Australia’s carbon credit scheme ‘largely a sham’, says whistleblower who tried to rein it in

Professor Andrew Macintosh is an environmental law and policy expert at The Australian National University (ANU). Australia. Photograph: Energy Transition Hub

A whistleblower who spent years working on the integrity of the Australian government’s carbon credit system has launched an extraordinary attack on the scheme, describing it as a fraud that is hurting the environment and has wasted more than $1bn in taxpayer funding.

Prof Andrew Macintosh, the former head of the government’s Emissions Reduction Assurance Committee, said the growing carbon market overseen by the government and the Clean Energy Regulator was “largely a sham” as most of the carbon credits approved did not represent real or new cuts in greenhouse gas emissions.