On Monday, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change will release its latest assessment of climate change. Today, it is being reported it will reveal global warming is accelerating faster than thought, with temperatures set to exceed the critical 1.5-degree threshold by the early 2030s, a decade earlier than forecast three years ago.
This underlines that: Australia's political debate about a net zero emissions target by 2050 is a distraction. The real debate must now focus on what we can achieve before 2030.
Today, 52 health, environment and other civil society organisations have come together to call for Australia to catch up with our allies and make concrete plans for action this decade. We need hard targets for 2030.
The Federal Coalition Government is currently split over a long term target for 2050; having a public squabble between Barnaby Joyce and some Queensland National Party MPs, who continually question climate science, and many Liberal MPs who want the government to act. This debate is a loud argument about a distant target, when it should be about immediate action. The rest of the world is firing arrows at close range, while we're still arguing about whether to set up a distant target.
