Australia's heavy reliance on coal -- providing about 80 percent of the country's electricity -- makes it the world's biggest per capita producer of emissions. First mined in Australia in 1798, coal is the country's oldest export industry, and now the biggest.

Australia mines 318 million tons of black coal annually. Just one-fifth of that amount is used domestically, with the remainder exported.

Nearly half of Australia's coal is exported to Japan. In the past year, exports to China increased ten-fold, totaling more than 20 million tons. And Australia is well positioned to meet India's growing demand as well.

The world's appetite for Australian coal will see the country's export industry double in the next 10 years, reports The Age. While the government talks about reducing the country's carbon dioxide pollution, the newspaper says, when it comes to coal exports, the focus is on how to increase the numbers.

''There's so much coal around, if we were to stop producing it, our buyers would just shift to perhaps lower quality ones from South Africa, or Indonesia, and tweak the technology to be able to use it,'' says Australian Coal Association chief Ralph Hillman.

But Guy Pearse, a former Liberal adviser turned coal industry critic, says Australia should halt coal exports now, before it represents an even larger part of the country's economy.

He says a phase-out is not only essential, but can be managed. ''The idea that the economy crashes is completely implausible. … If you look at where the economy is heading by 2030, we'll still double it. … You are still looking at a much larger economy and more prosperous people, even without coal," he told The Age.

When factoring in the 80 percent of the coal it exports, along with its own emissions from coal-fired plants, Australian coal is responsible for 1 billion tons of carbon dioxide each year. That's about 8.3 percent of the total global emissions from coal.

While some see the promise of "clean coal" through developing carbon capture and storage, Australia's Treasury says that technology is still 24 years away. But that's too late, say environmentalists and most scientists.

Greenpeace climate campaigner Julien Vincent thinks Australia should begin by capping coal exports, then reducing them, eventually, to nothing.

''Where is our moral credibility on climate change … when we are prepared to flog off to the rest of the world twice as much of the most polluting fuel at the same time as we're calling on everyone else to act on climate change?'' he said, The Age reports.

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