The Nature Positive Bills 2024 are a package of 3 Bills comprising the second stage of the Labor Government’s Nature Positive Plan to reform Australia’s national environmental law, the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (EPBC Act).
The Bills seek to establish:
The Bills were passed by the House of Representatives in July 2024 and subsequently introduced to the Senate on 12 August 2024, where the government requires the support of either the Coalition or the Greens and crossbench senators to pass the bills.
Recent Developments:
GHG Emission Regulation
Live: The Nature Positive Bills are currently before the Senate
GHG Emission Regulation
Live: The Nature Positive Bills are currently before the Senate
On 15 October, Rio Tinto published an updated position statement appearing to outline its support for reforms to Australia’s Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act. The company’s statement included calls for reforms that result in “strengthened and independent compliance and enforcement powers” and transparent “disclosure of project climate emissions”. This contrasts with the company’s position in a March 2024 letter to the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, in which it advocated for Australia's Prime Minister to “personally intervene” to rule out the introduction of climate considerations into the EPBC Act. However, although Rio Tinto's statement acknowledged the "interdependencies between nature and climate", the company does not clearly state whether it supports the inclusion of climate considerations into project assessment processes as part of the Government's Nature Positive reforms.
In a 10 September address at Minerals Week 2024, Minerals Council of Australia Chief Executive, Tania Constable advocated against the inclusion of climate considerations into Australia’s Environment Protection Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act. Constable appeared to call on the mining industry to lobby the Coalition Party to support Labor’s watered-down Nature Positive Bill as a means of sidelining the Greens Party from negotiations, who have proposed several amendments to the Bill, including the introduction of climate considerations and tighter restrictions around native forest logging.
As reported in a 24 July ABC News article, Business Council of Australia chief executive, Bran Black, advocated for the Australian government to rule out introducing a climate trigger into the Environment Protection Biodiversity Conservation Act. Black appeared to suggest that there was no need to incorporate climate considerations into the Act as Australia’s emissions are already regulated by its Safeguard Mechanism policy. The Business Council of Australia previously expressed opposition to the introduction of a climate trigger in its July 2024 submission to a Senate Inquiry into Australia’s Nature Positive Bills
In a March 28 personal letter to Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, Rio Tinto advocated for the Australian Government to weaken reforms to its Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act (EPBC Act). The letter, released under freedom of information laws, calls on the Prime Minister to personally intervene in the environment laws’ drafting process, including to rule out the inclusion of a climate trigger and other climate change requirements from its planned reform to the EPBC Act.
A broad group of industry associations advocated against the inclusion of a climate trigger in Australia’s EPBC Act in July 2024 submissions to a Senate Inquiry into the Nature Positive (Environment Information Australia) Bill 2024. The Business Council of Australia, Minerals Council of Australia, Australian Energy Producers, Association of Mining and Exploration Companies, and Chamber of Minerals and Energy of Western Australia all actively opposed the inclusion of a climate trigger as part of reforms to the EPBC Act, emphasizing potential risks of regulatory duplication, project approval delays and economic impacts to suggest that greenhouse gas considerations are more effectively dealt with by existing climate policy instruments.
The Australian Energy Council appeared to emphasize concerns regarding the introduction of a climate trigger into Australia’s EPBC Act in a 6 June blog post. Although the association noted a climate trigger could improve the effectiveness of mitigation measures under the Act, it appeared to qualify these statements by emphasizing that a climate trigger risks extending assessment and approval timelines for all referred projects under the Act.
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