Feed-in tariffs feed-in tariff (FIT) is a premium rate paid to producers of renewable energy. FIT system has been enacted in Austria, Brazil, Canada, China, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Israel, Italy, the Republic of Korea, Lithuania, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and in some states the United States. Hans-Josef Fell, a Greens MP in the German parliament who pioneered their feed-in tariff electricity system, claims that this is because it led to a 100 million tonne reduction in carbon emissions in Germany whereas emissions trading only led to a 9 million tonne reduction.
Limited solar photovoltaic FIT’s have been enacted by several State Governments in Australia and several have proposed feed-in tariffs schemes, the principal purposes of which are to encourage the adoption of renewable energy, to assist in meeting peak demand and to provide distributed electricity generation, reducing dependence on grids and major utilities.
On 28 October 28 2010 New South Wales government has cut solar feed in tariff from 60¢ to 20¢ a kilowatt hour.

Emissions trading is an administrative approach with the goal to reduce pollution by providing economic incentives for achieving reductions in the emission of pollutants. In such a plan, a central authority (usually a government agency) sets a limit or cap on the amount of a pollutant that can be emitted. Companies or other groups that emit the pollutant are given credits or allowances which represent the right to emit a specific amount. The total amount of credits cannot exceed the cap. Companies that pollute beyond their allowances must buy credits from those who pollute less than their allowances or face heavy penalties. This transfer is referred to as a trade. In effect, the buyer is being fined for polluting, while the seller is being rewarded for having reduced emissions. Thus companies that can easily reduce emissions will do so and those for which it is harder will buy credits which reduces greenhouse gasses at the lowest possible cost to society. There are currently several trading systems in place with the largest being the European Union’s. Many businesses have welcomed emissions trading as the best way to mitigate climate change. Enforcement of the caps is a problem, but unlike traditional regulation, emissions trading markets can be easier to enforce because the government overseeing the market does not need to regulate specific practices of each pollution source. However, monitoring and verifing of actual emissions is still required, which can be costly. Critics doubt whether these trading schemes can work as there may be too many credits given by the government, such as in the first phase of the European Union’s scheme. Once a large surplus was discovered the price for credits bottomed out and effectively collapsed, with no noticeable reduction of emissions.

Travelling by bus is the most environmentally conscious way of travel. Greyhound buses in Australia are some of the most environmentally efficient travel operators. Studies have shown that one full coach has five times less CO2 emissions per passenger per kilometre than a jet aircraft on the same route, and for every full coach, there are 16 fewer cars on the road. The buses are also fuelled with the cleanest diesel on the Australian Market, BP 10PPM. I will take as example a trip from Melbourne to Sydney considering that the bus uses 1 litre of diesel per 4 km. The distamce is 900km so the bus is using 900 / 4 = 225 liters of diesel. With 60 people on the bus one person is using 3.75 litres of diesel per trip.

Current biodiesel production capacity in Australia is about 18 million litres per year, however plans for establishment of new facilities or expansion of existing ones will increase this capacity to around 90 million litres per year. For example in Wyong NSW, Australian Biodiesel Consultancy and Collex are currently operating a trial biodiesel plant, using recycled cooking oil and tallow that produces 15 million litres per year. In WA, Australian Renewable Fuels has a plant which produces 40 million litres of biodiesel per year. It uses low grade tallow and used cooking oils as feedstock and will also annually produce 6,000 tonnes of raw glycerine and 1,800 tonnes of sulphate of potash fertiliser in paste form. It is using an improved production technology called a Continuous Trans Esterification Reactor (CTER) that reduces processing time and can reduce plant capital costs by up to 50%.