Posted on 7-6-2002

Australia 51st State Of USA?

CANBERRA, Australia, June 6, 2002 (ENS) - "It is not in Australia’s
interests to ratify the Kyoto Protocol." With those words to Parliament
Wednesday, on World Environment Day, Australian Prime Minister John Howard
put the world on notice that Australia will not join other industrialized
countries in the international treaty to limit global warming. "The reason
it is not in Australia’s interests to ratify the Kyoto Protocol is that,
because the arrangements currently exclude - and are likely under present
settings to continue to exclude - both developing countries and the United
States, for us to ratify the protocol would cost us jobs and damage our
industry." the Prime Minister said.

Under the Kyoto Protocol, an additon to the United Nations Framework
Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), 37 industrialized nations have
agreed to cut their emissions of six greenhouse gases linked to global
warming. Thirty-nine nations were to have been governed by the original
agreement signed in Kyoto, Japan in December 1997, but the Bush
administration in March 2001 said that the United States would not ratify,
and now Australia, too, has backed away from the agreement. The
industrialized countries that ratify the agreement must reduce emissions of
carbon dioxide to an average of 5.2 percent below 1990 levels during the
five year period 2008 to 2012. Countries of the European Union, which
ratified the protocol on Friday, agreed to cut their emissions by eight
percent.

Australia had secured the right to increase its emissions to a limit of
eight percent by 2012, but even that target is not generous enough for the
Howard government to support ratification. Prime Minister Howard told
Parliament, "One of the things that makes Australia almost unique in this
context is that as a developed country we are a major net exporter of
energy. The idea that you can sign up to a protocol that would facilitate
the export of dirty industries from this country into developing countries
and thereby facilitate the flight of jobs from this country..." Australia
is the world's leading coal exporter and has large natural gas reserves as
well. Australia's proven oil and natural gas reserves have nearly doubled
in recent years, and the country is now the third largest liquid natural
gas exporter in the Asia-Pacific region.

Australia has joined the United States in its global warming policies,
making an agreement with the U.S. in February to collaborate on voluntary
and technical means of reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The continental
country is predicted to suffer severe effects of global warming which is
already becoming evident. A report by Climate Action Network Australia in
February said three of Australia’s World Heritage Areas are showing signs
of significant damage due to climate change - Kakadu National Park, the Wet
Tropics of Queensland, and the Great Barrier Reef. Mount Kosciuszko,
Australia’s highest mountain, will lose its alpine environment due to
global warming, the Climate Action Network report predicts.