The Australian Parliament has approved a major law to reduce the impact of a series of polluting industrial plants on the environment, considered the most ambitious in over a decade. Facilities affected by the new rules range from liquefied natural gas plants to coal mines and aluminum smelters, which currently account for around a quarter of Australia’s carbon dioxide emissions. The goal of the law is to drastically reduce carbon dioxide emissions (CO2), which are the main cause of climate change, by 2030. It expects more than 200 plants to reduce their pollution by 4.9 percent annually starting July 1.
The Australian Parliament passed the law after Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s Labor government managed to secure the support of the centre-left Australian Green party and some independent senators: the implementation of ambitious environmental policies had been part of the electoral campaign of Albanian.