Carbon plan 'would close businesses'

THE Business Council of Australia warns of company closures and huge profit downgrades if the Rudd Government goes ahead with its planned carbon emission trading scheme. The Government's ETS model - outlined in a green paper released last month - provided inadequate compensation for emissions-intensive-trade-exposed business and contained significant anomalies, it said. Based on a carbon price of $40 per tonne - the current price in Europe - the compensation mechanism would result in some businesses closing across a range of sectors including minerals processing, manufacturing, oil refining, coal mining and sugar milling, a paper launched by the council today suggests. The council says it fully supports a comprehensive emissions trading scheme as the best way to reduce emissions, but getting the design detail right is... [read full story]