Rising sea levels a 'sleeping giant', page-50

I would argue that the key drivers to Australia's improved results are largely due to the drive for continual improvement by industry and increased awareness by individuals who have embraced new technology. I would equally argue that much of the debate over the past 5 or so years has been wasteful in political capital as well as creating roadblocks and barriers to constructive discussion and transition to lower CO2 emissions.

The DDPD interim report 2014 which also reported:
"However, Australia has made some recent progress in decarbonizing its economy. Over the past two decades Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions have remained stable while the size of the economy has almost doubled. As a result, the emissions intensity of Australia’s GDP has nearly halved and emissions per capita have decreased by approximately 25% over this period (see Figure 3f). Increasing emissions from energy use were roughly offset by reduced deforestation and increased plantation forestry."
The drivers here were already in place before a carbon tax and are ongoing without it imo.

I will need to better understand what the Direct action policy involves but personally have no problem with the concept to promote a broader environmental response. Coal is a primary source of energy in Australia and that is likely to continue for some time so it makes sense to encourage and promote efficiency where that is used. The criticism of selective reporting by Deniers is equally applicable to Alarmists and I believe until that is recognised we will continue to travel on a merry go round.

Many quote China is moving to introduce Carbon trading schemes and leading with introduction of renewables. That may be true and they also built a big dam and plan to increase nuclear and natural gas to replace coal. Is that what we want? Cherry picking one solution out of an overall response is not objective imo.

In about 5 minutes Mt St Helens destroyed around 600 square km's of forest, the area is recovering and gives some hope that all is not lost. Picture is from ScienceWorld



Cheers