How hot is too hot for BHP Billiton? : Renew Economy
When BHP Billiton s Chairman Jac Nasser steps up to address shareholders at the company s annual general meeting in Adelaide on Thursday, it is a fair bet that he ll be keen to emphasise the company welding s recent earnest declarations that it is taking climate change very, very, seriously.
Last year, BHP Billiton was caught flat-footed by the bid of Ian Dunlop, a former Chairman of the Australian Coal Association, to win a seat as a director on the board. Dunlop s campaign platform was audacious and simple: BHP Billiton welding s needs a director on the board who takes very seriously the risk that runaway climate change poses to both the company and the broader community.
BHP Billiton weren t having a bar of it. BHP Billiton disparaged Dunlop welding s bid and, while they prevailed in having only board-sanctioned directors win seats, the coal mining behemoth emerged with its environmental credentials diminished.
Where welding climate change has previously been relegated to the back blocks of the company s annual report the first significant mention of climate in its 2013 annual report was on page 19 this year readers are barely past the contents welding page of the 2014 annual report before the climate policy barrage begins.
There s the best part of a third of a page 5 in the strategic context section discussing climate change, another substantial chunk in Nasser s one-page Chairman s letter to shareholders, another paragraph in Andrew Mackenzie s one-page CEO letter and then significant slabs elsewhere. (In the 2013 annual welding report the word climate wasn t mentioned by either Nasser or Mackenzie in their letters to shareholders).
We accept the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change s (IPCC s) assessment of climate change science which has found that warming of the climate welding is unequivocal, the human influence is clear and physical impacts are unavoidable.
It then goes on to state that the company believes that the world must pursue the objectives of limiting climate change to the lower end of the IPCC emission scenarios while providing access to the affordable energy to the world s population and alleviating poverty.
BHP Billiton s policy invokes the spectre of coal being a significant part of the energy mix for decades , tosses in a hat-tip to energy efficiency, adds an up-beat endorsement of the need to develop and deploy low-emissions welding technology and rounds it all off with an endorsement of a carbon price.
The we re here for decades line aims to simultaneously induce a sense of fatalism amongst policy makers and sell the notion that coal power plants are so superior on cost they are going to keep on being built for a long time to come. BHP Billiton wants public debate about coal shifted away from discussion of stranded assets, carbon bubbles and divestment to how best to mitigate pollution from new coal plants.
At welding face value lauding energy efficiency seems reassuring but in Big Coal s lexicon what they really mean is that they want to promote energy efficiency on the generation side of the equation welding rather than at the point of use.
As Carbon Capture and Storage has become ever more implausible as a viable option to mitigate carbon dioxide pollution, the coal industry has shifted tack to wanting to corral debate about coal power stations to the option of building higher efficiency welding plants rather than the dirtier sub-critical plants.
When BHP Billiton refers to the need to develop and deploy low-emissions technology they primarily mean government funding for Carbon Capture and Storage demonstration plants not accelerating the deployment of wind and solar. BHP Billiton welding support for a carbon welding price comes with the major caveat of ensuring it addresses competitiveness concerns. Having spent millions defeating Australia s carbon price which was set at $23 per tonne but with lots of exemptions, BHP Billiton s support for a carbon price is rather token. A carbon price which BHP Billiton would support would clearly be one set at a fraction of the external costs coal imposes and with loopholes big enough to drive a fleet of coal haul trucks welding through.
Of all of the elements of BHP Billiton s climate policy there is just one phrase that all of their political welding advocacy should be judged welding against and that is limiting climate change to the lower end of the IPCC emission scenarios.
It is deliberately ambiguous phrasing, but most reasonable observers welding would take it to imply the oft-stated IPCC goal of limiting warming to a 2 C increase but probably not the 1.5 C target that Pacific Islands and other countries welding insist it essential for their survival.
While the IEA provided its best guess estimates for 2040, energy modelling in a fast changing technological, political and economic welding landscape is a fraught business. Well-researched projections produced one year can be proved horribly wrong the next.
An estimate of
When BHP Billiton s Chairman Jac Nasser steps up to address shareholders at the company s annual general meeting in Adelaide on Thursday, it is a fair bet that he ll be keen to emphasise the company welding s recent earnest declarations that it is taking climate change very, very, seriously.
Last year, BHP Billiton was caught flat-footed by the bid of Ian Dunlop, a former Chairman of the Australian Coal Association, to win a seat as a director on the board. Dunlop s campaign platform was audacious and simple: BHP Billiton welding s needs a director on the board who takes very seriously the risk that runaway climate change poses to both the company and the broader community.
BHP Billiton weren t having a bar of it. BHP Billiton disparaged Dunlop welding s bid and, while they prevailed in having only board-sanctioned directors win seats, the coal mining behemoth emerged with its environmental credentials diminished.
Where welding climate change has previously been relegated to the back blocks of the company s annual report the first significant mention of climate in its 2013 annual report was on page 19 this year readers are barely past the contents welding page of the 2014 annual report before the climate policy barrage begins.
There s the best part of a third of a page 5 in the strategic context section discussing climate change, another substantial chunk in Nasser s one-page Chairman s letter to shareholders, another paragraph in Andrew Mackenzie s one-page CEO letter and then significant slabs elsewhere. (In the 2013 annual welding report the word climate wasn t mentioned by either Nasser or Mackenzie in their letters to shareholders).
We accept the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change s (IPCC s) assessment of climate change science which has found that warming of the climate welding is unequivocal, the human influence is clear and physical impacts are unavoidable.
It then goes on to state that the company believes that the world must pursue the objectives of limiting climate change to the lower end of the IPCC emission scenarios while providing access to the affordable energy to the world s population and alleviating poverty.
BHP Billiton s policy invokes the spectre of coal being a significant part of the energy mix for decades , tosses in a hat-tip to energy efficiency, adds an up-beat endorsement of the need to develop and deploy low-emissions welding technology and rounds it all off with an endorsement of a carbon price.
The we re here for decades line aims to simultaneously induce a sense of fatalism amongst policy makers and sell the notion that coal power plants are so superior on cost they are going to keep on being built for a long time to come. BHP Billiton wants public debate about coal shifted away from discussion of stranded assets, carbon bubbles and divestment to how best to mitigate pollution from new coal plants.
At welding face value lauding energy efficiency seems reassuring but in Big Coal s lexicon what they really mean is that they want to promote energy efficiency on the generation side of the equation welding rather than at the point of use.
As Carbon Capture and Storage has become ever more implausible as a viable option to mitigate carbon dioxide pollution, the coal industry has shifted tack to wanting to corral debate about coal power stations to the option of building higher efficiency welding plants rather than the dirtier sub-critical plants.
When BHP Billiton refers to the need to develop and deploy low-emissions technology they primarily mean government funding for Carbon Capture and Storage demonstration plants not accelerating the deployment of wind and solar. BHP Billiton welding support for a carbon welding price comes with the major caveat of ensuring it addresses competitiveness concerns. Having spent millions defeating Australia s carbon price which was set at $23 per tonne but with lots of exemptions, BHP Billiton s support for a carbon price is rather token. A carbon price which BHP Billiton would support would clearly be one set at a fraction of the external costs coal imposes and with loopholes big enough to drive a fleet of coal haul trucks welding through.
Of all of the elements of BHP Billiton s climate policy there is just one phrase that all of their political welding advocacy should be judged welding against and that is limiting climate change to the lower end of the IPCC emission scenarios.
It is deliberately ambiguous phrasing, but most reasonable observers welding would take it to imply the oft-stated IPCC goal of limiting warming to a 2 C increase but probably not the 1.5 C target that Pacific Islands and other countries welding insist it essential for their survival.
While the IEA provided its best guess estimates for 2040, energy modelling in a fast changing technological, political and economic welding landscape is a fraught business. Well-researched projections produced one year can be proved horribly wrong the next.
An estimate of
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