Yeah sure, it's all a big con.

Never mind the decades of research and the mounting scientific evidence when it can all be explained away so easily as some kind of massive world-wide conspiracy - probably to form a World Government as planned by the Illuminati who are quietly working behind the scenes. This has been known about for a century but the evil plot only underway for the last 40-odd years.

It makes the so-called moon landing hoax tiny by comparison but has the same sort of motivation and the same evil conspirators behind it.

Then again, there are other commercial interests at work attempting to secure their own financial agenda too, with a similar history in tobacco, acid rain, DDT and other industries.

I wonder which is more likely?

Sure Australia only produces a tiny amount of the total but it's still about number 16 out of over 300 countries. To opt out means that only 15 countries would have to carry the rest and they in turn would then become the minority emitters. Fair?

The closest emitter to Australia is Indonesia but with a smaller land mass and 10 times our population it's easy to see who the bigger culprit per head of population is.

If we are ever going to move away from a dependence on ever-depleting fossil fuels, I like to know a better way.

It's funny to think that if Howard or even Turnbull was PM now, we'd probably have an ETS firmly in place and everybody would be praising them for their trailblazing visionary statesmanship.

@Wobbles,

<<The closest emitter to Australia is Indonesia but with a smaller land mass and 10 times our population it's easy to see who the bigger culprit per head of population is>>

So thinking outside the square—let’s forget the futile carbon tax.

Instead, let’s encourage couples to have an extra 20-30 kids each -–and "Ta Da" --we would MAGICALLY become so much less culpable!

rache yes, you have gone straight to the heart of the matter armed only with truth.
When Conservatives *High jacked* Liberalism, by one vote, it was driven as are such threads by those who Dennie truth.
Who plant all types of miss truths and unrelated things in an effort to divert us.
Remember however we too play a roll, the ALP.
Rudd, very firmly wanted an ETS Gillard did not.
Greens, a failure in any thing needing a clear head,had the opportunity to give Rudd the ETS.
Gillard, like Abbott WOULD HAVE, propped up the greens with a 3 year tax, becoming an ETS.
I see the DNA of Gillard in many such back downs and policy's that never had a chance.
Yet your truth remains.
And post a Democratic win in America, the near death of their Tea Party, Abbott's Conservatives may walk the plank of their high jacked ship, as Liberals look for a way to preserve the tax/ETS and NBN.

Scribbler;
Due to various shortages of diesel fuel in mostly Asia the refineries
are producing more diesel and less bunker fuel.
So ships are being forced into buying a more expensive diesel/bunker
mixture. I guess that the emmissions would depend on the ratio.

Luciferase;
Hydrogen is really a non starter. The first problem is the ERoEI is
very poor and the useful life of fuel cells is too short to be economic.
My son's father-in-law was directly involved in trials of buses to use
hydrogen fuel cells and they are just not worthwhile.
Both Dennis and Mercedes have done a lot of work on this to no avail.
There are other problems, such as requirements for parking areas.
You cannot park hydrogen vehicles in unventilated underground car
parks or bus depots without specially designed roofs.

Then you have to distribute the gas. It would require something like
eight times the number of tanker trucks than for petrol.
The tank required for the car is very big.
No, it is a very nice idea, but falls over like many ideas when it
gets down to the details.

Belly,
I will be watching with much interest, how many of the deniers rally around Abbott's Direct Action Plan if he wins the next election.

If a tax/ETS is a bad idea, then how is shovelling taxpayers money directly into the pockets of polluters somehow better when the whole thing is apparently a hoax? Isn't that wasteful?

I'm also interested in how that plan can reduce by hundreds of tons of emissions what he simultaneously claims to be a "weightless gas".