Affordability of renewable energy is the main concern for most Australians, according to a new CSIRO report.

This is an important factor as the federal Labor government aims to generate more than 80 per cent of electricity from renewable sources by 2030.

Amidst this, Copernicus reports world temperatures continue to rise as March is recorded as the 10th hottest consecutive month on record.

Australian Association for Environmental Education vice president Jennifer Pearson says renewable energy sources are critical given the climate chaos.

“We’ve known, for more than 20 years, that what we’re seeing now would happen and it’s going to get worse,” she says.

Dr Pearson says the long-term benefits of renewables outweighs the costs.

“Is it expensive to develop – probably,” she says.

“Is that reflected in the price of the materials and everything that needs to be used? That could be the case.

“But the cost of not doing it is bigger.”

In 2008, Jandakot-based gardening supplier Richgro introduced its Anaerobic Digestion Plant, making it the first bioenergy plant in the Southern Hemisphere.

The company converts food waste into clean energy and power, which can be exported back to the grid.

As a family-owned business, company director Geoff Richards is the fourth generation to inherit the company since it opened in 1916.

Mr Richards says before the plant’s introduction, food waste in Perth went straight to landfill.

“We wanted to provide a facility that took food waste and converted it all into energy,” he says.

Richgro takes food waste from a wide variety of companies from Coles, Miss Maud to McDonald’s.

Mr Richards says industries should take advantage of technological advancements to promote renewable energy sources so taxpayers don’t feel the burden of building and operating the sites.

Since the plant opened, he says the company has recovered the costs of what they spent to build it.

Governments can’t be expected to make all of this happen, Mr Richards says.

Richgro is run entirely from energy generated by the AD Plant.

“Any excess is fed into the grid,” Mr Richards says.