 | Government to Reopen South Australian Refinery? | The Oil Drum: Australia/New Zealand | The Bullroarer - Wednesday 30 January 2008 |  |
User login
Contact
- anz at theoildrum dot com
License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
Archives
GAIA Host Collective
15% by 2020 is not the 25-40% recommended by Bali. I'd also suggest starting earlier than 2011, say 2009 and including uncontracted coal and LNG exports in the cap. That is, some customers will have to make cuts as well or go elsewhere.
Even though the cuts are underwhelming at least it's a start to focus everybody's attention. No doubt some will plead for special treatment. Meanwhile other stuff is going on; for example January 2008 was the warmest/driest ever in parts of Australia and China is apparently running short of cheap coal. Personally I think fuel and water shortages will move things along faster than the wheels of government can turn.
Yep, everyone always has a really good excuse.
It's why the only real way forward is a per capita goal. So if today the global average emissions are (say) 7.5t per person, we begin with that as a goal, reducing it by (say) 0.2t/year. Every five years we reassess it, see what the latest science tells us, but if we can't agree on any changes, it just keeps dropping until it reaches 0t.
Countries over the average would pay a fine into a common fund; countries below the average would receive a proportional part of the common fund for renewable energy projects, reforestation and so on. This would encourage the heavy emissions countries to cut down, and help develop the impoverished countries.
But that would be fair, equitable, and productive. We can't have that!
Not sure I agree with a uniform personal allowance world wide. Some countries may be overpopulated, mismanaged or not have access to fossil fuels and complementary resources. Is Australia obliged to send coal to Bangladesh so per capita emissions even out? Or achieve the same result taking on millions of immigrants? The EU is having this problem right now setting a coal quota for Poland. An increase gives them no incentive to move to renewables later on.
Maybe a standard emissions allowance could be a long term goal of much less populous world with weaker borders. Many other rules will have to be changed eg personal water allowance, who can have kids or own a car.
The whole concept of quotas is vexed with problems which will likely prove impossible to solve to everyone's satisfaction.
I continue to believe that universal carbon taxes are the way to go - with WTO rules punishing countries which don't cooperate.
Who wants to bet on when (or if) the next round of Kyoto will be successfully concluded ?
As for rules about water allowances or number of kids - please tell me you aren't serious. Please.
Perhaps not a quota, but maybe no subsidies/tax cuts for babies!
Yes - get rid of the "baby bonus" etc - thats fine.
IIRC our birth rate is under replacement rate anyway, so if you wanted to stabilise Australia's population, the easy way to do it is to cut immigration back to the appropriate level.
And if you want to stabilise the world's population, you'd fund efforts in the developing world to improve women's education, give them access to contraception and to become economically independent - which are the most effective ways of achieving a manageable birth rate.
I've always thought that there was something strange about promoting "Australian Babies" instead of upping the immigration intake if the objective was population growth...
The other measures you mention are known to produce (or are at least correlated with)lower birth rates... and these measure are sadly resisted for that very reason, by those with other agendas/ideas.
Why would we send them coal?
We burn lots of shit, so we pay the fine. They don't burn much, so they get to draw on the funds and build renewable energy and stuff like that.
Don't be deliberately obtuse, it makes me feel like I'm talking to seppos.