KEY POINTS:
Business lobby groups say the Government's planned emissions trading scheme will put thousands of jobs and $1.5 billion of investment at risk.
The Greenhouse Policy Coalition and the Major Energy User Group base these claims on 32 responses to a survey by firms in the meat, dairy, pulp and paper, steel, cement, shipping, mining and supermarket sectors.
Based on a carbon price of $30 a tonne, respondent firms' direct energy costs would rise by a combined $241 million a year. No account is taken of carbon price impact on their other input costs.
Respondents were evenly split on whether their investment plans would be affected but among those who thought it would be, the combined impact was put at $1.55 billion of new capital investment and 425 new jobs at risk.
A minority thought a $30 carbon price would mean scaling back their existing businesses or would reduce business-as-usual growth. The number of jobs potentially at risk was estimated at just over 2000.
But the survey comes with an important health warning. It presumes no free allocation of allowances.
GPC and MEUG believe 14 of the 32 respondent firms would qualify for free allocation under the draft policy's provision to grandfather 90 per cent of a firm's 2005 emissions above a threshold of 50,000 tonnes.
GPC executive director Catherine Beard said she thought the larger emitters would have taken that into account in their responses. The policy exposes emitters to the full cost of carbon on any increase in their production and envisages the progressive phasing out of protection from 2013 to 2025.
Climate Change Minister David Parker said the Government was finalising decisions on the legislation for emissions trading, which was likely to be introduced into Parliament before Christmas.
"Following the bill's introduction, it will be referred to a select committee in the normal manner," he said.
"The Government will continue to work with business and other stakeholders on details of the scheme over the next year."
