Australia Still Unwilling To Start Even Domestic Carbon-Trading System

[hatrack]

EDIT

Countries committed to Kyoto caps can reduce emissions through energy efficiency and a switch to cleaner power sources at home, by investing in emissions-reducing projects overseas, or through buying carbon credits on an emerging traded market which the IEA predicts may be valued at $27.5 billion by 2010.

The European Union has capped emissions for energy intensive industrial sectors and the cost of credits has surged this year as heavy emitters such as the power sector rush to comply with the mandatory limits imposed on them by governments.

Australian business is already feeling the Kyoto effect, with analysts estimating clean-energy companies are receiving a share price boost due to the theoretical value of any future credit scheme. A number of emissions-intensive power and mining projects have been shelved because of potential future liabilities. "Doing nothing is very risky," said Sean Lucy, partner and climate change specialist at legal firm Phillips Fox.

"Things will move quickly and we could be locked into a reactive position or find ourselves unable to influence the rules as an enabling framework is established internationally for least-cost emissions," he told the conference. Australian states operate their own voluntary emissions reduction schemes, but the federal government's stance means it could miss out on what Lucy sees as an opportunity to prepare the economy for joining a "near-inevitable global market". (US$1=A$1.33)

EDIT/END

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/32996/story.htm