Scientific research body The Australia Institute has globally shamed Australia’s addiction to fossil fuel exports, running a full-page advert in The New York Times ahead of the United Nation’s Climate Ambition Summit that started yesterday in New York.
The ad runs as an open letter to the Australian government and is signed by 200 leading climate scientists – including Nobel Laureates JM Coetzee and Laureate Professor Pete Doherty – urging politicians to “accelerate climate action, not climate annihilation”.
You can add (and B&T urges you to do so) your own name to the open letter HERE.
The ad calls on the Australian government to end “new fossil fuel approvals and subsidies”.
The Australia Institute claims there are currently over 100 new coal and gas projects in development in Australia.
“If all these projects proceed, research by the Australia Institute shows they would add a further 1.7 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent to the atmosphere every year,” the open letter stated.
It urges Australia to follow the advice of the United Nations, the International Energy Agency (IEA) and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and prevent any further new fossil fuel developments.
Both foreign minister Penny Wong and assistant minister for climate change and energy, Jenny McAllister, will represent Australia at the summit.
The Australia Institute’s director of Australia’s climate and energy program, Polly Hemming (lead image), said the Australian government had “already approved four new coal mines and there are 110 more gas and coal mines in the pipeline”.
In the New York Times today! “Australia must accelerate climate action, not climate annihilation” 220 scientists and experts have called on Australia to stop approving and subsidising fossil fuels. @billmckibben @MichaelEMann @ClimateHuman#climate #auspol @TheAusInstitute pic.twitter.com/gpz7YsIgLF
— Polly Hemming (@pollyjhemming) September 19, 2023
“If Australia succeeds in its fossil fuel expansion plans, the other nations of the world will fail in their efforts to prevent dangerous climate change,” she said.
“Australia is already the world’s third largest fossil fuel exporter, behind only Saudi Arabia and Russia. But despite the dire warnings from the world’s scientists and the clear language from the UN Secretary-General, the Australian government is not only approving new fossil fuel projects, it is subsidising them and fighting in court to smooth their path,” Hemming said.
