a free economy, farmers should be given the choice to sell the electricity they produce directly into the market for money, not for water. However, I envision that for the task of irrigating the entire interior of Australia, farmers can only sell green electricity or green hydrogen gas that they produce on their farms for water to irrigate their farms. After the water is pulled inland, if they really want, the farmers can sell the water licenses to other farmers for cash. But water sourced from clean, green energy on these farms must come inland first. This is fundamental to the whole model I am proposing. 

In the 21st Century, harnessing, developing, applying, and transforming abundantly available energy in the form of sunlight to do work for this country will be so important. If we can create ways for the sun to work for this country, imagine how much we could leverage ourselves in the future. Politicians who can't comprehend this will just hold Australia back. There must be lots of them based on past and present performance. 

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