Big emitters would be spared from paying penalties on carbon emissions under an eight-point Coalition plan

Big emitters in the energy and mining sectors would be spared from having to pay carbon pollution penalties under an eight-point Opposition plan to scrap Labor’s ambitious climate change targets and develop a nuclear power industry in Australia.

The Opposition’s shadow minister for energy and emissions reduction Dan Tehan argued carbon emission penalties on industry were sending jobs offshore, without Federal Government subsidies, and pledged that under a Coalition government, emission reductions would be voluntary.

“If you’re a big emitter and you want to do your bit to reduce emissions, go for it, but we are not going to tax you and force you to do it and force those jobs offshore,” he told The Nightly on Wednesday.

“There will be a voluntary market that they can participate in.”

The safeguard mechanism, originally introduced in 2016 under the previous Coalition government, requires big emitters to pay a $250 penalty for every tonne of carbon emissions over an annual cap of 100,000 tonnes.

The Coalition now wants to scrap this policy entirely after Labor amended it in 2022 to comply with its climate targets.

Under Labor’s plan to reduce carbon emissions by 43 per cent by 2030, the Federal and NSW governments last month pledged $2.5 billion to save 1000 jobs at Tomago Aluminium in the Hunter beyond 2028, which Mr Tehan argued was the product of the safeguard mechanism pushing up energy costs by forcing emitters to reduce their pollution.

“It just doesn’t make sense: you tax them on one hand and you’re having to bail them out to the tune of two billion on another,” he said.

Opposition Leader Angus Taylor was energy minister under former Liberal prime minister Scott Morrison when the Coalition adopted net zero by 2050 in 2021, going to the 2022 election with a promise that it could reduce carbon emissions by 35 per cent by 2030 under a 26-28 per cent target.

Labor remains committed to net zero by 2050, which includes a 62-70 per cent reduction by 2035.

Almost a year after former Liberal leader Sussan Ley axed the Coalition’s commitment to net zero, Mr Tehan conceded the Coalition was yet to work out a climate emission reductions target, despite believing in the science of global warming.

“We will detail in a separate policy everything we will do with regards to our focus on emissions reduction,” he said.

“That will all be decided and an emissions reduction policy will be forthcoming but what we’re making very clear today is our energy policy will be focused on affordability on providing cheap power to Australians and cheap power to Australian businesses.

“We believe in the science, always have, we believe that you need to take the science seriously but at the same time we also know and understand if you’re going to be able to deal with anything, whether it be with emissions reductions or whether it be with driving household bills down, you need to do it from a position of economic strength and that means you have to do it from a position of energy strength.”

The Coalition is pledging to introduce legislation within the first 30 days of winning an election to scrap the Climate Change Act of 2022 to repeal legislated net zero emissions targets.

The safeguard mechanism would also be scrapped along with Labor’s New Vehicle Efficiency Standard that requires car makers to reduce new passenger car fleet emissions by 59 per cent by 2029 and equivalent light commercial vehicle emissions by 48 per cent.

This would be consistent with a policy former Liberal leader Peter Dutton took to the last election.

Mr Dutton also lost the last election with a plan for seven nuclear power stations at decommissioned coal-fired power stations, but under the Coalition’s new plan, they would simply just repeal the Howard Coalition government’s 1998 ban on nuclear energy that was legislated to secure Greens support for a new medical reactor at Lucas Heights in Sydney.

“Then, obviously, you’ve got to work with states and territories to make sure that they lift their requirements and then obviously you can begin to lay out the type of plan that you would have to developing a nuclear industry in this country,” Mr Tehan said.

“Until you get the ban lifted as a first step, it all becomes hypothetical.”

A Coalition government would also revoke four wind energy zones in the Hunter and Illawarra on either side of Sydney, the Southern Ocean and Bunbury in Western Australia.

“They’re too expensive and they have no social licence. Local communities are just up in arms about them,” Mr Tehan said.

A renewable energy code of conduct would also be applied to the Commonwealth’s Australian Renewable Energy Agency and the Clean Energy Finance Corporation requiring their projects to have community support.

Commonwealth energy funding to the states would also be conditional on prioritising affordability and reliability.

The Australian Energy Regulator would also be required to focus on affordability and reliability for households and businesses.