The tone of those suggestions is obvious –The Hog thinks Australia is making a monumental mistake.
Less obvious are the chosen comparisons of a rich man and a fool. Read on and learn.
The rich man likeness is based on comparing Australia’s buoyant economic position with the rest of an increasingly depressed world.
Europe, for example, is sliding into an economic morass caused by over-spending on a vast social welfare system it can no longer afford.
Deep spending cuts have become inevitable, along with tax rises, a combination that could extend the current winter of discontent into the lost decade forecast by new head of the International Monetary Fund, Christine Lagarde.
“In our increasingly interconnected world, no country or region can go it alone,” she said at roughly the same time Australia was indeed going it alone with its carbon tax and lofty aim of cutting the amount of carbon in the world’s atmosphere.
The juxtaposition of Lagarde’s warning and the Australian Parliament passing the carbon tax laws is ironic in the extreme because on the one hand we had the world’s top banker saying we’re all in this together just as Australia decided to act independently.
And, while the observation might seem like an irrational linking of a financial factor and a climate factor, the two are indeed linked because it is impossible to undertake an attack on coal and other sources of carbon emissions without having the money to pay for it.
Australia, the rich relative to the countries of Europe, has decided it is in a position to pay a lot more for its electricity by encouraging (subsidising?) renewable sources of power just as the rest of the world reckons the price is too high.
Consider that for a second. Australia’s politicians appear to believe burning less coal in this country will have two effects on the world – it will reduce carbon in the atmosphere and it will set a clean-power lead others will follow.
What utter arrogance, to actually believe a tiny country of 22 million people will have any effect on the global atmosphere by burning a little less coal when the residents of one Chinese city will make up the reduction (and probably double it) overnight.
As for the higher price to be paid for electricity produced by renewable energy sources, well it really is a case of a rich country indulging itself in a folly and possibly pricing some of its industries out of global markets.
In some ways, going it alone with a carbon tax and carbon reduction scheme is the same as a rich man buying a Ferrari when his bank account is fully-loaded, only to discover he can’t afford to run it when tough times come.
Sadly, Australia is misreading the signs evident in Europe, a part of the world which was once proud of its anti-carbon stance but which is now looking at a future where it cannot be so environmentally naive.
For several years, the Europeans have blocked the development of new coal, nuclear and gas-fired power stations, intent on having a 100% renewables energy supply – much like that advocated by some Australian politicians.
Europe, however, is now discovering a deep green future carries a big price tag and it is a region which (a) does not have the money to pay for that idyllic future and (b) will be forced to turn to cheaper power alternatives (coal?) or risk freezing in the dark.
A lifetime ago, the European experiment in renewable power looked to be setting a lead for the world. Then Europe went broke, like all rich men and rich countries do when they make foolish investment decisions.
Australia, in its bid to become a global leader in all things green, is about to repeat the European experience because it is ignoring one of the great warnings from the world of philosophy “that those who ignore history are condemned to repeat it”
