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Sunday 16 December 2007 (Updated Mon 17 Dec 07 at 11.15am AEDT)

RAPID ROUNDUP

Australian experts respond to outcomes of Bali climate talks

With international climate calks (COP13) reaching a dramatic conclusion in Bali yesterday, Australian experts respond to the final outcomes (the “Bali Roadmap”). Did they achieve what they set out to achieve? Is it enough? To see the decisions made at the Bali meetings go to the UNFCCC website.

Australian experts comment below. Feel free to use these quotes in your stories. If you need assistance tracking down an expert, contact the AusSMC on 08 8207 7415 or email us.

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Professor Barry Brook is Director of the Research Institute for Climate Change and Sustainability at the University of Adelaide.

Ian Lowe is Emeritus Professor of science, technology and society at Griffith University and President of the Australian Conservation Foundation.

Stephen Lincoln is Professor of Chemistry in the School of Chemistry and Physics at the University of Adelaide and has recently written a book called “Challenged Earth: An Overview of Humanity’s Stewardship of Earth.”

Dr Frank Jotzo is a Research Fellow at the Australian National University’s College of Asia and the Pacific. His expertise is in economics and climate change. Dr Jotzo was at the Bali meetings.

Professor Neville Nicholls is at the School of Geography & Environmental Science at Monash University and was a lead author of the IPCC Synthesis Report released in November.

Professor Matthew England is an ARC Federation Fellow and co-Director of the Climate Change Research Centre (CCRC) at the University of New South Wales. Professor England was in Bali for the first week of climate talks.

Professor Barry Brook is Director of the Research Institute for Climate Change and Sustainability at the University of Adelaide.

“The Bali Climate Change Conference achieved something very important – it laid down terms of reference for the future Copenhagen Protocol (‘Kyoto Phase 2’) that were based on hard science rather than diluted political compromise. Emissions reductions of 25-40% by 2020 is clearly required for a reasonable chance of staving off more than a 2C rise in global temperature. Yet this ambitious target will undoubtedly be tough for most nations to meet – a real ‘stretch goal’. I suspect that if such strong measures had not been tabled in Bali 2007, it would have been impossible to convince the majority of parties to sign up to these in Copenhagen 2009. But now the international community has close to two years to get comfortable with this idea, and to work out how such cuts might be practically achieved. That was Bali’s big win.”

Ian Lowe is Emeritus Professor of science, technology and society at Griffith University and President of the Australian Conservation Foundation.

The outcome of the Bali conference is a very positive step toward global action to slow climate change. It includes acceptance that developed nations need to set emission reduction targets in the range of 25 to 40 per cent by 2020. At least as important, the global reduction target for 2050 implies that developing nations must achieve their economic goals using much cleaner energy supply and much more efficient conversion than current practice.

The Australian government has finally played a positive role at this meeting, after ten years of obstruction. Significantly, the Coalition has supported the Bali agreement, putting behind them the decade of denial. Now we need the government to get down to putting in place practical policies to achieve the reductions. While it is appropriate to allow Professor Garnaut to continue assessing the economic impacts of our responses, we need to get our priorities right. Keeping the planet habitable should be a
higher priority than maintaining the rate of economic growth. So we should start now to reduce our future emissions by such measures as the New Zealand approach of banning fossil fuel power stations, by moving toward world's best practice for applicance efficiency, by investing in public
transport and by setting serious fuel efficiency standards for vehicles. We also need a price on carbon emissions and ambitious renewable energy targets.

Stephen Lincoln is Professor of Chemistry in the School of Chemistry and Physics at the University of Adelaide and has recently written a book called “Challenged Earth: An Overview of Humanity’s Stewardship of Earth.”

"The Bali meeting was never going to be more than a discussion about future discussions concerning the protocol to succeed Kyoto in 2013.

Hence, the lack of binding targets for carbon emissions is unsurprising despite the emotional nature of the meeting.

It became very clear that China and India with one third of the world's population will bargain hard over any emission reduction targets.

An Australian commitment to even the 20% lower end of the hoped for carbon dioxide emissions by 2020 will be hard to achieve.

Our energy is derived 95% from fossil fuels. While we contribute only 1.4% to global carbon dioxide emissions, the 18.4 tonne per capita emission is very high by world standards and is likely to be a continuing source of criticism by other nations.

Australia is the world’s largest coal exporter and is a major exporter of liquefied natural gas and uranium oxide. This, together with our other large mineral exports, substantially underpins our economy and energy intensive foreign industries.

Prime Minister Rudd has a challenging task ahead in seeking to make the essential carbon dioxide emission cuts whilst safeguarding both the domestic and export components of our economy."

Dr Frank Jotzo is a Research Fellow at the Australian National University’s College of Asia and the Pacific. His expertise is in economics and climate change. Dr Jotzo was at the Bali meetings.

“Bali did what Bali was meant to do: set an agenda for negotiations. The Bali Roadmap is an important step as it enlists all countries to act on climate change, but it leaves the hard bits for later.

Under its next President the United States will invariably play a more positive role, but a fundamental dilemma remains: how to cut greenhouse gases in developing countries without slowing their economic growth. The way forward is for rich countries, including Australia, to help finance the low-carbon transformation in poorer countries. That is not out of reach economically, but it will require strong political will, and future negotiations could be tougher still than at Bali.

The Bali drama showed just how hard it is to get agreement between all nations. It is not a foregone conclusion that an effective agreement can be reached globally, so regional climate partnerships could well have a role to play.”

Professor Neville Nicholls is at the School of Geography & Environmental Science at Monash University and was a lead author of the IPCC Synthesis Report released in November.

"I'm impressed by the efforts of the parties in Bali, and the final result. It is a very clear message that all countries now understand that the need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is urgent, and the Bali Roadmap provides a clear guide to how these countries will develop the means for ensuring such reductions take place. As well, the initiation of the Adaptation Fund was also critical - we are already committed to climate change because of past greenhouse gas emissions, so the Fund will play a critical role in helping vulnerable countries avoid the worst consequences of the changes already in the pipeline.

At the start of the year, when the first volume of the IPCC Fourth Assessment was approved, we did not expect such rapid action. The decisions in Bali are very heartening to the IPCC scientists, and make us feel our efforts have been worthwhile."

Professor Matthew England is an ARC Federation Fellow and co-Director of the Climate Change Research Centre (CCRC) at the University of New South Wales. Professor England was in Bali for the first week of climate talks.

"The 25-40% target for emissions reductions by 2020 is in line with scientific projections of the cuts needed, as a minimum, to give us a decent chance of avoiding dangerous anthropogenic climate change. This aligns with the 2007 Bali Climate Declaration by Scientists, in which over 200 of the world's top climate scientists signed off on a minimum target for emissions reductions. What we now need is a global framework for ensuring these targets are met. Much can be aspired to, we now need to set these reductions in a meaningful binding protocol."