What Are the Visions of Australia’s Future Reflected in Our Parties’ Policies?

When the Government released its climate change package on July 10, it was under the moniker of a “Clean Energy Future”. This is, ostensibly, a fairly clear vision for where Labor sees Australia in 2050 and beyond. However, as Fergus Green rightly points out, the package is a mish-mash of measures that don’t deliver clear policy signals to achieve this clean energy future. While this is partially a result of the multi-party committee that spawned the package, the rhetoric the Government employs is ambiguous as to precisely what sort of society they see Australia moving toward.

But where are we really going with all this? If the world follows the suggestions of science and reduces CO₂-e emissions to constrain dangerous climate change, what place is this future do our parties foresee?

There are five basic possibilities, relating to our emissions levels relative to our global entitlement and how we approach any excess/shortfall:

1. Australia emits less than its global entitlement of CO₂-e, and exports its remainder.⁽¹⁾
2. As above, but we don’t export the remainder.
3. Australia emits at or about its share of CO₂-e – a balanced carbon budget, if you like.
4. Australia emits more than its global share of CO₂-e, and offsets the difference by importing allowances/offsets from other countries.
5. As above, but we don’t import (enough) to cover our excess emissions.

Note that these are possibilities for some stabilised-emissions future (2050 and beyond), without defining the transition path there-to.

Both the approach to calculating Australia’s right to CO₂-e emissions and the position vis-à-vis offsetting domestic emissions internationally are predominantly moral decisions, even if they are underpinned by science, economics, law, and so on.

Following the argument that each person should have an equal right to the use of the global environment, which seems a sensible and equitable approach, Australia’s entitlement to emit CO₂-e should be based our share of the global population. (Perhaps a little less, if you take our disproportionate historical use of the atmosphere into consideration.)

The 2011 Garnaut Review estimated that global per capita emissions would need to fall to less than two tonnes of CO₂-e per year to stop CO₂-e concentrations rising altogether, with even lower levels required to reduce concentrations. One to two tonnes of CO₂-e per person per year seems a ballpark figure for our entitlement, then.

Offsetting domestic emissions internationally should, scientifically, be a non-issue: if the processes are of equal quality, arguing about whether Australian emissions should be offset by projects in Australia or Borneo is equivalent to arguing over offsetting in Queensland versus Tasmania; the climate responds equally well to both. And while the processes to offset emissions in Australia and Borneo are not of the same quality, we can restrict the import of foreign offsets to those that meet the relevant standards of additionality, verifiability, and so forth. This would be little different, in principle, to Australia’s importing of foodstuffs or consumer goods only from foreign companies certified to have a certain quality standard of production.

Where quality is equal, it would seem most efficient to choose the lowest cost abatement, which will probably not be in Australia. Investing in higher-cost domestic options, however, could establish new industries that prove more efficient in the long run, similar to the way Germany is fostering its solar and wind power industries. While Australia will end up importing some of our future offset and abatement technology – we simply aren’t large enough to develop everything ourselves –, a strong local market might have kept talents such as Dr. Zhongreng Shi or David Mills in Australia rather than watch them found their solar PV companies in China and the USA, respectively.

There are also the arguments that Australia should not achieve its entire net emissions reduction by shifting the work overseas. One argument involves equity: if foreign offsets are sold through intermediaries, is the money going to the end producers or the intermediaries? If it’s the intermediaries, would we prefer the money went to Australians, instead?  Another argument is that countries have an ethical responsibility to abate their own emissions (PDF). Such arguments for domestic abatement are broadly accepted (see Article 6(d) of the Kyoto Protocol, for example), though to varying degrees.

So: how do the climate policies of Australia’s political parties fit into the above framework?

Vision 1 – Low Emissions, Exporting Surplus

This is the vision of The Greens, and the clearest of the major parties. A goal of The Greens’ climate change policy is “to achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions as soon as is feasible and by no later than 2050”. Emitting zero is obviously less than our entitlement, which leaves the question of trading our surplus allowances/abatement. Since The Greens are comfortable with the MPCCC proposal of importing up to 50% of permits required under the ETS – though only, they stress, permits of the highest quality that do not replace serious domestic action –, they would presumably also be comfortable exporting any surplus we might have. (Assuming, of course, that our own abatement is of the highest quality!)

Part of The Greens’ vision is a low-impact lifestyle: less energy use, less driving, less flying, more public transport use, less logging, etc. Such lifestyle change might not be absolutely necessary to reach a low-emissions scenario, but it would certainly be more difficult without it.

Vision 2 – Low Emissions, Not Exporting Surplus

While a part of the environmental movement (and The Greens) might be against Australia enabling the emissions of other countries – similar to current calls to stop fossil fuel exports –, this scenario is unrealistic. It would require explicitly rejecting a potentially quite large revenue stream, which Australian businesses are famously vociferous opposed to, and a significant change in public attitudes toward actions that might be primarily symbolic.

In particular, if Australia achieves low net emissions via plentiful offset generation rather than low gross emissions, it would be radical to ban the generating companies from selling their offsets overseas. To a certain extent, this vision seeks to impose a lifestyle choice upon other countries by limiting their options – such a vision is not always wrong (most people would be happy limiting certain countries’ access to nuclear weapons, for example), but it is controversial.

Vision 3 – Medium Emissions, Balanced Over Cycle

The use of the term “balanced” here is deliberate: this future sees Australia emitting at or about its share of global CO₂-e emissions, trading allowances as and when economic or natural fluctuations require us to, but striving to maintain a roughly equal quantity of CO₂-e imports and exports over time. Unlike other budgets, however, there is no pressing need that this one sum to zero over time; that would purely be a matter of preference.

Vision 4 – High Emissions, With Imported Offsets/Allowances

This is the ALP’s position – probably. It’s difficult to tell. Labor’s rhetoric has been about cutting pollution, supporting jobs, remaining competitive, increasing efficiency, and moving toward clean energy. These are all laudable goals, but jobs and competition have little to do with the climate and it’s unclear how clean the ALP’s energy future is, exactly. The Government’s long-term target of 80% reduction of CO₂-e emissions versus 2000 levels by 2050 is one of the more concrete figures, but will still almost certainly lead to a future Australia that emits more than its global share.

Climate protection is not part of Labor’s core ideals. Though it’s not said so explicitly, implicit in the ALP’s rhetoric about maintaining our standard of living and its stance toward imported emissions (80% of required permits allowed under the CPRS; 50% under the current proposal) is a vision of an Australia that uses its wealth to pay other (poorer) nations to offset higher domestic consumption of CO₂-e. Labor might be interested fuelling our current consumption model differently, but it’s not particularly interested in changing the style in which we live as The Greens are; the choice is for “cheaper, rather than deeper” action, to borrow a phrase.

Vision 5 – High Emissions, Without Imports

It seems harsh to ascribe this vision to the entirety of the Liberal and National parties, as it is certainly not shared by all their members. Under the current leadership, however, this is the Coalition’s vision. Its direct action plan is nonsense and won’t achieve 5% emissions reductions by 2020 under the proposed spending cap, while Liberal policy documents don’t even include a target for 2050 or beyond.

Though a theoretical commitment to 100% domestic action sounds very responsible, Tony Abbott’s tendency to frame his public opinion on climate change based largely on the views of his audience at the time (contravening common sense, his own history, and physics along the way) makes the idea that he has an underlying commitment to significant action roughly as likely as Alan Jones having an underlying commitment to fair and balanced reporting.

Between the, let’s call it ‘intellectual flexibility’ of Tony Abbott and his Shadow Minister for Climate Action, Greg Hunt, so long as no Australian is monetarily worse off – never mind the environmental costs, or the rest of the world – it seems the L/NP vision is to plant some fig trees for their metaphorical leaves and let someone else sort out the problem.

The examples here are not definitive of each category. Malcolm Turnbull’s vision, for example, sees lower emissions than Tony Abbot’s and could share a category with The Greens or the ALP, but differs from theirs in its greater emphasis on carbon capture and storage technologies, as well as a more explicit recognition of the need to manage risk and uncertainty. Similarly, Paul Frijters’ “Give up, or hope for a technological miracle” stance would fall into the same category as the Coaltion vision, though he expressly rejects their direct action policy. (And the ALP’s policy, too, to be fair.)

Which type of future you prefer is entirely your choice. But don’t kid yourself: the Coalition (under Abbott) aren’t really interested in a low-carbon economy; the ALP would like a low-carbon economy, but only where it’s not too difficult; and the Greens sincerely want a zero-carbon economy, but will want to change your lifestyle to achieve that. It’d be nice if they said it – but most voters only want so much honesty from their politicians.

⁽¹⁾ This needn’t be an allowance as under a global emissions trading scheme with binding national targets and permit allocations, but could simply be a level of domestic CO₂-e offsetting in excess of the local demand that’s then traded abroad.

This post was first published by New Matilda.