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BHP Says Will Work with Australia on Climate Change (Update1)
2010-09-15 04:20:14.839 GMT
(Updates with CEO comment in second paragraph.)
By Rebecca Keenan and Elisabeth Behrmann
Sept. 15 (Bloomberg) -- BHP Billiton Ltd., the world's
largest mining company, will work with Australia's government on
climate change policies as Prime Minister Julia Gillard pushes
to impose a price on carbon emissions.
BHP is "committed to working with governments on the
design of effective policies to help reduce greenhouse gas
concentrations in the atmosphere," Marius Kloppers, chief
executive officer of the Melbourne-based company, said today in
an industry briefing in Sydney. "Our preferred solution is the
introduction of an international climate framework, which
includes binding commitments by all developed and major
developing economies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions."
Australia, seeking to curb greenhouse gas emissions,
appointed Greg Combet, a former union leader and coal mining
engineer, as climate change minister this week. Gillard has
agreed to establish a climate change committee to move toward
introducing a penalty for carbon emissions.
"We believe local actions that are eventually harmonized
into unified global action is a more likely outcome than an
immediate broadly supported global initiative," Kloppers said.
"We also believe that such a global initiative will eventually
come, and when it does Australia will need to have acted ahead
of it to maintain its competitiveness."
BHP gained 0.3 percent to A$39.17 at 2:01 p.m. Sydney time
on the Australian stock exchange.
For Related News and Information:
To see more on BHP: BHP AU <Equity> <GO>
To see more metal news: METT <GO>
--Editors: Keith Gosman, Indranil Ghosh
To contact the reporter on this story:
Rebecca Keenan in Melbourne at +61-3-9228-8721 or
rkeenan5@bloomberg.net
Elisabeth Behrmann in Sydney at +61-2-9777-8624 or
ebehrmann1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story:
Hwee Ann Tan at +852-2977-6644 or
hatan@bloomberg.net
