Parliament Updates

Zali Steggall speaks about climate risk and methane measurement, monitoring and reporting

4 July 2024

Climate risk is escalating and costing our communities, and 1.5 degrees is not a goal or a target. It is an important threshold. Scientists around the globe have identified it as the point beyond which climate risk will accelerate, impacting every aspect of our economy, environment and communities.

The government is not doing all it can to mitigate the worst effects of climate change and mitigate that risk. It continues to approve extension of coal and gas projects well beyond 2050. We need diligent measuring and monitoring of all emissions, in particular methane emanating from extraction and gas that is transported, including from open coalmines. Methane traps more heat in the atmosphere per molecule than CO2, making it 80 times more harmful than CO2 for 20 years after it's released.

Opposition members interjecting

Australia has signed the Global Methane Pledge to reduce methane emissions by 30 per cent by 2030. The interjections from members of the coalition are not surprising, because we know they do not want to act on climate change. They want to continue seeing their communities exposed to escalating risk without mitigating it. Who will pay the cost? Communities will pay the cost.

In relation to methane, Australia has signed the Global Methane Pledge to reduce methane emissions by 30 per cent by 2030. However, our laws do not require facilities to actually measure, monitor and capture, where possible, methane emissions. In 2019, on our current flawed measuring, methane made up 68 per cent of Australia's emissions from the energy industry overall. We are not yet on track to achieving net zero by 2050. There is compelling evidence of gross underreporting of fugitive methane emissions from Australian mines and gas facilities, based on analysis by the International Energy Agency's satellite data published in its Global Methane Tracker. The International Energy Agency highlights that methane emissions from oil and gas are some of the easiest to abate if appropriate monitoring and measuring is implemented.

We should have global best practice on measuring, monitoring and reporting methane, especially as we are the 11th highest methane emitter globally and 10 per cent of our national emissions are fugitive. There's a growing body of evidence highlighting the gross underreporting of methane emissions, particularly from other fugitive emissions from open-cut mines and from oil and gas extraction. The ACF'sAnnual Australian methane plume summary2023 shockingly reported that Glencore's Hail Creek mine is suspected as having had at least one super-emitting event over a 16-day period, where there were some 60-times-higher methane emissions than what was in fact reported or offset. The Global Methane Tracker 2024 suggests Australia is underreporting it's methane emissions by up to 64 per cent. This underreporting is significant, not only due to the magnitude of potential error but also due to the high contribution methane makes to Australia's overall emissions profile and the liabilities associated with these emissions under the safeguard mechanism.

This evidence has been put to the government, and the government is on notice that Australia has an emissions reporting problem and is undermining not only the safeguard mechanism but our international commitment under the Paris Agreement and the Global Methane Pledge. The review of the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting scheme by the Climate Change Authority recommended mandatory measurement, reporting and independent verification of methane emissions. Investment in emissions monitoring infrastructure is necessary for the full implementation of these recommendations, but unfortunately there was nothing in the last budget from the government to address that. Further, the government has now missed its statutory deadline to respond to the review's recommendations to fix methane reporting. It's now two weeks overdue.

At a time when the Minister for the Environment and Water continues to approve further gas projects well into the future, that is negligent. The Australian government must urgently address methane emissions both in the agricultural sector and in the coal and gas sector. May I remind the House and people out there that the first impact of a biowarming climate will be on those relying on the environment for their living—for example, in the agriculture sector. The warnings that that sector will not survive are dire. The crops will not survive the kind of predicted temperature changes and climate changes that are coming. I urge the government and the coalition: come to your senses and start acting on this threat.