World is Green

One of the clean tech areas of the future is Water. Allianz has launched a new fund which will target this area across the world.

“Less than 0.007% of all the water in the world is potable, or safe for consumption,¹ yet the demand for fresh water is steadily increasing,” said Bozena Jankowska, portfolio manager of the Allianz RCM Global Water Fund. “Solving this global water challenge demands a long-term effort from institutions around the world which we believe will require significant investment from the private sector.”

The Fund will seek long-term capital appreciation by investing in a portfolio of companies that are substantially engaged in water-related activities that relate to the quality or availability of or demand for potable and non-potable water. The following are included among these activities:

• Water production, storage, transport and distribution;
• Water supply-enhancing or water demand-reducing technologies and materials;
• Water planning, control and research;
• Water conditioning, such as filtering, desalination, disinfection and purification;
• Sewage and liquid waste treatment; and
• Water delivery-related equipment and technology, consulting or engineering services relating to any of the above-mentioned activities.

Malcolm Turnbull, the current liberal leader current liberal member (thanks Julie White for the correction) in Australia and the former Environment minister under the Howard government gave a recent speech on Climate Change and Economics. (Hat tip: Green Link Central)

During my time as Environment Minister three points about climate change became very clear to me and you will have heard me making them often. They bear repeating today.

The first is obvious: climate change is a fact, not a theory. By that I mean that whatever reservations people might have about the science, policymakers must, as Rupert Murdoch once observed, “give the planet the benefit of the doubt.”

The second point is less obvious. Given that so much of our emissions are from sources that are likely to be very hard to abate either at all or at realistic cost, the emission reduction goals we are setting ourselves for 2050 will mean in practical terms that we will need in 42 years to have a world where all or almost all of our energy comes from zero emission sources and where deforestation, currently the source of 20 per cent of global emissions, is replaced by a global programme of reforestation – an initiative I was proud to have pioneered while Environment Minister in the Howard Government last year.

This would mean that there would be no coal fired power stations unless the CO2 was captured and stored safely under the ground. Automobiles would be electric – a whole energy hungry world would have to undergo an industrial and technological transformation of a kind never seen before in its global scope and scale.

The third point is that there is no prospect of achieving the massive global reductions in emissions that science demands unless all of the major emitting nations both in the developed and developing world play a part. Until a few years ago that was a controversial statement, but as always the relentless logic of arithmetic has won the day. Indeed, as we saw at the US President’s first Major Economies Meeting on climate last September even if the developed world cut its emissions by 100 per cent by 2050, to achieve a global reduction to 50 per cent of 2005 levels, the developing world would need to cut its
emissions by 47 per cent.

Carbon trading scheme to exceed federal bonds

Anthony Collins…

“The value of the permits is likely to be issued over the first 10 years [and] is likely to exceed $100 billion,” he said.

“That’s going to be larger than the value of Commonwealth Government bonds on issue today.”

Harold Lubansky has suggested a radical way to control inflation in Australia and at the same time fund green projects.

From The Age:

Mr Lubansky proposes the creation of a National Climate Change Savings Scheme into which Australians earning a net income of $38,000 a year or more would contribute.

Instead of the Reserve Bank needing to lift interest rates in a bid to control inflation, the central bank would be given powers to order a payment into the climate change fund.

“What it does is work to soak up excess liquidity. Raising interest rates limits the amount we have to spend, spending less elsewhere decreases the pressure on supply and that decreases the upward pressure to raise prices. This would act similarly,” Mr Lubansky said.

Under the Lubansky proposal, those earning $38,000 a year would be charged $250, or 0.66% of net disposable income, instead of paying 0.25% more on their mortgage. It rises to $2500, or 1%, for those earning $250,000 a year.

Unlike mortgage repayments which are never seen again, the money paid into the fund would be returned to individuals to spend on legislated carbon abatement measures such as solar panels, the differential cost on hybrid cars and infrastructure for green power.

I am not qualified enough to comment on this but it does sound an innovative way. Any comments?