Carbon price passes in Australia

Baby steps:

The carbon plan, if passed by the Senate, would see Australia join the European Union and New Zealand with national emissions trading schemes, while the United States and Japan have smaller regional schemes.
The government and the Greens hope the carbon tax will reignite momentum for a global emissions reduction agreement at climate talks in Durban, South Africa, in December.

The above is a very partial list. India last year passed a coal tax which is estimated to have raised $555 million in its first year. That's India -- one of those poor, fast-growing, regardless-of-what-we-do-they will-never-do-anything places. And they've moved further down a path to a comprehensive carbon price than we have in North America.

China, though, with its new coal plant every week -- surely China would never pass a carbon tax.

BEIJING, May 11 - China could impose a carbon tax as soon as 2012, and officials have proposed it start from 10 yuan ($1.46) to 20 yuan per tonne of carbon dioxide, a Chinese newspaper said on Tuesday.
The Chinese-language Economic Information Daily said officials and experts from the Ministry of Finance and other state agencies have been studying how to introduce a tax aimed at curbing carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels.

Huh. Maybe we need to rethink this notion that developing countries will not act on global warming, even if the rich world steps up.

South Korea also seems to be moving towards an emissions trading scheme:

The National Assembly is expected to pass by December a bill for the proposed emission trading scheme, or ETS, Park Chun Kyoo, director general of the Presidential Committee on Green Growth overseeing climate change policy, said in an interview.
“Prospects for the bill appear quite healthy as it has backing from the ruling and opposition parties,” said Victoria Cuming, senior analyst at Bloomberg New Energy Finance in London.