This modelling indicates that there could be significant system cost savings if geothermal technologies are available at the costs projected by the Australian Bureau of Resources and Energy Economics for the year 2030. These savings could amount to $1.6 to $2.9 billion per year in a 100% renewable power system. The cost savings from including a small amount of bioenergy are even higher, and could amount to 4 to 12 billion dollars per year from including 3-5 TWh pa of bioenergy (depending upon the availability of geothermal technologies). Even including only 0.1TWh per year of bioenergy could reduce system costs from $140/MWh to $108/MWh, a saving of almost $7 billion per year. This suggests that ensuring a small amount of bioenergy availability could be an important policy goal.
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