The Australian Trucking Association has called for a blanket carbon tax exemption for the nation’s trucking sector, saying that the industry has little room to maneuver or offset its emissions.

In a speech delivered to the National Press Club, ATA Chairman David Simon said that the introduction of the carbon tax would spell disaster for the sector.

“In its Clean Energy Package, the Government announced that the fuel used by the trucking industry would not be subject to the carbon tax until mid-2014. The Government’s plan is that it would then reduce the fuel tax credits that trucking operators can claim by almost 7 cents per litre in the first year,” Mr Simon said.

“That’s a 27 per cent tax hike. It would cost the industry more than half a billion dollars a year. It would be a massive shock for many trucking businesses, and they would not be able to respond.”

Mr Simon said that the rationale behind the Clean Energy Package, that businesses can respond by increasing their dependency on renewables, does not apply to the trucking sector because access to low emissions technology is either too expensive, inaccessible or inappropriate for the transport sector. It assumes that businesses that cannot do this would be able to increase their prices. This would, in turn, change their customers’ behaviour.

“Neither of these assumptions fit the commercial reality of the trucking industry,” he said.

“Trucking businesses only have limited opportunities to reduce their energy use. Switching to renewables is not generally an option.

“The Government projects that the use of biodiesel will increase rapidly from the end of the decade, and that it will be the dominant transport fuel by 2030.

“But the carbon tax on trucking would take effect in 2014, not the end of the decade. Biodiesel blends are rarely available, and gaseous fuels like LNG are not usable for long distance operations.

In a rare display of unity in the transport sector, the Australasian Railway Sector chief, Bill Nye, said that he supported the calls, and that the same exemption should be extended to the rail sector.

“Trains emit one third of the pollution of trucks and yet the rail industry is required to pay $110 million each year whilst one of Australia’s largest polluters is given a free pass,” Mr Nye said.

“This has created a perverse incentive where we are actually encouraging the use of a more emissions intensive transport option”, Mr Nye continued