More scam details for @Dochico you as it is wide ranging >Amajor Australian study has found some of the nation's biggest polluters are meeting their emissions obligations using carbon credits that have not actually resulted in emissions reductions.
Almost a third of projects under Australia's carbon credit scheme did little to nothing to reduce emissions despite costing taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars, the researchers found.
Andrew Macintosh, one of the lead authors of the paper and an environment law and policy professor at the Australian National University first sounded the alarm two years ago, calling the carbon market "largely a sham".
His calls were rejected by a government-commissioned review, but Professor Macintosh said the new research shows further evidence that human-induced regeneration – a core part of the Australian Carbon Credit Unit (ACCU) scheme – hasn't worked.
"The data is telling us very clearly that the credits that are being issued are in no way shape or form being matched by the abatement that these projects are actually generating," He told the ABC.
Researchers monitored 182 Human Induced Regeneration (HIR) projects, which make up about 30 per cent of all ACCUs and have cost taxpayers nearly $300 million over their lifetime.
They found many of the projects to grow native forests were claiming to be regenerating them in uncleared desert and semi-desert areas.
According to the study, 80 per cent of those projects experienced either no change, or negative change to their tree cover between 2013 when first registered, and June 2022, despite receiving nearly 23 million credits.
Professor Macintosh said the ACCU scheme was "severely lacking in integrity" and jeopardised the integrity of the safeguard mechanism.i
