Details here at news.com.au
Meanwhile, let’s all sleep in tomorrow.
INTRODUCTION of the Federal Government’s emissions trading scheme has been delayed until mid-2011, 12 months later than originally planned.
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd made the announcement in Canberra today, saying the Government had also decided to increase the upper limit of its carbon reduction target range to 25 per cent of 2000 emission levels by 2020.
The Government had planned to introduce the scheme in July 2010 despite opposition from business, green groups and the Coalition.
Legislation setting up the scheme was due to be introduced to Parliament next month.
The announcement follows a decision by the Australian Greens to compromise and lower their demand for a 40 per cut in carbon emissions to 25 per cent.
Mr Rudd said the “significant” changes to the scheme were made because of three factors: the impact of the global financial crisis on the Australian economy; the need to provide a strong outcome at the Copenhagen (climate) meeting at the end of the year; and third, because it was in Australia’s fundamental national interest to provide “business certainty and investment certainty for the future”.
A one-year fixed price period will be introduced – permits will cost $10 per tonne of carbon in 2011-12 – with the transition to full market trading to begin on July 1, 2012.
“This, we believe, represents an appropriate response to the current uncertainty,” Mr Rudd said.
Good for the Aussies. Now if only the Obama administration will adopt a similar position and delay any climate change laws. Delay is on the side of the anti AGW side as this will allow the trend of further cooling which will completely throttle future ideas of Cap and Trade nonsense.
“F Rasmin (22:58:34) :
The latest date for the next Australian federal election is end of 2010. By then Kevin Rudd and his socialist government will be just a memory for those of us Aussies who wish to remember.”
I was not able to vote last time, so only those Aussies foolish enough to believe a politician like KRudd747. I will however be able to vote in 2010. Will I want to? I very much doubt it! I have yet to meet a politician that is worthy of my support. So far, since the days of Thatcher in the UK, I’ve seen them feather their nests at my expense. An ETS will just be another layer of feathers.
Pedro X (21:57:39) :
For our non Australians I will expand a little on this and hope you will correct me if I’m wrong.
The Senate is one of the two houses of the Australian Federal Parliament. It consists of 76 Senators, twelve from each of the six states and two from each of the mainland territories. It has virtually equal power to make laws with the other House of Parliament, the House of Representatives. It is elected by proportional representation, so that its composition closely reflects the voting pattern of the electors.
Currently the seats are held by these parties.
Australian Labor Party 32, Liberal Party of Australia 32, Australian Greens 5, National Party of Australia 4, Country Liberal 1, Family First 1, Independent 1.
The Australian Labor Party would be the equivalent of the Liberals in the US and the Liberal Party of Australia would be the equivalent the Republicans.
National Party of Australia are generally allied with the Liberals but represent the rural community (farmers). The rest are reasonably self explanatory.
Labor and the Greens can muster 37 seats and Liberal and Nationals 36.
So the balance of the house is held by the three minor parties.
With regards to the carbon dioxide tax, the liberals are weak in that they have not got across the fact that this nasty piece of legislation is a tax on everything used by the public and industry. The Nationals, led by Barnaby Joyce, are well aware of the destructive consequences this will have on all primary producers and nation wide industry. He is often the lone voice of sanity in the entire two political houses of Australia.
From Michael (23:09:43) :
“Why isn’t an Australian in charge of the world?”
Michael – it’s not all as it seems!
A brief summary:
– Kevin Rudd heads the Australian Labor Party. They are a left leaning socialist party.
– Kevin Rudd was elected on a platform of saving the environment and saving jobs from the evil John Howard (The Liberals – right leaning party).
– Kevin Rudd signs the Kyoto Protocol (to much applause) and promises to introduce an emissions trading scheme (ETS), to much fanfare.
– The ETS draft is released with a 5% reduction of 2000 levels by 2020. This is laughed at by the Greens who want a more drastic target of 40% or greater – but with no idea on how this will be achieved (!).
– The opposition party wants to block the ETS, but only on the grounds that it not be rushed through and be fully considered. (The opposition party are in favour of an ETS, however, not one that is not introduced it until 2012).
– The opposition party and the Greens party have the balance of power and can block the ETS legislation in our Senate, which gives them bargaining power – hence the 25%. So in fact, Kevin Rudd has had to bow to the Greens to get the target from 5% to 25%!!
– In the meantime, our carbon intensive industries (of which we have many) have been decrying the ETS and giving an indication of job losses. Many of the job losses are “blue-collar” (working class) jobs that Kevin Rudd vowed to protect! (As a side note, Kevin Rudds political was founded by the union movement (teamsters eqivalent) in Australia – so he’s painted himself into a corner).
Kevin Rudd is basically buying himself some time. He’s still publicly an AGW believer. He is also a populist, career politition, so he will do what ever is needed to stay in power.
Just recently Kevin Rudd said that reducing “carbon pollution” is the “biggest moral issue we face this century”. It appears that morals can be moved to fit his agenda.
Trust me, you don’t want this bunch of Australians in charge of the world. Pity us, don’t congratulate us! AGW is a big political football in this country
Andrew.
C’mon Aussie c’mon. Keep this up and you can have the ashes (in the unlikely event of a repeat of 05)
Hey! I know! Let’s ban R-744! I mean, banning R-12 worked. Why not just ban R-744 and call it a day?
Looking Pedro X and my posts, it is necessary to explain that the Federal house can pass legislation but if it is not endorsed by the senate it cannot become law.
Kevin Rudd (Prime Minister) has the majority in the House of Representatives but not in the Senate.
Michael,
If you want to put an Australian in charge of the world, I hope you are considering only kangaroos and koalas. I suppose a wombat would be OK as well, but please not an Australian politician.
Carbon trading should be a crime punishable by 200 hours of community service. Anybody that buys into this hair brained idea should be forced to redo every year of schooling they ever had starting with kindergarten and ending with 12th grade, with an emphasis on learning the fundamentals of science, math and economics.
Even if CO2 was a problem carbon trading could not possibly be the solution.
Amazing how someone could try to get money to flow by getting people to behave in exactly the same way that they are now. Charging someone for it, and then claim that it is “solving” the CO2 problem.
He gave up because he couldn’t get it through,and I don’t believe he will get 25 percent reduction through either.
Thank you Senator Xenophon for being silly enough to want more
Thank you Steve Fielding for being concerned about Aussies.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25426410-5013871,00.html
Wasted money
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24883515-5013871,00.html
And in the U.S., House Reps Waxman & Markey find themselves facing a similar dilemma — their cap-and-trade fantasy faces the reality of not only Republican opposition, but that of Democrat opposition as well from members whose districts emit CO2 (where refineries or coal-fired power stations are located). They also fear doing something that’ll get killed in the Senate. So they’ve delayed their bill — and will probably keep on delaying it until it dies in committee.
Let’s face it, despite their well deserved derision, politicians aren’t totally stupid. Faced with the prospect that voters in their district will rebel at what amounts to a major energy tax, each member will vote ‘No’ to anything that’ll hit his voters and get him kicked out of office.
MikeN (21:48:52) :
The GCMs are so hardwired with positive feedback on CO2 I doubt they ever show a decadal cooling.
As an Australian skeptic I would not call this good news. Industrialized economies rely on energy. The threat of carbon taxation has caused a serious reduction in energy investment. The resulting energy insecurity is a major contributing factor in the present economic recession. Kevin Rudd’s spineless move will only serve to make the recession longer and deeper than it need be. I personally believe the faster politicians and the media admit to the errors, mendacity and malfeasance involved in the global warming hoax, the faster economies will recover. Kevin Rudd might have a chance at the next election if he admits to the truth about global warming before then. His present weaseling and delay benefits no one.
Slightly O/T – Q. Why do surgeons find operating on politicians easy? A.They have no brains, no spine and no balls. The only two working parts are the mouth and the @ur momisugly$#hole, and those are interchangeable…
Not on Australia, but on 2050 targets, this morning in ScienceDaily (As Swiss-Canadian, I perk up on publications like that – this review, quoting the Swiss author extensively, sets all the records straight… sarc off):
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/05/090502092019.htm
“The behaviour of CO2 in the atmosphere is best described as a full bathtub,” says Reo Knutti, professor at the Institute for Atmosphere and Climate at ETH Zurich, and co-author of one of the two studies. The inflow of the bathtub is large, but the drainage is small. The CO2 emissions are increasing every year, but the CO2 is only removed from the atmosphere very slowly. To not let the bathtub overflow, the inflow must thus be stopped early enough. “It is wrong to believe that the temperature will remain constant with constant emissions,” says Knutti.”
The study represent more elaborate computer models “simulating thousands of combinations of scenarios and assumptions”
but, here is the big question: Is the basic assumption correct? Namely the long residence time of anthropogenic CO2 in the atmosphere? As someone who has worked on stable carbon isotope ratios as a bulk tracer of global carbon cycles in the early days (when each sample was purified ‘manually’ in an elaborate vacuum line and then run through a massive Mass Spec – 2 samples per hour…) I am with the short residence times observed and inferred by Segalstad, Spencer and used by Dyson (and many others).
Wonder what esteemed WUWT commentators and the experts think about these next-gen super-computer models, that support politically correct policy pathways.
Kevin Rudd said “Climate change is the great moral challenge of our generation” before the election.
But he will delay ETS until after the next election.
Is he waiting for the science to be validated, or is he just a socialist wimp?
Every age has its peculiar folly: some scheme, project, or phantasy into which it plunges, spurred on by the love of gain, the necessity of excitement, or the mere force of imitation.
—Charles Mackay,
Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, 1841
Putin must be rolling on the floor laughing at the USA’s idiocy.
The sloshed vodka and smashed glasses at Medvedev’s house is off the scale.
Western World (except Australia) shoots self in foot over idealogical fairytales of Global Warming.
Tears of hyterical laughter shake the midnight hour.
Nice USA doggie, roll over and you’ll get a carbon cookie.
Play dead, and you can get Dog Tag with Hero Al Gore on it.
You don’t have to worry about ANWR any more, Uncle Pooty will suck the oil from under the Ice Cap for you. Then Pooty will process it, pipe it over to Sarah’s place. You Betcha.
Who will fork out $$$ for Carbon Credit IPO?
You guessed it, the nations that sell the Fossil Fuels to the Fossil Fools.
David Archibald (23:35:38) :
For any WUWT readers in Melbourne on Sunday 24th May, I am presenting at a symposium at Monash University on Natural Climate Change. The symposium is being run by Professor Lance Endersbee. I am on a 3.15 pm – 44 slides in 25 minutes.
Thanks David…not withstanding a global catastrophe I will be there.
I don’t know about that, Leon. For a bunch of them in power, they really have themselves convinced that they are on a mission from Gore. A few of them woke up in the shower when the hot water heater petered out. As for the majority, Fossil Fools Day is every day.
The Australian E.T.S. (Cap and Trade_) will never see the light of day. It’s political suicide in Australia. The people vote with their back pocket – The one with their wallet in.
This ETS will be compromised again and then and put off until 2012 which will then become 2015 in which time climate hysteria will long be exposed.
KRudds government panders to the minority parties to stay in power.
The Minister of the Environment – Peter Garret is a former (and current) rock star and green activist. The Minister of climate change has been put in the unenviable position of pushing a barrow that even many members of her own government are sceptical about.
Stay tuned to our Prime Minister Mr. KRudd. There seems to be a rumor around that he is looking more than a little interested in the opposing point of view.
Australia had it’s own version of your current U.S. situation. 30 years ago. A socialist government was elected with it’s own Godlike charismatic leader. These socialists changed the social fabric of Australia and in doing so in a few short years plundered the nations wealth. This government was almost on the brink of bankruptcy when the Queens representative in Australia sacked the government.
(The U.K. Queen was and still is the head of state in Australia)
An election was held shortly after where the socialists were decimated at the ballot box.
I can see similarities where the U.S. Going down the same path as we did then. Australia is still paying for that governments incompetency.
An Australian in Charge
Cmon Guys…You know that when the chips are down no matter what Australians have said beforehand they are extremely pragmatic and get in and do what’s necessary. Rudd said what he had to to get elected and now he’s doing what he has to to stay elected.
When you have the wellbeing of 22 million people as your responsibilty it also provides some clarity to cut through ideology.
Regards
Michael
PS, where on Earth did Penny Wong come from?
Australian E.T.S. situation part II.
Prime Minister Mr KRudd is a fluent Mandarin speaker with very close ties to the Chinese administration.
Australia’s long time economic future is closely tied in with China.
Chinese investment consortium’s are moving into Australia’s vast mineral deposits and are putting up big money (no doubt ex US ) to try and acquire some of Australia’s biggest mining companies and operations. This includes interest in Australia’s massive black coal and natural gas reserves – not to mention Iron ore,copper,gold etc etc etc.
Australia’s mining companies are some of the biggest in the world.
Australia’s power generation and public transport companies are for the most part privately owned. The Chinese consortium’s are looking into moving into and buying these assets.
An ETS (Cap and Trade)will not suit China’s entrepreneurial ambitions at all.
I don’t expect to see any Climate change initiatives on the Chinese mainland in the near distant future.
On another note. Chinese car companies will be moving in to the Australian market in the next six months or so. It is expected that these imports will decimate the local car industry with their low pricing. Prices of their vehicles are expected to be 25% cheaper than the comparable vehicle from other manufacturers.
The raw materials for these cars are sourced from Australia. Their factories are for the most part powered by Australian coal and gas.
Still on the subject of Kevin Rudds Minister for the Evironment, Heritage, and the Arts Peter Garrett. In his time as a rock singer (it is not known if these antics continue in in parliament ) Wikopedia states, ‘He is known for his trademark “stiff and sudden” dance movements that resemble spastic tics in his performances and the promotional videos’.
I am stunned and appalled by the ignorance of many posters. Global warming is not a hoax. Many of you appeared to have swallowed the lies concocted by the likes of ExxonMobil (http://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&source=web&ct=res&cd=1&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.greenpeace.org%2Fusa%2Fnews%2Fexxonsecrets-2007&ei=M9z-SZnsJ5jMjAf_rZWsAw&usg=AFQjCNFvatGmrnzDKPvySyMGTiEnWYMN9Q&sig2=sE5CXxWOYLIv3-hPycOGfw). I am saddened and angry that we are still debating whether global warming is real or not and it is considered acceptable to delay anti-warming measures “for economic reasons”. Bloody hell – is the medium-term wellbeing of life on the planet not a good economic reason to do everything we can to halt global warming?
Politicians the world over can back human caused global warming because they realise that climate change real or imaginary is or can be a very very slow process indeed.