This proposal would establish a new Commonwealth Agency – Australian Local Power Agency (ALPA) to deliver the following schemes:

• The Local Power Scheme would establish 50 local power hubs to support renewable energy projects in regional communities.
  • Each hub would be provided $500,000 a year for 5 years for establishment and administration costs.
  • These hubs would also receive administered funding each year, for 10 years, to distribute up to:
    • 10 seed grants of up to $10,000 per grant for small‐scale renewable energy projects by new or early‐stage community groups
    • five enablement grants of up to $50,000 per grant for non‐capital costs of new projects
    • two forgivable development loans of up to $150,000 each, at an annual concessional interest rate of 1 per cent for renewable energy projects by communities and eligible organisations. Loans for unsuccessful projects will be written off.
• The Underwriting New Community Investment Scheme (UNCI Scheme) would guarantee a minimum return for eligible community‐owned renewable energy generation and storage projects for up to 10,000 gigawatt hours each year for 10 years.
  • Under this scheme, the government would subsidise eligible energy projects the gap between the average annual wholesale electricity price and the target price of $80 per megawatt hour, when the average wholesale price falls below the target price.
  • The eligible energy projects for this scheme are those that:
    • can generate or store from 1 to 10 megawatts of electricity
    • are at least 51 per cent community‐owned through local individuals, organisations or councils, with the remainder funded through private investment
    • are community‐driven, have broad local support, and deliver tangible benefits to the region
    • demonstrate technical benefits to the grid consistent with the Integrated Systems Plan.
• The Community Renewable Investment Scheme (CRIS) would require any new large‐scale renewable development to offer 20 per cent of the project equity to local communities within 30 kilometres of the project. To administer this scheme, the ALPA would be provided on‐going funding to:
  • develop guidelines for the scheme
  • assess whether developers meet those guidelines
  • award approvals once developers have completed co‐investment funding rounds.

The proposal would take effect from 1 July 2021. All grants, loan principal amounts and the target price under the UNCI Scheme would be indexed annually by the Consumer Price Index.