Direct action fund would cost taxpayers $23b if used to meet Paris climate targets

Taxpayers would pay up to $23.6 billion for Australia to meet international climate targets if the Turnbull government were to continue with its "direct action" emissions-reduction fund as its main policy.

Adam Bandt said the Parliamentary Budget Office
 analysis showed the emissions reduction fund was
 "an empty vessel built to appease the Trumps
 in the Coalition". 

Following a request by the Greens, the federal Parliamentary Budget Office estimated the cost of using the fund to meet the target the Coalition submitted at the Paris climate summit – a 26 to 28 per cent emissions cut compared with 2005 levels by 2030.

The fund pays businesses and farmers through an auction process, with the cheapest bids winning contracts to cut emissions.

Read Adam Morton’s story in today’s Melbourne Age - “Direct action fund would cost taxpayers $23b if used to meet Paris climate targets.”