The federal government is claiming a climate change policy win, with new figures showing Australia will exceed its 2020 targets to slash carbon emissions.
Labor dismissed the latest forecasts, claiming they only meet the targets in a technical sense and capitalise on work done during its time in government.
Environment Minister Greg Hunt on Wednesday declared his critics wrong while revealing the latest emissions data predicted a 28 million tonne over-achievement on the five per cent target by 2020.
"This confirms we are on track to meet or beat our target," he told the National Press Club in Canberra.
"Critics have claimed time and time again that we would never achieve our 2020 target ... I can formally advise that the critics are wrong."
Opposition environment spokesman Mark Butler pre-empted Mr Hunt's trumpeting, earlier telling reporters the figures rely on accounting measures and external factors.
They included a decline in manufacturing - which he blames for job losses and lower economic growth - and "very substantial" emissions reductions achieved under Labor's now-scrapped carbon tax.
The figures also relied on "carry-over" accounting, which allows Australia to use excess abatement from the first Kyoto period to offset current emissions.
"This data will confirm that under the Turnbull government, carbon pollution levels are rising, they are not dropping," Mr Butler said.
That's a view confirmed by carbon market analysts Reputex which released figures showing Australia's emissions would grow by six per cent on 2000 levels, rather than drop by five per cent.
That was partly due to the carry over, and partly because the abatement task had become easier after slower activity in coal mining and LNG, Reputex said.
Mr Hunt said that argument was one of the oddest and most desperate he'd seen since taking up the environment portfolio.
Australia used international accounting rules verified by the United Nations.
"They are the global gold standard and they were designed this way precisely so as to provide an incentive for nations to over-achieve," Mr Hunt said.
Mr Butler refused to commit Labor to dropping the carry-over accounting measures in government.
The release of the figures comes just before Mr Hunt heads to Paris as part of the Australian government delegation at the UN climate change conference.
It's hoped 196 countries will sign an agreement to curb emissions after 2020, with the ultimate goal of limiting global warming to at least two degrees.
The government's $2.55 billion direct action policy - which pays polluters not to pollute - has purchased 92 million tonnes of carbon abatement.
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