Climate and population

Barry Brannan
A population growth strategy for Tasmania would drive up greenhouse gas emissions, says Sustainable Population Australia.
MEDIA RELEASE
SUSTAINABLE POPULATION AUSTRALIA INC
(Tasmanian Branch)

Thursday, 11 December 2008

POPULATION GROWTH PRESENT CLIMATE CHALLENGES
A population growth strategy for Tasmania would drive up greenhouse gas emissions, says Sustainable Population Australia.

The state ranks amongst the worst greenhouse gases polluters compared to most industrialised countries. This is despite Tasmania having a per-capita greenhouse emission rate lower than the Australian average.

Overseas immigrants typically increase their greenhouse gas emissions when moving to the state.

The UK is our top source of immigrants and our emission rate of approximately 17T CO2-equivalent per capita exceeds the UK rate of approximately 11T per capita. Similarly, Tasmania’s emissions far exceed those from other common countries of origin such as China and India. The only major source of immigrants where emission rates are higher is New Zealand, but only barely.

“Tasmania’s per-capita emissions exceed that of most countries where our immigrants originate”, said Barry Brannan, Vice-President of the Tasmanian Branch of Sustainable Population Australia.

Interstate migration only accounts for a small proportion of the state’s population growth, so any reduction in emissions from that group is outweighed by increases from overseas migrants.

To complicate things further, the theory that immigrants will adopt our average per-capita emissions may no longer hold true. With limited opportunity to increase Tasmania’s hydro power output, the state relies more on coal power imported over Basslink and burning of gas.

Tasmania’s current per-capita emission rate has benefited from a large share of hydro power to date. As this proportion decreases, our per capita emission rate will increase.

“Without radical plans for efficient energy generation, Tasmania’s per-capita emissions will rise significantly with population growth”, says Mr Brannan.

“Any government serious about climate change must recognise the impacts of population growth”.

“Meeting climate change targets will be hard enough with our current population let alone with an additional 500,000 people”, Mr Brannan concluded.

Email: tas@population.org.au

www.population.org.au