Australia’s new Prime Minister to carry out climate denialist agenda

Australia rips up climate-change policies New Scientist, 11:57 10 September 2013 by Michael Slezak Australia’s landslide election result seems to be bad news for the climate. Following the election of a new government, Australia is to abolish its emissions trading scheme, disband a climate advisory body and institute a carbon reduction policy that experts say will fail to meet its meagre target. …

The carbon price – widely called a “carbon tax” – was set to increase gradually until 2015 when carbon credits would be opened for trading, allowing the market to set the price.

Abbott’s coalition also signalled that it would disband Australia’s Climate Commission – an independent scientific body that provides reliable information on climate change to the public. In response to a report the commission released, warning that extreme weather was made more likely by climate change, Abbott said: “When the carbon tax goes, all of those bureaucracies will go and I suspect we might find that the particular position you refer to goes with them.”

Contentious views

In 2009, Abbott said, when talking about climate change, that the “science is highly contentious, to say the least” and “the climate change argument is absolute crap”,…..

It is a “great leap backwards”, says Ian Lowe from Griffith University in Queensland, Australia. He says that no experts think the targets will be met and that the stance is ideological, because senior members of the government don’t think climate change is man-made He worries that the outgoing government will also see the election result as a reason to abandon serious effort on climate policy.

Despite one analysis suggesting that the direct action plan’s funding of A$3.2 billion represents less than half of what is needed to meet the 5 per cent target, Abbott indicated the government will not up this figure…….. http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn24173-australia-rips-up-climatechange-policies.html#.UjFX8NJwonE