Councils have been urged to consider tailored debt finance to improve their energy performance and reduce emissions from old and poorly maintained assets.
According to a newly released Market Report by the Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC), Clean energy opportunities for local government, councils are missing out on lower cost clean energy solutions, leading to unnecessarily high operating costs, as well as higher carbon emissions.
The report finds that councils typically hold large property and infrastructure portfolios with long operating lives. But while councils generally have stable cash flows and a strong capacity to service debt, many councils are making relatively little use of currently available low cost finance to update this critical infrastructure.
The report also identifies a number of areas where councils can act immediately to benefit from clean energy investments.
More information about the report is available on the CEFC website.
The CEFC Local Government will be at the NGA.