The WHOLE Point of the Carbon Tax?

Not the WHOLE Point of the Carbon Tax -

Tony Abbott: “The impacts of the carbon tax on the construction industry because anything that uses steel, cement, glass, plastic or aluminium is going to have a big impact from the carbon tax because making all these things involves an enormous amount of energy and the whole point of the carbon tax is to make energy more expensive [sic. See below].”

“There is no doubt that this package, as it stands, is going to do terrible damage to the aluminium industry in this country. We have an aluminium industry in this country because we’ve got cheap power and if we don’t have the cheap power it’s going to be very difficult to sustain. Now, I know they’re talking to the Government about various forms of assistance but the best assistance you can give aluminium is not to have a carbon tax.”
(From the transcript of the Hon. Tony Abbott MHR, interview with Richard Kew, Coast FM, Western Victoria, July 15, 2011 – Subject: Julia Gillard's Carbon Tax) 

The Whole Point of the Carbon Tax Is NOT To Make Energy More Expensive -

Aluminium refining with the Hall–Héroult process developed 125 years ago uses about 15 kWh of electricity for each kilogram of aluminium produced from aluminium oxide.

At very high temperatures attainable with Concentrated Solar Thermal technology, this 15 kWh of electricity can be reduced: with higher and higher temperatures, the amount of electricity required becomes less and less.

Ellingham Diagram

Any experimenters willing to develop a commercially competitive Concentrated Solar Thermal aluminium refining process that reduces the amount of electricity to 1 kWh for each kilogram of aluminium produced should get their funding bids ready.

Eliminating the environmentally hazardous fluoride compounds created by the 19th Century industrial process still used today will be an extra benefit.