Adam Morton

 

The Guardian Australia 

Australia risks becoming an isolated laggard in addressing the Climate Crisis, without obvious allies to shelter it from rising international pressure to act, as the US takes a leadership role under President-elect Joe Biden, experts say.

    The President-elect has declared addressing the Climate Crisis “the number-one issue facing humanity” and promised $2 trillion in climate spending and policies to put the US on a path to 100% clean electricity by 2035 and net-zero emissions no later than 2050.

    Biden last week promised to rejoin the Paris Agreement (which, due to a quirk of timing, the US officially left on the day after the election) on his first day in office and has said he would “use every tool of American foreign policy to push the rest of the world” to increase their ambition to combat the problem.

    With the Democrats in the White House, every member of the G7** and the European Union will be committed to net-zero emissions by 2050. China – comfortably the world’s biggest annual emitter – says it will be carbon neutral before 2060. The Morrison government has resisted setting a specific long-term emissions goal, saying it would reach net zero “in the second half of the century”.

 

J. L. Scalzo, EPA

Joe Biden says he

would “use every 

tool of American 

foreign policy to 

push the rest of the

world” to combat

the problem. 

 

    Howard Bamsey, Australia’s former special envoy on the Climate Crisis, said Biden’s win demonstrated “even more clearly that the world is indeed changing” in its response to the issue. Japan and South Korea – the world’s fifth- and seventh-biggest emitters respectively and, with China, the biggest markets for Australia’s fossil fuel exports – last week set carbon neutrality targets for 2050.

    Bamsey said Biden’s election would likely affect climate action in two ways: By increasing the confidence of major investors to back clean solutions as it became even clearer the world was moving away from fossil fuels, and by “radically” transforming Climate Crisis diplomacy ahead of the major international conference in Glasgow in November, 2021.

    He said the Morrison government risked being left with no obvious allies on the issue if it continued to stand apart from increasing action and cooperation.

    “There’s no cover any longer with this,” Bamsey said. “I think in [President-elect] Joe Biden’s first conversation with Scott Morrison, or the second, the [Climate Crisis] will be mentioned. It’s been such an important part of his campaign and he clearly recognises the economic imperative for change.”

    Dean Bialek, a former Australian diplomat to the UN now working with the British government in preparing for the Glasgow conference, said much of the world was increasingly seeing climate action as an economic opportunity, rather than a burden.

    He said Australia had faced significant pressure to lift its climate commitments at the UN climate conference in Madrid last year and risked being further isolated as a climate laggard alongside only Brazil, Russia and Saudi Arabia among G20* countries if it stuck to its current position.

“the shadows that Australia has been hiding in are much smaller now”

 

    “It means that the shadows that Australia has been hiding in are much smaller now, particularly with China, Korea and Japan having moved on net zero in recent weeks,” Bialek said. “It starts to smell like a government that doesn’t care about [the Climate Crisis].”

    With most major economies now promising net-zero emissions by mid-century, it is expected attention in climate diplomacy will turn to countries increasing their commitments to act over the next decade, a period scientists have advised is crucial if countries are to live up to the commitment under the Paris Agreement to “pursue efforts” to limit global heating to 1.5ºC.

    The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change estimated hitting that mark would require about a 45% cut in global emissions below 2010 levels by 2030. With global action falling far short of that – global emissions rose slightly last year – scientists say the globe is on track for more than 3ºC of heating, a change they say would have far-reaching and catastrophic consequences.

    The Morrison government has a 2030 emissions target of 26% to 28% below the levels of 2005, having rejected a science-based recommendation by the Climate Change Authority of a reduction of between 45% and 60% over that time frame. Prior to COVID-19, national emissions had reduced just 2.2% since the Coalition was elected in 2013 and official data released last December suggested Australia would miss its 2030 target unless it used a contentious carbon accounting measure rejected by other countries.

    The Coalition has backed a “technology, not taxes” approach to the Climate Crisis, setting “stretch goals” to reduce the cost of five low-emissions technologies to make them competitive, but the goals are not tied to a time frame or an emissions reduction trajectory.

    Frank Jotzo, director of the Centre for Climate Economics and Policy at the Australian National University, said President-elect Joe Biden would be expected to announce a stronger 2030 target (the US’s current short-term goal is a cut of 26% to 28% by 2025) before the Glasgow summit, as expected under the Paris Agreement.

    While the Democrats appear only an outside chance to control the Senate – likely to be necessary if it is to pass significant national climate legislation – Jotzo said a Biden administration would be expected to re-strengthen institutions and bring back climate friendly regulations abolished under Donald Trump. A taskforce led by former secretary of state John Kerry and congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez identified 56 policy steps on climate and energy that would not need Congress support.

 

*Group of Twenty. An international forum for the governments and central bank governors from 19 countries and the European Union.

 

**Group of Seven. An international intergovernmental economic organization consisting of seven major developed countries.

 

Morton, A., (2020, November 8). Australia warned it could be isolated over climate inaction after Joe Biden victory. The Guardian Australia. Also available here https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/nov/08/australia-warned-it-could-be-isolated-over-climate-inaction-after-joe-biden-victory