With the passage of the carbon tax legislation through the Senate, Australia has become the 33rd country to introduce a price on carbon, joining all the major European countries and New Zealand, along with major cities in China and groups of states and provinces in the United States of America and Canada. “In addition to 32 other fully operational national schemes, Japan and Korea are developing emissions trading schemes,” said CSU expert on the carbon tax, Professor Kevin Parton.
“With more and more countries prepared to put a price on carbon, it will enhance the general competitiveness of Australian industry to parallel our international competitors.”
Professor Parton, who is a senior researcher with CSU’s Institute for Land, Water and Society, explained that the tax is designed to encourage business to become more energy efficient and to look for profit potential in a clean energy world.
“By introducing the policy - which takes effect from July 2012 - Australia can take control of its own policy agenda. Without the policy, we would have been increasingly at the whim of other nations,” Professor Parton said.
“For example, it was planned that Qantas would be levied fees from early 2012 under the European Union emissions trading scheme. These are fees that Qantas could arguably avoid once the Australian scheme is operational.”
Professor Parton praised this step forward for Australia in having a relatively independent approach to carbon pricing.
“Under the Australian scheme, around 500 major carbon producing organisations will face a tax of $23 per tonne of CO2 equivalent that they emit. Because it is expected some cost increases will be passed on to consumers, the federal government will also provide tax cuts and pension increases to compensate individuals.”
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