"Third, is the method chosen to ‘price carbon’ the most cost-effective option, maximising global emissions abatement for the cost involved?"

There is no cost effective option. Reductions in Australia's greenhouse gas emissions are irrelevant to global emissions and irrelevent to the progress of global warming.

Carbon tax advocates will lie and obfuscate endlessly to try and avoid this inescapable fact.

on the abc [4 corners ]..last night
we saw how much methan is in coal seams..[via fraking]

i contend that mining coal releases methane
[and methane is over 100 times worse a grenhouse gas than carbon]

so naturally all that methane
released in coal seam gas..and mining coal
and refioning petrol products metals etc..needs to be taxed

so tax it as it leaves the cuntry...its time
that greenhouse gas.. was curbed at the source

you mine it..and the methane destroys the protective blanket
its time the real blame was accorded..stop the spin

tax all grenhouse destructive gasses
start with thoat cleaner used to make solarcells
that substance is worse than methane..

its time that poluters paid for all their polution...especially those currently getting a free lunch subsidy..or feed-in tarrif..[a huge scam]

no more special deals
THE MORE YOU USE..the more you pay

get rid of basic charges
scale it ..so the big user pay more
the more you get..the more you pay

now go away
lies are lies

no more new taxes ..on the poor
tax the rich..before the poor ..decide its time ..to eat the rich
and those paid to lie for them

"Policies targeting national PRODUCTION of emissions... are likely to be less cost-effective, not least because they induce `carbon leakage' due to industries shifting offshore," wrote Carmody (my emphasis).

What about general `production leakage' and `national income leakage' due to industries shifting offshore to avoid our production-based INCOME TAX?

If you want to maximize the competitive advantage of shifting a tax from the production/origin side to the consumption/destination side, you need to do it with the biggest tax in the system, namely income tax. That is the true "principled, comprehensive approach to the trade-exposed sector".

In my last article I explained how income tax could be turned into an indirect consumption tax without regressive redistributive effects: http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=10792 .

More recently I supported my claims with diagrams: http://blog.lvrg.org.au/2010/12/prudent-prosperity-productive-austerity.html .

Why price Carbon? What is to be achieved by doing so? In his long time advocacy for a carbon tax, Mr Carmody overlooks one salient point. First and foremost, pricing carbon must ensure that our greenhouse gas emissions are not just reduced but are reduced in a manner which meets specific annual and longer term targets.

A carbon tax per-se does not do this. What it aims to do is discourage, not limit emissions. A carbon tax leaves it up to each of the 1,000 companies directly responsible for emissions to decide whether or not to reduce their emissions and if so, by how much and whether or not to pass-on to their customers some or all of the carbon tax they pay. A carbon tax therefore fails to achieve its prime purpose.

The only sure way of reducing emissions to levels which achieve government approved targets is by a cap and trade or ETS system which, as its name implies, results in annual emissions being capped at a specified level.

Another salient difference between a Carbon Tax and an ETS is that with the former, government determines the level of tax to be imposed, while with an ETS the price put on carbon is determined by the market place and will vary with the level of reduction. Very few would argue that government is better placed than the market place to determine the price of carbon.
Carbon reduction is not the option afforded by a tax. It is a necessity made compulsory because of the harm which on-going emissions will cause and to meet our international obligations to reduce carbon emissions to a level ensuring that average global temperature is limited to 2°C above pre-industrial by 2100.

For these reasons, and a lot of others, it is widely accepted that an ETS is the most cost efficient and effective way of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, provided it is properly administered - which is a lot more than can be said of the CRPS concoction rejected by Parliament in 2009.

Lets see who will feel no pain from a carbon tax which is nothing short of a deceit tax
-Public servants who pay no office costs (paid by the taxpayer)
- Politicians (pay none of their costs for flying the globe on dubious excursions) again paid by the taxpayer
- The rich who pay next to no tax anyway

Who will pay?

-Pensioners trying to heat houses (if they can still avoid to)
- Small business trying to pay utilities for office/shop space
- General population trying to keep homes cool in 40 degree plus temperatures.

Where will the tax money go?

Corrupt 3rd world Governments?
Re election funds for the major parties?
Funding hopelessly failed Green projects such as wind farms?
Into the pockets of the alarmist to find answers to a non problem?

What difference will this tax have on climate and weather? Absolutely none.

The best option here is to do nothing and let everyone know that we are doing nothing so that we can all have the certainty that is needed. Carbon Dioxide is a very good gas and is less than one twenty fifth of one percent of the atmosphere.