The United Nations' top climate official Christiana Figueres has warned that most of the world's coal must be left in the ground to avoid catastrophic global warming. At a special climate summit in New York on Tuesday, countries including China were talking up their plans to vigorously develop their renewable energy industries and dramatically reduce coal consumption. "If we've learned anything in the mining industry through all its cycles, it's that you can never be sure whether a resource has had it or not. Just because it is not feasible or economic to develop a mine at present doesn't mean it will always be that way," Mr Robb will tell the conference. "Australia's reputation as a reliable supplier of low-cost resources and energy is something we must continue to nurture, or our customers will diversify away from us." Mr Robb, who recently oversaw a deal to sell Australian uranium to India, said there was rising demand for a more diversified energy mix from China and India, but demand for coal remained high in those two booming economies.

In addition, it was not possible to "rule out the discovery of innovative technologies that will make for the cleaner or clean burning of coal". While Australia pursued opportunities in shale gasfields such as the Cooper Basin, he said, new uses for brown coal were also being explored in the Latrobe Valley. "Some of these applications may not work out, but coal's long association with innovation suggests that others will. It is important to be patient and take a long-term view because the utility of our large resource deposits changes over time," Mr Robb will say. "Instead of thinking brown coal's day has passed, we need to bear in mind its potential to support new industries and jobs in the future." By repealing the carbon and mining taxes, Mr Robb said, the Abbott government had demonstrated its understanding of the need for an economic climate that encouraged investment.

But his speech is at odds with the growing urgency in the international community to move economies away from coal and fossil fuel-intensive industries. Economist Frank Jotzo, from the Australian National University's Crawford school of public policy, said after the New York summit that Australia was stuck in what was now considered "old thinking", in which economic growth was seen as a trade-off for action on global warming. He said this outlook was rooted in the idea that "coal is king", but countries such as China and the US were moving away from that view and recognising opportunities for economic growth in developing low-carbon industries. Environment Victoria chief executive Mark Wakeham said the federal and Victorian governments refused to accept that "this huge body of coal is not some bounty we can exploit". "We're not treating the other resources we have seriously, such as renewable energy," he said.

Loading "And anyone who tries to highlight the conflict between the Australian position and what the science says and what the international community says is just shot down." Follow us on Twitter