Janaline, Luke and Glenn discuss why the Australian government continues to approve extensions and expansions of export coal and gas projects. They look at whether stopping new projects would actually reduce global emissions, or potentially make it harder for Australian governments to persuade their trade partners to decarbonise. Is sovereign risk real or overblown? And what is the best strategy to reduce global emissions? Spoiler alert - decarbonising global heavy industry supply chains might help.
Janaline, Luke and Glenn ask why Australian Prime Ministers spend so much time with very tiny island countries, and why Australian governments spend so much development aid in the region. Short answer - geography matters. We make the case for development assistance as an investment in global stability and for delivering it in a way that is less colonial and more collaborative (eg ask people what they need). Also Pacific island governments are full of smart people with a clear idea of their national interest and a clear ability to pursue it. Focusing on US-China rivalry totally misses this point.
Janaline, Luke and Glenn look at the history of international climate negotiations and ask why has it all been so hard? Maybe we are asking for the wrong thing - instead of asking countries to give something up (fossil fuel use), what if we asked them to build something new instead, in the form of decarbonised heavy industry supply chains? Something less vulnerable to other people’s wars…
Janaline, Luke and Glenn look at the Safeguard Mechanism - the government’s main policy to manage down industrial emissions - and how it can be made more effective. How can it make miners and fossil fuel companies do more of the heavy lifting, and shouldn’t the whole thing just be scrapped for an economy-wide price on carbon? Maybe a focus on methane will help? This episode carries a nerd alert, but we hope you will bear with us because it genuinely is so important.
Renewable energy is really taking off in Australia, but is it fast enough to meet the Government’s target of 82% by 2030? The McKell Institute and the Electrical Trades Union have recently released a report calling for a publicly-owned renewable energy entity to provide affordable, reliable renewable electricity to large industrial projects to accelerate the transition of Australia’s industrial and export base from fossil fuels to clean energy. Janaline, Luke and Glenn discuss the pros and cons of publicly owned energy generation, and the opportunities it can present for Australia’s industrial future. Spoiler alert - we think this is a terrific proposal.
Janaline and William examine Labor’s Future Made in Australia policy and explore its implications for Australia’s future economic prosperity.
William and Janaline examine the gap between climate messaging and actual climate policy, and what stopping new fossil fuel developments in Australia would really mean for global emissions.