Christine Milne (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I want to ask the minister: what is the Australian government’s policy position on the appropriate level for atmospheric concentration of CO by 2100? I have asked the minister this before, and he has never given me an answer. I would really like to know because, in the absence of a greenhouse trigger, which he is not going to support, and in the absence of a national target other than our Kyoto target, which everybody agrees is inadequate, I think we need to know what the government’s position is in relation to the appropriate level for the atmospheric concentration of CO by 2100.

The British government made a judgement about this. It decided that it had to go for something significantly less than 550 parts per million because at that level of concentration you would get more than two degrees of warming, which everybody agrees—I think there is now a consensus—is dangerous climate change. I was rather horrified to see today in the report brought out in a collaboration between ABARE and the CSIRO, The heat is on: the future of energy in Australia, that their base level scenario is looking at 575 parts per million by 2100. That is more than two degrees of warming. That is the Barrier Reef dead. As I said last week, I think it is already too late for coral reefs around the world; they have passed the threshold of dangerous climate change.

I think the Australian people and the community need to know what decision the government has made about what level of concentration of CO in the atmosphere it believes is appropriate. If you say you want to stabilise greenhouse gases in such a way that you get less than two degrees of warming then that means that you are accepting a policy position of substantial cuts by 2050—more than 60 per cent. The figure of 60 per cent was an original estimate by the Blair government. The science is now coming in showing that global warming is accelerating at a faster rate, and people are now looking at upping that figure. There are calls for policy positions that take us to substantially more than that. The Greens have moved for a policy position of an 80 per cent reduction on 1990 levels by 2015. I would like to know what level of atmospheric concentration the government has decided is the level it intends to aim for and produce policies to deliver.