Woodside Petroleum joins BHP and Rio Tinto to call for carbon price

'By the time the science is proven, it will be too late to act,' chief Peter Coleman says

Woodside Petroleum chief executive, Peter Coleman, has joined mining giants BHP and Rio Tinto in calling for a price on carbon to help with emissions reduction targets and the transition to renewable energy.

But the energy minister, Angus Taylor, has claimed Australia doesn't need a carbon price as emissions levels are coming down - a position at odds with the government's official emissions data and independent modelling.