Pre-paying for power is

suddenly an issue, or so it would seem. Our state newspaper is certainly making an issue of it this morning. There is apparently a "Right to Power" report that has someone writing an editorial about the problem in our APY lands - the remote indigenous communities. Yes, there are problems in other areas too but this is the sort of story which makes news material.

What the report is saying is that there are far too many households where the power gets cut off automatically when the money runs out. This can happen up to sixty times a year, more than once a week. There are around sixty-five thousand households on the pre-payment-meter scheme. The claim is that people are choosing between things like keeping their houses cool or keeping the refrigerator running

I read it all with interest because we lived in a remote area with no power. Our source of power, put in almost six months after we arrived was a 32v power plant. It was enough to keep the lights on and, if the engine was running, to use an iron for a brief period. It was not enough for heating or cooling or the use of any sort of refrigeration or cooking facility.  There was no power at all in the school. If it was very hot then we worked with the windows open and hoped there might be a bit of air coming in. At night the temperatures would still be so higher that we would sleep on top of the mattresses. We could not sleep outside because the wild life made it unsafe. 

But, we did have a refrigerator. It was kerosene/paraffin powered. We thought of it as a luxury even though it was also an essential for Mum who was working as a full time teacher. It was where you kept the weekly forequarter or hindquarter of hogget which came each week. It was where Mum put the milk she made from powder each morning. There was not much else in it because there was no need to put pumpkin and potatoes in there and everything else had to come from packets or tins. 

Now there are different expectations even in the most remote communities. There is an expectation that power will be available at all times for keeping their uninsulated housing cool, their refrigerator cool, their freezer running and the television running. There might be a computer and other devices which draw on the power supply. All this is expensive, even more expensive when there are days and days over 40'C and nights not much cooler.  Too many people in these areas also live on government welfare.

For the first time I can remember the editorial is questioning the government's headlong rush into so-called renewable power sources which have dramatically increased the cost of power to remote communities, sometimes by as much as forty percent. Is it time to rethink this...and perhaps rethink some other remote area issues as well?