Cross-posted from The Conversation. A recent headline – Failed doubters trust leaves taxpayers six-figure loss – marked the end of a four-year epic saga of secretly-funded climate denial, harassment of scientists and tying-up of valuable government resources in New Zealand. It’s likely to be a familiar story to my scientist colleagues in Australia, the UK, USA and
From the SMH, the kings of carbon emissions (and the princes):
It’s always interesting to get beyond the politics and look at what the money is doing when it comes to climate change. Citi has a note out today doing just that: Conference Call — Today, Citi hosted a client conference call with Professor David Karoly, an expert in climate science from Melbourne University, who has
From the AFR: Lawmakers at the European Parliament have approved a rescue plan for the European Union’s system for trading carbon-emission credits. Their hope is to revive prices for carbon credits, which have been so low that the system is creating few incentives for smokestack industries to cut back on their emissions of greenhouse gases.
I’ve been meaning to ask Terry McCrann for a little while how he can be so very certain that climate change is not an issue and that it’s pointless doing anything about it. Today, however, I’m simply going to offer you a snippet of his latest rant and you can decide for yourself if you
Cross-posted from Giles Parkinson at Reneweconomy. Tony Abbott has some homework to do. Over the next 15 months he is going to have to figure out how it is that Australia will meet its contribution to a new treaty that aims to limit global warming to 2°C. He’s not the only one. More than 190
Cross-posted from Giles Parkinson at Reneweconomy. Australia’s reputation at the international climate change talks hit a new low on Wednesday after the G77 and China took offence at what they described as the hard-line tactics and “bad behaviour” of the Australian negotiators and walked out of a crucial meeting. The Australian delegation was accused of
From Giles Parkinson at Reneweconomy: The ministers arriving this week (with the notable exception of Australia) will have much to do, because inside the negotiating rooms things did not go well in the first week. Some progress was made in items such as defining market mechanisms for forest protection, but others such as loss and
Cross-posted from Giles Parkinson at Reneweconomy: It has taken just seven days, but already the reputation of Australia as a constructive force in international climate policy has been completely trashed — both in terms of its domestic actions and in the wrecking ball tactics it has sent to the UN’s annual climate summit in Poland.
Cross-posted from The Conversation. Australia’s refusal to support developing countries’ efforts under a new climate change agreement or the new UN Green Climate Fund will further undermine its claims to being a good international citizen. According to media reports, Cabinet has authorised negotiators at the current UN climate talks in Warsaw to affirm our target to reduce domestic greenhouse
The ACCC this morning declared that it would pursue 9% price reductions for electricity from providers and 7% from gas providers as the carbon tax is cut. I’ve argued previously that will be difficult to engineer, not least because the costs of “direct action” will be even higher as new low carbon capacity must replace
We already know that this Government is struggling to produce a coherent climate change policy but how deep does its skepticism run? John Howard gave a speech last night in the UK that suggests very deep. From the SMH: Mr Howard revealed before the speech that the only book he had read on climate change
Crikey’s Paddy Manning has a red hot go today at former Western Mining doyen Hugh Morgan for yesterday’s declaration in an interview withThe Australian that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change would be remembered as a “Chicken Little”, like the Club of Rome: It is hardly worth attacking Morgan, who is entitled to his opinion, and good luck
The Leader of the Opposition, Bill “Kingslayer” Shorten, has taken MB criticism to heart and backflipped on his leaked decision to execute the carbon tax. From the man himself a few minutes ago: “So the opposition will move amendments consistent with our pre-election commitments to terminate the carbon tax on the basis of moving to
From the SMH: In a draft report that is likely to ignite further debate about the Abbott government’s policies, the Climate Change Authority said Australia should aim for a 15 per cent cut in emissions by 2020 compared with 2000 levels as a “minimum option”. The authority, which the Coalition has vowed to scrap, said
Cross-posted from The Conversation. Recently NASA reported that this year’s maximum wintertime extent of Antarctic sea ice was the largest on record, even greater than the previous year’s record. This is understandably at odds with the public’s perception of how polar ice should respond to a warming climate, given the dramatic headlines of severe decline in Arctic
The news this morning is that the Kingslayer is moving to fell another former ally. From the SMH Labor is expected to support axing the carbon tax, with senior figures – including leader Bill Shorten – now convinced that its case for action on climate change is more easily sold if the politically ”toxic” tax
Leading economists have overwhelmingly rejected Tony Abbott’s direct action climate change policy and backed carbon pricing. For what its worth, a Fairfax Media survey 32 of 35 prominent economists supported carbon pricing: Internationally renowned Australian economist Justin Wolfers…said direct action would involve more economic disruption but have a lesser environmental pay-off than an emissions trading
From the AFR: In a wide-ranging interview with right-wing columnist and broadcaster Andrew Bolt, due to air on television on Sunday, Mr Abbott slammed the ABC and other media organisations for suggesting this month’s bushfires were a result of climate change. “I suppose, you might say, that they are desperate to find anything that they
From the SMH: A senior United Nations climate change official says there is ”absolutely” a link between climate change and bushfires and has warned that the Coalition government will pay a high political and financial price for its decision scrap carbon pricing. In an interview with CNN’s Christine Amanpour on Monday, the head of the
The Australian Industry Group is on crusade this morning to render “Direct Action” moot. From the AFR: The Abbott government’s direct action climate change policy is unlikely to reduce carbon emissions sufficiently, and the money set aside for it would be better spent on paying for pollution reduction in developing counties, the Australian Industry Groups
As I’ve said. From the SMH: Hugh Saddler, a principal consultant for energy analysts Pitt & Sherry, said it had been ”almost impossible” to see the carbon price footprint when it was introduced, and it would be no easier if it was removed. The Australian Bureau of Statistics agreed. ”The ABS is not able to
From the SMH: Tony Abbott will have the first half of a constitutional trigger for a double-dissolution election in place by Christmas, after announcing plans to present his carbon price repeal legislation this year. The move keeps open the chances of another election in the first half of 2014 if the eight bill package is
It’s one of those spectacular ironies of history when the communists push forward into market reforms where the capitalists fear to tread. But that’s where we’re at today with carbon pricing. As Australia prepares to dismantle its emissions trading scheme via a politically driven government with little interest in markets and a clever coal billionaire
From Climate Spectator (which will no doubt wind up now): With the announcement yesterday from the AEC that Palmer United candidate Zhenya Wang has likely won a Senate seat, the carbon price now appears doomed. The latest count has the Coalition with 33 seats, requiring another six votes to achieve a majority. The Palmer United
The AFR this morning reports that: The latest findings from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change on the science of climate change, on whichThe Australian Financial Review has been briefed, are expected to upgrade the likelihood that man-made activity is causing global warming to 95 per cent. It is now “unequivocal” Earth has warmed since the start of
By Leith van Onselen Technological advancement and the shale gas revolution currently underway in the United States has encouraged other countries to seek to extract natural gas trapped in shale rocks or coal seams via the process of hydraulic fracking. This process essentially involves drilling and inserting a pipe deep into the ground and then
By Leith van Onselen It hasn’t taken long for the new Coalition Government to fulfill its election promise to disband the Climate Commission and sack its commissioners: The Coalition is delivering on an election promise to dispense with the commission, saving taxpayers $580,000 this financial year and $1.6 million in following years… “The Coalition believes
Cross-posted from The Conversation The Coalition has returned to government at a time of uncertainty and rapid change in almost every area of energy policy. With an energy policy released and a responsible minister named, what can we determine about where this new government is headed? The Coalition’s formal policy tries to address some of
From Bloomie: Ice in Antarctica and Greenland is disappearing faster and may drive sea levels higher than predicted this century, according to leaked United Nations documents. Greenland’s ice added six times more to sea levels in the decade through 2011 than in the previous 10 years, according to a draft of the UN’s most comprehensive study on
