KEY POINTS:
First of all this is an epoch-making change, introducing into the economy a price signal to reduce emissions.
The signal may be pretty faint at first for most consumers, but the change is essential. We will never get on top of the climate change problem without harnessing the power of prices and markets to deliver emissions reductions at least cost.
The package passes a key test of credibility inasmuch as it extends an olive branch - is that a pine branch - to the forestry sector.
It is a turnaround from the sterile policy of trying to explain to Kyoto foresters that they are not entitled to feel aggrieved, when they do and have for five years.
The forest sector is crucial both to reducing the coutnry's net emissions in the short term and to ensure there is a plentiful source of biofuels and green building materials in the long term.
For the rest of us the package is the thin end of a wedge which will widen over time, but saving the planet was never going to be free.
