This is why the Opposition’s new climate announcement is causing major waves.

Peter Dutton has dropped a new climate bombshell, announcing his party will head to the polls with a plan to abandon Australia’s 2030 emissions targets.

But this is much bigger than a domestic policy debate – this would be a breakup on a global scale.

Ditching the 2030 targets means pulling out of the Paris Agreement, the most significant climate change treaty of all time.

In December 2015, almost every country in the world signed a legally binding agreement to keep global surface temperature to 1.5 degrees. 

To do so meant almost halving emissions by 2030, and something Australia has legislated.

But the Coalition claims that at current rates, the only way Australia can meet that target is by collapsing the industry.

The Coalition plan is net zero by 2050, using nuclear power to get there and relying on gas to support the grid until the reactors are built. 

Which the CSIRO says won’t happen before 2040, and at a cost of up to $12 billion per reactor.