Media

Tim Buckley notes that for building and pest reports, the “caveat emptor” principle applies, and the onus is on the buyer to obtain any necessary knowledge. “Sellers are going to be reluctant to provide climate risk information. They’ll be virtually admitting “I bought in a flood plain 40 years ago.” Buckley believes it is up to the government to provide accurate information, although if they don’t already own it, they will need to either pay to acquire the data or cover the cost of reports from private providers. Read more

Tim Buckley comments that the Safeguard Mechanism installed by the former LNP government “has been 100% ineffective over the last couple of years at doing anything but giving heavy industries a free excuse to keep on polluting,” Under the SGM reforms put in place by the current government “the value of carbon credits is likely to go up over time quite rapidly toward the cap,” of A$75/mtCO2e set by the government – a credible and rising price on carbon to incentivise decarbonisation. Read more

Adam Bandt says the emissions pact struck with Chris Bowen will kill off Betaloo Basin gas projects. Shares in gas companies Empire and Tamboran took an immediate hit. Tim Buckley weighs the frackers’ deficient responses on their emissions risks. Read more

Forbes probes Vinod Adani, Gautam’s older brother accused by Hindenburg of market manipulation and money laundering. “While his brother gives speeches and hobnobs with politicians, Vinod stays in the shadows. ‘I’ve always thought it was a partnership,’ says Tim Buckley. ‘Gautam was the warm, cuddly, friendly public face, and Vinod was the mastermind in the private tax haven, the real puppet master’.” Read more

Tim Buckley comments for this story on the passage of the $15bn National Reconstruction Fund through parliament, designed to help develop domestic manufacturing and boost investment in clean tech, noting that while it is modest by comparison to Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act, it has the potential to work in concert with the Safeguard Mechanism to crowd-in capital to green investments. Read more

Our op ed in today’s Canberra Times on the deal struck yesterday between the Labor federal government and the Greens with the support of the Teals and David Pocock, which will see an improved Safeguard Mechanism, designed to cut emissions from Australia’s biggest polluters, finally signed into law. Read more

“Industry is broadly supportive of the [incoming NSW ALP government’s] energy transition plan, but experts told The Fifth Estate more detail was needed on how cities will be fully electrified in coming years. ‘We’ve seen talk from the federal and state energy ministers that we need to do an electrification of everything and we haven’t seen any detail. The property sector is the obvious starting point,’ said Tim Buckley.” Read more

SMH reviews the deal struck between the government and the Greens to ensure passage of the Safeguard Mechanism through parliament: “Tim Buckley calculates the cost of offsetting rather than reducing emissions to be $5 billion annually by 2030. ‘Industry can’t just afford a hit like that,’ he says. ‘Solutions once considered unviable are now immediately financially inevitable’.” Read more

Tim Buckley said that Adani’s woes may bring benefits to opening space for other companies. There are other Indian companies interested in investing in renewable energy and now there could be an acceleration of India’s transition to cleaner energy. “Adani Group’s continuing interest in new fossil fuel projects put the Indian government under pressure to deliver a fossil fuel agenda and less pressure to deliver on renewables. At the end of the day, it’s about removing the biggest single private developer of new fossil fuel projects in India, reducing their impact on the political system and democracy in India.” Read more

Tim Buckley breaks down the deal struck today by the federal government with the Greens to support its proposed Safeguard mechanism legislation, with some amendments – including a hard cap on emissions, and some significant advances on limiting and reporting methane, a key driver of climate change and 70% of the emissions covered by the SGM. Read more

Tim Buckley refute assertions by the opposition that the safeguard deal struck today will raise energy prices, noting any price increases arising from the mechanism would be “immaterial”: “The impact of the safeguard mechanism on the Australian consumer is almost immaterial in terms of the overall impact of energy prices and resulting wider inflation. Extreme weather events have a much greater impact on businesses’ bottom line than any costs they would incur under the legislation, with the $8.5 billion in losses caused by flooding in 2022 alone exemplifying how the costs of inaction on climate far exceed any “costs” of decarbonisation. Read more

Professor Ian Lowe’s op ed on his new methane report (release supported by CEF) throws a spotlight on the elephant in the room of the Safeguard Mechanism debate currently at the pointy end in federal parliament: the outsized contribution to our emissions budget of the climate-wrecking greenhouse gas methane, and the need for increased ambition and rigour in the SGM framework to account for and reduce it. Read more