Australia’s harsh reality: adapt or perish
Another interim report from Professor Ross Garnaut gave a stark ultimatum in the first comprehensive assessment of the impact on the country of climate change.
Australians must pay more for petrol, food and energy or ultimately face a rising death toll, economic loss and the eventual destruction of the Great Barrier Reef, the snowfields, Kakadu and the nation’s food bowl, the Murray-Darling Basin.
Professor Garnaut said the more forms of energy encompassed by the emission trading scheme, the lower the price rises would be. This included petrol and other transport fuels.
He said the impact on petrol prices would not be as large as that being caused by the present oil shock and argued against compensating motorists at the pump by reducing fuel excise.
He warns that, by the end of the century, taking no action would result in $425 billion being wiped each year from the economy and a reduction in wages of almost 8 per cent as well as environmental degradation.
His report recommends adopting an unconstrained emissions trading scheme from 2010 involving charging high-polluting industries such as coal-fired power stations for each tonne of carbon they emit. They would have to buy permits to emit greenhouse gases and the costs would be passed on to consumers, encouraging them to use less and driving everybody to look for cleaner energy sources.
Professor Garnaut said that while Australia alone could not have any significant impact on reducing greenhouse gas emissions, the developed countries need to move first, otherwise the polluters in the developing world are unlikely to act. He said that it would be delusional to argue for a delay based on scientific uncertainty and only cost more in the long run.
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