Scott Morrison must work out how he can square the circle on climate targets

Scott Morrison in Canberra on Tuesday. Picture: Gary Ramage

Staring down the gun barrel of an alarming IPCC report, Scott Morrison has intensified his climate change message – Australia has heard and is acting but intends to bring the public with it.

The Prime Minister knows the world energy economy is being transformed, but he hates the gesture politics of targets without plans. His task is to square the circle by hardening up “net zero” at 2050 with a plan that documents the costs but still carries enough Coalition supporters.

That’s hard. He must fashion a revamped policy from a set of core principles – no blank cheque for emission reductions, no carbon taxes, no city elites dumping on the regions and a new argument for his technology-based solution – so that it’s the answer for the developing world.

The dual strategy Morrison runs became apparent on Tuesday. He knows he must honour the UN orthodoxy, enforced by the big banks and finance houses, and that means Australia signing up to “net zero” as a responsible player – but he thinks the rich world model doesn’t work for a climate problem that is about China, India, the developing nations and their compulsion for growth.

This means tension is guaranteed for Morrison in the Glasgow meeting because Australia’s differences are not just about targets but about the model, with Morrison chasing global traction for his technology advocacy.

The IPCC report hasn’t changed Morrison’s mind. It won’t matter how many demonstrators turn out. Indeed, it has only strengthened his core stance. But there is one certainty – it will intensify the pressure on Morrison and Nationals leader Barnaby Joyce in their efforts to find a path through to “net zero” at 2050 in a way that holds their diverse voting base together.

Morrison’s distaste for the European stance on climate is palpable. He thinks it will divide the world and erode the global trade system.

He denounced the notion of carbon taxes in an advanced economy because “it doesn’t solve the problem” in China, India, Indonesia or South Africa.

His mind is shut on any global pricing model. For Morrison, targets are not results.

“World history teaches one thing,” he says. “Technology changes everything.”

That’s true. But the truism cannot eradicate the price signals needed to deliver the needed shifts in technology.

Morrison affirmed his previous position – Australia stands by its 26-28 per cent targets for 2030 fully aware that it will “meet and beat them”. Our progress towards these targets will be upgraded before Glasgow but Morrison, from his remarks, seems resistant to any more ambitious revision of these 2030 targets. Yet this is where the pressure on Australia will come.

“Commitments will be made and commitments won’t be met,” Morrison said, contemptuous of the proven model of climate change politics. He virtually said the debate was about China, pointing out that China’s emissions were greater than all OECD nations combined – a welcome comment given the absence of much discussion about China in our debate.