Petro Georgiou (Kooyong, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I seek leave to speak again without closing the debate.

Leave granted.

There is dissent from the report of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Science and Innovation. Four committee members conclude:

Climate change is a natural phenomenon that has always been with us, and always will be. Whether human activities are disturbing the climate in dangerous ways has yet to be proven. It is for this reason that we strongly disagree with the absolute statements and position taken in this review regarding AGW—

anthropogenic global warming. The view is:

... most of the public statements that promote the dangerous human warming scare are made from a position of ignorance ...

There could be no clearer divergence from the committee’s view, which is:

There is now compelling evidence that human activity is changing the global climate. The majority of scientists, and the community at large, agree that global action is needed, otherwise we risk reaching a point where it is too late to reverse the damage.

Let me make my position clear. As chairman I totally affirm the committee’s conclusion that the evidence is compelling and that the link between greenhouse gas emissions from human activity and high temperatures is convincing. Equally, I affirm the right of others to dissent from this view and to believe that global warming and the human contribution to it is unsubstantiated. However, as chairman of the committee, I also have the responsibility of correcting a number of erroneous assertions made in the dissenting report. I will address three of the most substantial of these.

Firstly, the dissent says the committee ‘strays well outside its terms of reference’ by addressing whether global warming is a problem and human activities are contributing to it. This is not the case. The committee’s second term of reference specifically directs it to report on the potential environmental benefits of geosequestration. Axiomatically, this requires the committee to form a view on whether global warming is a problem and whether human activity has impacted on it. As the committee stated:

... the purpose of CCS ... is to reduce the negative impact of anthropogenic ... emissions on the environment ...

If the committee formed a view that there was no negative impact then it would have to conclude that CCS could not deliver any significant environmental benefit. As one witness bluntly put it under questioning:

... people all around the world are looking at capture and sequestration. If you did not think greenhouse was an issue, you would not be doing anything.

The dissent says that the committee did not take any evidence relating to anthropogenic global warming. This is not the case. The committee received 46 submissions. The evidence given in 94 per cent of these, 43 in number, related to anthropogenic global warming, the impact of greenhouse gases on the environment, the gases’ derivation from human action and the challenge of reducing these emissions. Only one of these submissions argued that global warming has no human cause. The evidence of all the other submissions either expressed concern about climate change, recognised it as a problem, emphasised the need for change to manage emissions or called for urgent action on the climate front. Let me quote some of the evidence tendered. The Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association’s submission stated:

The clearest environmental benefit associated with geosequestration technology relates to the technology’s potential to make a contribution to significantly lowering the greenhouse gas emissions associated with fossil fuel ...

The Australian Coal Association attested that climate change is a global problem and stated:

... the ... industry acknowledges the challenge posed by climate change and recognises the need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions ...

The CRC for Greenhouse Accounting’s evidence was:

... all remaining credible scientific argument against human-induced climate change has evaporated—

and I am sure they did not intend a pun there.

Similar evidence was raised at every one of the public hearings by every organisation that contributed to the proceedings. For instance, Mr Alex Zapantis stated in evidence:

Rio Tinto unequivocally accepts the overwhelming scientific consensus that emissions of greenhouse gases from human activities are contributing to climate change ...

Dr Tony Espie from BP United Kingdom gave evidence that:

Without significant action, global greenhouse gas emissions are now projected to more than double by 2050, predominantly due to the burning of fossil fuels.

Similarly, Greenpeace’s evidence was:

... the driving force behind developing the technology is to reduce carbon dioxide emissions into the atmosphere in an effort to reduce the impacts of human-induced climate change.

The dissenting report says that the committee used the pseudoscientific figure of more than 90 per cent certainty that human beings have affected the climate and said that it is ‘in the bureaucratic summary for policymakers, not in the actual technical reports’. This is not the case. The technical summary contained in the IPCC fourth assessment report, at page 23, says:

The standard terms used in this report to define the likelihood of an outcome or result where this can be estimated probabilistically are:

…                …                   …

Very likely         > 90% probability

The main body of the text, at chapter 9 and throughout, states:

Greenhouse gas forcing has very likely caused most of the observed warming over the last 50 years.

The observed pattern of tropospheric warming and stratospheric cooling is very likely due to the influence of anthropogenic forcing …

I could go on, but I will just concentrate on what might be a lighter note. I have to say that the dissenting report’s criticism of the committee quoting Rupert Murdoch’s comment on climate change, saying it demonstrates the one-sided nature of the report, is misplaced. Undoubtedly, politicians have different attitudes towards Mr Murdoch’s various views and at different times. In this case, however, the majority of the committee simply believed that Mr Murdoch, as a nonscientist, nicely articulated an important point. It is worth while quoting Mr Murdoch’s words that the committee found illuminating and that the dissenting report finds objectionable:

I am no scientist but … I do know how to assess a risk. Climate change poses clear catastrophic threats. We may not agree on the extent, but we certainly can’t afford the risk of inaction.

I believe that is an eminently sensible line but, no doubt, Mr Murdoch is quite capable of defending his own views.

I believe in the right of my parliamentary colleagues to dissent. If some parliamentarians want to deny that human activity is changing the globe for the worst, they have the right to do so. It is important, however, that the record be set straight regarding the committee acting within its terms of reference, having taken evidence regarding global warming and the character of the IPCC’s substantive report and technical comments. I hope that I have done this. I thank the members of the committee. I thank the secretariat for an exercise that made substantial demands on the secretariat and on the committee. I commend the report to the House.

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