Putting the knife into the Rudd ETS

I noted below how John Quiggin thinks the amended Rudd Emissions Trading Scheme should be supported by the Greens.

The very Green David Spratt (at his Climate Code Red blog, which I found via some comment at Quiggin's blog) really puts the knife to the scheme, and then twists it.

One of the key points I liked was to do with the proposition (which we are bound to hear again and again) that the Liberals have to support passage of the legislation so that it is in place before the Copenhagen conference. The suggestion never made sense to me, and Spratt agrees:

ISSUE 1. Passing the CPRS is necessary for Australia to be credible at Copenhagen.

No, quite the opposite. If there were no legislation, Australia's position would not be tied by law to Rudd's poor target and pressure would be maintained to catch up with the leading bunch. The targets in the proposed CPRS legislation are out of whack with the major players such as the UK, US and EU, who have agreed to unconditional cut emissions of 34-46%, 20% and 20-30% from 1990 levels respectively. Let's be honest, what happens at Copenhagen depends more than any other factor on what the G2 – the USA and China — strike by way of a climate deal, and what Australia puts in the table has little relevance to that. They are used to Australia behaving badly.