Gas may not be the energy solution of the future, but for now at least it is useful for securing the reliability of the electricity grid.
That's the view of the federal government's low-emissions technology advisor Alan Finkel regarding the government's proposed gas peaker at Kurri.
The government confirmed this week that the $600 million 660 megawatt plant would run for about 2 per cent of the time.
It will initially run on diesel fuel until a link is established with the Sydney-Newcastle gas pipeline.
Dr Finkel said peaking plants played an important role in counteracting or firming the inherent variability of renewable energies such as wind and solar.
"For a few hours at a time batteries can be the solution but we don't have enough of them at the moment," he said.
"The nice thing about peaking generation is you could have a one hour lull in the wind and ramp up your natural gas generators or you can have a five-day lull in the wind and ramp up your natural gas generators. But overall you don't need to run these firming generators more than 500 hours a year."
While gas was "a long way short of where we want to get to", in the short term it would enable more renewables to be introduced to the grid as coal generation declined.
"People shouldn't look at the installed capacity of a (peaker plant) and say 'oh, it's a gigawatt of gas, that's a lot of carbon dioxide'," he said.
"It's actually a very small amount of carbon dioxide emissions associated with a gigawatt running for a few hundred hours a year.
"For each hour that it is used it produces significantly less emissions than from an hour of coal-fired generation. Gas is better there is no doubt about it."
