Right-wing maverick Tony Abbott ousted Liberal Party leader Malcolm Turnbull by just one vote, 42-41, in a shock back-room result likely to doom marathon attempts to pass emissions laws.

A second defeat of the government bill, which aims to cut carbon pollution by between five and 25 percent of 2000 levels by 2020, would give the government powers to call an early election.

"We will oppose the legislation in the Senate -- that is the right thing to do," Abbott told reporters, adding that he was "not frightened of an election on this issue".

The opposition upheavals underlined the domestic battles some world leaders could face as they prepare for December 7-18 climate talks in Copenhagen aimed at crafting a new pact for curbing gases that drive global warming.

Abbott's victory came after Turnbull sparked a party revolt by supporting the government's emissions trading legislation, which is strongly opposed by the industry and agriculture lobbies.

The 52-year-old Abbott, a super-fit ex-trainee priest who recently posed for the cameras in his swimming trunks, sought to play down his earlier comments that climate-change science was "crap" as "a bit of hyperbole".

"I think climate change is real," Abbot said, prompting laughter at his press conference.

"I think man does make a contribution. There's an argument as to how great that contribution is, and second, what should be done about it.

"The last thing we should be doing is rushing through a great big new tax just so (Prime Minister) Kevin Rudd can take a trophy to Copenhagen," he added.

The Copenhagen talks, under the 192-nation UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, are in particular intended to arrive at a successor treaty to the Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012.

Failure to pass the cuts ahead of the UN summit would be deeply embarrassing for Labor leader Rudd, who has said it would jeopardise Australia's ability to be "fully active in the negotiations".

"A failure to vote, or shall I say a vote to delay the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, is a vote to deny the climate-change science," Rudd told reporters during a visit to Washington.

Rudd has sought to place Australia, the developed world's worst per capita polluter, at the centre of the international climate debate despite its accounting for just 1.5 percent of global emissions.

Abbott said the opposition would seek to stall the legislation by deferring it to a Senate committee, or otherwise he vowed to defeat it this week in the upper house, where neither side holds a majority.

"Many millions of Australians are concerned that the Rudd government's emissions trading scheme looks like a great big tax, to create a great big slush fund," he said.

The bill's defeat would give Rudd the power to call Australia's first "double dissolution" election since 1987, although the prime minister has played down the prospect.

Snap polls must be held between 33 and 68 days after parliament is dissolved, meaning any election would be held early next year. Rudd started a three-year term in February 2008.

The centre-left leader campaigned on a strong environmental platform during 2007 polls and ratified the Kyoto Protocol shortly after taking office.

He has been asked to be a "friend of the chair", a deal-broker role, at the Copenhagen talks which aim to craft a new pact for curbing the gases that drive global warming.

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