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Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese promised to end the country’s acrimonious climate wars when he was elected in May—ousting a government which had dragged its feet on taking meaningful action on climate change since coming to power in 2013.
He made an important step in the right direction on Aug. 4, when Australia’s House of Representatives passed legislation that will enshrine tougher emissions reductions targets when it passes the Senate, which is expected to happen in September. The new national target—a 43% cut in greenhouse gas emissions below 2005 levels by 2030—will be a step up from the previous conservative government’s target of between 26% and 28%. The law will also reaffirm the country’s commitment to net-zero emissions by 2050.
It’s the country’s most meaningful climate legislation in a decade—and the journey to get here has seen more than one prime minister ousted for attempting to take climate action. But climate advocates say that the new law will be just the beginning of a long fight to get the country—the world’s third largest exporter of fossil fuels—where it needs to be. This will be a “springboard for future action,” Amanda McKenzie, the CEO of the Climate Council, tells TIME. “This is the necessary first step,” she says, but “there is still a long way to go.”
The Fossil Fuel Question
It was clear from the start what the biggest hurdle would be to securing a strong climate proposal. Ahead of Australia’s climate bill being introduced to parliament in late July, Albanese said in a televised interview with the national broadcaster the Australian Broadcasting Corporation that the Labor Party, which Albanese leads, would not support a moratorium on fossil fuel projects because doing so would have a “devastating impact on the Australian economy.”
Australia produces 7% of all…
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Source : time
