Tony Wood (Australian businessman)
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Tony Wood is an Australian businessman and Energy Program Director at the Grattan Institute. He has become a prominent spokesperson for the institute since his appointment in 2011, and has written 32 articles for The Conversation related to energy, climate change and energy policy.[1] From 2002 to 2008 he was executive general manager of Origin Energy, where he held executive positions for a total of 14 years. Wood has declared interests as a shareholder of BHP Billiton and Origin Energy.[2]
Career
[edit]Wood has worked in the energy, transport, chemical and fertiliser industries. He contributed to the Garnaut Climate Change Review in 2008 and worked with the Clinton Foundation from 2009 to 2014 as director of its Clean Energy programme. He was appointed director of the energy programme at the Grattan Institute in mid-2011, and has represented it in publications,[3] on radio[4] and at public forum.[5] He was on the executive board of the Committee for Melbourne and the Green Energy Taskforce of the Government of the Northern Territory. He has also worked as a financial advisor for PwC[6] and has served as Chairperson of the Energy Retailers Association of Australia.[citation needed]
His areas of interest include natural gas, carbon capture and storage, solar power and nuclear power.[6][7]
Nuclear power
[edit]In 2011, Wood contributed a chapter on "Nuclear power in Australia's energy future" to Australia's nuclear options, a policy perspective document for the Committee for Economic Development of Australia. He argued that the need to reduce carbon emissions in order to limit the impacts of climate change should bring into consideration the possibility of nuclear power in Australia.[7] In February 2012, Wood told interviewer Andrew Charlton that "the cost or acceptability of nuclear energy would remain a challenge in Australia."[8] Wood's publications on The Conversation declare him to be a shareholder in BHP Billiton (a resources company engaged in uranium mining and a Foundation Partner of the Grattan Institute).[2]
Solar power
[edit]In 2015, Wood told the ABC that the environmental benefits achieved by Australia's take-up of solar photovoltaic panels had come at great cost to Australian taxpayers- a net cost of "about $9 billion". He said "in the time that we had could have done a lot better, with that money, or we could have actually reduced greenhouse gas emissions a lot more cheaply... and then we could have been moving onto a different future for solar." "Solar with batteries in the future might be a much better way." John Grimes responded in defence of solar panel deployment, stating that the report Wood was referring to was "cherry-picking", and was "designed to cast solar PV in the worst possible light."[9]
Education
[edit]Tony Wood has a postgraduate diploma in business administration from the Queensland Institute of Technology and a master's degree in Science (Physical chemistry) from the University of Queensland.[citation needed]
References
[edit]- ^ "Tony Wood". The Conversation. Archived from the original on 13 June 2015. Retrieved 30 May 2015.
- ^ a b Wood, Tony. "Could smaller be better? Shrinking the carbon tax scheme". Archived from the original on 20 October 2015. Retrieved 30 May 2015.
- ^ "Tony Wood - Articles". The Conversation. Archived from the original on 2 April 2015. Retrieved 21 March 2015.
- ^ Vanstone, Amanda (11 November 2013). "Getting gas right". Radio National - Counterpoint. Archived from the original on 2 April 2015. Retrieved 21 March 2015.
- ^ "Australia's technology future - leader or follower?" (PDF). Institute of Mineral & Energy Resources. University of Adelaide. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2 April 2015. Retrieved 21 March 2015.
- ^ a b "Tony Wood". Grattan Institute. Archived from the original on 21 March 2015. Retrieved 2 April 2015.
- ^ a b Australia's nuclear options - CEDA policy perspective (PDF). Melbourne, Australia: CEDA. 2011. ISBN 978-0-85801-277-6. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2 September 2014. Retrieved 24 March 2015.
- ^ "054 transcript energy 20120215" (PDF). grattan.edu.au. Archived (PDF) from the original on 27 March 2015. Retrieved 28 May 2015.
- ^ "Expensive solar subsidies, but pay-off to come says Grattan report". Radio National. 24 May 2015. Archived from the original on 25 August 2016. Retrieved 28 May 2015.