On WA’s electoral allowance

Richard Barlow writes: Re. “Money for nothing: WA MPs given an annual $80k unreported, unaudited slush fund” (Friday)

Some twenty years ago (new) WA MPs lost their generous pension scheme, having to endure the penury of the standard 9.5% Super guarantee like their State public servants.  That was until their tribunal determined that they should be paid Super at the same rate as Commonwealth public servants, that is , 15.4%. All in favour? Naturally.

On the Clean Energy Target

David Edmunds writes: Re. “On the Clean Energy Target“

In response to Mark Freeman’s somewhat terse response to Bernard Keane’s piece, “Clean energy Target, should Labor let them eat coal”, he is wrong in his criticism of the units used.  A megawatt (MW) is a measure of power, a megattwatt hour (MWhr) is a measure of energy.  That is, if an energy source produces power at the rate of 1 MW for one hour, it will have delivered 1 MWhr of energy.  When stating the amount of CO2 produced per unit of energy the correct comparison is mass of CO2 per MWhr.

Unfortunately, Bernard should have used Kg rather than tonnes.  The Finkel report says that coal fired power stations produce between 1140Kg per MWhr and 700Kg per MWhr, depending on the type of coal and the power station technology. (Appendix B, page 203 of the Finkel report).