16/07/2021

(AU The Guardian) Australian Government Stokes Fears That Europe’s New Carbon Levy Could Hurt Jobs

The Guardian - 

Dan Tehan criticises tariffs as ‘just a new form of protectionism’ despite Australia’s major exports being mostly spared in initial stage

The Australian trade minister, Dan Tehan, has criticised the European Union’s new carbon tariffs, saying reductions in carbon emissions will not be achieved ‘by raising barriers to trade’. Photograph: Mick Tsikas/AAP

The Morrison government has renewed fears that the European Union’s new carbon tariffs could hit Australian jobs, despite Australia’s major exports being largely spared from the first stage of the scheme.

Exports to Europe of cement, iron and steel, aluminium, fertiliser and electricity are the first to face potential costs under a new climate policy unveiled by the EU late on Wednesday night Australian time.

The carbon border adjustment mechanism will require EU-based businesses that import goods to pay a price, linked to what they would have paid if the items had been produced under the EU’s own emissions trading scheme.

EU’s green deal plans launched with ‘make-or-break decade’ warning.  Read more
The goal is to prevent “carbon leakage” – or the movement of emissions-intensive industry – to countries with less ambitious climate policies.

The policy also aims to encourage producers globally to reduce their emissions and for countries to adopt greener policies.

Deductions will be offered to importers if the non-EU producers can show they have already paid a carbon price for the production of the goods in another country – but the Abbott government repealed Australia’s own carbon pricing scheme in 2014.

The Australian trade minister, Dan Tehan, said the government would seek to understand the full impact on Australia’s trade and economy, but argued it was important to “incentivise not penalise when it comes to emission reductions”.

“Australia is very concerned that the EU’s carbon border adjustment mechanism is just a new form of protectionism that will undermine global free trade and impact Australian exporters and jobs,” Tehan said from Japan, the latest stop in a two-week trade mission.

Trade figures show Australia exported $11.7bn worth of goods to EU countries in the 2019-20 financial year, with major exports including coal ($2.7bn), gold coin ($689m) and gold ($409m).

Australia is not listed in the top-10 exporters in the sectors initially covered by the carbon border adjustment mechanism. China, Russia, Turkey and the United Kingdom are the top exporters of iron and steel to the EU.

Analysts said the policy would affect Australia directly, as it exported a small amount of iron to the EU, but also indirectly as Australia provides goods along the supply chain like alumina to Mozambique which is smelted and exported as aluminium to the EU.

“The Australian government claims that its approach to climate is dictated by technology not taxes,” Richie Merzian, the director of the climate and energy program at the Australia Institute, said.

“It’s clear now that the taxes on Australian high-polluting goods are coming and the revenue will be collected and invested into our trade competitors.”

The EU has left the door to expanding the scheme to other sectors in future. There are also concerns in the Australian government that other countries, including the UK, the United States and Japan, may also consider similar policies.

In a sign of action in the US, Democrats agreed on Wednesday to include a “polluter import fee” in a sweeping $3.5tn budget plan. The New York Times reported the Democrats’ proposal would target nations that lacked aggressive climate change policies, but it faces a number of political and procedural obstacles before it becomes a reality.

The EU plans to phase in its scheme, with businesses facing monitoring and reporting obligations from 2023 to 2025, before paying from 2026 onwards.

Cash for carbon offsets heading offshore due to Australian climate policy uncertainty.  Read more
Climate has been raised as an issue during ongoing negotiations between Australia and the EU on a free trade agreement.

Guardian Australia understands Australia has raised questions about the operation of the carbon border adjustment scheme during those talks.

The EU has repeatedly said it would design the scheme to comply with World Trade Organization rules. Prior to the announcement of the details on Wednesday, analysts in Australia had offered differing estimates about the costs facing Australian businesses.

Tehan said the government was now analysing the legislation to fully understand whether it was consistent with the EU’s WTO obligations.

He said reductions in carbon emissions would not be achieved “by raising barriers to trade”.

Instead, Tehan said, reductions would be achieved by “lowering the cost, and accelerating the uptake, of green technology globally, particularly in developing countries”.

A senior German government official has previously dismissed claims from Tehan and Australia’s emissions reduction minister, Angus Taylor, that carbon border charges could become a new form of protectionism.

Two Liberal MPs urge Morrison to set 2050 net zero target before UN climate conference.  Read more
The Australian government has faced mounting international pressure to lift its emission reduction commitments, including from the US and the UK, but the Nationals have been campaigning against a firm commitment to net zero emissions by 2050.

The EU ambassador in Canberra, Michael Pulch, said in February that Europe wished to see all of its partner countries head in the direction of net zero by 2050. All countries should also consider upgrading their 2030 targets, he said, as part of “a more ambitious climate objective”.

The Australian prime minister, Scott Morrison, said he wants to achieve net zero as soon as possible but preferably by 2050. Two Liberal backbenchers on Wednesday called on Morrison to set the firm 2050 target before the Glasgow climate conference and to restore funding and advisory powers to the Climate Change Authority. 

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(Common Dreams) 'Biggest Story In The World Right Now': Humanity Has Flipped Amazon From Carbon Sink To Source

Common Dreams - Jessica Corbett

The findings, said one expert, "show that the uncertain future is happening now."

Even with a decree banning fires, flames and clouds of smoke were seen near the city of Novo Progresso, in southern Pará, Brazil, on August 15, 2020. (Photo: Ernesto Carriço/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

Following years of warnings and mounting fears among scientists, "terrifying" research revealed Wednesday that climate change and deforestation have turned parts of the Amazon basin, a crucial "sink," into a source of planet-heating carbon dioxide.

Though recent research has elevated concerns about the Amazon putting more CO2 and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere than it absorbs, the new findings, published in the journal Nature, were presented as a "first" by scientists and climate reporters.

From 2010 to 2018, researchers for the new study—led by Luciana Gatti of Brazil's National Institute for Space Research—conducted "vertical profiling measurements" of carbon dioxide and monoxide a few miles above the tree canopy at four sites in Amazonia.

The researchers found that "Southeastern Amazonia, in particular, acts as a net carbon source" and "total carbon emissions are greater in eastern Amazonia than in the western part." The former, they noted, has been "subjected to more deforestation, warming, and moisture stress" than the latter in recent decades. As The New York Times reported Wednesday:
In an accompanying article in Nature, Scott Denning, a professor in the department of atmospheric science at Colorado State University, wrote that the paper's "atmospheric profiles show that the uncertain future is happening now."

In an emailed response to questions, Dr. Denning praised the new study as the first real large-scale measurement—from various altitudes across thousands of kilometers and remote sectors—of the phenomenon, an advance beyond the traditional measurement at forest sites. The results show "that warming and deforestation in eastern Amazonia have reversed the carbon sink at regional scale and that the change is actually showing up in atmospheric CO2," he wrote.
Gatti told The Guardian that "the first very bad news is that forest-burning produces around three times more CO2 than the forest absorbs. The second bad news is that the places where deforestation is 30% or more show carbon emissions 10 times higher than where deforestation is lower than 20%."

According to the newspaper—which noted the role of emissions from deliberately set fires for beef and soy production as well as the global criticism that Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has faced for encouraging the soaring deforestation:
Fewer trees meant less rain and higher temperatures, making the dry season even worse for the remaining forest, she said: "We have a very negative loop that makes the forest more susceptible to uncontrolled fires."

Much of the timber, beef, and soy from the Amazon is exported from Brazil. "We need a global agreement to save the Amazon," Gatti said. European nations have said they will block an E.U. trade deal with Brazil and other countries unless Bolsonaro agrees to do more to tackle Amazonian destruction.
The study comes after a March analysis, published in the journal Frontiers in Forests and Global Change, that took into account not only CO2 but also methane, nitrous oxide, black carbon, biogenic volatile organic compounds, aerosols, evapotranspiration, and albedo.
The new findings also follow an April study, published in Nature Climate Change, that focused on Brazil, which is home to the majority of the incredibly biodiverse and threatened rainforest that spans nine countries.

Comparing that research to Wednesday's, Denning said that "they're complementary studies with radically different methods that come to very similar conclusions."
The researchers from the April study, who relied on satellite monitoring, found that between 2010 and 2019, the Brazilian Amazon released 16.6 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide, while only taking in 13.9 billion tonnes—meaning that over a decade, it released nearly 20% more CO2 than it absorbed.

"We half-expected it, but it is the first time that we have figures showing that the Brazilian Amazon has flipped, and is now a net emitter," said co-author Jean-Pierre Wigneron, a scientist at France's National Institute for Agronomic Research (INRA), at the time. "We don't know at what point the changeover could become irreversible."

Agence France-Presse reported that in a statement about the study, INRA said that "Brazil saw a sharp decline in the application of environmental protection policies after the change of government in 2019," referencing when Bolsonaro was sworn in as president.

"Imagine if we could prohibit fires in the Amazon—it could be a carbon sink," Gatti said Wednesday, noting the negative impact of converting swaths of the rainforest last for agriculture. "But we are doing the opposite—we are accelerating climate change."

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(Al Jazeera) EU Unveils Tough Climate Rules To Stop ‘Wars Over Water And Food’

Al Jazeera - News Agencies

European Commission unveils ambitious plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 55 percent from 1990 levels by 2030.

EC President Ursula von der Leyen presents the EU's new climate policy with EU Commissioner Paolo Gentiloni beside her in Brussels, Belgium, on Wednesday. [Yves Herman/Reuters]
The European Union unveiled sweeping new legislation to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 55 percent this decade, aiming to turn green goals into concrete action and set an example for the world’s other big economies to follow.

The proposals by the EU’s executive branch, the European Commission, range from the de facto phasing out of gasoline and diesel cars by 2035 to new national limits on gases from heating buildings.

The aim of the “Fit for 55” legislation, commission officials said, is to wean the continent off fossil fuels and take better care of the environment by policy design – rather than be forced into desperate measures at a future climatic tipping point when it is all but too late.

“The infernos and hurricanes we have seen over the last few weeks are only a very small window into what our future could look like,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told reporters.

“But by acting now, when we still have the policy choices, we can do things another way … Europe was the first continent to declare to be climate neutral in 2050, and now we are the very first ones to put a concrete road map on the table.”

‘Wars over water and food’

European Commission Executive Vice-President Frans Timmermans said by failing to act now, “we would fail our children and grandchildren, who in my view, if we don’t fix this, will be fighting wars over water and food”.

The plan involves a revamp of the bloc’s emissions trading scheme under which companies pay for carbon dioxide they emit and introduces taxes on shipping and aviation fuels for the first time.

The commission wants to exploit the public mood for change provoked by the COVID-19 pandemic. It is already channelling more than one-third of a massive recovery package aimed at reviving European economies ravaged by coronavirus restrictions into climate-oriented goals.



The new legislation will involve about a dozen major proposals – most of them building on laws already in place to meet the EU’s old goal of a 40 percent cut in gas emissions by 2030, compared to 1990 levels – and must be endorsed by the 27 member countries and EU politicians.

World leaders agreed six years ago in Paris to keep the global warming increase to below 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit), and ideally no more than 1.5 degrees C (2.7F) by the end of the century.

Scientists say both goals will be missed by a wide margin unless drastic steps are taken to begin cutting greenhouse gas emissions.

“The principle is simple – emission of CO2 must have a price, a price on CO2 that incentivises consumers, producers and innovators to choose the clean technologies, to go toward the clean and sustainable products,” von der Leyen said.

Given the implications, the proposals are certain to be subject to intense lobbying from industry and environmental groups as they pass through the legislative process over at least the next year.

The plan will also be met with resistance because of the different energy mixes in member countries, ranging from coal-reliant Poland to nuclear-dependent France.



Among the most controversial elements is a plan for a “Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism”. It will impose duties on foreign companies, thereby increasing the price of certain goods – notably steel, aluminium, concrete and fertiliser.

The aim is to ease pressure on European producers that cut emissions but struggle to compete with importers that do not have the same environmental restrictions.

The question is how the EU – known for its staunch defence of open trade – will ensure the carbon tax will comply with World Trade Organization rules and not be considered a protectionist measure.

Another concern is the need to help those likely to be hit by rising energy prices, and the commission is proposing to set up a “social climate fund” worth several billion euros to help those who might be hardest hit.

“This fund will support income and it will support investments to tackle energy poverty and to cut bills for vulnerable households and small businesses,” von der Leyen said.



It is likely many will not be able to afford zero-emission cars after 2035. Under Fit for 55, a drastic acceleration in sales of battery-powered cars is likely as the EU aims for a 100 percent reduction in auto emissions of C02.

The new measures will start to bite in the next several years, with a 55 percent reduction in average fleet carbon dioxide emissions by 2030 compared with 2021.

The Fit for 55 measures will require approval by member states and the European parliament, a process that could take two years.

A diplomat from one EU country said the success of the package would rest on its ability to be realistic and socially fair, while not destabilising the economy.

“The aim is to put the economy on a new level, not to stop it,” the diplomat said.

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