Minister declared: “We will not close coal mines and power plants.”
Australia wants to mine coal for decades to come. “We have made it very clear that we will not close any coal mines or coal-fired power plants,” said Australian Resource Minister Keith Pitt in a TV interview on Monday. There will be a market for coal for a long time, and Australia will also have the raw material for as long Selling.
He said that the demand for coal will continue to rise until 2030, said Pitt. “And if we don’t win the market, someone else will do it.” Then it would be better if “Australia’s quality product” created jobs and boosted the economy in Australia than if the fuel came from Indonesia or Russia.
One of the largest coal producers
At the world climate conference COP26 in Glasgow last week, 40 countries announced that they wanted to forego the use of coal in the future. However, Australia and other important coal countries such as China and the USA did not sign.
The government of Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced last month that Australia wanted to be climate neutral by 2050. However, it did not come up with a specific plan for how this would be achieved. Canberra is apparently mainly relying on new technologies, which, however, do not yet exist.
Australia is one of the largest producers of coal and natural gas in the world. At the same time, the country has had to contend with increasingly extreme climate-related natural disasters such as droughts, floods and bush fires in recent years.
(WHAT/AFP)
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