Impact of Direct Action Plan and Carbon Tax Policy on Australia’s Transport Sector

IMPACT OF DIRECT ACTION PLAN AND CARBON TAX POLICY ON AUSTRALIA’S TRANSPORT SECTOR
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Impact of Direct Action Plan and Carbon Tax Policy on Australia’s Transport Sector
Rationale and Theoretical Underpinnings of the Policies
Australia’s local and federal governments launched a Carbon Tax Policy via the Clean Energy Act 2011. The focus was on minimizing and controlling carbon emissions to provide relevant support to the country’s economy by the newly implemented Clean Energy Regulator and Climate Change Authority (Australian Academy of Science, 2015). With the implementation of the Carbon Tax Policy, the Australian Government observed a decrease in carbon emissions. The Australian Government abides by the Kyoto Protocol and UNFCC guidelines in developing climate change policies. The economic theory indicates that greenhouse gas emission pollution is an externality because the exchange between transport companies and customers impacts the climate that is not part of the exchange.
Direct Action Plan is a climate change policy adopted by the Australian Government for minimizing greenhouse gas emissions. This scheme provides incentives to Australian firms for minimizing carbon emissions (Hoque et al., 2019). The Emission Reduction Fund of the Government provides direct support to the industries and businesses that are adopting CO2 emission reduction policies at the workplace. The transport sector is working collaboratively with the Government of Australia to promote best practices so that carbon emissions do not negatively impact the overall industry. The Government is also providing subsidies to carbon emission reduction projects.
The Direct Action Plan and Carbon Tax Policy play a vital role in promoting environmentally friendly practices and minimizing carbon emissions. The carbon emission has been minimized in the transport sector by 17 percent from fuel consumption, domestic shipping, pipeline transport, aviation, rail, and off-road recreational vehicles. Also, the greenhouse carbon gas emissions have decreased by 1.4 percent after introducing climate change policies like the Carbon Tax Policy and Direct Action Plan (Hoque et al., 2020). It can be concluded that the Australian Government's climate change policies have been successful in achieving the desired targets.
Australia’s Transport Sector and Climate Change Policies
The Government's climate change policies aim to minimize carbon emissions by 80% by the year 2050 and limiting global warming response below 2 degrees. In Australia, cars are a source of generating greenhouse pollution across different states. The Transport sector is the main contributor to emitting greenhouse gas, which is 17 percent of its overall carbon emissions (Wolfram and Wiedmann, 2017). From the year 1990, the transport sector's carbon emissions have increased by 60 percent, which is more than any other industry. However, the implementation of the Carbon Tax Policy has contributed to de-carbonizing Australia. The Government is providing subsidies to the transport sector so that the fuel costs remain at an affordable rate (Wolfram and Wiedmann, 20...