Labor's offering "A New Way" and the coalition "Real Solutions", but climate advocates warn the major parties can't deliver either unless they address the risks posed by a warming planet.
Dangerous climate change threatens the health, security and prosperity of Australians, and voters are concerned about how it could drive up future insurance premiums and food prices if left unchecked.
In its latest report, the Climate Institute says Australians in particular have a lot to lose from worsening bushfires, droughts, heatwaves and coastal flooding.
"Australia is more exposed to climate risks than any other developed nation," institute head John Connor said.
Mr Connor says it is in Australia's national interest to avoid a global temperature rise of two degrees, as anything beyond that posed significant known - and more alarmingly, many unknown - risks.
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The world is currently on track to a four-degree rise in warming.
Mr Connor said Australia was already facing some unavoidable impacts of climate change, but it wasn't too late to close the gap between "danger" and "relative safety".
It's a message that's been picked up by one politician, albeit a retired one, in former Liberal Party leader John Hewson.
Launching the institute's "Dangerous Degrees" report in Canberra, Dr Hewson said a business as usual approach to CO2 emissions would lead to a global economic downturn far worse than recent financial woes.
"A failure to change track puts in jeopardy everything for which Australians have worked and their retirement nest eggs," he said.
Superannuation funds were waking up to this and seeing the gain to be made from investing in solution to this problem, he added.
The report also warns of worsening health and a breakdown in global security if millions are displaced by rising sea levels, food shortages or other environmental crises driven by a hostile climate.
