COMMENT: Action For Climate Change and InterGenerational Equity: Is Sustainability the Elephant in the Room?

     The media coverage that followed a protest by a group of climate activists in Brisbane on 01 February focussed more on the “general overreach” of government in silencing protesters - rather than on understanding activist concerns: Whether “we are acting appropriately or urgently enough on climate change”.

Whilst there may be divided public opinion on rights to protest, there should be no dispute that the activist’s concerns drew attention to serious issues related to action for climate change.

Australia’s new Climate Change Act 2022 came into force on 15 September 2022. GHG emissions are to be reduced  by 43% on 2005 levels by 2030 and to reach net-zero by 2050.

But the legislation does not as yet provide a national plan on how these targets are to be achieved.

In the absence of any national plan for action for climate change, climate activist concerns about what the future holds for our children and grandchildren are real and warrant wider conversation.

Concern for future generations falls squarely within the environmental science concept of intergenerational equity i.e. ensuring fairness between generations. It is the foundation for sustainable development.

One  of  the Sustainable Development Goals of the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development is “Climate Action”: A Target for achieving this sustainable development goal is to “Integrate climate change measures into national policies, strategies and planning...The aim is to achieve this goal by 2030": Target 13.2.

The Paris Agreement imposes a binding obligation requiring all countries emission reductions to be made “on the basis of equity and in the context of sustainable development”.

Achieving sustainable development requires its three cornerstones to be evaluated: Environmental, economic, and social (including cultural) objectives.

To ensure that future risks from climate change to people, economies, and ecosystems are effectively addressed, all objectives are weighted equally, and balanced fairly; and not focussed inordinately on any one objective.

A national plan for a power system should be based on a systematic and objective evaluation to find the optimum balance between  renewables and all feasible and viable climate action option(s).

It must lead to a sustainable solution that provides, not only affordable energy, but also reliable, and secure energy. To do this, the power system needs to be both predictable and dispatchable.

Without a national plan, 

today’s emission reduction targets 

may prove to be an “illusory promise” -  

a promise made which is uncertain, indefinite, vague or impossible to fulfil.

TAGS: Climate change; action; emissions; national plan; illusory promise; Paris Agreement; sustainability; inter-generational equity; protests; activism.