Geoscience Reference
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The per capita costs of carbon taxes of this magnitude are considerable. For Australia,
with emissions of some 18 tonnes per capita (similar to the US and Canada) a tax of $75
pertonnewouldcost$1350perheadunlessitweretobeabletobeimposedonallsources,
in which case it would be around $250 per head (US and Canada are comparable). 20 These
direct costs of a carbon tax understate the true costs since they exclude the costs that are
incorporated in the goods and services we buy.
Surveys have indicated that few people, even those voicing concerns about global
emissions, are willing to pay these sorts of sums to bring about emission reductions. For
Australia,theresearchfirmGalaxyfoundthatonly4percentofrespondentssaidtheywere
willingtooutlayover$1000peryeartoreducegreenhouseemissions(42percentsaidthey
would outlay over $300 per year). 21
Of course, saying one would outlay funds and actually outlaying them is
different—people, rich and poor, resist tax outlays even if they consider them to be valid.
According to Garnaut, non-hydro renewables and CCS will account for 90 per cent
of electricity generation in Australia by 2050. If supply increases by only 20 per cent on
the 2014 level of 220,000 GWh, reaching 264,000 GWh, at a current carbon intensity of
0.87 tonnes per MWh, this translates into 230 million tonnes of CO 2 . 22 With carbon priced
at $250 per tonne, the additional cost of electricity would be $57,500 million, or, for a
population which might by then be 30 million, close to an average of $2,000 per capita.
And this is only for electricity, which is responsible for less than half of total emissions.
Direct effects on household energy consumers aside, Garnaut trivialises the costs of
achieving Australia's required 80 per cent emission reductions, which would necessitate
abandoningexistingtechnologyandsubstitutingitwithtotallyunproventechnologies.The
mix of technologies differs from scenario to scenario, but Figure 5 is typical of the mix
Garnuat forecasts.
Noteworthy is that by 2050 virtually all electricity is assumed to be generated from
technologiesthateitherdon'tpresentlyexistoraremassivelymoreexpensivethanthoseof
today.
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