Australia an embarrassing handbrake on COPs nobler ambitions

The standout Australian performer at COP26 has been the very popular coffee machine in the official pavilion. It’s attracted an appreciative queue at all hours. Australia has shown very high ambition with its coffee game here in Glasgow, meeting and beating its targets and receiving net zero complaints from the hundreds of caffeine-hungry delegates.

Minister for Industry, Energy and Emissions Reduction Angus Taylor at the Australia pavillion during COP26 at Glasgow.Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

But all the free coffee in the world is not going to cover for Australia’s utter failure to rise to the challenge at this global climate summit.

We’re proud Australians. Our plucky country has been the source of many world-changing innovations. Australian ingenuity has helped beat cancers and restore hearing. It’s helped drive down the cost of solar power. At our best, there is no challenge we cannot overcome. But in Glasgow at the UN climate talks, over these past two weeks, we’ve felt embarrassed.

Australia’s intransigence on climate makes us the outlier on the world stage, heckling from the wings. Almost every comparable developed economy brought a credible commitment to slash emissions at least 50 per cent by 2030 and a clear policy vision to back it up. We brought the “Australian Way”: a grab bag of slogans delivered by the Prime Minister to a near-empty hall and the Santos pop-up stall in our national pavilion â€" a state-sponsored promotional opportunity for a fossil fuel giant spruiking the fraudulent climate “solution” that is carbon capture and storage.

Thankfully, many other countries brought their A-game to COP26, and there was much over the past two weeks that has given us hope. The opening days saw a series of new agreements designed to accelerate action and help keep alive the ultimate goal of limiting warming to 1.5 degrees: from a new global pledge to reduce emissions of methane â€" a highly potent greenhouse gas â€" to deals on coal phase-out, deforestation, climate finance and more. Australia was conspicuously absent from most of these.

Tim Flannery and carbon utilisation expert Sophia Hamblin Wang at the Australian pavilion for COP26.Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

At every COP there are moments when someone manages to cut through the noise with a brutally honest and rousing speech or other intervention. This year it was Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley, who excoriated leaders for failing on the promises of the Paris Agreement, demanding that they “try harder”. In a similarly powerful moment, Tuvalu foreign minister Simon Kofe gave a speech by video link â€" at a lectern, dressed in suit and tie, while knee-deep in the ocean. Yes, for his low-lying Pacific island nation, climate change is an existential threat.

At the beginning of the second week, Australian bushfire survivor Jo Dodds held a press conference outside the Australian pavilion with fellow bushfire survivors from the US, Canada and Turkey.

As the talks entered their end game, news broke of a new deal between the US and China, who â€" despite their differences â€" have committed to working together to accelerate action on climate change. Yet another sign that the world is moving while Australia is standing still.

The world’s combined efforts remain woefully inadequate in the face of the latest science, but Glasgow may yet succeed in its key task â€" to kickstart a decade of truly transformative action. If it does, it will not have been due to Australia’s presence here but in spite of it. It is such a shame, as we could be playing an outsized role.

As we write, negotiators are locked in tense talks over the final COP decision. An early draft called for the phase-out of coal and fossil fuel subsidies and on all countries that did not come to Glasgow with a stronger target for 2030 to do so as soon as possible next year. That includes Australia. But word on the ground is that Australia is working hard to weaken the final communique.

Protestors The Glasgow Actions Team take aim at political leaders, including Scott Morrison, at the Glasgow COP Summit.Credit:Getty

We know what to do if we are serious about tackling the greatest existential challenge in human history: as a first step, Australia should commit to at least halving emissions by the end of this decade. The first priority should be to stop adding to the problem, to replace all fossil fuels. Broadly, this can be achieved with electrification and efficiency improvements using readily available and affordable technologies.

The second priority should be powering everything with our endless wind and sunshine, backed by storage. The Australian Energy Market Operator predicted the nation’s largest grid could become 70 per cent renewable in 10 years, but the development of wind and solar is outpacing this scenario already.

Third, we should grasp the economic opportunities of zero-emissions technologies, which vastly exceed the value of Australia’s existing exports. We can build a prosperous and sustainable future as a global zero-emissions manufacturing superpower. Yet we remain the biggest exporter of fossil gas and the second biggest of thermal coal on the face of the earth with the weakest climate commitments of any developed nation. The federal government is effectively serving the interests of the fossil fuel industry, not ours. We are a serious and serial offender in the climate crisis.

And we’re being left in the dust by the world community gathered at COP, when we should be acting like our lives depend on credible, urgent commitments to tackle climate change. Because they do.

Professor Tim Flannery is chief climate councillor, scientist, author, explorer, and former Australian of the Year. Dr Simon Bradshaw is Research Director at the Climate Council.

Professor Tim Flannery is chief councillor of the Climate Council.

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