Emissions reduction fund to pay for fossil fuel plant that would be built anyway
by Adam Morton from Environment | The Guardian on (#49THZ)
Exclusive: miner Gold Fields to get $1m from Coalition fund for gas power plant for its Western Australian mine
The Morrison government's emissions reduction fund - rebadged as a "climate solutions" policy and to be boosted with an extra $2bn - is being used to help one of the world's biggest gold miners pay for a fossil fuel power plant the company concedes it would have built anyway.
Fund opponents say it is the latest evidence that design flaws in the scheme are leading to taxpayers' money being wasted on projects that are commercially viable even without public support. In some cases, the climate funding is going to new fossil fuel projects on the grounds that they are cleaner than the dirty projects they replace.
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