Greens announce ambitious new emissions targets in line with Paris
The Australian Greens has formally adopted a policy to reduce Australia's greenhouse gas emissions by 75 per cent on 2005 levels by 2030 and to net zero by 2035, saying it is the only way Australia can feasibly meet its contribution to the Paris agreement goal to keep global warming to as close to 1.5 degrees as possible.
Greens leader Adam Bandt said the policy was based upon a new analysis of Australian carbon emissions showing that should Australia's current targets remain in place the nation would exceed the budget required for the Paris goal of 1.5 degrees Celsius as soon as 2027 and exceed the budget for the Paris goal of 2 degrees as soon as 2032.
Greens leader Adam Bandt formally laid out a policy for net zero emissions by 2035.Credit:Dominic Lorrimer
Describing the new targets as "Climate Emergency Targets", Mr Bandt said he hoped they would influence voters' decisions in the crucial Eden-Monaro byelection and that the party would use them to apply pressure to the major parties to set more ambitious emissions reduction targets.
"Going to the next election with anything less than a 48 per cent cut by 2030 means abandoning the Paris Agreement," said Mr Bandt. "The only pathway for climate action is to turf the government out, put Greens into balance of power and implement a Green New Deal."
Labor and the Independent MP Zali Stegall, who won Tony Abbott's seat of Warringah at the last election in a campaign that emphasised climate action, have also endorsed science-based interim targets to be met before 2050.
Opposition climate change and energy spokesman Mark Butler told the Herald and The Age, "If Labor won the last election, we would have used the so-called ratchet mechanism in the Paris agreement to lodge an increased commitment to emissions reduction".
Mr Butler said the Paris Agreement required countries to revise their plans every five years, and that they would become increasingly ambitious over time in line with the scientific advice on action required to limit warming to under 2 degrees Celsius.
"There is an expectation that's what countries will do under the agreement," Mr Butler said.
The Morrison government had said it would meet or exceed its interim Paris target, which is to reduce emissions by at least 26 per cent from 2005 by 2030. The government is expected to use carry-over credits earned under the Kyoto climate agreement, which expired in 2020.
Energy Minister Angus Taylor has said the government can comply with Paris rules by achieving net zero emissions "in the second half of the century".
Article two of the agreement locks signatories into following the "best available science" and the "highest level of ambition" to limit global warming to below two degrees and as close to 1.5 degrees as possible.
Macquarie University deputy vice-chancellor Lesley Hughes said the science showed that under the current trajectory of warming, net zero global emissions before 2050 would be required to limit the temperature rise to below two degrees.
"The emissions plan and trajectory of emissions reduction over the next decade will count more to global warming than what happens in 2040 to 2050."
The peak body for power suppliers, the heaviest-polluting Australian industry, on Thursday threw its support behind a nationwide target for "net zero" emissions by 2050.