Al Gore continues to weigh into the Australian climate debate and not in an altogether constructive fashion. From the News:
AL GORE has warned Tony Abbott to “change or get out of the way” of sensible environmental policy, labelling the Prime Minister a “straight-out climate denier”.
Speaking to Vice after forging an unlikely alliance with Clive Palmer, the former US vice-president said “silly” initiatives like the government’s direct action plan had “never worked anywhere.”
Mr Gore also praised the Palmer United Party leader, who has backed a carbon emissions trading scheme with a starting price of zero dollars, but only if Australia’s main trading partners adopt a similar mechanism, for putting forward a plan that was “so much better than would have been the case”.
“He does have an unusual style,” Mr Gore said of the Australian mining magnate. “But I think that whatever unusual features to his style there may be, deep down there’s absolutely no question in my mind that he has a sense of social justice, he has a keen sense of right and wrong. … He wants to make the world a better place.”
A few facts, then. Direct Action does work. It is essentially the current policy of the United States. The issue with it is that it is much less efficient and more expensive than a market-based price which unleashes everyone at once upon the problem rather than a tiny clique of bureaucrats throwing darts at the chosen few polluters.
Yes, Mr Gore, Clive Palmer has saved some of Australia’s climate change infrastructure and a possible future carbon price. But he is also destroying the alternative government carbon mitigation policy in the process and the government still seems intent on killing the Renewable Energy Target (RET) as well. So right now, Al Gore looks like he’s lending his brand to a series of political machinations that will denude Australia of any effective climate policy action for the foreseeable future.
As well, Clive Palmer is also a notorious climate skeptic and remains so, still holding the line that it is nature and not man that changing the climate. After meeting Gore the afternoon before last week’s Palmer United policy shift, Clive Palmer declared that he had changed his view because he feared that without an emissions trading scheme, Australia would be punished by carbon mitigation tariffs in other countries. So, Mr Palmer either came up with the policy that afternoon or he’s used Mr Gore superbly to give himself an invaluable stamp of environmental approval, which has already paid dividends in the polls.
Perhaps Mr Gore calculates that an Australia offering the prospect of an ETS in the future is a more constructive move for restricting carbon for the wider world than having an Australia that is actually lowering its emissions because it’ll help bring larger emitters into a global ETS. There are emissions pilots in US states and China, as well as the EU scheme of course. It’s bold gamble, though. As the track of trade negotiations over many years has shown, unilateral and domestic actions are easier political sells and have benefits as well so Mr Gore should not be trashing the alternatives.
Or, perhaps he’s being used.
