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Experts from industry, academia and carbon consultancies agree the cost of the carbon trading scheme will hit small and medium size enterprises (SME) from two directions.
Ahead of Melbourne’s Carbon Reduction & Trading Conference and Expo, which will help SMEs come to terms with the new carbon economy from March 31 to April 2, experts say large business will pass costs both up and down the supply chain, affecting customers and suppliers.
The National Centre for Sustainability’s Richard Lester says large emitters caught under the proposed new laws are already beginning to put pressure on smaller suppliers to minimise their carbon footprints.
“While the National Greenhouse Energy Reporting Scheme (NGERS) and Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (CPRS) legislation, at this stage, only have a direct impact on fairly large organisations, we are increasingly finding small to medium enterprises that supply goods and services to larger companies and to government are being asked to provide quite detailed information on their carbon footprint,” he said.
“I expect that it will get to a stage soon when many tenders will require this kind of information. In fact, we are seeing this happen already, particularly in the government sector.”
Jesco dAlquen, CEO of carbon management technology firm, Tradeslot, says that a key part of that information will be the embedded carbon costs in goods and services.
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