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Does Australia’s safeguard mechanism matter for Metals and Mining?

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The Australian government has set greenhouse gas emission limits on its largest industrial facilities under the Australian Safeguard Mechanism (ASM). The impact on Metals & Mining (M&M) assets will vary widely due to the unique emission limitations applied to each commodity and the coal sector will bear the brunt. With such varied impacts across Australia’s M&M facilities, the path forward for each sector or asset will be unique.

Table of contents

  • Executive Summary
  • Background and Emission Limits
    • Analysis assumptions
    • Mining assets (non-coal)
    • Copper mines
    • Lead and zinc mines
    • Bauxite mines
    • Iron ore mines
    • Lithium mines
    • Gold mines
    • 6 more item(s)...
    • Compliance options under the ASM
    • 1) Business-as-usual (buying credits)
    • 2) Invest in decarbonisation
    • 3) Apply for a relaxed emissions baseline
    • 4) Borrow credits from future years
    • 5) Apply for a Multi-Year-Monitoring-Period
    • Implications

Tables and charts

This report includes the following images and tables:

  • Australian M&M assets by sector and ASM inclusion (%)
  • Average upper limit of carbon costs incurred under the ASM (% of cash costs)
  • Safeguard hybrid baselines: default and facility-specific emissions intensity baseline ratio
  • Lead and zinc mines - average cost of emissions - @ US$50/tCO2e
  • Bauxite mines - average cost of emissions - @ A$50/tCO2e
  • Iron ore mines - average cost of emissions - @ A$75/tCO2e
  • Lithium mines - average cost of emissions - @ A$75/tCO2e
  • Gold mines - average cost of emissions - @ A$75/tCO2e
  • Alumina refineries - average cost of emissions - @ A$75/tCO2e
  • Aluminium smelters - average cost of emissions - @ A$75/tCO2e
  • Steel plants - average cost of emissions - @ A$75/tCO2e
  • Safeguard hybrid baselines: default and facility-specific emissions intensity baseline ratio
  • 1 more item(s)...

What's included

This report contains:

  • Document

    Does Australia’s safeguard mechanism matter for Metals and Mining?

    PDF 1.57 MB