Greg Hunt (Flinders, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Climate Change, Environment and Water) Share this | Hansard source

In rising to support the Offshore Petroleum and Greenhouse Gas Storage Legislation Amendment Bill 2009, I want to put the bill into context. It is a part of the process of ensuring that we move Australia and, more importantly still, the world’s energy generation sources to a low or zero carbon emissions base. That is the goal, that is the objective, that is the responsibility, and that is what will occur. The only debate is around the time frame, but that outcome will occur over the course of the next half century—be in no doubt. The task is to do it in a way which is most effective with regard to environmental outcomes, and most efficient with regard to the costs imposed on our society and on other societies. The task is also to do it in a way which means that no one generation or no one country or society bears a disproportionate load. That is the context.

In addressing this bill, I want to proceed in four steps: firstly, to look at the great global challenge; secondly, to address the challenge we face and our response as we move towards a clean energy sector; thirdly, to deal with some of the impediments; and, fourthly, to deal with this particular bill’s contribution.

The global challenge is simple to understand. At this moment, at this point of history, what we see is 40 billion tonnes of CO2 or equivalent gases being put into the atmosphere every year. That figure is on the increase as China and India grow and add 800 new coal or gas fired power stations over the next five years. That is the grand historic moment which we face at present. The goal and objective, which we have sought for over two centuries, of seeing the eradication of poverty and the development of developing societies is part of that process. It is the grand historic paradox: as people come out of poverty, they consume more electricity and energy and, as they do this, they create CO2 emissions. That is, sadly, the great paradox of history, which brings us to this tragedy of the commons. And that is the issue which has been part of the great work of my life—coming back from a thesis in 1990 on the different approaches to reducing carbon emissions, whether it was a carbon tax or an emissions trading scheme. That has been part of the work of my life, and I have been happy to place my political career on hold along the way in order to make the case publicly.

Having said that, with this great challenge of 40 billion tonnes of CO2, with this great challenge of 800 new coal and gas fired power stations, with Australia’s responsibility at present being about 1.4 per cent—or 560 million tonnes—of CO2 per annum out of a total of 40 billion tonnes, we then say, ‘How do we address this problem?’ We know that energy generation for stationary energy produces approximately half of global emissions and approximately half of Australian emissions. We also know that deforestation—primarily driven out of the great rainforests of the world—accounts for a wedge of 8 billion tonnes, or approximately 20 per cent of global emissions.

When you look at the great historic passage over the next 50 years, we proceed in three stages. First, we can halve deforestation. We can take that 8 billion tonnes of CO2 per annum, reduce it to 4 billion tonnes, and reduce global emissions by 10 per cent through a global rainforest recovery program. That is achievable, it is desirable, and it has collateral environmental and biodiversity benefits of an enormous scale. That can be achieved over the next five years. The United States, to their credit, has picked up the proposal of a global rainforest recovery program, which we had in government, for which Malcolm Turnbull, Alexander Downer and I announced a $200 million program, and which we pursued. We did it after discussions with Tim Flannery—and I pay credit to Tim Flannery for coming to us with that program, which was announced in early 2007.

Having said that, the second great stage is the cleaning up of our global energy sources, and the third great stage is the cleaning up of our transportation fuels. These are all opportunities which we can pursue over the coming half century. The staging is not absolute, there will be overlaps, we can do the immediate work with the Rainforest Recovery Program, this bill deals with part 2, the clarification, cleaning up and improvement of our energy sources, the transition to a clean energy economy.

That then brings me to part 2, this notion of the clean energy economy, and there are really three elements to this concept alone. Firstly, there is the adoption of renewable energy, secondly, there is the transition to gas as a major fossil fuel base and, thirdly, there is the cleanup of coal fired power. Carbon capture and storage—which is underpinned by this bill, which amends work which we did whilst in government—is fundamental to the process of cleaning up our coal and our gas fired reserves. I say this because we can see that with a full carbon capture and storage program combined with drying and gasification, instead of about 1.2 or 1.3 kilograms of CO2 per kilowatt hour of energy, or 1.2 or 1.3 tons of CO2 or equivalent gases for each megawatt hour of energy generated from brown coal we can achieve about 0.1 or 0.2 tonnes per megawatt hour or, in other words, we can have an 80 to 90 per cent reduction in emissions. That is profound, that is a profound change.

Similarly, if we do that with gas we are looking again at 0.1 or 0.2 tonnes per megawatt hour. Again, we are looking at a sea-change in emissions. That is the great change for Australia along with the process of biosequestration of soil carbons, of bio-char, of mallee and mulga revegetation—which Garnaut himself talks about as having a potential for 800 million tonnes of additional capture per annum against Australia’s current 560 million tonnes—in other words, the potential for Australia to be a net carbon sink.

We must clean up our energy because if we can do that in Australia we can take that technology to China and India, because it does not matter if we close down Australia if we do not deal with these great sources of China and India, which are multiplying in their emissions as they go through this historic development path, then we will not solve the global problem; there is no question about that. It is, for me, part of my life’s work to help address this issue. So that is I why I believe in the importance of carbon capture and storage.

The member for Werriwa raised what is happening with enhanced oil recovery around the world, he was actually quite informed and I compliment him on what he had to say in relation to that. We know that in North Dakota there is an Australian firm engaged in some of the critical work here, the precursor work towards a major enhanced oil recovery program using carbon capture and storage. We know that the North West Shelf, through the work of Chevron with Gorgon, potentially with the Pluto project, is going to be a site of one of the world’s greatest carbon capture and storage programs. We know in Algeria, with know with the Sleipner field in Norway that carbon capture and storage is underway. The technological components are not that difficult, they are however expensive and so that is the challenge that we have.

Having dealt with the second element of the clean up of energy, I want to deal with the issue in relation to some of the impediments. Recently, we have seen three setbacks. First, we have seen the abolition of the Solar Rebate Program in Australia cutting dead an $8,000 rebate on the same day, no notice, no warning, the loss of jobs, the loss of opportunity, the loss of the capacity for mums, dads and seniors to immediately access solar power.

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