Australia is the world’s worst per capita polluter

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http://www.khaleejtimes.ae/DisplayArticle08.asp?xfile=data/environment/2010/August/environment_August1.xml§ion=environment

(AFP)

1 August 2010,

<snip>Australia is the world’s worst per capita polluter, and electricity generation accounts for about one-third of the country’s greenhouse emissions, which last year reached an equivalent 537 million tonnes of CO2.

Some of the country’s biggest coal mines are in the Hunter region, with BHP Billiton, Rio Tinto and Xstrata projects connected by rail to Newcastle Harbour, the world’s largest coal export port.

Hundreds of ships leave there every year for Japan, Korea, Taiwan, China and India, and Australia is the world’s number one exporter of coal, last year accounting for a 28 percent share of the global market.

Former prime minister Kevin Rudd won a landslide 2007 election victory on a pro-green platform which saw him ratify the Kyoto Protocol and take a lead role at last year’s failed climate talks in Copenhagen.

His decision to shelve an emissions trading scheme which was twice rejected by lawmakers sent his popularity into such a spin the ruling Labor party dumped him in a shock coup favouring his female deputy, Julia Gillard.