By Ed King
RTCC in Doha
Australia will consider increasing its emission reduction targets under the Kyoto Protocol second commitment period (2CP), according to Mark Dreyfus, Parliamentary Secretary for climate change.
Canberra became the latest government to announce it would join 2CP two weeks before the UN climate summit in Doha started, revealing that it would aim to reduce emissions by a minimum of 0.5 per cent below 1990 levels – a pledge many believe is at the lower end of the ambition scale.
This target has not been well received by pressure groups, although as WWF’s Will McGoldrick explains: “a 99.5 per cent Kyoto 2 target is consistent with Australia’s existing pledge to reduce emissions by at least 5 per cent below 2000 levels by 2020.”
Speaking to RTCC, Dreyfus said this was not the end of the road for Australian’s climate ambitions: “We’ve made it very clear that there will be opportunities to increase that, and we’ve left open the possibility in the future.
“But equally those who look very closely at the task that Australia has undertaken, what we have done with out announced target is against business as usual, we have made a 22% reduction, and I think people are very impressed by the large commitment and the large effort that it involves.”
Mark Dreyfus MP, Australian Parliamentary Secretary for Climate Change and Energy Efficiency from Responding to Climate Change on Vimeo.