PM's 5-15 per cent cuts a death warrant for Great Barrier Reef

Climate Positive urges the Australian Government to rethink it's decision to limit carbon pollution cuts to between 5 and 15 percent.

"Far from being in the national interest, this target condemns Australia to ecological and economic losses that will dwarf the costs of retrofitting the Australian economy to a low carbon future. It is a sad day for our major ecosystems, agricultural sector, security, coastlines and economy," Climate Positive Chairman, Mr Brendan Condon said. "The Australian Government's idea of what is acceptable climate change puts us in a very dangerous position in terms of future global warming. It is a death warrant to the Great Barrier Reef, Kakadu and the Murray Darling Basin," he said.

Widely respected scientists, including Dr James Hansen from the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, are pleading for deep emission cuts to avoid triggering runaway global warming, large sea level rise, crashes in agricultural systems and mass extinctions. "No two people or nations will see acceptable climate change in the same way. Inhabitants of
some of the South Pacific island nations such as the Carteret Islands have already left their islands as they have become uninhabitable with rising sea levels. To them, the change they have already experienced is too much," Mr Condon said.

"Transitioning to a de-carbonised future is simpler for Australia than for other countries due to our abundant resources of wind, solar, tidal and geothermal energy. Australia should therefore be a major player in solving the climate crisis. It's time to accept our international responsibilities
and pull our weight in solving the global warming crisis. Today's retrograde announcement by the Australian Government essentially puts us on a crash course with ecological disaster," Mr Condon said.