As the country struggles to retain its global competitiveness but retaining its current energy production levels to sustain local industries, the Australian Parliament has dedided to put a price on coal emissions.

According to Climate Change Minister Greg Combet, carbon pollution emissions will soon come with a price to compliment the country's bid to meet ecological targets amidst increasing demand for the fuel to power manufacturing and various other industries.

Australia's industries derive close to 80 percent of its power generation from coal.

"It's in the country's 'national interest' to impose a price on these emissions, which is the cheapest way of reducing this form of pollution," Combet said at a conference in Melbourne today.

He noted that this is one of the commitments of Prime Minister Julia Gillard as she gained the support ofrom the Greens Party and three independents.

Gillard and her team created a new committee that would consider proposals whether to form a market-based emissions-trading system, a carbon tax or a "hybrid" of both and will "usually" convene in a monthly basis.

"A market mechanism, such as a as a cap-and-trade emissions trading scheme is a very efficient way of going about achieving quantifiable emissions reductions," said Combet, a former coal-mining engineer and union leader.

The Australian Parliament would likely change its tact on carbon emissions in the next three years.

Citigroup said in a Bloomberg report that the likely scenario for the Australian government is to price carbon emissions in the near term instead of a previous plan to tax or create a trading system.

An analyst at Citigroup in Sydney said Prime Minister Julia Gillard would have to deal with similar issues of compensation and allocation of free permits."

As a form of pledge to tackle climate change Prime Minister Gillard said earlier this month that she would set up a committee that would be in-charge of the carbon plan.

It was cited in the report that if such a policy would be implemented, energy companies Origin Energy Ltd., AGL Energy Ltd. and Infigen Energy.

Because a carbon regulation policy will greatly depend on electricity generation, this would prime up electricity prices, but at the same time, set a better economics for renewable forms of energy.

In a statement last week, BHP Billiton Ltd. Chief Executive Officer Marius Kloppers has urged lawmakers to combine a carbon tax, regulation and a market-based trading system restricted to power generation.