Monday 2 November 2020

Australian Prime Minster Morrison & Foreign Minster Payne not as sanguine about trading partners' pledges of zero green house gas emission targets as they pretend?


This was Australian Prime Minister and Liberal MP for Cook Scott Morrison after the world left this country even further behind with regard to climate change policy and emissions reduction targets…..


The Sydney Morning Herald, 28 October 2020:


Prime Minister Scott Morrison says he will not be dictated to by other governments' climate change goals, declaring he is not worried about the future of Australia's exports despite four of the country's top trading partners adopting net-zero emissions targets.


China, Japan, Britain and South Korea, which account for more than $310 billion in Australian annual trade between them, have all now adopted the emissions target by 2050 or 2060, ramping up pressure on Australia's fossil fuel industry. Coal and natural gas alone are worth more than 25 per cent of Australia's exports, or $110 billion each year….


Major Australian export companies such as Rio Tinto, BHP, major agriculture groups and multinational food companies are pursuing carbon neutrality, which experts say is a move to avoid being stung with trade tariffs or charges by countries that have set net-zero targets….


Australian Foreign Affairs Minister and Liberal Senator Marise Payne was just as stubborn as her own prime minister.


However, it was made obvious by at least one other media article published the next day that Morrison was perhaps uncomfortable with the situation and how it might read to the general public.


The Guardian, 29 October 2019:


The Morrison government has quietly appointed an expert panel to come up with new ways to cut greenhouse gas emissions and given it less than a month to come up with recommendations.


In what is being seen by observers as an acknowledgment that its main climate change policy, the $2.55bn emissions reduction fund, is failing to cut national pollution, the government has appointed a panel of four business leaders and policy experts to suggest options to expand it.


The panel is headed by Grant King, the outgoing president of the Business Council of Australia and a former chief executive of Origin Energy. It was appointed by the minister for emissions reduction, Angus Taylor, in mid-October but has not been made public…..


The panel has been established despite Morrison and Taylor maintaining they have set out “to the last tonne” of carbon dioxide how Australia will meet the 2030 emissions target announced before the Paris climate conference . In reality, national emissions have risen each year since 2015  and most analyses  suggest the government will not reach the goal, a 26%-28% cut below 2005 levels, under current policies…..


Expert Panel examining oppo... by The Guardian

https://www.scribd.com/document/432470725/Expert-Panel-examining-opportunities-for-further-abatement



BACKGROUND


The Sydney Morning Herald, 28 October 2019:


Australia's carbon emissions appear to have edged higher in the final quarter of the 2018-19 financial year, delaying the downward trajectory the nation needs in order to hit the country's Paris climate goals.


National emissions are projected to have reached 134.6 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (Mt CO2-e) in April-June 2019, according to Ndevr Environmental Consultants, an environmental auditing company with a track record of accurately estimating the nation's emissions.


That total would come in about 900,000 tonnes of CO2-e more than for the previous three months, Ndevr said in a report based on public data and sector estimates. The tally would be less - by a similar amount - than the fourth quarter of 2017-18.


For the whole year, emissions were modestly higher than for previous 12 months, marking three consecutive years of increases. Excluding land-use changes - such as deforestation or tree planting - annual emissions have risen for the five years since the Abbott government scrapped the carbon price in 2014…..


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