One convenient argument used against any pricing of carbon is that it automatically leads to a proportional increase in prices to pensioners and Barnaby thinks the answer is cheap power….as the Nats did with free water allocations in Murray Darling.
As soon as there is a serious price signal the biggest users need to get serious about getting more efficient ie with a bit of effort and investment there is no net cost over time.
There has been a huge growth in energy consumption in Qld (& Australia) in the past decade while California has levelled out after they acted after the era of outages.
The combined role of pricing and tax is to reduce emmisions while also assisting the needy with some subsidy paid from the tax.
I was told a story last night about visitor cabins in Scotland (at Findhorn) that were so drafty and poorly sealed that heaters needed to be left on all night during winter.
If there is no price there is no incentive to conserve.
There are no free lunches free energy or free anything except sunlight and rain.
The hypocracy of the major parties using the needy argument is breathtaking when Rudd & Turnbill agreed on a CPR scheme with huge subsidies to the big polluters.
David Wyatt