Opposition leader, Peter Dutton, deserves an elephant stamp for calling out the impossibility of Australia reaching its 2030 emissions target set by the Labor government. The Coalition has now effectively disowned the target.

Recall here that the Coalition had been shooting for an emissions-reduction cut of between 26 and 28 per cent by 2030 from a base of 2005. The then prime minister, Scott Morrison, declared that this would be achieved in a canter. He wasn’t wrong on that score, because by the end of 2023, a cut of 29 per cent had been achieved.

But as they say, the last mile is always the hardest and so the 43 per cent emissions reduction set by the Albanese government is looking like a tough climb to the top of Everest in unfavourable weather conditions.

But this fact never deterred Albo and the hapless B1, Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen, from racing the new higher target into legislation and formally advising the UN climate bureaucrats in charge of the Paris Agreement racket of this more ambitious goal.

Mind you, the fact that the target is legislated doesn’t really make much difference nor does our refreshed statement of intent made to the UN – let’s not forget here that the Paris climate agreement is not legally binding.

Most signatories to Paris haven’t bothered to legislate their targets and have no intention of doing so. The UK, much to its shame, is different in that regard. Theresa May, a true climate believer if there ever was, insisted on this as well as committing the Tories to net zero.

She even conferred ridiculous powers on the Climate Change Committee, appointing extremist chairs who bully the Poms to change their evil climate ways – don’t eat meat, install expensive and ineffective heat pumps, use ‘active transport’ (walk, cycle or scooter) rather than drive the car, don’t even think about getting on a plane, etc, etc. Is it really any surprise that the Tories are about to get a drubbing, Boris and Rishi having never walked away from this rubbish?

But I digress. Let me get back to Australia. Dutts’ decision to decline the 43 per cent target is a mixture of informed realism and courageous politics. Needless to say, the progressive press is aghast, claiming that the announcement puts paid to the Liberals’ chances of winning back the Teal seats, although we shall see.

The rent-seeking business community with interests in green things is complaining bitterly. Evidently, they need certainty which is simply code for more subsidies. A lower target or no target at all will undermine their case for even more moolah from taxpayers and long-suffering consumers.

One of the advantages that Dutts has over Albo is that Dutts can count. Albo’s strong suit is wishful thinking and dreaming up rhyming cliches. The fact is that a 43 per cent target requires losing around 100 million tonnes of CO2-equivalent in six years in the context of a rapidly rising population. It boils down to the maths: where will those tonnes come from?

Sadly – OK, not that sadly – for B1, the renewable energy experiment has not been going entirely to plan, like Japan’s second world war effort. Of course, if you throw subsidies at something, you will get more of it. But there have been some significant impediments to renewable energy (RE)investment in recent times – escalating costs, worker shortages, local resistance to RE developments (God bless our country cousins) and inadequate transmission.

As a consequence, the amount of RE added to the grid has been a fraction of what is required to meet another B1 target – 82 per cent RE in the grid by 2030. It’s only around 40 per cent now. There is a long way to go.

Going by the polls, voter opinion is on the side of the Coalition on this issue. A rising majority think that affordable and reliable electricity is the most important consideration with a small and declining proportion taking the view that hitting the emissions target should prevail. Even those on board with the green energy idea either don’t want to pay anything extra or $100 more per year at most. It looks as though peak climate has been reached and we are now on the sunlit downhill.

Albo and B1 could easily be tempted to look beyond the electricity grid to achieve the unachievable target. Laughably, there was a view at some stage that 90 per cent of all car sales by 2030 would be EVs. Given recent developments in the EV market here and overseas, it would seem extremely optimistic to predict that half of all car sales in Australia will be EVs by the end of the decade.

Let’s face it, the wheels are really falling off the EV market in the US – pardon the pun. General Motors, which was given great licks of taxpayer money to convert to EV production and ditch its highly profitable and popular lines of internal combustion vehicles, is walking back at an incredible pace. The company built an EV truck expecting to sell 150,000 in the first year; it sold 27,000.

There are so many hairs on EVs as convenient family or work vehicles, including the incredibly high cost of insurance and the absence of a second-hand market. Add in the difficulty of accessing fast charging and range anxiety, and the real surprise is that so many EVs have been sold.

But note here that most EVs are sold to companies attracted by the substantial tax concessions, not to private buyers. The only ones surprised by these developments are the true-believing green activists – and B1.

The Albanese government might have a crack at pushing for the closure of some of the big emitters – aluminium smelters, alumina refineries, steel works – but the politics of this are not great. Attacking the farming community also has its downsides – just take a look at what has been happening in Europe with farmers revolting.

The bottom line is that Australia’s current emissions target already looks like a bust and most people who follow these things know this.

As Speccie readers appreciate, a political leader who stands for nothing is never well-placed to roll an incumbent government. Claims of superior managerial competence simply do not cut it if the proposed platforms are essentially the same as the government’s. (Take note, David Crisafulli, hapless opposition leader of the LNP in Queensland. It was a Bill Shorten moment – ‘I don’t know what’s in Labor’s budget but we will support it.’)

I say hats off to Dutts: he has taken a stand on the 2030 target. Next stop: ditch the folly of net zero by 2050.