climate policy
24 Nov 2009
Will Billions For Big Carbon Be Enough?
The Rudd Government has made a last ditch attempt to secure the passage of the ETS — by caving in nearly completely to the demands of the Opposition
It's the last dangle of the carrot for a recalcitrant Opposition. But will billions for big carbon be enough?After weeks of negotiations between Penny Wong and the Opposition's Ian Macfarlane, the two major parties have finally cut a deal to pass an emissions trading scheme into Australian law. Billions more taxpayer dollars will be sacrificed on the altar of making the emissions trading scheme palatable for big polluters. Now all Kevin Rudd needs is for the rebel Liberal and National senators to actually agree. This deal might just ensure enough of them do to get the bill passed.
In case you haven't been following, or have simply given up on the long-running ETS circus, here's a brief story so far.
The Rudd Government's proposed response to the issue of rapid and dangerous global warming is called the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, or CPRS. Developed over the first 18 months of Kevin Rudd's first term in office, the bill was itself a compromise between the interests of low-income consumers, electricity generators and the heavily polluting but politically powerful resource industries.
Ignoring all the various concessions, compensations and carve-outs, the CPRS is meant to reduce Australia's greenhouse gas emissions by 5 per cent of 2000 levels by 2020. If, by some miracle of international diplomacy, the world reaches a global agreement on climate change at the Copenhagen conference or one of the planned follow-up meetings, the CPRS will ratchet up to a 15 or 25 per cent reduction in emissions.
The Opposition initially opposed the CPRS, blocking the legislation the first time it was introduced to parliament. Partly this was a political tactic, but it also reflected the strong minority of the Liberal Party — not to mention the entire National Party — that doesn't believe climate change is happening at all. In a way, the denialists at least have the benefit of logic. If you don't believe climate change is happening, why do anything about it?
The Rudd Government used this first rejection as a lever to destabilise the Opposition. Under the Constitution, if a bill is rejected twice it can then provide a "trigger" for the government to go to a so-called "double dissolution" election, in which all seats and senate spots in parliament are up for grabs. This would be a nightmare scenario for the Opposition: on current polls Kevin Rudd would romp back in.
The combination of a growing and vocal faction of climate sceptics in the Liberal Party, a weak leader in Malcolm Turnbull, and the threat of electoral oblivion at a double-dissolution poll has driven a deep wedge through the conservative parties. At times the Liberal Party has looked like it might split altogether over the issue of climate change.
But Kevin Rudd has his own reasons for trying to pass this bill. An emissions trading scheme was a key Labor election promise, and Rudd wants to go to the Copenhagen climate change conference next month with a firm Australian commitment.
The result is that Labor's Wong and the Liberal's Ian Macfarlane have been locked in a small room for the past fortnight in an attempt to cut a deal. And what a deal they've emerged with. Way back in March this year, I called the CPRS "absurdly ineffective". The result of the concessions that Wong and Rudd have offered in order to reach this agreement with the Liberals means that the new compromise is even worse.
The new dollars promised to noisy heavy industries turn the newly compromised CPRS even browner. Electricity generators get a whopping new bribe of $4 billion, taking their total assistance package to $7.3 billion — not to help keep your power bill down, mind you, but simply in return for keeping the lights on. It's quite amazing that this recently privatised sector of the economy, which has known about global warming for two decades and has been on notice that a carbon price is coming for at least 10 years, can still manage to hold elected governments to ransom.
The coal industry gets an extra $750 million in assistance, taking its total assistance to $1.5 billion over the next five years, plus an extra $270 million for gassy coal mine abatement (coal mines leak a lot of methane, a potent greenhouse gas). Food processers, which use a lot of electricity, get $150 million. There's also a "Transitional Electricity Cost Assistance Program of $1.1 billion to assist medium and large manufacturing and mining businesses with CPRS-related increases in electricity prices in the early years of the Scheme".
For the really dirty parts of the Australian economy, there are buckets of new money. The so-called "emissions-intensive, trade-exposed" industries like aluminium smelting and natural gas mining — which were already slated to get free carbon permits under Labor's original bill — will now get even more free permits, up from 60 and 90 per cent to 70 and 95 per cent. This new deal means that for the dirtiest polluting industries that just happen to export their pollution overseas, the Australian taxpayer will pay for an astonishing 95 per cent of their pollution.
Carbon leakage? How about carbon bonanza! This is the kind of assistance that your local cafe or garage can only dream about. But then again, your local cafe or garage hasn't had a team of lobbyists in Canberra working around the clock for the past two years.
And, as previously announced, the Government will permanently exclude agriculture from the scheme. Agriculture generates something like 16 per cent of Australia's greenhouse gas emissions, much of it through land-clearing and burping cows. Those emissions will now not be covered by the scheme, but somehow "offsets for agricultural emissions abatement will be included".
On the upside, the Government has announced a nebulous mechanism to allow voluntary reductions by households and businesses to count under the emissions reduction cap. How it will do this has yet to be outlined and there are many difficulties in making such a scheme work.
All in all, this is a deal that rewards big polluters and punishes small businesses, consumers and the environment. If you ever needed an object lesson in the way money and power interact in a democracy, the CPRS deal is it. No wonder Bob Brown is calling it "pay the polluters".
For his part, Kevin Rudd claimed in his press conference this morning that the new deal is "both environmentally credible and economically responsible".
It's neither. In terms of environmental responsibility, the consensus of the world's top climate scientists is that much, much deeper cuts are required globally to hold carbon dioxide levels at a relatively safe level. When it comes to the dollars, the Government's relatively modest headline figure of $7.01 billion in extra costs as a result of this deal doesn't take into account the potential fluctuations in the future carbon market. All those extra free permits could see the Australian taxpayer on the hook for billions extra if the coal price or the Australian dollar change significantly.
Of course, that is if this bill even passes. Although the Shadow Cabinet has approved the deal, the Coalition party room is still debating it, and some Liberal and National Senators are almost certain to cross the floor.
The Prime Minister said today that this deal "is a deal for this week because we need to get this thing through". If the bill goes down in the Senate, Labor is likely to go back to the drawing board, possibly taking the country to a double-dissolution mid-next year. If that happens, it will probably reconsider many of the generous concessions it has offered in this deal. Senior executives in the fossil fuel and electricity industries will be holding their breath and hoping this bill will pass. It's the very best deal they will ever get. In fact, it's far better than even they might have imagined.
As for ordinary Australians like you and me? We'll be paying for this cave-in through higher taxes for the next decade at least. And it won't stop global warming one jot. For that, we've got to hope and pray the world can reach some kind of agreement at Copenhagen. It's a bleak time to be an optimist on climate change.
UPDATE 4pm: After a long Coalition party room meeting, the Opposition is still unable to reach a decision on Labor's CPRS deal. The Australian and the Fairfax newspapers are both reporting that Liberal climate change spokesman Andrew Robb made a dramatic intervention against the proposed deal, speaking out against Ian Macfarlane and Malcolm Turnbull's position.
There is even considerable speculation of a leadership spill against Turnbull. In a dramatic day in Canberra, it looks as though Kevin Rudd will be gifted his dearest wish, with the possibility looming that the Liberals will not only give him a double dissolution trigger, but a new and untried Opposition leader as well.
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The horror…The….horror
Australia is a relatively low emmitter in absolute terms and is therefore at best a ‘demonstration economy’.
We have no real power to influence climate beyond:
A: Our ability to model a low carbon economy for developing nations and stubborne rich babies to follow and;
B: The potential to use our wealth to invest in low carbon technologies that can be used by the rest of the world to reduce their emissions and, yes, make us money.
This is why the cushioning of our high carbon industries from the effects of the ETS is such a disaster. It nullifies what is our primary potential contribution to the world.
Australia’s agricultural industry will now lag behind other smarter countries in the ability to export low carbon technological improvements.
Despite the fact that our agricultural emissions are a drop in the ocean globally, agriculture is a huge emmitter for most developing countries. We’re then going to ask them to reduce their emissions.
Shame on us.
Residents of large developing megatropolises are never going to learn from the way Australian consumers and businesses reduce carbon. All we had to offer was innovation in energy, industry and agriculture.
Ben typically i don’t see eye to eye with your articles, but this one is spot on. CPRS is a bastard dog.
Can it be the starting point for a better mechanism? Who cares when the bar is set this low.
This a monumental historic failure in modern Australian governance.
I might not agree with Steve Fieldings viewpoint at all but i completely agree with his take on the CPRS. So now i am siding with climate deniers - this is getting weird, and costly.
Excellent summation by Ben Eltham. The greedy, climate criminal Lib-Labs have betrayed Australia, Humanity, the Biosphere, our children and grandchildren.
Simple arithmetic calculations based on authoritative data tell us that Labor policy under the CPRS means that Australia’s Domestic and Exported GHG pollution will INCREASE to 173% of the 2000 value by 2050 (see “Climate justice & climate injustice: Australia wants a 2020 per capita GHG pollution 15 times greater than Developing World’s “: http://sites.google.com/site/yarravalleyclimateactiongroup/climate-justi… ).
Indeed, in the latest Labor-Liberal compromise CPRS version agricultural GHG pollution is permanently excluded and hence Australia is committed to more than 50% of current GHG pollution FOREVER (World Bank environmental experts having recently established that livestock alone are responsible for over 51% of man-made GHG pollution) – dog-in-the-manger climate racism because, for example, Australia’s per capita GHG polution (including that from carbon exports) is already 60 times greater than that of Bangladesh.
The following last-ditch letter has been sent to Australian media and to all most readily e-mail accessible Federal MPs.
LETTER.
Please reject the flawed, counterproductive, dangerous and fraudulent Labor CPRS and advise all your colleagues to do likewise.
Whatever your position on climate change or market economics, voting for the dishonest, counterproductive, fraudulent Labor CPRS is a betrayal of Science, Public Integrity, Risk Management, Australia, Humanity and the Biosphere (noting, incidentally, that the Labor-threatened Great Barrier Reef currently supports 70,000 Australian tourism jobs).
Liberal, National Party, Independent, and Green MPs - and indeed Labor MPs - have a unique opportunity to OPPOSE this comprehensive Labor betrayal of Australians, the Australian environment and Australian values.
Details of this betrayal of Australia is already being letter-boxed in the electorates of Jaga Jaga and Higgins (Melbourne) and similar action by over 140 climate action groups throughout Australia will ensure that those betraying Australia will be held accountable at the next and indeed ALL future elections (noting that the Climate Disruption and Climate Emergency is steadily worsening).
No ETS (CPRS) is better than having a flawed, fraudulent, counterproductive and dangerous ETS (CPRS) as proposed by the climate criminal, pro-coal Labor Government that will lock Australia into INCREASING domestic and exported GHG pollution (e.g. to 173% of the 2000 value by 2050: http://sites.google.com/site/yarravalleyclimateactiongroup/climate-justi… ) and, further, after the latest compromise with the Opposition, the Labor CPRS permanently excludes agriculture from consideration – thereby committing Australia to more than 50% of current GHG pollution FOREVER and the destruction of Humanity and the Biosphere if adopted globally (see “Australia sabotages Copenhagen by excluding huge Agricultural GHG emissions” : http://countercurrents.org/polya171109.htm ).
Top climate scientists, analysts and economists oppose ETS schemes in general as variously empirically ineffective, fraudulent, dishonest, flawed, counterproductive and dangerous (see Yarra Valley Climate Action Group website compendium “Experts: Carbon Tax needed and NOT Cap-and-Trade Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) “ : http://sites.google.com/site/yarravalleyclimateactiongroup/carbon-tax-ne… ) as exampled below.
Dr James Hansen (US): “The worst thing about cap-and-trade [ETS], from a climate standpoint, is that it will surely be inadequate to achieve the sharp reduction of emissions that is needed. Thus cap-and-trade would practically guarantee disastrous climate change for our children and grandchildren. The only solution to the climate problem is to leave much of the fossil fuels in the ground. That requires a high enough carbon price that we move on to our energy future beyond fossil fuels.”
Stephen Lendman (US): “Contributing $4,452,585 to Democrats in 2008 (around $1 million to Obama) was mere pocket change for what it can reap from scams like cap and trade disguised as an environmental plan. The scheme was devised. GS [Goldman Sachs] helped write it. The House passed it and sent it to the Senate. Unless stopped, it will transfer more of our wealth to corporate polluters and Wall Street on top of all they’ve stolen so far from derivatives fraud and the imploded housing and other bubbles. And Goldman will lead the way finding new ways to do it until there’s nothing left to extract.”
Greenpeace (World): “As it comes to the floor, the Waxman-Markey bill sets emission reduction targets far lower than science demands, then undermines even those targets with massive offsets. The giveaways and preferences in the bill will actually spur a new generation of nuclear and coal-fired power plants to the detriment of real energy solutions. To support such a bill is to abandon the real leadership that is called for at this pivotal moment in history. We simply no longer have the time for legislation this weak.”
Dr Vandana Shiva (India): “Regulating by carbon trading is like fiddling as Rome burns… We face a stark choice: we can destroy the conditions for human life on the planet by clinging to "free-market" fundamentalism, or we can secure our future by bringing commerce within the laws of ecological sustainability and social justice”.
Ken Davidson (Australia): “The [Australian] Rudd Government’s environmental credentials are in tatters: the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme [CPRS] has been exposed as sham. This shouldn’t be surprising. There isn’t one cap-and-trade scheme in the world that has resulted in a reduction in carbon emissions. Instead, such schemes have made money for the biggest polluters and created a new branch of the derivatives industry that creates new wealth opportunities for brokers and financiers. Rudd’s cap and trade scheme benefits the worst polluters. But the Australian scheme is special. It has been rorted at the planning stage … The carbon scheme is not simply weak. It is fraudulent.”
.
Yours sincerely,
Dr Gideon Polya, Macleod, Melbourne, Victoria, 3085,
END LETTER.
We must hold the climate criminal Lib-Labs and their corporate backers Accountable via the market and the ballot box. Ultimately the World will hold them responsible via Sanctions, Boycotts, Green Tariffs, Reparations Demands and International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutions.
Peace is the only way but Silence kills and Silence is complicity.
Hi Dr Gideon Polya
Typical scaremongering and exaggeration
I didnt know it was a criminal act to have a differing view on climate change (or simply a view different to your warped one)
Corporate backers??? Would they be the likes of Richard Branson, Warren Buffett, Bill Gates? Hang on a sec, they’ve all invested in "green" technology. Looks like the climate change supporters line the pockets of the biggest corporates in the world
And to think you want sanctions, boycotts, green tariffs, reparations demands ….yeah good one Dr Gideon that’s really thinking about your children and grandchildren’s future
You say peace is the only way. Looks your way is filled more with hate and propaganda
A very good summary, Ben, about an unfolding tragedy that gets worse and worse. Just a few quibbles:
Firstly, your article gives the incorrect impression that CPRS will reduce Australia’s emissions by 5% (unconditional) by 2020. This target is for the whole of Australia’s emissions, while CPRS only covers a large fraction of these. Furthermore, all of the theoretical ‘reductions’ could be achieved by buying cheap overseas offsets of dubious effectiveness. Even Treasury modelling finds that Australia’s emissions will continue to increase under CPRS.
Secondly, the exclusion of agriculture from CPRS may be a good thing, since it would be very difficult to estimate emissions from thousands of farms with different crops, animals, soils, rainfall and farming techniques. It may be better to take time to develop a separate scheme with well designed carrots and sticks to change agricultural practices.
You have to wonder what it is that makes extreme right-winger’s become pro-Pollutionist’s. Andrew Bolt, Tim Blair, Piers Akerman and other right-wing extremists of their ilk around the world have become obsessively intent on preventing the planet from becoming an environmentally nicer place for us all to live in. Not content with merely objecting to governments taxing their carbon producing big business net-worked clients, these people are actively pro-Pollution.
To prove the point – and how desperate is this – they even protest the introduction of power-saving light globes by scurrying around trying to find any smidgen of evidence to present to consumers that will deter them from using these energy-saving devices. Andrew Bolt in his column today got so desperate about these devices that he actually published a piece that attempted to deny that energy-saving light globes are not as good as they are cracked up to be on the packaging. The fact is; they’re probably not, but, despite Bolt’s ludicrous nonsense, they are still a lot better than the ones they’re replacing both in terms of economy and energy efficiency. But, if we had Bolt’s way, we wouldn’t have them at all.
These right-wing pro-Pollution propagandists are being paid to bring down the world-wide green-leaning movement. Instead of encouraging the development of renewable energy resources, they are actively discouraging it as a waste of time and money. They want us to continue using non-renewable resources like coal, oil and gas. They argue that the world’s economy revolves around these resources and that we should continue to enrich ourselves by mining them and selling them to the highest bidder. In order to substantiate their view that this practice continue, the pro-Pollutionist’s attempt to argue that, contrary to scientific opinion, the world is not experiencing any ‘climate change’ or ‘global warming’ that can be attributable to man’s excessive use of non-renewable energy resources and that, rather, any ‘climate change’ or ‘global warming’ that mankind is experiencing on the planet is actually due to natural phenomena.
One of the pro-Pollution propagandists other arguments for the world remaining Pollutionist are that the costs of researching and developing alternative renewable non-polluting energy resources are too prohibitive. They argue that the currently available renewable energy resources are nowhere near efficient enough to meet our ever-growing energy needs. They are, of course, in this regard, quite right. But is the answer simply not to bother continuing to develop alternative renewable energy resource systems and just carry on using non-renewable energy resources until it runs out? Regardless of whether or not using carbon-based energy resources are causing ‘climate change’ or ‘global warming’, there is absolutely no doubt that we are polluting the atmosphere with toxic fumes that are, at the very least, creating an unhealthy environment for life on our planet particularly those that live in or near cities. In other words, ‘climate change’ and ‘global warming’ are not just the only concerns we have about the planets future; our own health is at risk as we slowly choke ourselves into oblivion by the continued use of carbon fuels.
Ignored entirely by the pro-Pollutionist’s is the problem of what we do once the non-renewable resources actually do run out. Our use and reliance on coal, gas and oil has multiplied almost exponentially since mankind started seriously using it less than a couple of hundred years ago. Back then we believed we had an all-but inexhaustible supply of the stuff; now we’re battling to find enough to keep us going for today let alone for the future when our kidz and their kidz will be needing more and more of the stuff. As the world’s population increases, so our demand for energy will increase. There will come a point sooner or later, however, when there is simply none left and future man will be cursing their forebears for not having had the foresight not to do something about when they had the opportunity.
Some scientists and environmentalists are wondering if it’s not actually already too late and that we should have begun looking seriously at finding ways of using renewable energy resources when we first realised back in the second half of the last century that we don’t have an inexhaustible supply of non-renewable energy resources. Hopefully, it’s not too late and mankind will ignore the Pollutionist’s money-centric arguments about continuing to use resources that will inevitably run out one day, and that we will make a determined effort to find a way of living that doesn’t pollute and is sustainably limitless.
Regardless of the arguments about ‘climate change’ and ‘global warming’, going ‘green’ can be nothing other than good for all of mankind across the planet no matter what way one looks at it. The ‘live for today and to hell with tomorrow’ creed of the money-grubbing pro-Pollutionist’s should be ignored. The world collectively must re-organise itself to prepare for the creation of a sustainable planet and move away from the pseudo-nationalistic, money-centric, war-mongering, resource-squabbling, people-ignoring world that we live in today.
Whether you go along with ‘climate change’ or ‘global warming’ or not, or regardless of whether you think ‘carbon trading’ and ‘compensating polluters’ is a good thing or just another money-grabbing idea for big-business, we cannot afford to turn our backs on the reality of diminishing energy resources and a world which we are slowly but undeniably polluting to death. The world must change its fundamental outlook on life; the alternative is that mankind will ultimately be responsible for its own demise.
http://lataan.blogspot.com
Good onya Ben, That’s a good article & I have to agree that the CPRS is a mongrel dog. Kevin Rudd is all about playing himself up as a great leader, pretending he is up there with the best but as we Australians can see the lack of humble pie about him & his stalking mannerisms are to be the countries downfall.
The Krudd/ W(r)ong CPRS was always a dogs breakfast, and now it has been vomited up.
In any case, Krudd is nothing if not a crass politician, a pretty brainless, dead-minded one at that (one thing he will NEVER be is a Statesman), but one thing is paramount, after the ‘Ute-Gate’ affair, Krudd is determined to utterly destroy Turnbull, and this bastardised CPRS thing is the means he is using to get what he wants. The climate, the world, the very existence of humanity on this little planet is nothing in his mind beside this one overwhelming desire.
My fervent hope is that this mongrel thing will be consigned to the rubbish bin of history, that we do have another election soon, that the Nats be wiped out entirely, that the Liberals (so called) be decimated, that Krudd and Co. also be almost wiped out, and that the Greens and Progressive Independents win absolute control of the House of Reps and the Senate. Dream on!!!
I see Shaun Carney of the Fairfax mob has denoted people who call our gutless PM ‘Krudd’ (crud) as being all ‘Rusted On Liberals’. He could not be further from the truth. We are just people who resist the bulldust coming out of the minds and silken tongues of our gutless and piss-weak leaders and their minders.
Appeasement: delaying gruesome wars today!
This circus could have one good outcome.If the combination of the realistic attitude of the Greens with the head in the sand policy of the Tories results in the rejection of the CPRS scam then KRudd may go for a double dissolution.
Bring it on Kev.Labor may not be such a shoo-in as some think and there is always the possibility of some change for the better in the Senate.
douglas jones
The State of the World 2009 says page 6
”Taking advantage of the inevitable uncertainties and caveats contained in leading climate assessments, a handful of climate skeptics - many of them PhD’s with oil industry funding - managed to position climate change as a scientific debate rather than a grim reality”
That is they fought to maintain profit.
The latest boom/bust debacle was also driven by the desire for short term profit. Although underpinning economic theory and esoteric maths may have been bible much deregulation was due to lobbying, removing regulation put in place post 1933 so a crash could not happen again. As is said now with proposed yet to be implemented corrections.
Much due to deregulation was in theory legal but the intent was short term profit using what turned out and was known to be valueless collateral. Robert Shiller is now in favour for many.
It is also now doubted that resources, even with substitution, are unlimited. Herman Daly may yet be favoured.
Growth is needed as well as consumption for capitalist endeavour which has given many riches in the past, profit is said to be the driver so why not try a cap and trade with subsidies as band aid to be palliative to hurt? Previous similar efforts have not worked though the corporate profits were welcome and now that we have dithered and GHG levels still increase with a 100 year residence time. That is what GHG is in the sky at present is there until 2109. Perhaps something quicker is needed. A straight carbon allocation per person with subsidy to help the change engendered, what a pity all that money has been frittered in trying to maintain the economy maybe for the wrong reasons the opposition is right.
If necessary governments might need to run war economies which worked quite well 1938 to 1948 with survival of most corporations, they were smaller and their lobby influence was less though they still cried doom we are all ruined particularly post 1932 when regulations were imposed following the Pecora Commission. There is enough new inventions to prime the economy which will require the labour otherwise made into soldiers.
Some one else may gain profit and some corporations may crash, but is that not what is supposed to happen under competition?
Before this can happen the role of short term big profit needs to be addressed wrongs admitted but like the wrong done to the nice thought subtending the banning of war and the UN by recent actions it seems the media will not allow such ideas other than in limited form to prove their correct reporting of happenings.
We have a way to go and time is passing people are hurting already, mind you those of lesser breed and unimportant countries, though corporations are buying agricultural land for food security and of course profit. We compete not co operate. Naturally any though of compensation to those damaged or killed by climate change is far too costly though warm satisfying words of proposed change are often voiced.
Ah, bugger. The original scheme had households subsidised to offset rising energy costs. The amount was based on an average which meant that for myself who uses little power, it was the equivalent of a cash bonus. But no, that $5.67 billion is instead being handed to dirty industry. Now I’m looking at the prospect of rising costs and little slack left to reduce usage. The AGW version of no good deed goes unpunished.
The proposed legislation is a dog’s breakfast and a blatant confidence trick that insults the intelligence of the general public. Neither fish nor fowl, the ETS bill, if enacted, will ensure that many working families will experience serious financial suffering because of increased unemployment and much higher prices for food and groceries, while the major polluting industries and their bankers will feel little discomfort.
Currently in the Senate, the most sense is being spoken by the Independent Senators. Also here, the Greens have clearly exposed untrustworthy Ministers and dishonest spin revealing Government hypocrisy. Throughout next year, the Opposition need to make a serious study of the science behind global and national climate predictions before even considering any proposed legislation. It’s obvious that most members of the Government have not done this.
The whole situation is a national disgrace.
Thanks for your remarks Mark, I appreciate the clarification.
I understand that the cap will not apply to Australia’s entire emissions given the carve-out for agriculture. I also take your point about the difficulties of measuring agricultural emissions, though designing it carefully could be tough.
Now don’t get me wong, I’m rudd behind you!
The accounting stunts pulled by treasury demonstrate that this just monopoly money. The same kind of non existent instrument traded by the international monetary markets and look how well that went.
It is nothing more than political brinkmanship , designed to destroy the liberal party , revenge for all those years in the political wilderness. Apparently this is how the Australian mediocrity responds to an economic structural challenge.
Coal fired electricity generation is old tech , so many of our generators well past their service life. New technology to replace these exists and can be built now . If this was real money $7 bill would enable us to follow Spain’s lead , new high tech generation that doesn’t require the huge inefficiency of tearing holes in the ground and burning huge quantities of a finite resource for little result.
Just read Garrett’s body language to gauge how distasteful a political stunt this is.
Dazza, The CPRS ‘is’ a dogs breakfast & it is not a matter of only reducing industry pollution but replenishing the forestry as well. For instance, The wilder beast migration in South Africa, is the last remaining animal migration in the world but if one is to get in a chopper & fly up the Mara River that feeds the Wilder beast population, the first thing you will come across is wheat fields & then burning jungle. Once the jungle is gone, so to is the river that supports the wider beast population. America used to have the same migratory populations with the Buffalo & other parts of the world the same thing. My point is that the government want to make every excuse to tax the population but have no inclination to make any amends to the damage it has already caused, therefore the ice caps melting & so called green house gases can keep on being blamed for the sake of an over populated planet that humans now over occupy.
well people you should not too upset about all this , the obvious is that there is climate change ,if you look at history it’s been happening for a long time , this continent has been slowly getting drier for ages ,according to geoligists , there were rain forests in central Australia,and nothing we do will really change it, Mother nature is the boss and we have to cop whatever she dishes up.That’s my opinion anyway like it or lump it ,I believe we are on the end of an ice age when that finishes we will have to learn to cope with a colder climate,it will turn. But Ben is right about the new bill it’s not going to do much ,maybe if they get it passed they will hike the reduction targets up , the thing that is obvious is ,it will hurt the consumers ,Rudd will come to realize this at the ballot box one day soon ,I have voted Labor all my life for reasons you are not interested in , but I am changing my vote next time,2 years this guy Rudd has done nothing to benefit the people of this land ,the public health is crap ,the water situation is terrible and they are stopping dams ,there is no plans to help develop infrastucture in the bigger cities ,public transport needs a lot of help .You need to be able to move people around, people are still being ripped off by crooks in the investment world ,and taxpayers just lost $450 million on the Myer float because the ATO were having a nap, the homeless level is rising and not much is being done about public housing and finally the indigenous people are still living in the dust, So it’s really all about an obsession on Rudds part to go overseas and say look at MOI !!I did something !He loves the world stage he better enjoy it now because come next election I say despite what the polls say He is going to pay for neglecting this country for the sake of what is a stupid bit of legislation, there a bit long winded cheers Bobbeeart
Re the comments by the highly respected Dr Mark Diesendorf above about the exclusion of agriculture from the Lib-Lab ETS.
It has been recently estimated by World Bank environmental experts Goodland and Anhang that livestock alone contributes over 51% or 33 billion tons CO2-e of annual man-made GHG pollution that is now estimated at about 64 billion tons CO2-e - as compared to previous 2006 FAO estimate of 18% of a 50% lower figure (see Robert Goodland and Jeff Anhang, "Livestock and Climate Change". World Watch, November 2009: http://www.worldwatch.org/node/6294 ).
If Goodland and Anhang are correct (their detailed analysis seems quite reasonable: http://www.worldwatch.org/files/pdf/Livestock%20and%20Climate%20Change.p…) then (a) the annual GHG pollution to be cut is 50% greater than hitherto estimated and (b) the Lib-Lab ETS that permanently excludes agriculture commits Australia (the World’s worst per capita GHG polluter if one includes its Coal and LNG Exports) to over 50% of its current Domestic GHG pollution FOREVER.
The call by top climate scientists, including the the UK Royal Society Working Party on Coral for a return of atmospheric CO2 concentration to about 300 ppm from the present circa 390 ppm (for details and documentation see "300.org - return atmosphere CO2 to 300 ppm": http://sites.google.com/site/300orgsite/300-org–return-atmosphere-co2-…) means ultimately NEGATIVE GHG pollution.
However World leading annual per capita GHG polluter, climate criminal, climate genocidal, climate racist Lib-Lab Australia has, via the ETS permanent agriculture exclusion, now committed to INCREASING GHG pollution FOREVER through continued Australian annual Domestic GHG pollution by either about 20% (FAO 2006) or over 51% (World Bank analysts 2009) of the current level .
This is dog-in-the-manger, climate racist, climate genocidal, climate criminality for which the civilized World will inevitably hold climate criminal Apartheid Australia (the climate racist New White Australia) ACCOUNTABLE via Sanctions, Boycotts, Green Tariffs, Reparations Demands and International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutions.
Peace is the only way but Silence kills and Silence is complicity.
Ben, I wonder about these concessions made by the ALP to get the bill passed with indecent haste.
For example:
"The Government will introduce minor technical amendments to remove all
doubt that fuel exporters (including Australian coal exporters) will not be
held liable under the CPRS for the carbon embodied in fuel they export."
Because this seems to me to lock-in compensation from CPRS revenue if, for any reason, limits are placed on export coal. For example in future other nations eg France and Germany may place an import duty on coal to discourage its use. If this happens the government would need to compensate the exporters (mostly foreign owned).
Why is this needed? What does this have to do with the ETS?
How does this act to reduce the burning of coal on this planet?
David Booth
Bywong NSW
Re: Post by ‘DrGideonPolya’, above (26/11/09 - 7:37)
The salient point about substantial livestock emission of methane is correct. Therefore, action to commence a worldwide reduction in herd sizes seems a logical early step to obtain a rapid decrease in emmission output.
Inexplicably, ‘DrGideonPolya’ damages the argument’s credibility with the use of offensive invective.
(This comment has been edited)
I think the ‘concessions’ to get the bill through are ones the ALP wants as much as the Liberals. A pathetically weak ETS and CPRS suit the pro fossil fuel agenda of Labor as much or better than it suits the Liberals; having the Liberals and Nationals to blame is a way to keep BAU whilst slowing the flow of votes by concerned Australians away from Labor to the Greens.
MASTERFUL Malcolm has ensured a marvellous new market for his mates to exploit, funded by the Taxpayer and courtesy of Krudd and Wrong.
Hopefully the public will be so outraged that a new grassroots political movement will evolve to give voters a choice in next year’s election!
"Fools rush in where Angels fear to tread". Take heed Miz Wang, krudd and Sir Malco. Just forget the egos for the sake of caution and wait until the Copenhagen talks reveal the plans of trading competitors and partners. It’s just common sense…
I just posted the following in response to another newmatilda article. I think it’s relevant to this one though.
Um…Hasn’t anyone here read about ‘Climategate’ yet?
The East Anglia Climatic Research Unit, the biggy when it comes to IPCC GW modeling, has been telling porkies:
Hiding the temperature declines over the last 7 or so years.
Hiding the record global temperatures of 1,000 years ago.
Building fudge factors into their modeling code to ensure the graph kept climbing despite falling temperatures (concurrent with increasing CO2 levels).
Attempting to control debate and prevent publication of research that didn’t agree with them.
Destroying and withholding data.
And more.
People who think the coal companies are the bad guys are only seeing part of the picture…there are other companies of far greater wealth and power that expect to make massive gains on the back of carbon trading and the forced global investment into the next investment bubble it would accomplish and one of them is well represented by its former top dogs now sitting pretty in the US executive branch.
Do a bit of digging. Go on. I dare you.
Look, irrespective of the politics, it’s desirable to reduce, or eliminate if practical, all types of harmful emissions, globally.
However, to address this sentiment, the Federal Government today put before the Senate specific legislative mechanisms that were significantly flawed. This is now the view of a great many Australians for many different reasons. Most importantly however, many climate scientists, worldwide, consider that there are better ways to proceed than those just rejected by the Parliament.
The Government also made the fatal error of trying to rush the Parliament with Bills that have such momentous, far-reaching and long-lasting consequences. With important legislative proposals, the Senate usually takes whatever time it considers necessary to do its job properly. The government tried to short-cut the process for political purposes.
Many members of the Press have tried to characterise today’s actions of the Opposition, conveniently ignoring the confederacy of the Greens in the vote, as those of dinosaur deniers. To their credit, these Senators, Independent and Greens and Nationals and Liberals, are doing their job of review in the national interest. They believe that the proposed legislation can be improved, as often is the case, and expect the Minister to go back to the drawing board and think again.
Fosterman, great response & although I am aware of that, I bring your attention to National Party’s Barnaby Joyce, who commented on Lateline ABC TV Australia last night, when questioned by Tony Jones about the issue of climate change but stated that the information being pushed at the public was not credible & it was funded by the government for their political gain.
Even though they know it & we know it, it is a still an issue of reducing pollution without depleting the job market & sending the country broke. There are many alternatives but Kevin Rudd & his wife are so far up each other on cloud 9, they think the rest of us will just be as mesmerized in their abnormality.
Iview ! That is my view , well said , as I say climate change is a fact of life or in some cases death ,dinosaurs are a good example of that ,this planet is constantly changing itself we are just along for the ride , stopping a few coal generators is going to make little difference to what happens in the end.But people get fanatic about these things and everyone should calm down and think we need to eat , weneed to see at night ,we need to be warm in cold places , and we need to move around the planet and it all takes energy of some kind ,we cannot go back to horse ‘n’carts so there needs to be a balanced approach to finding less damaging solutions to it all , but to just ram a bill down our throats like Rudd is doing that will cost everyone in the land heaps more to live is not good. He is as Iview says playing the political game and it will come back and bite him , they have no real policy to develop renewables ,it’s like an obsession to impress the rest of the world ,there are so many other issues that need dealing with here ,urgently and labor is showing us the finger ,it’s like contempt in my eyes , the new oppo leader will exploit all this , and as he said it is my job to oppose and to develop my own policy to climate change, people call him the Mad Monk ,but he is very smart poi\litician and I believe be a force to be reckoned with ,So Penny Wong had better get back to work and come up with something a lot better than the present ETS..