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KYOTO KOST

New Zealand’s trustworthy treasury says the government’s Kyoto Kaper will cost the pacifist islands only $303 million, although other estimates put the eventual cost at anywhere between $500 million to $1.2 billion. That’s for a population of just four million. If similar debts were incurred by Australia and the US, we’d be looking—based on relative population size—at these remarkable figures:

NZ: $303 million. Australia: $1.5 billion. US: $22 billion.

NZ: $500 million. Australia: $2.5 billion. US: $37 billion.

NZ: $1.2 billion. Australia: $6 billion. US: $90 billion.

(Most of that cash, by the way, would be sent to Russia, who you might remember from such environmental successes as Chernobyl.) A group of Kiwi industrialists sensibly want the government to ditch its Kyoto policy. An election due later this year, however, may see the government itself ditched.

UPDATE. Richard McEnroe in comments: “The upside of Kyoto is that it lets CS buy spelling credits from more literate nations ...”

UPDATE II. Figures above corrected. Apologies for idiocy.

Posted by Tim B. on 07/14/2005 at 07:59 AM
  1. Any government that ratified Kyoto and fails to live up to its commitment should be shot with a ball of their own shit.

    Posted by Arty on 2005 07 14 at 09:30 AM • permalink

  2. The upside of Kyoto is that it lets CS buy spelling credits from more literate nations….

    Posted by richard mcenroe on 2005 07 14 at 09:44 AM • permalink

  3. I can never follow your NZ Herald links—they always lead to an index page, and the story you mention is always gone by the time I read it tomorrow or yesterday or whatever the hell day it is out there.

    Anyway, this payment is the bill for how long of a time period? Is it going to be recurring?

    Posted by Otter on 2005 07 14 at 10:16 AM • permalink

  4. The Australian letters 14/7

    PAUL Kelly’s points on the G8 and Kyoto fail to acknowledge the role the US and Australia openly play to promote Kyoto’s failure [....]

    Kyoto is currently the only international agreement with any chance of driving a shift to low-carbon economies. Voluntary approaches simply don’t work[....]

    Catherine Fitzpatrick
    Greenpeace Energy Campaign

    And Kyoto works?

    Posted by Melanie on 2005 07 14 at 10:54 AM • permalink

  5. Ultimately, Paul dear, all ‘international agreements’ are voluntary approaches, since nobody actually enforces the silly things.

    Posted by Achillea on 2005 07 14 at 11:28 AM • permalink

  6. Boy, they’re gonna have to sell a lot of sheep for this.

    Posted by Gary from Jersey on 2005 07 14 at 12:36 PM • permalink

  7. Per-capita, Kyoto is costing NZ about what the war in Iraq is costing the US.

    Reform tyrannies, thru example, and promote historic firsts in freedom throughout the most dangerous region in the world ... or satisfy the environmental lobby industry and thereby avoid negative press for day?

    Decisions, decisions.

    Posted by localharbor on 2005 07 14 at 12:39 PM • permalink

  8. Well, we know where the money’s going now, next question.

    WHY?!

    Posted by Aging Gamer on 2005 07 14 at 12:44 PM • permalink

  9. Gee, you’d think Australian news would be all over such an important story as this.  No doubt the Age’s henny-penny Melissa Fyfe, or maybe Dr. Clive Hamilton, are preparing major op-ed pieces as we speak.

    Posted by cuckoo on 2005 07 14 at 06:43 PM • permalink

  10. Tim,

    you miscalculated this,

    Australia’s population is 20 million,
    NZ’s is a bit more than 4 million.
    The correct table should be:

    NZ $303 million   AUS $1.5 billion
    NZ $500 million   AUS $2.5 billion
    NZ $1.2 billion   AUS $6 billion

    Posted by Honkie Hammer on 2005 07 14 at 07:39 PM • permalink

  11. Honkie #10 it is not the relative size of the population which matters it is the relative size of the economies. ie Aus economy is 7.25 times that of NZ. And I think the $303M is in NZ$ which is 92c Aus.

    So the calc as I see it is:
    303M/0.92 x 7.25 = 2,387M

    Posted by lingus4 on 2005 07 14 at 09:07 PM • permalink

  12. There is also the little matter of the different industry mix and sources of energy to be factored in, which means Tim has underestimated the equivalent impact.
    The reason why, as the green groups love to point out, that Australia has the highest per capita production of greenhous gases is because we have processing industries that produce a lot of greenhouse gas.  For example, removing our aluminium smelters and transferring them to a kyoto exempt country such as Indonesia, for example, would instantly give us an enormous reduction in greenhouse gas emissions that would make us the biggest heroes in hte world to the enviroweenies (well, maybe after getting rid of JWH as well). 

    Of course, doing so would result in a severe multiplication of Australia’s current account deficit, massive loss in export revenue, and make no difference to global greenhouse gas emissions, which would be merely emitted somewhere else - but hey, we sure would feel morally superior, wouldn’t we?

    Posted by entropy on 2005 07 14 at 10:31 PM • permalink

  13. Sorry Tim — Nobody accepts it when an evil conservative corrects a math error.

    TIM LIES!  CURRENCY FLIES!

    Posted by richard mcenroe on 2005 07 15 at 12:09 AM • permalink

  14. I demand a People’s Inquiry into the faulty intelligence data that resulted in Tim’s shameless lie.

    Impeach Tim Blair!

    Posted by PW on 2005 07 15 at 03:43 AM • permalink

  15. Tim, shame, shame!  Where is your Compassionate Head Tilt [TM]?????

    Posted by The_Real_JeffS on 2005 07 15 at 04:56 AM • permalink

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