Baker & McKenzie Writes Business Guide to Australia's Carbon Market

Sydney, Australia, November 2011 – Baker & McKenzie has authored a guide for businesses to Australia's new carbon market following the Australian Government's passage of the carbon pricing legislation earlier this month. The Firm was commissioned by the Carbon Market Institute (CMI) to write the guide.

Australia's Clean Energy Legislative Package – A Guide for Business is the first of its kind, designed to inform and educate Australian companies about the new scheme and how it will affect their businesses.

Baker & McKenzie Global Head of Climate Change, Martijn Wilder, said the scheme will transform the business landscape, creating new risks and opportunities to which business leaders will need to understand and respond.

"We are delighted to have worked with CMI to produce this comprehensive, yet easy-to-understand guide for businesses on what is a fairly complicated scheme,” he added.

Executive director of the Carbon Market Institute, Mike Tournier, said the more informed businesses are about the scheme, the better.

“Businesses are more likely to achieve the best outcomes from a national carbon price mechanism if they have a solid understanding of the content of the scheme and are able to easily navigate their way around the Legislative Package that underpins the scheme," he said.

The carbon price mechanism and accompanying legislation establishes a carbon price by way of an emissions trading scheme similar to that in Europe and New Zealand. It is designed to provide price signals to incentivise new behaviors and encourage the adoption and consumption of low carbon energy alternatives.

Australia's Clean Energy Legislative Package – A Guide for Business follows other market-leading publications prepared by Baker & McKenzie's Global Climate Change team including the official CDM and JI Rulebooks and the Emission Trading and New Energy Global Law Guide.

A copy of the Guide is available here.