Green Building Council releases CPRS Position Paper

The Green Building Council of Australia (GBCA) today formally released its response the Federal Government's Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (CPRS) Green Paper.

In releasing the response, GBCA Chief Executive Romilly Madew described it as highlighting the key role the built environment has in climate change and greenhouse gas abatement.

"Our consistent message has always been that buildings in Australia represent the single largest source of cost-effective GHG abatement. This is backed up by a wealth of independent evidence such as the IPPC, McKinsey and a range of other research journals.

"The CPRS does represent an avenue by which the government can unlock the tremendous potential within Australia's built environment, the GBCA had envisaged that the CPRS would in some way incorporate the building sector.

"It is discouraging that buildings have not been included in the CPRS, however, we understand it is the government's intention to introduce a scheme which is focused principally on the emission intensive energy producers", Ms Madew said.

The GBCA submission reinforces the value of the built environment in the fight against climate change and lays out a range of policy measures that could operate alongside the CPRS.

Included in the submission are initiatives such as accelerated depreciation for green buildings, discounts to state and local charges such as land tax and rates for green buildings, establishment of an R&D fund and support for programs that would close the information gap.

"These and the other complementary measures identified in the report, if introduced, would go a long way to tapping the potential within Australian buildings to reduce energy use and related emissions.

"We will continue to promote to government options to incorporate buildings in the CPRS when it is reviewed sometime in 2013. We hope that the government will look at those options and seriously consider their implementation.

"In the meantime, we will work with the Federal Government to provide policy solutions that will form the basis of the Prime Minister's 'second plank' to our national effort to address climate change".