, Columnist
Bushfires Reap What Australia’s Carbon Exports Have Sown
Dependence on the coal trade has helped to undermine emissions targets and contributed to rising global temperatures.
Paradise lost.
Photographer: Ian Waldie/Getty Images
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Australia isn’t what the world thought it was.
A country that markets itself on the basis of its wide-open blue skies, azure waters and huggable wildlife is suddenly presenting a different face: Tourists in holiday towns, huddled on beaches to get away from the impending fire front; cities choked by orange smoke and falling ash; kangaroos and koalas incinerated as they try to flee paddocks and woodlands.