According to the NT government, by ~2010 the NT’s emissions will almost double compared to 1990 levels (1990 is the international benchmark year). This doubling will occur mainly as a result of the planned completion of the Darwin LNG plant and the Alcan refinery expansion at Gove.
These two projects alone, when completed, will increase the Territory’s greenhouse pollution levels by a massive ~35%! No one should be accepting, let alone proud, of such colossal increases from one-off industrial projects - which are only ‘economic’ because overseas-owned corporations want to maximize profits by accelerating the export (and exhaustion) of our non-renewable resources.
A big opportunity!
Northern Australia, including the NT, is home to the world’s greatest remaining expanse of relatively intact savanna woodlands. The value of these woodlands as a global carbon sink – in addition to all their other values - is only just starting to be understood and acknowledged. Working with the WA and Queensland state governments, national and international governments, businesses and non-government organisations, the NT government should lead the way in developing an international carbon offsets scheme that will pay Indigenous and non-Indigenous landholders across northern Australia to protect and look after their native forests/woodlands as an effective global carbon sink – rather than clearing it for woodchip plantations (Tiwi islands) or to run cattle which produce high levels of the most serious greenhouse gas, methane.
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