I’m not convinced by your attributing the delay in Australian action to the “Green movement”. The Greens party came out with two key criticisms of the CPRS when it was proposed, namely that the targets are too low, and that the compensation to polluting industries too high.
This was basically the position of Ross Garnaut and a number of other academics at the ANU. And since then, one of the positions has been endorsed by the government with the increase in the upper target.
Given that the Greens have yet to block any legislation, I think it would be premature to be attributing blame there. Instead, lets identify the problems with the current legislation and what can be improved.

I was quite interested in your talk at the Australia-China Climate Change Forum, especially the discussion about international emissions allocations being based on a global carbon budget. It is interesting to note that the April 30, 2009, issue of Nature has some articles that suggest that a total global carbon budget is a good predictor of the likelihood of global temperature increases increasing by more than a certain level, such as 2 degrees C.

Since your talk, Australia has announced that it would agree to a 25% reduction 2020 target, but only if certain conditions are met. These include a global agreement consistent with 450 ppm; industrialised countries agree to in aggregate reduce their emissions by at least 25% of 1990 levels by 2020; and major developing countries (non Annex 1 members of the Major Economies Forum) agree to reduce their 2020 emissions by 20% below business as usual by 2020.

This raises an interesting question. Would a 25% emission reduction by Australia compared to 2000 levels be consistent with such an agreement?

Kind regards

Peter Wood

I recall these remarks from your closing comment to the public forum in Canberra.
I am glad you have shared them with the rest of the world.
I apologise that I did not have space to cover them in my summary of the conference.

I hope Australian policy-makers will note your points.
At present, the prospects for action are not so good. A modest start towards mitigation may be prevented by a sad combination of the impossibly ambitious Green movement and some people who still do not accept the need for urgent mitigation.

The US does not have Greens in Congres, but sceptics and the selfish may prevent legislative action in the US Congress.

An announcement by the Chinese Government indicating willingness to open negotiations carbon budgets for all major emitters in 2010 , within a framework to be agreed in Copenhagen, would be extremely valuable to avoid a global disappointment followed by climate disasters.

Best wishes,

Andrew Elek