Antinuclear

What exactly IS the Coalition’s “Direct Action” climate policy?

The Coalition’s climate change policy: it’s the public, not polluters, who pay   The Guardian, Lisa Caripis 19 Aug 13 “….. Essentially, Direct Action is a scheme that rewards entities that voluntarily reduce their emissions. So, if you’re an emitter you can propose an emissions reduction project to the government − it might be to improve your energy efficiency, store carbon in the soil or plant trees. The government compares your proposal to other project proposals, and picks the ones that will be the cheapest to implement. If it picks yours, you enter into an agreement to cut your emissions and are paid once you’ve delivered the emissions cuts.

You don’t have to be a policy expert to see where major cracks could form in this policy model. First and foremost, if the cash reward is to be the driving incentive, how large would the pool of funds need to be to drive the level of emissions reductions necessary to meet our 5-25% target? A report published last week estimates that, depending on the level of Australia’s 2020 target, it would cost $4-15bn more than the Coalition has currently budgeted. In fact, the report claims that the funding the Coalition has pledged is so inadequate that emissions would rise by 8-10% by 2020.

Under Direct Action it is the public, not polluters who pay. Is that fair? Unlike under a carbon price, there’s no cost, no disincentive, to keep polluting at the same rate. Indeed, Hunt recently suggested that the Coalition no longer even intends to penalise polluters that increase their emissions. So, Direct Action (ie taxpayer) funded projects would need to cut enough emissions to offset the emissions of non-participants.

Predicting and controlling the trajectory of Australia’s emissions under Direct Action would be quite a challenge. Without an annual cap on emissions or price per tonne of emissions as is in place under carbon price models, how would a Coalition government ensure that we are on track to meet our international obligations and reduce emissions to safe levels? What happens if projects fail to deliver the cuts as promised? Can we afford a policy that could leave our health, communities and property exposed to the substantial risks posed by climate change? ….  http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/aug/20/coalition-climate-change-direct-action

August 20, 2013 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA - NATIONAL, climate change - global warming, election 2013