Post by Michael Wilbur-Ham on Jul 30, 2013 11:28:18 GMT 10
What is Labor's target for Australia's 2020 carbon emissions?
I'm sure that most would answer a cut of 5%.
But for those who wish to fairly compare our domestic actions with other first world economies the real figure is an increase of 43%.
This report from the Department of Industry, Innovation, Climate Change, etc - climatechange.gov.au/reducing-carbon/reducing-australias-emissions/australias-emissions-projections - contains a massive story which I don't believe has yet been picked up by the media.
[23-3-17: I've just found that the links in this post no longer work - the Australian Government has either moved this content or no longer provides it on-line. I do have a copy somewhere on my home computer, and I may find a way to put this up one day.]
As well as our first world economy (Energy, Industrial processes, Agriculture and Waste) Australia has a third world economy of massive deforestation (land clearing). What Howard, Rudd and Gillard have done is hide a 43% increase in domestic emissions by our first world economy by a significant decline in land clearing.
I suspect that no other western country 'benefits' nearly as much from the inclusion of deforestation in their analysis of how they are acting on climate change. In fact in 1997's Kyoto agreements forestry and deforestation was only included at the very last minute on the insistence of Australia.
As it is only fair to compare the cut or rise in emissions from the same base year, and all other countries use 1990 as the base year, the 43% increase figure is from 1990 to 2020.
The 43% figure is based on what we are doing within Australia - and so our 100 Mt CO2-e of abatement from overseas (our buying of cheap permits from the EU) is also not included.
I don't think that the authors of this government report tried to hide what was happening. In fact figure 6 was created to draw our attention to this fact: see climatechange.gov.au/sites/climatechange/files/files/climate-change/projections/aep-data.xlsx and select figure 6 at the bottom of the spreadsheet.
This graph makes it very obvious that when forestry and deforestation (here called LULUCF - land use, land-use change and forestry) is excluded that domestic emissions just rise and rise.
When we exclude forestry and deforestation our 1990 domestic emissions were 416.16 Mt and the 2020 forecast for domestic emissions is 594.78 - this is an increase of 42.9%
This report makes clear that we have been deceived by both Liberal and Labor, and our compliant media (ABC, Fairfax and of course Murdoch) have not questioned the political spin and kept us in the dark. Even most articles on The Conversation hide what is really happening.
A more detailed breakdown what is really happening - How -5% becomes +43%
The figures I quote below are all taken from the data in the graphs in the paper - climatechange.gov.au/sites/climatechange/files/files/climate-change/projections/aep-data.xlsx
The 5% cut comes from our emissions being 565.49 Mt CO2-e in 2000 and the target being set for 537.21 Mt in 2020 - a cut of 5.0%.
1 - 1990 is the internationally accepted base year:
Whenever we hear emission increase or decrease figures or targets about other countries these figures are from 1990. This is the base year agreed at Kyoto.
So when we read that the EU is aiming to cut emissions by 20% by 2020 it is misleading to compare this to Australia's 5% cut because the EU is a cut from 1990 levels whilst Australia is a cut from 2000 levels.
So the first thing to do to fairly compare Australia with other western countries is to set our base year to 1990.
Our emissions in 1990 were 549.54 Mt so our 2020 target is to cut our 1990 emissions by only 2.24%.
2 - Let's look at only what is achieved within Australia.
The Australian government report forecasts that carbon pricing is expected to lead to a 55 Mt reduction in emissions domestically compared with no carbon pricing, but that to meet the 5% cut on 2000 levels by 2020 we will have to have 100 Mt abatement from overseas (mainly from buying permits from the EU).
Rudd's intention to move to an ETS a year earlier which will be connected to the EU ETS means that I suspect that if anything we will buy more permits from the EU and thus do less to cut our domestic emissions than predicted in this paper. But keeping with the figures in the paper, Australia's domestic emissions in 2020 are forecast to be 637.41 Mt.
So Labor expect our total domestic emissions from 1990 to increase by 16.0%
3 - The Australia Clause - Our deplorable land clearing history is used to hide what is happening in our first world economy.
The purpose of the first Kyoto protocol was for the western world, which at that time had emitted most of the carbon and was rich enough to take action, to set an example. Thus it was very important to try to get all the western countries on board.
The Howard government did not believe in climate change, and whilst most western countries were agreeing to cuts their emissions the Howard government argued that Australia 'was different' and we should be allowed to increase our emissions by 8.0%. This was agreed.
Because this was a deal between western countries, forestry and deforestation was not included in the calculations.
But just before the Kyoto meeting ended, someone in the Australian government noticed what had happened with our land clearing, and at the last minute Australia pushed to amend the agreement to include forestry and deforestation. This was called the Australia Clause, and as everyone wanted the Kyoto protocol passed, Australia got its way.
As we know, despite all of these wins by Australia, the Howard government refused to sign the protocol.
So why is this important?
In 1990 there was massive land clearing, mainly in Queensland. In 1990 our forestry and deforestation emission were 92.69 Mt which was 16.9% of our total emissions.
But by 1997, at the time of the Kyoto meeting, our land clearing had already reduced significantly and was then only 72.5 Mt, and even without any wish to act on climate change our rate of land clearing was expected to continue to fall.
The current forecast for 2020 is that forestry and deforestation will 'only' emit 42.63 Mt.
The inclusion of the Australia Clause in the Kyoto agreement has allowed Australia to hide it's huge increase in emissions from the first world part of our economy (energy, industry, farming) by our appalling behaviour of massive land clearing which is usually the bad practice of a second or third world country.
It is great that land clearing is being reduced so significantly, but I don't think our energy sector and industry should be allowed to increase their emissions to make up for it. No other western country (that I know of) is significantly benefiting from changes to land clearing practices.
So, if we want to know what Australian energy companies, industry and farming are doing with emissions we need to exclude forestry and deforestation from our figures.
Figure 6 in the Excel table makes this very explicit - you can see that when forestry and deforestation (here called LULUCF - land use, land-use change and forestry) is excluded that domestic emissions just rise and rise. I believe that this was the department making this point very clear in the hope that someone would pick up on it.
So when we exclude forestry and deforestation our 1990 emissions were 416.16 Mt and our forecast 2020 domestic emissions are 594.78 - this is an increase of 42.9%
Conclusion:
I think Australia has a double duty to take action to prevent climate change.
Of course we should have stopped most land clearing as soon as we could (and we should reduce this even further than forecast - it is still 7.2% of our forecast emissions for 2020).
But as a developed country I believe that we also have a moral duty for our energy suppliers, our industry, and our farmers to contribute to emission reductions as much as is being done in all other western countries.
That our energy sector, industry and farmers are rapidly increasing their emissions as the rest of the world acts to reduce emissions is a national disgrace - and just like the shock of finding out what happened at Manus Island I believe that many Australians will be shocked to learn the truth behind Labor's emissions plans.
Some will argue that 100 Mt from abatement from overseas is fine - but I believe that the people have a right to know that rather than cutting our emissions at home we are mainly buying cheap permits from the EU and thus our domestic emissions are increasing by 16.0%.
Some will argue that including land clearing is fair or a clever strategy - but I believe that the people have a right to know how our changes to land clearing have been used to hide a massive increase in emissions by the first world part of our economy.
Though this post criticises Labor the 'Australia Clause' deception was invented by the Liberals. So the Liberals are as much to blame for this deception as Labor.
I'm sure that most would answer a cut of 5%.
But for those who wish to fairly compare our domestic actions with other first world economies the real figure is an increase of 43%.
This report from the Department of Industry, Innovation, Climate Change, etc - climatechange.gov.au/reducing-carbon/reducing-australias-emissions/australias-emissions-projections - contains a massive story which I don't believe has yet been picked up by the media.
[23-3-17: I've just found that the links in this post no longer work - the Australian Government has either moved this content or no longer provides it on-line. I do have a copy somewhere on my home computer, and I may find a way to put this up one day.]
As well as our first world economy (Energy, Industrial processes, Agriculture and Waste) Australia has a third world economy of massive deforestation (land clearing). What Howard, Rudd and Gillard have done is hide a 43% increase in domestic emissions by our first world economy by a significant decline in land clearing.
I suspect that no other western country 'benefits' nearly as much from the inclusion of deforestation in their analysis of how they are acting on climate change. In fact in 1997's Kyoto agreements forestry and deforestation was only included at the very last minute on the insistence of Australia.
As it is only fair to compare the cut or rise in emissions from the same base year, and all other countries use 1990 as the base year, the 43% increase figure is from 1990 to 2020.
The 43% figure is based on what we are doing within Australia - and so our 100 Mt CO2-e of abatement from overseas (our buying of cheap permits from the EU) is also not included.
I don't think that the authors of this government report tried to hide what was happening. In fact figure 6 was created to draw our attention to this fact: see climatechange.gov.au/sites/climatechange/files/files/climate-change/projections/aep-data.xlsx and select figure 6 at the bottom of the spreadsheet.
This graph makes it very obvious that when forestry and deforestation (here called LULUCF - land use, land-use change and forestry) is excluded that domestic emissions just rise and rise.
When we exclude forestry and deforestation our 1990 domestic emissions were 416.16 Mt and the 2020 forecast for domestic emissions is 594.78 - this is an increase of 42.9%
This report makes clear that we have been deceived by both Liberal and Labor, and our compliant media (ABC, Fairfax and of course Murdoch) have not questioned the political spin and kept us in the dark. Even most articles on The Conversation hide what is really happening.
A more detailed breakdown what is really happening - How -5% becomes +43%
The figures I quote below are all taken from the data in the graphs in the paper - climatechange.gov.au/sites/climatechange/files/files/climate-change/projections/aep-data.xlsx
The 5% cut comes from our emissions being 565.49 Mt CO2-e in 2000 and the target being set for 537.21 Mt in 2020 - a cut of 5.0%.
1 - 1990 is the internationally accepted base year:
Whenever we hear emission increase or decrease figures or targets about other countries these figures are from 1990. This is the base year agreed at Kyoto.
So when we read that the EU is aiming to cut emissions by 20% by 2020 it is misleading to compare this to Australia's 5% cut because the EU is a cut from 1990 levels whilst Australia is a cut from 2000 levels.
So the first thing to do to fairly compare Australia with other western countries is to set our base year to 1990.
Our emissions in 1990 were 549.54 Mt so our 2020 target is to cut our 1990 emissions by only 2.24%.
2 - Let's look at only what is achieved within Australia.
The Australian government report forecasts that carbon pricing is expected to lead to a 55 Mt reduction in emissions domestically compared with no carbon pricing, but that to meet the 5% cut on 2000 levels by 2020 we will have to have 100 Mt abatement from overseas (mainly from buying permits from the EU).
Rudd's intention to move to an ETS a year earlier which will be connected to the EU ETS means that I suspect that if anything we will buy more permits from the EU and thus do less to cut our domestic emissions than predicted in this paper. But keeping with the figures in the paper, Australia's domestic emissions in 2020 are forecast to be 637.41 Mt.
So Labor expect our total domestic emissions from 1990 to increase by 16.0%
3 - The Australia Clause - Our deplorable land clearing history is used to hide what is happening in our first world economy.
The purpose of the first Kyoto protocol was for the western world, which at that time had emitted most of the carbon and was rich enough to take action, to set an example. Thus it was very important to try to get all the western countries on board.
The Howard government did not believe in climate change, and whilst most western countries were agreeing to cuts their emissions the Howard government argued that Australia 'was different' and we should be allowed to increase our emissions by 8.0%. This was agreed.
Because this was a deal between western countries, forestry and deforestation was not included in the calculations.
But just before the Kyoto meeting ended, someone in the Australian government noticed what had happened with our land clearing, and at the last minute Australia pushed to amend the agreement to include forestry and deforestation. This was called the Australia Clause, and as everyone wanted the Kyoto protocol passed, Australia got its way.
As we know, despite all of these wins by Australia, the Howard government refused to sign the protocol.
So why is this important?
In 1990 there was massive land clearing, mainly in Queensland. In 1990 our forestry and deforestation emission were 92.69 Mt which was 16.9% of our total emissions.
But by 1997, at the time of the Kyoto meeting, our land clearing had already reduced significantly and was then only 72.5 Mt, and even without any wish to act on climate change our rate of land clearing was expected to continue to fall.
The current forecast for 2020 is that forestry and deforestation will 'only' emit 42.63 Mt.
The inclusion of the Australia Clause in the Kyoto agreement has allowed Australia to hide it's huge increase in emissions from the first world part of our economy (energy, industry, farming) by our appalling behaviour of massive land clearing which is usually the bad practice of a second or third world country.
It is great that land clearing is being reduced so significantly, but I don't think our energy sector and industry should be allowed to increase their emissions to make up for it. No other western country (that I know of) is significantly benefiting from changes to land clearing practices.
So, if we want to know what Australian energy companies, industry and farming are doing with emissions we need to exclude forestry and deforestation from our figures.
Figure 6 in the Excel table makes this very explicit - you can see that when forestry and deforestation (here called LULUCF - land use, land-use change and forestry) is excluded that domestic emissions just rise and rise. I believe that this was the department making this point very clear in the hope that someone would pick up on it.
So when we exclude forestry and deforestation our 1990 emissions were 416.16 Mt and our forecast 2020 domestic emissions are 594.78 - this is an increase of 42.9%
Conclusion:
I think Australia has a double duty to take action to prevent climate change.
Of course we should have stopped most land clearing as soon as we could (and we should reduce this even further than forecast - it is still 7.2% of our forecast emissions for 2020).
But as a developed country I believe that we also have a moral duty for our energy suppliers, our industry, and our farmers to contribute to emission reductions as much as is being done in all other western countries.
That our energy sector, industry and farmers are rapidly increasing their emissions as the rest of the world acts to reduce emissions is a national disgrace - and just like the shock of finding out what happened at Manus Island I believe that many Australians will be shocked to learn the truth behind Labor's emissions plans.
Some will argue that 100 Mt from abatement from overseas is fine - but I believe that the people have a right to know that rather than cutting our emissions at home we are mainly buying cheap permits from the EU and thus our domestic emissions are increasing by 16.0%.
Some will argue that including land clearing is fair or a clever strategy - but I believe that the people have a right to know how our changes to land clearing have been used to hide a massive increase in emissions by the first world part of our economy.
Though this post criticises Labor the 'Australia Clause' deception was invented by the Liberals. So the Liberals are as much to blame for this deception as Labor.