The rural sector is a major source of emissions, but at the same time holds tremendous opportunities to play a significant role in Australia’s mitigation effort. Consequently, this Update paper looks at how the land sector is greatly affected by climate change and the large part it plays in its mitigation.
by Garnaut Climate Change Review
This Update paper re-examines likely trends in global emissions in the absence of effective mitigation and in the absence of major feedbacks from climate change to economic growth. It analyses changes in the variables affecting emissions growth (namely population, economic output, energy demand, and the economic and technological factors affecting the choice among sources of energy) in major countries and regions. It also explores the implications of the Great Crash of 2008, which lowered the long-term growth trajectory of developed countries, but did not slow the immense growth momentum of the largest developing countries, nor end the higher growth of the early twenty first century in other developing countries.
by Professor Ross Garnaut
The threat of climate change to prosperity in one country cannot be removed by the actions of that country alone. Effective action to moderate the risks of human-induced climate change requires large contributions to reductions in emissions from all major countries, and substantial contributions from the rest of the world as well. As a result, the search for effective climate change policy is partly a search for effective cooperation amongst countries of a kind and dimension that has never previously been known. This paper discusses that search for an international basis for effective climate change policy.
by Professor Ross Garnaut
The Garnaut Climate Change Review—led by Professor Ross Garnaut—was first commissioned by Australia’s Commonwealth, State and Territory Governments in 2007, to conduct an independent study of the impacts of climate change on the Australian economy. This paper focuses on five climate change action issues: the choice of discount rate (the valuation of the welfare of people living now relative to people living in future); the presence of uncertainty; the interaction between climate change, its mitigation and the growth of incomes and economic welfare in developing countries; what is an appropriate and proportionate Australian contribution to various levels of international mitigation effort; and the optimal balance between efforts on climate change mitigation and on climate change adaptation.
by Professor Ross Garnaut
