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December 6, 2007
I managed to scan the newspapers in a newsagent in Foster, Victoria, which is just out of Wilson's Promontory, today. I saw that big industry is saying that the Rudd Government needs to take time to get climate change right. So says the Australian Financial Review, and it adds that any missteps at Bali could pitch Australia into a significant slowdown and create a governance crisis against a backdrop of rising global insecurity.
Dyson
The AFR does recognize that Australia faces severe environmental and social impacts if world leaders fail to adequately manage the task of bringing down polluting emissions. The implication is that "business as usual" is not longer an option.
Surely we can move on from the debates and polemics of the past. They seem so out of date now. As does the option of free pollution permits for heavy energy intensive industries and those who want to keep the old coal fired power stations going.
Update
I see that Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics (ABARE) has come out with a a stark assessment of Australia's vulnerability to a heating planet, a key research agency has predicted that production of wheat, beef, dairy items and sugar will fall by about 10% by 2020 as temperatures rise and rainfall declines.By 2050, it warns the nation's total economic output could have been shaved by as much as 5% as key agricultural exports are slashed by between 15% and 79% — placing Australia among the nations worst affected by climate change.
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Gary,
no doubt the heavy energy interest groups will try to rort the system and the Greenhouse mafia will try and bend the politics. We wil lhear also special pleading a speical transition period for emission -intensive, trade -exposed industries.