Australia expert wants cautious carbon targets: report

CANBERRA (Reuters) - The Australian government's emissions trading architect will call for cautious and proportionate carbon reduction targets in a paper to be delivered on Friday, media reports said.

Economist Ross Garnaut, asked to design an emissions trading system for the centre-left government, will outline how much it will cost the $850 billion economy and what cuts the country needs to make to curb carbon emissions by 60 percent by 2050.

Australia is the world's 16th biggest carbon polluter, accounting for about 1.5 percent of global emissions, but produces five times more carbon pollution per person than China and is the fourth-largest per-capita emitter.

The centre-left government is planning to begin carbon trading in 2010, forcing 1,000 companies to buy permits to cover emissions and putting a market price on carbon to encourage firms to clean up.

But it has come under pressure from big companies to increase compensation for the scheme, with business leaders warning it could drive high-emission firms offshore or out of business.

Garnaut told the Sydney Morning Herald newspaper ahead of his 12:30 pm (10:30 p.m. EDT) National Press Club speech that "the costs of adjustment are proportionate to other countries, and they are manageable." In a draft report in July, Garnaut said a 90 percent cut in emissions by 2050 might be needed to combat climate change, far higher than the government's 60 percent target.

The newspaper said Garnaut would not comment on a report on an Internet site that he would recommend a 2020 reduction target of only between zero and 15 percent from 1990 emission levels.

In his Friday speech, Garnaut would outline four possible targets for cutting greenhouse pollution according to a range of scenarios, the newspaper said.

Garnaut would also look at the cost of keeping carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases at levels of 450 parts a million, which scientists say will give only a moderate chance of averting dangerous climate change.

He is not believed to be in favor of acting on emissions to keep carbon dioxide at a higher level of 550 parts a million in the atmosphere, the newspaper said.

(Reporting by Rob Taylor, editing by Jonathan Standing)