Fossil fuel companies are the driving force behind climate change and rising energy bills.
Coal, oil and gas companies are pumping pollution into our atmosphere every year and raking in massive profits.
Those record profits come straight from our electricity and fuel bills, enriching their billionaire owners.
Their pollution is heating the planet, fuelling unnatural disasters and putting Australians' homes, health and future at risk.
The impacts of climate change are here today and Australia is on the front line of this crisis.
The Great Barrier Reef, one of the natural wonders of the world, is regularly being bleached and is struggling to survive as ocean temperatures soar.
Wet forests that have stood for thousands of years are burning in megafires driven by hotter, drier conditions.
Severe floods, once considered rare, are now devastating communities every few years.
Cyclones are becoming more intense, heatwaves more unbearable and droughts more punishing.
These are not normal weather patterns. They are the unnatural consequences of a climate pushed to breaking point by the relentless burning of fossil fuels.
And while we face the fallout, fossil fuel companies are laughing all the way to the bank.
Companies drilling oil and gas or mining coal are making billions, even as they destroy our environment.
When you open your electricity bill and see it has jumped, it's because fossil fuel prices are up.
Australia's energy grid is still using coal and gas, even as renewables take over, and their prices directly affect the cost of electricity. Take a look at historical prices of coal and gas to see how much they have risen in the last few years.
Gas prices in Australia follow the international benchmark which spiked by 10 times at the beginning of Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Coal prices are almost double the long-term average.
Australia's coal-fired power plants are ready to switch off. Many are decades old, and they're starting to fall apart.
When these plants break down, like the explosion at the Callide coal power station in Queensland, it disrupts supply. That shortage drives electricity prices sky-high which ends up on our bills. These plants were supposed to provide reliable energy, but they're now a liability.
Fossil gas prices in Australia are closely tied to electricity prices. When gas prices go up, so do our power bills.
Gas companies export 75 per cent of all the gas extracted in Australia. They might say they're supplying "clean" energy, but gas is a highly potent fossil fuel and burning it for electricity is heating the climate.
And to make matters worse, disinformation about the rising cost of our power bills is rife on both social media and traditional media which is causing a dramatic corrosion of the public's trust.
Here's the good news.
Coal is on the way out. Across Australia and the world, coal-fired power plants are being retired as cleaner, cheaper renewable energy comes online.
Solar panels and wind turbines are now the cheapest way to produce electricity. Paired with batteries and hydropower, renewables provide a flexible, affordable and reliable energy system that can power our economy without causing dangerous climate heating.
We need to build affordable, reliable renewable energy to keep the lights on.
Renewables don't just reduce emissions, they bring down costs, because the 'feedstock', wind and sunshine, are essentially free.
By investing in solar, wind and battery storage, we can stabilise energy prices and slash emissions at the same time. Just ask anyone with solar what happened to their power bills.
Fossil fuels are bad for the environment, bad for the climate and bad for your wallet. The sooner we transition to clean energy, the better.
We need governments to step up and support this transition with bold policies that phase out coal and gas and make sure renewable energy projects are built quickly, in the right places and raise up the communities around them.
The cheapest, cleanest energy comes from the wind and sun. It's time to harness it. Fossil fuels had their time, but that time is over.
The future is renewable and the sooner we embrace it, the sooner we can protect our planet, lower our power bills and secure a better future for all Australians and for natural wonders like the Great Barrier Reef.
Jack Redpath is a nature and renewables campaigner at the Australian Conservation Foundation
This piece was published in the Newcastle Herald and other Australian Community Media newspapers and websites
