■ The President of France, Jacques Chirac, was to lead a signing ceremony yesterday to develop a new breed of experimental nuclear fusion reactor that mimics the energy-producing process powering the sun, Agence France-Presse reports.
The event in Paris was to see representatives from China, the European Union, India, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the US formally set up the structure of the €10 billion ($16.7 billion) reactor.
Wednesday, November 22, 2006
The big issue: location, location, location
SMH
The big issue: location, location, location
Wendy Frew Environment Reporter
November 22, 2006
Other related coverage
* Taskforce plots nuclear path
* Nuclear is green power: report
* Waste site a long way down the track
* Editorial: Beyond Strangelove
* Nuclear costs understated: report's critics
THE energy future envisaged by the seven-member taskforce would involve as many as 25 nuclear power plants strung out along the east coast, near water supplies, transport and urban populations.
The report did not specify any exact locations for the plants, which would be constructed over 40 years.
However, the head of the taskforce, Ziggy Switkowski, told reporters it would make most sense to build them close to coal-fired power stations because they needed access to electricity transmission lines and water to cool the plants.
"Obviously you want to have the generation of power reasonably close to where the market is," he said.
"Reasonably close means tens of kilometres. It does not mean hundreds of metres nor does it mean hundreds of kilometres. It's tens of kilometres. It needs to be close to the national electricity transmission grid, similarly tens of kilometres."
In NSW, coal-fired plants are at Lake Macquarie, south of Newcastle, the Hunter Valley, and Lithgow.
Earlier this year, the Australia Institute said research showed the most suitable sites would have to be on the east coast because nuclear reactors need large amounts of water for cooling. They also needed to be near main electricity transmission lines to keep infrastructure costs down, have good rail and port access for transport of imported fuel rods, and be built close to a big load centre such as Melbourne, Sydney or Newcastle.
The prolonged drought and the unreliability of inland water sources meant it was impossible to build reactors away from main urban centres.
However, finding a suitable and acceptable site for the first reactor would be controversial.
At a time when cities are facing water shortages because of population growth and changing rain patterns, a nuclear power plant would be an added drain on water supplies.
Reactors could not be built in Western Australia or the Northern Territory because they are not part of the National Electricity Grid.
State governments are strongly opposed to nuclear energy because of public anxiety and their support for the coal industry. The Premier, Morris Iemma, has categorically ruled out building a plant in NSW, where it would be against the law.
■ The President of France, Jacques Chirac, was to lead a signing ceremony yesterday to develop a new breed of experimental nuclear fusion reactor that mimics the energy-producing process powering the sun, Agence France-Presse reports.
The event in Paris was to see representatives from China, the European Union, India, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the US formally set up the structure of the €10 billion ($16.7 billion) reactor.
The big issue: location, location, location
Wendy Frew Environment Reporter
November 22, 2006
Other related coverage
* Taskforce plots nuclear path
* Nuclear is green power: report
* Waste site a long way down the track
* Editorial: Beyond Strangelove
* Nuclear costs understated: report's critics
THE energy future envisaged by the seven-member taskforce would involve as many as 25 nuclear power plants strung out along the east coast, near water supplies, transport and urban populations.
The report did not specify any exact locations for the plants, which would be constructed over 40 years.
However, the head of the taskforce, Ziggy Switkowski, told reporters it would make most sense to build them close to coal-fired power stations because they needed access to electricity transmission lines and water to cool the plants.
"Obviously you want to have the generation of power reasonably close to where the market is," he said.
"Reasonably close means tens of kilometres. It does not mean hundreds of metres nor does it mean hundreds of kilometres. It's tens of kilometres. It needs to be close to the national electricity transmission grid, similarly tens of kilometres."
In NSW, coal-fired plants are at Lake Macquarie, south of Newcastle, the Hunter Valley, and Lithgow.
Earlier this year, the Australia Institute said research showed the most suitable sites would have to be on the east coast because nuclear reactors need large amounts of water for cooling. They also needed to be near main electricity transmission lines to keep infrastructure costs down, have good rail and port access for transport of imported fuel rods, and be built close to a big load centre such as Melbourne, Sydney or Newcastle.
The prolonged drought and the unreliability of inland water sources meant it was impossible to build reactors away from main urban centres.
However, finding a suitable and acceptable site for the first reactor would be controversial.
At a time when cities are facing water shortages because of population growth and changing rain patterns, a nuclear power plant would be an added drain on water supplies.
Reactors could not be built in Western Australia or the Northern Territory because they are not part of the National Electricity Grid.
State governments are strongly opposed to nuclear energy because of public anxiety and their support for the coal industry. The Premier, Morris Iemma, has categorically ruled out building a plant in NSW, where it would be against the law.
■ The President of France, Jacques Chirac, was to lead a signing ceremony yesterday to develop a new breed of experimental nuclear fusion reactor that mimics the energy-producing process powering the sun, Agence France-Presse reports.
The event in Paris was to see representatives from China, the European Union, India, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the US formally set up the structure of the €10 billion ($16.7 billion) reactor.
Tuesday, November 21, 2006
Climate shocks: more to come
By Julian Cribb - posted Thursday, 16 November 2006
Climate change may occur more rapidly and with far greater impact than even its chief exponents have so far been prepared to concede.
The warning comes from Australian atmospheric researcher Dr Barrie Pittock, who argues in a recent article (R&D Review, October 2006) there are firm scientific grounds for suspecting the pace of climate change may be faster and its manifestations more extreme than presently thought.
Pittock is a scientist one listens to with respect. Twenty-five years ago he was an influential figure in a group that persuaded the superpowers - the US and USSR - there would be no survivors of an atomic war, because of the nuclear winter it would unleash. Thus one of the first uses of climate modelling was to save the human race.
Pittock lists the following reasons for believing the present consensus on climate change may be understating its impact:
1. Global dimming is decreasing, reducing the braking effect it applies to global warming.
2. Permafrost is melting across huge areas, reducing the albedo - or reflectance - of the earth’s heat into space.
3. There are signs that forests, soils and algae are becoming sources rather than sinks for atmospheric carbon as climate change stresses them.
4. Arctic sea ice is retreating rapidly, also reducing the amount of heat being returned to space.
5. Ocean circulation changes are occurring in the in mid- to high latitudes in ways which may have unpredictable effects on the climate.
6. The ice cover of Antarctica and Greenland is shrinking, raising sea levels and reducing heat loss.
7. Tropical cyclones appear to be becoming more intense.
8. The Atlantic meridional overturning circulation, one of the earth’s major heat transport systems, has slowed. This was not expected to occur for a century or more.
Scientists have been warning a largely-deaf Australia about climate change for more than 30 years. Indeed, CSIRO published a little book on it for the general public in 1976 or 77.
And, as if to confirm the scientific view about phase-shifts - sudden, irreversible changes from one state to another - there have been two more big developments. In the UK, the Stern Report is finally shifting economists’ attitudes to greenhouse economics - a very important development (though why cutting-edge economics should be 30 years behind cutting-edge science is worth considering).
More importantly research conducted by CSIRO for Coal21, the coal industry lobby which is committed to low-CO2 solutions for Australia, reveals a seismic shift in Australian public opinion on this issue. The survey, in New South Wales and Queensland, found 90-93 per cent of respondents now rate climate change as an important issue.
When was the last time 90 per cent of Australians agreed on anything? If this view pertains nationally, then climate change action is now a political no-brainer and the politician who ignores it merits whatever fate awaits them at the polls. Sudden moves on solar, nuclear and oxyfuels suggest the Federal Government’s pollsters may be telling it something similar.
So much for the three new climate shocks - social, economic and scientific. What can be done about it? Government policy and research activity to date has focused on mitigating CO2 emissions, but in reality these may take 10-30 years to cut in and 100-300 years to have a tangible effect on the global climate.
The real policy and research challenge for Australia, which remains broadly unaddressed, is how we will live day-to-day under a hotter, drier, more volatile climate. In other words, how we will cope in every walk of life with the inevitable.
Are we prepared, for example, for the migration of the wheatbelt into the racehorse belt in pursuit of reliable rainfall? Are we ready for the surge in insect-born disease, the higher rates of death and sudden illness among the elderly from heat stroke? Are our fashionable eave-less villas and tall apartment blocks due for a real estate crash as their unsuitability to the new Australian climate emerges?
Will our demand for light cotton garments and rice accelerate the destruction of inland river systems? Will air-conditioned offices with unopenable windows need fundamental redesign? Can our infrastructure withstand fiercer cyclones, bigger storm surges, heavier monsoons and longer droughts? Will we protect our coastal cities with levees, like New Orleans, or abandon the low lying suburbs to the waves?
It has already dawned on governments that greenhouse prevention is both urgent and costly. But the science necessary to adapt the whole of society to unavoidable climate change conditions is vastly greater - and has barely begun.
Australia urgently needs a national plan for coping with inevitable climate change in all sectors of industry, the community and daily life. And that requires the national scientific effort delivering the solutions to be placed on the equivalent of a wartime footing.
First published in The Australian on November 15, 2006 as 'The climate's right for science to go to war'.
Professor Julian Cribb is a science communicator and Adjunct Professor of Science Communication at the University of Technology Sydney. He is a member of On Line Opinion's Editorial Advisory Board.
Source: On-Line Opinion
Climate change may occur more rapidly and with far greater impact than even its chief exponents have so far been prepared to concede.
The warning comes from Australian atmospheric researcher Dr Barrie Pittock, who argues in a recent article (R&D Review, October 2006) there are firm scientific grounds for suspecting the pace of climate change may be faster and its manifestations more extreme than presently thought.
Pittock is a scientist one listens to with respect. Twenty-five years ago he was an influential figure in a group that persuaded the superpowers - the US and USSR - there would be no survivors of an atomic war, because of the nuclear winter it would unleash. Thus one of the first uses of climate modelling was to save the human race.
Pittock lists the following reasons for believing the present consensus on climate change may be understating its impact:
1. Global dimming is decreasing, reducing the braking effect it applies to global warming.
2. Permafrost is melting across huge areas, reducing the albedo - or reflectance - of the earth’s heat into space.
3. There are signs that forests, soils and algae are becoming sources rather than sinks for atmospheric carbon as climate change stresses them.
4. Arctic sea ice is retreating rapidly, also reducing the amount of heat being returned to space.
5. Ocean circulation changes are occurring in the in mid- to high latitudes in ways which may have unpredictable effects on the climate.
6. The ice cover of Antarctica and Greenland is shrinking, raising sea levels and reducing heat loss.
7. Tropical cyclones appear to be becoming more intense.
8. The Atlantic meridional overturning circulation, one of the earth’s major heat transport systems, has slowed. This was not expected to occur for a century or more.
Scientists have been warning a largely-deaf Australia about climate change for more than 30 years. Indeed, CSIRO published a little book on it for the general public in 1976 or 77.
And, as if to confirm the scientific view about phase-shifts - sudden, irreversible changes from one state to another - there have been two more big developments. In the UK, the Stern Report is finally shifting economists’ attitudes to greenhouse economics - a very important development (though why cutting-edge economics should be 30 years behind cutting-edge science is worth considering).
More importantly research conducted by CSIRO for Coal21, the coal industry lobby which is committed to low-CO2 solutions for Australia, reveals a seismic shift in Australian public opinion on this issue. The survey, in New South Wales and Queensland, found 90-93 per cent of respondents now rate climate change as an important issue.
When was the last time 90 per cent of Australians agreed on anything? If this view pertains nationally, then climate change action is now a political no-brainer and the politician who ignores it merits whatever fate awaits them at the polls. Sudden moves on solar, nuclear and oxyfuels suggest the Federal Government’s pollsters may be telling it something similar.
So much for the three new climate shocks - social, economic and scientific. What can be done about it? Government policy and research activity to date has focused on mitigating CO2 emissions, but in reality these may take 10-30 years to cut in and 100-300 years to have a tangible effect on the global climate.
The real policy and research challenge for Australia, which remains broadly unaddressed, is how we will live day-to-day under a hotter, drier, more volatile climate. In other words, how we will cope in every walk of life with the inevitable.
Are we prepared, for example, for the migration of the wheatbelt into the racehorse belt in pursuit of reliable rainfall? Are we ready for the surge in insect-born disease, the higher rates of death and sudden illness among the elderly from heat stroke? Are our fashionable eave-less villas and tall apartment blocks due for a real estate crash as their unsuitability to the new Australian climate emerges?
Will our demand for light cotton garments and rice accelerate the destruction of inland river systems? Will air-conditioned offices with unopenable windows need fundamental redesign? Can our infrastructure withstand fiercer cyclones, bigger storm surges, heavier monsoons and longer droughts? Will we protect our coastal cities with levees, like New Orleans, or abandon the low lying suburbs to the waves?
It has already dawned on governments that greenhouse prevention is both urgent and costly. But the science necessary to adapt the whole of society to unavoidable climate change conditions is vastly greater - and has barely begun.
Australia urgently needs a national plan for coping with inevitable climate change in all sectors of industry, the community and daily life. And that requires the national scientific effort delivering the solutions to be placed on the equivalent of a wartime footing.
First published in The Australian on November 15, 2006 as 'The climate's right for science to go to war'.
Professor Julian Cribb is a science communicator and Adjunct Professor of Science Communication at the University of Technology Sydney. He is a member of On Line Opinion's Editorial Advisory Board.
Source: On-Line Opinion
Adapting our energy policy to climate change
By Cliff Hooker - posted Monday, 20 November 2006
Australia needs an insurance policy against being caught out by the massive changes to energy systems heading our way. That policy is acquiring adaptive resilience. But, while government action has recently improved, it is not yet thinking in these terms, and likely doesn’t have adequate coverage.
Adaptive resilience is the capacity to sustain core functioning while coping with change, through making adaptable adjustments. It is the primary form of insurance against being surprised and damaged by change.
In the energy context, resilience means sustaining the provision of energy services through the coming massive changes, changes induced principally by global constraints on oil supply and on carbon dioxide emissions (plus declining fresh water) yet with rapidly rising energy demands.
Advertisement
The principal government approach before 2006 was inaction and denial that we needed to face change, while the world signed the Kyoto Agreement and introduced carbon emissions trading.
Some caution was justified: the nature of climate change and our role in it was unclear; Kyoto was flawed; development of clean coal technology (aka carbon sequestration) was in its infancy; early European experience with emissions trading did not sufficiently benefit needed innovation; and Australia’s extreme coal intensiveness and smaller economy made it more vulnerable than most to prematurely committing to impractical technologies.
But the immediate risks of this policy were also clear: we denied ourselves the opportunity to both innovate and export in the emerging raft of clean energy technologies and to join global emissions offset trading. Both of these are huge potential costs: global trading doubled to $22 billion last year, and overseas competitors developed commercialisable technologies while Australia lost many of its own innovations to them.
Sectors of the business community, including some in the energy sector, increasingly chafed that they did not have a clear policy and incentives framework within which to pursue innovation and trading. The less immediate, but larger, risk was that Australia would be unprepared to adapt, technically and institutionally, when the time of local climate change and global shove arrived.
2006 saw a policy shift driven by increasing world conviction about energy imperatives, the upshot being some modest research and development funding initiatives in the context of a bias toward first, coal and second, nuclear energy, with solar relegated to a minor role.
Again, some coal bias is understandable: Australia has large coal reserves and a developed industrial coal infrastructure; if carbon sequestration can be made to work at a reasonable cost, it offers obvious advantages, plus the option to provide hydrogen to replace oil for transport energy. There is a similar uranium resource advantage for nuclear power. However, while coal supports a wide range of skills and mid-sized technical businesses that suit our mid-sized economy - generating employment, innovation and exports - it is likely that specialist nuclear technology would not perform so well (though we don’t have the research to know for sure).
But again the risks are clear: we forego the opportunity to innovate and export in the suite of new clean radiant solar technologies, where the energy resource is far larger than either coal or uranium (notwithstanding the PM’s conflation of it with limited wind); we may find that the present process of choosing technologies to support leaves gaps that turn out to be important (for instance, energy storage, concentrating solar thermal?); we may be caught out if carbon sequestration proves to be too limited or too expensive, and similarly for the promised new nuclear technologies; we may be caught out on the wider issue of supporting skills and businesses (on which renewable technologies also likely perform well). Again, these are all potentially large costs. For instance, if some of the many radiant solar technologies become commercially competitive, as they currently promise to do, then at shove time Australia would suffer a costly and disruptive energy transition.
As noted earlier, the proper way to protect against these risks, even while pursuing coal prospects, is to acquire suitable adaptive resilience. In the energy case this is achieved by systematically acquiring a level of technological capacity in each of a full suite of the relevant technologies, according to their promise, so that we are ready to utilise them. Plus we should introduce a clear supporting framework concerned with transport, energy conservation, and so on, including helping to introduce an improved emissions trading scheme, in Australia and globally.
I suggest that to ensure resilience is achieved and remove the danger of gaps and undue biases risked by the present approach, it may be necessary to create a public national capacity to systematically evaluate potential technologies, including their wider societal impacts, together with the level of Australia’s technological capacity appropriate to each, and propose share-able national projects.
Cliff Hooker is addressing “New Technology for Infrastructure: The World of Tomorrow” the national symposium of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering on November 20, 2006.
Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the University of Newcastle, Cliff Hooker is Director of the Complex Adaptive Systems Research Group, researching foundations of self-organisation, bio-cognitive organisation and sustainable development. He is Director of Assessing Sustainability Dimensions and Impacts, The CRC for Coal in Sustainable Development, aiming to re-focus sustainable development around resiliency. The Centre supervises Sustainability Options for Australia’s Future for the Joint Academies’ Committee on Sustainability, Australian National Academies Forum.
Source: On-Line Opinion
Australia needs an insurance policy against being caught out by the massive changes to energy systems heading our way. That policy is acquiring adaptive resilience. But, while government action has recently improved, it is not yet thinking in these terms, and likely doesn’t have adequate coverage.
Adaptive resilience is the capacity to sustain core functioning while coping with change, through making adaptable adjustments. It is the primary form of insurance against being surprised and damaged by change.
In the energy context, resilience means sustaining the provision of energy services through the coming massive changes, changes induced principally by global constraints on oil supply and on carbon dioxide emissions (plus declining fresh water) yet with rapidly rising energy demands.
Advertisement
The principal government approach before 2006 was inaction and denial that we needed to face change, while the world signed the Kyoto Agreement and introduced carbon emissions trading.
Some caution was justified: the nature of climate change and our role in it was unclear; Kyoto was flawed; development of clean coal technology (aka carbon sequestration) was in its infancy; early European experience with emissions trading did not sufficiently benefit needed innovation; and Australia’s extreme coal intensiveness and smaller economy made it more vulnerable than most to prematurely committing to impractical technologies.
But the immediate risks of this policy were also clear: we denied ourselves the opportunity to both innovate and export in the emerging raft of clean energy technologies and to join global emissions offset trading. Both of these are huge potential costs: global trading doubled to $22 billion last year, and overseas competitors developed commercialisable technologies while Australia lost many of its own innovations to them.
Sectors of the business community, including some in the energy sector, increasingly chafed that they did not have a clear policy and incentives framework within which to pursue innovation and trading. The less immediate, but larger, risk was that Australia would be unprepared to adapt, technically and institutionally, when the time of local climate change and global shove arrived.
2006 saw a policy shift driven by increasing world conviction about energy imperatives, the upshot being some modest research and development funding initiatives in the context of a bias toward first, coal and second, nuclear energy, with solar relegated to a minor role.
Again, some coal bias is understandable: Australia has large coal reserves and a developed industrial coal infrastructure; if carbon sequestration can be made to work at a reasonable cost, it offers obvious advantages, plus the option to provide hydrogen to replace oil for transport energy. There is a similar uranium resource advantage for nuclear power. However, while coal supports a wide range of skills and mid-sized technical businesses that suit our mid-sized economy - generating employment, innovation and exports - it is likely that specialist nuclear technology would not perform so well (though we don’t have the research to know for sure).
But again the risks are clear: we forego the opportunity to innovate and export in the suite of new clean radiant solar technologies, where the energy resource is far larger than either coal or uranium (notwithstanding the PM’s conflation of it with limited wind); we may find that the present process of choosing technologies to support leaves gaps that turn out to be important (for instance, energy storage, concentrating solar thermal?); we may be caught out if carbon sequestration proves to be too limited or too expensive, and similarly for the promised new nuclear technologies; we may be caught out on the wider issue of supporting skills and businesses (on which renewable technologies also likely perform well). Again, these are all potentially large costs. For instance, if some of the many radiant solar technologies become commercially competitive, as they currently promise to do, then at shove time Australia would suffer a costly and disruptive energy transition.
As noted earlier, the proper way to protect against these risks, even while pursuing coal prospects, is to acquire suitable adaptive resilience. In the energy case this is achieved by systematically acquiring a level of technological capacity in each of a full suite of the relevant technologies, according to their promise, so that we are ready to utilise them. Plus we should introduce a clear supporting framework concerned with transport, energy conservation, and so on, including helping to introduce an improved emissions trading scheme, in Australia and globally.
I suggest that to ensure resilience is achieved and remove the danger of gaps and undue biases risked by the present approach, it may be necessary to create a public national capacity to systematically evaluate potential technologies, including their wider societal impacts, together with the level of Australia’s technological capacity appropriate to each, and propose share-able national projects.
Cliff Hooker is addressing “New Technology for Infrastructure: The World of Tomorrow” the national symposium of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering on November 20, 2006.
Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the University of Newcastle, Cliff Hooker is Director of the Complex Adaptive Systems Research Group, researching foundations of self-organisation, bio-cognitive organisation and sustainable development. He is Director of Assessing Sustainability Dimensions and Impacts, The CRC for Coal in Sustainable Development, aiming to re-focus sustainable development around resiliency. The Centre supervises Sustainability Options for Australia’s Future for the Joint Academies’ Committee on Sustainability, Australian National Academies Forum.
Source: On-Line Opinion
Call to resist nuclear path
SMH
Stephanie Peatling, Wendy Frew and Mark Metherell
November 21, 2006
Latest related coverage
* Resist nuclear path, says Gore
* Don't despair, says Gore, mood is shifting
Other related coverage
* Scientists to review PM's nuclear report
* Dale Bailey: Change the fuel for a happier reaction
* PM thaws on carbon trading
* Just wait for a more convenient truth, urges PM
AUSTRALIA will take a step closer to a nuclear future today, but the former US vice-president, Al Gore, has some advice: don't.
A task force led by the former Telstra boss Ziggy Switkowski will release a report that is expected to be broadly in favour of a domestic nuclear power industry.
In an interview with the Herald yesterday, Mr Gore said it would be too expensive and would threaten the world's safety through possible weapons proliferation. "Early in my career I was enthusiastic about nuclear power. I'm not now," the climate campaigner said in Sydney.
"I'm not an automatic opponent to any nuclear power plants [but] I think that a realistic view is that they will play only a small and limited role. The reason why they're likely to play only a limited role is mainly economic."
The Switkowski task force is believed to argue that nuclear power could be economically viable in Australia in about 15 years, but it is not expected to make a specific recommendation to go ahead.
The Prime Minister, John Howard, has advocated nuclear power as cleaner fuel in the fight against global warming. Mr Gore said the long-term problems of storing nuclear waste, potential accidents and securing reactors could possibly be overcome.
"But that leaves the proliferation issue," he said.
In the case of Iran and North Korea, he said nuclear scientists worked by day on energy issues and then "you make them work at night on weapons". "What will you do? Spread thousands and thousands of reactors in Papua New Guinea and
Libya and Sudan? If this were the option of choice the world would become more dangerous."
The Switkowski taskforce has been commissioned by Mr Howard to investigate whether nuclear power would become economically viable in the long term. It was also asked to consider the potential for enrichment, uranium dumps and proliferation risks.
Labor's environment spokesman, Anthony Albanese, said it would not be surprising if a task force made up of nuclear advocates came out in favour. But he said it should answer the hard questions: where nuclear reactors and dumps would go.
A recent Herald poll found only 17 per cent of Australians nominated nuclear power as a solution for global warming. Energy experts have warned it could be viable only if heavily subsidised by the Government, so it could compete with coal. They say it would rely on what price was set on carbon pollution, and on the Federal Government overcoming state and public opposition. And still, construction could take 10 years.
And according to the research principal at the Institute for Sustainable Futures, Chris Riedy, it could take seven years for the reactor to break even on its energy consumption - that is, to produce enough electricity free of greenhouse gas to make up for the coal-fired power expended to dig up the uranium for fuel and to build the reactor.
"So you would not make any dent in carbon emissions for at least 17 years," he said.
Stephanie Peatling, Wendy Frew and Mark Metherell
November 21, 2006
Latest related coverage
* Resist nuclear path, says Gore
* Don't despair, says Gore, mood is shifting
Other related coverage
* Scientists to review PM's nuclear report
* Dale Bailey: Change the fuel for a happier reaction
* PM thaws on carbon trading
* Just wait for a more convenient truth, urges PM
AUSTRALIA will take a step closer to a nuclear future today, but the former US vice-president, Al Gore, has some advice: don't.
A task force led by the former Telstra boss Ziggy Switkowski will release a report that is expected to be broadly in favour of a domestic nuclear power industry.
In an interview with the Herald yesterday, Mr Gore said it would be too expensive and would threaten the world's safety through possible weapons proliferation. "Early in my career I was enthusiastic about nuclear power. I'm not now," the climate campaigner said in Sydney.
"I'm not an automatic opponent to any nuclear power plants [but] I think that a realistic view is that they will play only a small and limited role. The reason why they're likely to play only a limited role is mainly economic."
The Switkowski task force is believed to argue that nuclear power could be economically viable in Australia in about 15 years, but it is not expected to make a specific recommendation to go ahead.
The Prime Minister, John Howard, has advocated nuclear power as cleaner fuel in the fight against global warming. Mr Gore said the long-term problems of storing nuclear waste, potential accidents and securing reactors could possibly be overcome.
"But that leaves the proliferation issue," he said.
In the case of Iran and North Korea, he said nuclear scientists worked by day on energy issues and then "you make them work at night on weapons". "What will you do? Spread thousands and thousands of reactors in Papua New Guinea and
Libya and Sudan? If this were the option of choice the world would become more dangerous."
The Switkowski taskforce has been commissioned by Mr Howard to investigate whether nuclear power would become economically viable in the long term. It was also asked to consider the potential for enrichment, uranium dumps and proliferation risks.
Labor's environment spokesman, Anthony Albanese, said it would not be surprising if a task force made up of nuclear advocates came out in favour. But he said it should answer the hard questions: where nuclear reactors and dumps would go.
A recent Herald poll found only 17 per cent of Australians nominated nuclear power as a solution for global warming. Energy experts have warned it could be viable only if heavily subsidised by the Government, so it could compete with coal. They say it would rely on what price was set on carbon pollution, and on the Federal Government overcoming state and public opposition. And still, construction could take 10 years.
And according to the research principal at the Institute for Sustainable Futures, Chris Riedy, it could take seven years for the reactor to break even on its energy consumption - that is, to produce enough electricity free of greenhouse gas to make up for the coal-fired power expended to dig up the uranium for fuel and to build the reactor.
"So you would not make any dent in carbon emissions for at least 17 years," he said.
Sunday, November 19, 2006
Warming could 'devastate' Australian economy: IMF
SMH
November 18, 2006 - 4:08PM
* Little urgency as climate conference fizzles out
Climate change could have a devastating effect on the Australian economy, if the projections of the Stern report on global warming were true, the head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) warned today.
IMF managing director Rodrigo de Rato said the report on the economic impact of climate change, by former World Bank chief economist Nicholas Stern released in the UK recently, was alarming.
"The link between greenhouse gas emissions and changes in global temperature is now well-established," Mr de Rato said as a two-day meeting of finance ministers and central bankers from the world's 20 largest economies (G20) got underway in Melbourne today.
"It is a matter of fact rather than of faith.
"The consequences of global warming are less certain, but they are expected to be serious."
The Stern report said climate change could cut gross domestic product growth by five to 20 per cent in many countries.
"If these numbers are borne out even broadly by further analysts, they are alarming indeed," Mr de Rato said.
"In terms of the effect on people's quality of life, here in Australia and worldwide, the effects could be devastating."
But Mr de Rato said the present outlook for global economic growth was positive, although there were inflationary risks and called on the world's central bankers to remain vigilant.
Many central banks around the world are lifting interest rates to head off inflationary pressures driven by booming energy and commodities prices and capacity constraints, including the Reserve Bank of Australia which has raised rates three times this year.
"In such circumstances, central banks should remain vigilant and act to preserve the hard-won credibility gains of recent years," Mr de Rato said.
"And on fiscal policy, governments should take advantage of the strength of the current global economy to push ahead with the necessary fiscal adjustment."
The IMF has projected a global growth rate of 5.1 per cent this year and 4.9 per cent in 2007.
"So our central forecast remains broadly unchanged for another year of robust and more balanced global growth," he said.
However, there were downside risks to growth, including any further slowdown in the US economy driven by a correction in the housing market.
"The outlook for inflation also remains uncertain," Mr de Rato said.
"The fall in energy prices since September helps, but we do not know whether this will be sustained."
Mr de Rato said thus far the US economy had cooled faster than expected, after a series of rate hikes, but that had been offset by more rapid growth in Europe and continued strength in major emerging economies.
"The outlook for the global economy remains good, but there are significant downside risks," Mr de Rato said.
He said another risk to world growth was any instability in the financial system.
"While financial crises appear a remote possibility in today's benign economic environment, it would be complacent to assume they have disappeared forever," he said.
AAP
November 18, 2006 - 4:08PM
* Little urgency as climate conference fizzles out
Climate change could have a devastating effect on the Australian economy, if the projections of the Stern report on global warming were true, the head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) warned today.
IMF managing director Rodrigo de Rato said the report on the economic impact of climate change, by former World Bank chief economist Nicholas Stern released in the UK recently, was alarming.
"The link between greenhouse gas emissions and changes in global temperature is now well-established," Mr de Rato said as a two-day meeting of finance ministers and central bankers from the world's 20 largest economies (G20) got underway in Melbourne today.
"It is a matter of fact rather than of faith.
"The consequences of global warming are less certain, but they are expected to be serious."
The Stern report said climate change could cut gross domestic product growth by five to 20 per cent in many countries.
"If these numbers are borne out even broadly by further analysts, they are alarming indeed," Mr de Rato said.
"In terms of the effect on people's quality of life, here in Australia and worldwide, the effects could be devastating."
But Mr de Rato said the present outlook for global economic growth was positive, although there were inflationary risks and called on the world's central bankers to remain vigilant.
Many central banks around the world are lifting interest rates to head off inflationary pressures driven by booming energy and commodities prices and capacity constraints, including the Reserve Bank of Australia which has raised rates three times this year.
"In such circumstances, central banks should remain vigilant and act to preserve the hard-won credibility gains of recent years," Mr de Rato said.
"And on fiscal policy, governments should take advantage of the strength of the current global economy to push ahead with the necessary fiscal adjustment."
The IMF has projected a global growth rate of 5.1 per cent this year and 4.9 per cent in 2007.
"So our central forecast remains broadly unchanged for another year of robust and more balanced global growth," he said.
However, there were downside risks to growth, including any further slowdown in the US economy driven by a correction in the housing market.
"The outlook for inflation also remains uncertain," Mr de Rato said.
"The fall in energy prices since September helps, but we do not know whether this will be sustained."
Mr de Rato said thus far the US economy had cooled faster than expected, after a series of rate hikes, but that had been offset by more rapid growth in Europe and continued strength in major emerging economies.
"The outlook for the global economy remains good, but there are significant downside risks," Mr de Rato said.
He said another risk to world growth was any instability in the financial system.
"While financial crises appear a remote possibility in today's benign economic environment, it would be complacent to assume they have disappeared forever," he said.
AAP
Friday, November 17, 2006
Beach action praised
The Bega District News
Friday, 17 November 2006
The founder ofClean Energy for Eternity, Matthew Nott accepts the Community Action award from bega valley Shire mayor Tony Allen.
The founder ofClean Energy for Eternity, Matthew Nott accepts the Community Action award from bega valley Shire mayor Tony Allen.
Bega Valley Shire Council nominated the CEFE group for their organisation of the successful community day on Tathra Beach earlier this year and for their ongoing efforts in promoting community action in tackling climate change through the use of renewable energy sources.
The Community Action award recognises outstanding community organisation and pride - expressed through civic, cultural and environmental activities.
A key factor in CEFE's success was the strong partnerships they have developed between the local beach community (including clubs and organised groups), local business and the local council.
Little Jiguma Beach at Pambula Beach received a highly commended award
in the Friendly Beach category.
The State awards will be announced on November 30.
The truth? 'Nuclear is not the answer'
The Age
Leon Gettler
November 17, 2006
The climate change campaigner and former US vice-president Al Gore preaches his gospel in Melbourne yesterday.
The climate change campaigner and former US vice-president Al Gore preaches his gospel in Melbourne yesterday.
NUCLEAR energy is not the panacea for tackling global warming, says one of the world's most celebrated climate change campaigners, former US vice-president Al Gore.
Mr Gore also shrugged off Prime Minister John Howard's recent claim that his film An Inconvenient Truth showed "a degree of the peeved politician".
"It may be one of those elements that's in the eyes of the beholder," he told The Age yesterday.#
Mr Gore said nuclear power was unlikely to play a significantly bigger role in the climate change battle. "Even if you set aside the problem of long-term waste storage and the danger of operator accident and the vulnerability to terrorist attack, you still have two others that are more difficult," he said.
The first problem was one of economics.
"Nuclear power plants are the costliest to build and they take the longest time and at present they come in only one size — extra large."
The second was nuclear weapons proliferation. "For eight years when I was in the White House, every problem of weapons proliferation was connected to a reactor program," he said.
The Prime Minister has recently talked up the prospects of nuclear power plants being built in Australia, arguing the country could not afford to "sacrifice rational discussion on the altar of anti-nuclear theology and political opportunism".
Next week an inquiry into nuclear power headed by former Telstra chief executive Ziggy Switkowski is due to deliver its findings.
Mr Gore said it was extremely important that Mr Howard had now acknowledged the damage from carbon dioxide emissions.
"Let me say I want to be respectful of the Prime Minister's change in rhetoric.
"It's not easy to do something like that and … this position might be a way station for him on the real road to Damascus where he actually joins the world community," he said.
"And he may. I don't know, I can't look into his heart."
Mr Gore said that Australia and the US should sign the Kyoto Protocol but he acknowledged that this presented Mr Howard and US President George Bush with big political problems given that they had previously "demonised" it.
Of Australia's promotion of a new global climate change pact he said: "Obviously neither Australia nor the United States can write its own little treaty and be separate from the rest of the world."
But there was, he said, a third path: "To join the world discussion now in Nairobi on how to strengthen Kyoto and how to make whatever changes Prime Minister Howard wants to advocate and join the rest of the world community. That's the test."
Mr Gore, now chairman of investment firm Generation Investment Management, yesterday met with Premier Steve Bracks and his deputy John Thwaites. He described Victoria as forward thinking on climate change and said he would take a number of local initiatives back to the United States.
He was particularly impressed with the Bracks Government's "black balloons" advertising campaign, which links household energy usage with the amount of carbon dioxide it releases into the air.
"I'm going to take that ad back and show it to some folks there, maybe put it on YouTube," he said.
With MATHEW MURPHY and LIZ MINCHIN
Leon Gettler
November 17, 2006
The climate change campaigner and former US vice-president Al Gore preaches his gospel in Melbourne yesterday.
The climate change campaigner and former US vice-president Al Gore preaches his gospel in Melbourne yesterday.
NUCLEAR energy is not the panacea for tackling global warming, says one of the world's most celebrated climate change campaigners, former US vice-president Al Gore.
Mr Gore also shrugged off Prime Minister John Howard's recent claim that his film An Inconvenient Truth showed "a degree of the peeved politician".
"It may be one of those elements that's in the eyes of the beholder," he told The Age yesterday.#
Mr Gore said nuclear power was unlikely to play a significantly bigger role in the climate change battle. "Even if you set aside the problem of long-term waste storage and the danger of operator accident and the vulnerability to terrorist attack, you still have two others that are more difficult," he said.
The first problem was one of economics.
"Nuclear power plants are the costliest to build and they take the longest time and at present they come in only one size — extra large."
The second was nuclear weapons proliferation. "For eight years when I was in the White House, every problem of weapons proliferation was connected to a reactor program," he said.
The Prime Minister has recently talked up the prospects of nuclear power plants being built in Australia, arguing the country could not afford to "sacrifice rational discussion on the altar of anti-nuclear theology and political opportunism".
Next week an inquiry into nuclear power headed by former Telstra chief executive Ziggy Switkowski is due to deliver its findings.
Mr Gore said it was extremely important that Mr Howard had now acknowledged the damage from carbon dioxide emissions.
"Let me say I want to be respectful of the Prime Minister's change in rhetoric.
"It's not easy to do something like that and … this position might be a way station for him on the real road to Damascus where he actually joins the world community," he said.
"And he may. I don't know, I can't look into his heart."
Mr Gore said that Australia and the US should sign the Kyoto Protocol but he acknowledged that this presented Mr Howard and US President George Bush with big political problems given that they had previously "demonised" it.
Of Australia's promotion of a new global climate change pact he said: "Obviously neither Australia nor the United States can write its own little treaty and be separate from the rest of the world."
But there was, he said, a third path: "To join the world discussion now in Nairobi on how to strengthen Kyoto and how to make whatever changes Prime Minister Howard wants to advocate and join the rest of the world community. That's the test."
Mr Gore, now chairman of investment firm Generation Investment Management, yesterday met with Premier Steve Bracks and his deputy John Thwaites. He described Victoria as forward thinking on climate change and said he would take a number of local initiatives back to the United States.
He was particularly impressed with the Bracks Government's "black balloons" advertising campaign, which links household energy usage with the amount of carbon dioxide it releases into the air.
"I'm going to take that ad back and show it to some folks there, maybe put it on YouTube," he said.
With MATHEW MURPHY and LIZ MINCHIN
Leaders to tackle climate
The Age
Tim Colebatch
November 17, 2006
GLOBAL warming and the Stern report on climate change will become part of the agenda facing the G20 meeting of the world's key finance ministers and central bank governors, which opens in Melbourne tonight.
The chief secretary to the British Treasury, Stephen Timms, told The Age that global warming, and the need to speed up the world's response to it, was so crucial that it must be debated as widely as possible, including by the world's financial leaders.
Australian Treasurer Peter Costello, who will chair the summit, agreed that the heads of the world's 20 biggest economies would discuss global warming when they debated future energy security and prices.
"That is very much on everybody's minds at the moment," Mr Costello said. In a world where "nearly everybody's oil is coming out of the Middle East", the huge growth in oil demand from China and India threatened to put great pressure on prices.
Forty of the world's most powerful finance ministers, central bank governors and heads of global financial institutions will be in Melbourne for the summit this weekend.
A massive security operation began yesterday around the Grand Hyatt hotel in Russell Street, where the three-day event is being held. Several major streets were blocked off and some one-way streets were reversed, creating traffic gridlock during the city's morning and evening peak hours.
Chief Commissioner Christine Nixon briefed police at their secret inner-city command post yesterday, as extra officers were rostered partly in anticipation of big street demonstrations against the summit this weekend.
The meeting brings together those responsible for running the world's 20 biggest economies, which account for 85 per cent of global output and two-thirds of the world's people.
The participants will include the world's key central bankers, led by new US Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke, European Central Bank president Jean-Claude Trichet, and the bank chiefs of Japan, Toshihiko Fukui, and China, Zhou Xiaochuan.
International Monetary Fund head Rodrigo de Rato will also take part, along with World Bank president Paul Wolfowitz.
The meeting begins tonight with an official dinner at the Grand Hyatt. Formal discussions begin tomorrow behind closed doors and finish on Sunday.
Climate change is not on the formal agenda, but Mr Timms, who is representing Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer, Gordon Brown, said he and others would raise it and the Stern report in the session on energy security.
"Climate change is certainly the biggest market failure in the world," Mr Timms said. "If we delay addressing it, then the costs the world economy will incur in a generation or two will be far, far greater than the costs of making changes now.
"We need an international consensus on a worldwide carbon market, so there'll be a price on carbon (emissions), allowing people to make decisions on energy-efficient, low-carbon technologies on a market-oriented basis."
Mr Timms predicted that Australia and the US, both of which refused to sign the Kyoto agreement on cutting greenhouse emissions, would be in the new consensus.
"Everybody can see the urgency," Mr Timms said. "I think there's a real prospect of getting the international consensus we need."
Britain would also urge the G20 to send a strong call to conclude the Doha round agreement to reduce trade barriers worldwide, he said, and to reform the role of the International Monetary Fund and voting power within it, to reflect the growth of new economic powers and low-income countries.
Ministers and bank chiefs from the 10 biggest emerging economies, headed by China, India and Brazil, will be at this weekend's meeting, the most important economic conference ever held in Australia.
They will meet with their counterparts from the 10 largest rich economies, for talks on issues from ageing populations to aid effectiveness.
Mr Costello said yesterday an international market for alternative fuels needed to be considered to avoid high oil prices in the future.
He told 2GB radio that countries such as China with its population of 1.3 billion, were "sucking up" scarce oil resources and the only solution was to look at alternative fuels.
But he stopped short of agreeing to a mandated system in Australia requiring people to use ethanol.
Tim Colebatch
November 17, 2006
GLOBAL warming and the Stern report on climate change will become part of the agenda facing the G20 meeting of the world's key finance ministers and central bank governors, which opens in Melbourne tonight.
The chief secretary to the British Treasury, Stephen Timms, told The Age that global warming, and the need to speed up the world's response to it, was so crucial that it must be debated as widely as possible, including by the world's financial leaders.
Australian Treasurer Peter Costello, who will chair the summit, agreed that the heads of the world's 20 biggest economies would discuss global warming when they debated future energy security and prices.
"That is very much on everybody's minds at the moment," Mr Costello said. In a world where "nearly everybody's oil is coming out of the Middle East", the huge growth in oil demand from China and India threatened to put great pressure on prices.
Forty of the world's most powerful finance ministers, central bank governors and heads of global financial institutions will be in Melbourne for the summit this weekend.
A massive security operation began yesterday around the Grand Hyatt hotel in Russell Street, where the three-day event is being held. Several major streets were blocked off and some one-way streets were reversed, creating traffic gridlock during the city's morning and evening peak hours.
Chief Commissioner Christine Nixon briefed police at their secret inner-city command post yesterday, as extra officers were rostered partly in anticipation of big street demonstrations against the summit this weekend.
The meeting brings together those responsible for running the world's 20 biggest economies, which account for 85 per cent of global output and two-thirds of the world's people.
The participants will include the world's key central bankers, led by new US Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke, European Central Bank president Jean-Claude Trichet, and the bank chiefs of Japan, Toshihiko Fukui, and China, Zhou Xiaochuan.
International Monetary Fund head Rodrigo de Rato will also take part, along with World Bank president Paul Wolfowitz.
The meeting begins tonight with an official dinner at the Grand Hyatt. Formal discussions begin tomorrow behind closed doors and finish on Sunday.
Climate change is not on the formal agenda, but Mr Timms, who is representing Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer, Gordon Brown, said he and others would raise it and the Stern report in the session on energy security.
"Climate change is certainly the biggest market failure in the world," Mr Timms said. "If we delay addressing it, then the costs the world economy will incur in a generation or two will be far, far greater than the costs of making changes now.
"We need an international consensus on a worldwide carbon market, so there'll be a price on carbon (emissions), allowing people to make decisions on energy-efficient, low-carbon technologies on a market-oriented basis."
Mr Timms predicted that Australia and the US, both of which refused to sign the Kyoto agreement on cutting greenhouse emissions, would be in the new consensus.
"Everybody can see the urgency," Mr Timms said. "I think there's a real prospect of getting the international consensus we need."
Britain would also urge the G20 to send a strong call to conclude the Doha round agreement to reduce trade barriers worldwide, he said, and to reform the role of the International Monetary Fund and voting power within it, to reflect the growth of new economic powers and low-income countries.
Ministers and bank chiefs from the 10 biggest emerging economies, headed by China, India and Brazil, will be at this weekend's meeting, the most important economic conference ever held in Australia.
They will meet with their counterparts from the 10 largest rich economies, for talks on issues from ageing populations to aid effectiveness.
Mr Costello said yesterday an international market for alternative fuels needed to be considered to avoid high oil prices in the future.
He told 2GB radio that countries such as China with its population of 1.3 billion, were "sucking up" scarce oil resources and the only solution was to look at alternative fuels.
But he stopped short of agreeing to a mandated system in Australia requiring people to use ethanol.
Thursday, November 16, 2006
Greenhouse alternative will fail, says Gore
SMH
Al Gore … better to join Kyoto.
Wendy Frew Environment Reporter
November 16, 2006
JOHN HOWARD'S promotion of a new global climate-change pact that would protect Australia's economic interests is unrealistic and likely to fail, the former US vice-president Al Gore says.
In Australia this month to train "climate change presenters", Mr Gore yesterday urged the Prime Minister to join negotiations taking place in Nairobi on a tougher second phase of the Kyoto Protocol on climate change.
"If [Australia's proposal] is not part of the rest of the world community then it has no meaningful force," Mr Gore said.
"If the proposition is that Australia will design a completely different [greenhouse gas emissions] trading system and then wait until the rest of the world abandons the main one and adopts the Australian one, that's probably not realistic … Joining the process now in Nairobi and seeking some modifications to Kyoto - that is entirely proper."
Mr Howard said on Monday he would form a taskforce to consider a global carbon trading scheme to help tackle climate change. His own Greenhouse Office has researched and made recommendations on emissions trading in papers dating as far back as 1999, but they have been ignored by the Government.
Yesterday the Prime Minister met with business leaders - including Don Argus from BHP, Oscar Groeneveld from Rio Tinto Aluminium and Colin Beckett from Chevron Oil - to discuss emissions trading. It appears scientists, energy experts and environmentalists will not be consulted although they have been long-term supporters of such a global scheme.
However, Mr Howard has warned he would not support any scheme that would damage Australia's fossil fuel sector or energy-intensive industries such as aluminium, steel and cement. Nor would he take part in any global agreement that did not set tough emission reduction targets for developing nations such as China and India.
Mr Gore agreed it was vital that future heavy polluters such as China and India dramatically cut their emissions, "but since the end of World War II every global treaty has had the same basis: the wealthy countries … go first and then those nations … if their per capita incomes are so much lower [than those of the developed world], they come along in the second phase".
On Tuesday the French Prime Minister, Dominique de Villepin, threatened to tax imports from countries that had not committed themselves to the second phase of the Kyoto Protocol. "Europe has to use all its weight to stand up to this sort of environmental dumping," he said.
Al Gore … better to join Kyoto.
Wendy Frew Environment Reporter
November 16, 2006
JOHN HOWARD'S promotion of a new global climate-change pact that would protect Australia's economic interests is unrealistic and likely to fail, the former US vice-president Al Gore says.
In Australia this month to train "climate change presenters", Mr Gore yesterday urged the Prime Minister to join negotiations taking place in Nairobi on a tougher second phase of the Kyoto Protocol on climate change.
"If [Australia's proposal] is not part of the rest of the world community then it has no meaningful force," Mr Gore said.
"If the proposition is that Australia will design a completely different [greenhouse gas emissions] trading system and then wait until the rest of the world abandons the main one and adopts the Australian one, that's probably not realistic … Joining the process now in Nairobi and seeking some modifications to Kyoto - that is entirely proper."
Mr Howard said on Monday he would form a taskforce to consider a global carbon trading scheme to help tackle climate change. His own Greenhouse Office has researched and made recommendations on emissions trading in papers dating as far back as 1999, but they have been ignored by the Government.
Yesterday the Prime Minister met with business leaders - including Don Argus from BHP, Oscar Groeneveld from Rio Tinto Aluminium and Colin Beckett from Chevron Oil - to discuss emissions trading. It appears scientists, energy experts and environmentalists will not be consulted although they have been long-term supporters of such a global scheme.
However, Mr Howard has warned he would not support any scheme that would damage Australia's fossil fuel sector or energy-intensive industries such as aluminium, steel and cement. Nor would he take part in any global agreement that did not set tough emission reduction targets for developing nations such as China and India.
Mr Gore agreed it was vital that future heavy polluters such as China and India dramatically cut their emissions, "but since the end of World War II every global treaty has had the same basis: the wealthy countries … go first and then those nations … if their per capita incomes are so much lower [than those of the developed world], they come along in the second phase".
On Tuesday the French Prime Minister, Dominique de Villepin, threatened to tax imports from countries that had not committed themselves to the second phase of the Kyoto Protocol. "Europe has to use all its weight to stand up to this sort of environmental dumping," he said.
Wednesday, November 15, 2006
A recipe for environmental disaster
The Age
November 15, 2006
For someone who prides himself on his leadership qualities, Prime Minister John Howard is looking rather uncertain right now. The image he conjured this week of a bedraggled, sodden figure in need of a raincoat and umbrella was rather unfortunate for a man trying to assert his political strength. There is a sense that in global politics, the Prime Minister has been caught without his wet weather gear. Rather than articulating a vision for the future, his rhetoric has for too long been shaped by denial. Following US President George Bush's lead, he refused to commit Australia to the Kyoto Protocol, which binds developed nations to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and has until recently rejected the need for strong local action on climate change. But, as Mr Howard has now acknowledged, the political climate, like the weather, is changing.
Australia cannot ignore changing global realities and how the nation fares will depend on much stronger leadership on the environment than the nation has had to date. Two weeks ago when the Stern report described climate change as the "greatest and widest-ranging market failure ever seen", Mr Howard told his party room not to be "mesmerised" by one report. He did, however, say Australia would sign a new Kyoto-style agreement on reducing greenhouse gas emissions, but only if it included every other country. "If everybody is in, I am prepared to lead Australia in," Mr Howard said. Waiting for everyone else to join is a rather strange approach to leadership. In fact, as The Age has previously noted, the Prime Minister's words imply that he sees no leadership role for this country in environmental matters and that he is happy to follow in the wake of less developed nations. His claim that the Kyoto Protocol lacks validity because it exempts poorer nations from targets to reduce greenhouse gases misrepresents the nature of the agreement, which was specifically designed to encourage developed nations to initiate change as a precursor to involving the developing world at a later stage.
The Government can no longer ignore Britain's call to take seriously the findings of the Stern report and, with Mr Bush's diminished authority in US politics, it will need to engage more positively with ideas it previously dismissed. Accordingly, in the past fortnight, Mr Howard has been busy modifying his approach while trying to avoid the appearance of backing down. As Australia faces being sidelined at the United Nations Climate Summit in Nairobi - our failure to sign Kyoto restricts this country's delegation to observer status at some meetings - the Prime Minister has initiated a joint Government-business taskforce to prepare for Australia's possible participation in a global emissions trading system. But, lest this be interpreted as acceptance of the reality of the problem, Mr Howard remained adamant that his first responsibility was to protect the Australian economy and countered criticisms of his scepticism by saying "the truth is I'm not that sceptical". It is difficult to know quite how to interpret this.
In fact, Australia has little option but to engage more positively with the world in dealing with environmental matters. Carbon trading would place specific limits on greenhouse emissions and those exceeding their limits would have to buy carbon "credits", while under-polluters would be able to profit by selling their credits. Given our reliance on coal and our poor international record on dealing with climate change - Australia ranked 47th on a list of 56 countries released this week - the Prime Minister had little alternative but to soften his approach. It is to be hoped that the next step will be an acknowledgement that the Government has a moral responsibility to reconsider its response to the Kyoto Protocol. This was made more likely by French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin's call yesterday for punitive taxes on imports from countries that refused to sign the protocol. "Our efforts will be worthless if we (Europe) are the only ones fighting for the future of the planet," he said. Mr Howard will soon have no option but to respond to the political and environmental realities of global warming. Sadly, he has missed the chance to show genuine leadership.
November 15, 2006
For someone who prides himself on his leadership qualities, Prime Minister John Howard is looking rather uncertain right now. The image he conjured this week of a bedraggled, sodden figure in need of a raincoat and umbrella was rather unfortunate for a man trying to assert his political strength. There is a sense that in global politics, the Prime Minister has been caught without his wet weather gear. Rather than articulating a vision for the future, his rhetoric has for too long been shaped by denial. Following US President George Bush's lead, he refused to commit Australia to the Kyoto Protocol, which binds developed nations to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and has until recently rejected the need for strong local action on climate change. But, as Mr Howard has now acknowledged, the political climate, like the weather, is changing.
Australia cannot ignore changing global realities and how the nation fares will depend on much stronger leadership on the environment than the nation has had to date. Two weeks ago when the Stern report described climate change as the "greatest and widest-ranging market failure ever seen", Mr Howard told his party room not to be "mesmerised" by one report. He did, however, say Australia would sign a new Kyoto-style agreement on reducing greenhouse gas emissions, but only if it included every other country. "If everybody is in, I am prepared to lead Australia in," Mr Howard said. Waiting for everyone else to join is a rather strange approach to leadership. In fact, as The Age has previously noted, the Prime Minister's words imply that he sees no leadership role for this country in environmental matters and that he is happy to follow in the wake of less developed nations. His claim that the Kyoto Protocol lacks validity because it exempts poorer nations from targets to reduce greenhouse gases misrepresents the nature of the agreement, which was specifically designed to encourage developed nations to initiate change as a precursor to involving the developing world at a later stage.
The Government can no longer ignore Britain's call to take seriously the findings of the Stern report and, with Mr Bush's diminished authority in US politics, it will need to engage more positively with ideas it previously dismissed. Accordingly, in the past fortnight, Mr Howard has been busy modifying his approach while trying to avoid the appearance of backing down. As Australia faces being sidelined at the United Nations Climate Summit in Nairobi - our failure to sign Kyoto restricts this country's delegation to observer status at some meetings - the Prime Minister has initiated a joint Government-business taskforce to prepare for Australia's possible participation in a global emissions trading system. But, lest this be interpreted as acceptance of the reality of the problem, Mr Howard remained adamant that his first responsibility was to protect the Australian economy and countered criticisms of his scepticism by saying "the truth is I'm not that sceptical". It is difficult to know quite how to interpret this.
In fact, Australia has little option but to engage more positively with the world in dealing with environmental matters. Carbon trading would place specific limits on greenhouse emissions and those exceeding their limits would have to buy carbon "credits", while under-polluters would be able to profit by selling their credits. Given our reliance on coal and our poor international record on dealing with climate change - Australia ranked 47th on a list of 56 countries released this week - the Prime Minister had little alternative but to soften his approach. It is to be hoped that the next step will be an acknowledgement that the Government has a moral responsibility to reconsider its response to the Kyoto Protocol. This was made more likely by French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin's call yesterday for punitive taxes on imports from countries that refused to sign the protocol. "Our efforts will be worthless if we (Europe) are the only ones fighting for the future of the planet," he said. Mr Howard will soon have no option but to respond to the political and environmental realities of global warming. Sadly, he has missed the chance to show genuine leadership.
Greens sceptical over greenhouse delays
SMH
Wendy Frew Environment Reporter
November 15, 2006
ENERGY campaigners and green groups have warned that Federal Government plans to exclude heavy greenhouse gas polluters from any emissions trading schemes could result in higher carbon emissions from Australia.
They expressed disbelief yesterday that the Government - long a critic of emissions trading - was simply delaying taking action again.
A co-ordinator with Climate Action Network Australia, Julie-Anne Richards, said the Australian Government's attempts to propose a "new Kyoto" agreement at climate change negotiations in Nairobi this week put it at risk of being "seen as a world joke".
"There is already a global carbon trading scheme that's in operation right now, and it's within the Kyoto Protocol," Ms Richards said.
"Australia could already be taking advantage of this scheme."
Instead the Government was ducking the issue with proposals that "simply won't address the scale of the problem".
On Monday the Prime Minister, John Howard, appeared to yield to pressure when he told members of the Business Council of Australia that the Government would set up a working group with business to examine a carbon trading scheme.
However, he warned he would not preside over policies that would "rob Australia of its competitive advantage in the industries that are so important to us".
He also said an agreement between Australia, China, India, Japan, South Korea and the US to develop technology to cut greenhouse pollution, in a group called AP6, could form the basis of a new global compact on climate change. However, AP6 has no targets for cutting emissions, no timetable to deploy so-called clean technologies, no carrots to encourage industry to cut emissions and no stick to penalise them if they fail to do so.
A campaigner with Greenpeace, Danny Kennedy, said the latest announcement seemed to be another government smokescreen.
"Do we really need a hat-trick of energy inquiries before we can move forward on tackling climate change? Mr Howard does not need to reinvent the wheel [on emissions trading]."
Wendy Frew Environment Reporter
November 15, 2006
ENERGY campaigners and green groups have warned that Federal Government plans to exclude heavy greenhouse gas polluters from any emissions trading schemes could result in higher carbon emissions from Australia.
They expressed disbelief yesterday that the Government - long a critic of emissions trading - was simply delaying taking action again.
A co-ordinator with Climate Action Network Australia, Julie-Anne Richards, said the Australian Government's attempts to propose a "new Kyoto" agreement at climate change negotiations in Nairobi this week put it at risk of being "seen as a world joke".
"There is already a global carbon trading scheme that's in operation right now, and it's within the Kyoto Protocol," Ms Richards said.
"Australia could already be taking advantage of this scheme."
Instead the Government was ducking the issue with proposals that "simply won't address the scale of the problem".
On Monday the Prime Minister, John Howard, appeared to yield to pressure when he told members of the Business Council of Australia that the Government would set up a working group with business to examine a carbon trading scheme.
However, he warned he would not preside over policies that would "rob Australia of its competitive advantage in the industries that are so important to us".
He also said an agreement between Australia, China, India, Japan, South Korea and the US to develop technology to cut greenhouse pollution, in a group called AP6, could form the basis of a new global compact on climate change. However, AP6 has no targets for cutting emissions, no timetable to deploy so-called clean technologies, no carrots to encourage industry to cut emissions and no stick to penalise them if they fail to do so.
A campaigner with Greenpeace, Danny Kennedy, said the latest announcement seemed to be another government smokescreen.
"Do we really need a hat-trick of energy inquiries before we can move forward on tackling climate change? Mr Howard does not need to reinvent the wheel [on emissions trading]."
Little support for PM's new Kyoto
SMH
James Button in Nairobi
November 15, 2006
* Greens sceptical over greenhouse delays
* French promise revenge for not signing protocol
Other related coverage
* Australia snubbed at climate meet
* The view from Nairobi
* Blair agrees Kyoto inadequate: PM
* Kenyan protest at summit on climate change
YVO DE BOER was, naturally, diplomatic. Asked what he thought of John Howard's vow to "push for a new Kyoto" at the global warming summit in Nairobi this week, the executive director of the United Nations climate change convention said Australia was "actively engaged" in general debates.
However, it joined the specific debate on the future role of industrialised nations in reducing greenhouse emissions "to the extent that it can as an observer".
While Australia is not the pariah it is sometimes said to be in climate-change talks, its decision not to ratify Kyoto in 2002 has almost certainly robbed it of influence, as the world prepares for a new agreement to reduce emissions after the the protocol expires in 2012.
Early indications from Nairobi are that if Mr Howard wants to rewrite the protocol from scratch, his plan will receive little attention or sympathy among the 6000 delegates.
Although the Environment Minister, Ian Campbell, has said there is "great enthusiasm" for the new Kyoto plan, no delegate who spoke to the Herald - including two members of the Australian delegation - understood what the phrase "new Kyoto" meant.
Mr Campbell was due to arrive in Nairobi yesterday.
Mr de Boer said "no Australian official has come up to me and said that they intend to return to the protocol".
The confusion exposes a vital issue at the conference, which enters its last and most important three days today.
Mr Campbell has said the protocol is flawed because it does not force fast-growing developing nations such as China and India to reduce their emissions.
Yet China, unlike Australia, has joined the global carbon market and is taking part in projects to reduce its emissions through the UN Clean Development Mechanism.
Virtually all countries agree that tackling escalating emissions from China - and those of the US, which did not ratify the protocol - is of huge importance to future agreements. Yet it is doubtful most believe the protocol must be re-created in order to address the problem.
The International Energy Agency's latest report, released last week, shows that China will overtake the US as the world's highest source of energy-related emissions by 2009 - 10 years earlier than the agency had initially forecast.
A central debate at the conference is how to further involve China and other developing nations in reducing emissions, without demanding they sacrifice the economic growth the West has already enjoyed.
James Button in Nairobi
November 15, 2006
* Greens sceptical over greenhouse delays
* French promise revenge for not signing protocol
Other related coverage
* Australia snubbed at climate meet
* The view from Nairobi
* Blair agrees Kyoto inadequate: PM
* Kenyan protest at summit on climate change
YVO DE BOER was, naturally, diplomatic. Asked what he thought of John Howard's vow to "push for a new Kyoto" at the global warming summit in Nairobi this week, the executive director of the United Nations climate change convention said Australia was "actively engaged" in general debates.
However, it joined the specific debate on the future role of industrialised nations in reducing greenhouse emissions "to the extent that it can as an observer".
While Australia is not the pariah it is sometimes said to be in climate-change talks, its decision not to ratify Kyoto in 2002 has almost certainly robbed it of influence, as the world prepares for a new agreement to reduce emissions after the the protocol expires in 2012.
Early indications from Nairobi are that if Mr Howard wants to rewrite the protocol from scratch, his plan will receive little attention or sympathy among the 6000 delegates.
Although the Environment Minister, Ian Campbell, has said there is "great enthusiasm" for the new Kyoto plan, no delegate who spoke to the Herald - including two members of the Australian delegation - understood what the phrase "new Kyoto" meant.
Mr Campbell was due to arrive in Nairobi yesterday.
Mr de Boer said "no Australian official has come up to me and said that they intend to return to the protocol".
The confusion exposes a vital issue at the conference, which enters its last and most important three days today.
Mr Campbell has said the protocol is flawed because it does not force fast-growing developing nations such as China and India to reduce their emissions.
Yet China, unlike Australia, has joined the global carbon market and is taking part in projects to reduce its emissions through the UN Clean Development Mechanism.
Virtually all countries agree that tackling escalating emissions from China - and those of the US, which did not ratify the protocol - is of huge importance to future agreements. Yet it is doubtful most believe the protocol must be re-created in order to address the problem.
The International Energy Agency's latest report, released last week, shows that China will overtake the US as the world's highest source of energy-related emissions by 2009 - 10 years earlier than the agency had initially forecast.
A central debate at the conference is how to further involve China and other developing nations in reducing emissions, without demanding they sacrifice the economic growth the West has already enjoyed.
Monday, November 13, 2006
Government to push for 'new Kyoto'
SMH
November 13, 2006 - 5:33PM
Australia's push for its desired "new Kyoto" at a major climate change conference in Africa will be hobbled from the start because it has not ratified the Kyoto Protocol on easing global warming, critics warn.
Prime Minister John Howard has again stressed it's crucial for the world to look beyond Kyoto, which places curbs on emissions in industrialised countries, with lesser initial restrictions for developing nations, including the emerging powerhouse China.
"What we have to do is get an arrangement that involves everybody, and when you have everybody in it means ... no country is severely disadvantaged," Mr Howard said.
Environment Minister Ian Campbell is headed to Nairobi, Kenya, for the conference of the parties (COP) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the body which oversees the Kyoto Protocol.
That conference will formulate a new stage of the protocol once its current timeframe ends in 2012, perhaps with mandatory reductions in emissions.
Australia is invited because it signed the original Kyoto document, although it never ratified it, as did 166 other countries.
A so-called meeting of the parties (MOP) to the Kyoto Protocol will be held after the COP meeting and it is from this later meeting Australia will be excluded.
The two-week conference opened last week with a warning that climate change may be most serious threat ever to face humankind.
Australia, which is sending a high-level delegation, will use the meeting to lobby for its technological solutions path to addressing greenhouse gas emissions and for an all-encompassing new agreement.
Senator Campbell said he had already held talks with countries including Britain and Canada to garner support for a post-Kyoto framework.
"Even the existing Kyoto signatories know that it's not working, they know that the world needs a better agreement," he said.
Greenpeace energy campaigner Catherine Fitzpatrick, who is in Nairobi, said Australia would be relegated to observer status because it is one of only two industrialised nations, along with the United States, to refuse to ratify Kyoto.
"Talk of 'new Kyoto' is just a ploy to detract from the fact that Australia has consistently refused to join the international community on taking cooperative action on climate change, whilst bolstering the big polluters such as the coal industry," she said.
Ms Fitzpatrick said the government had finally realised Australia was being sidelined by the rest of the world and was missing out on a multi-billion dollar global carbon market.
Greens senator Christine Milne, also attending the conference, said most countries would rubbish Australia's push, with Senator Campbell's delegation seen as a sideshow to the main game.
"What Australia's involved in is a dialogue with the other countries that are signed on to the climate change convention," she said.
"Australia could play a constructive role if it wanted to, even as an observer, but unfortunately it seems to use its position to make sure that the rest of the world doesn't move beyond what Australia is prepared to agree to."
The high level section of the conference will be opened by UN secretary-general Kofi Annan.
Former World Bank chief economist Sir Nicholas Stern, whose review of the possible impact of climate change on world economics made a huge impact on the issue last week, is also expected to address the conference.
Opposition environment spokesman Anthony Albanese, whose Labor Party has a policy of ratifying Kyoto, is also in Nairobi.
- AAP
November 13, 2006 - 5:33PM
Australia's push for its desired "new Kyoto" at a major climate change conference in Africa will be hobbled from the start because it has not ratified the Kyoto Protocol on easing global warming, critics warn.
Prime Minister John Howard has again stressed it's crucial for the world to look beyond Kyoto, which places curbs on emissions in industrialised countries, with lesser initial restrictions for developing nations, including the emerging powerhouse China.
"What we have to do is get an arrangement that involves everybody, and when you have everybody in it means ... no country is severely disadvantaged," Mr Howard said.
Environment Minister Ian Campbell is headed to Nairobi, Kenya, for the conference of the parties (COP) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the body which oversees the Kyoto Protocol.
That conference will formulate a new stage of the protocol once its current timeframe ends in 2012, perhaps with mandatory reductions in emissions.
Australia is invited because it signed the original Kyoto document, although it never ratified it, as did 166 other countries.
A so-called meeting of the parties (MOP) to the Kyoto Protocol will be held after the COP meeting and it is from this later meeting Australia will be excluded.
The two-week conference opened last week with a warning that climate change may be most serious threat ever to face humankind.
Australia, which is sending a high-level delegation, will use the meeting to lobby for its technological solutions path to addressing greenhouse gas emissions and for an all-encompassing new agreement.
Senator Campbell said he had already held talks with countries including Britain and Canada to garner support for a post-Kyoto framework.
"Even the existing Kyoto signatories know that it's not working, they know that the world needs a better agreement," he said.
Greenpeace energy campaigner Catherine Fitzpatrick, who is in Nairobi, said Australia would be relegated to observer status because it is one of only two industrialised nations, along with the United States, to refuse to ratify Kyoto.
"Talk of 'new Kyoto' is just a ploy to detract from the fact that Australia has consistently refused to join the international community on taking cooperative action on climate change, whilst bolstering the big polluters such as the coal industry," she said.
Ms Fitzpatrick said the government had finally realised Australia was being sidelined by the rest of the world and was missing out on a multi-billion dollar global carbon market.
Greens senator Christine Milne, also attending the conference, said most countries would rubbish Australia's push, with Senator Campbell's delegation seen as a sideshow to the main game.
"What Australia's involved in is a dialogue with the other countries that are signed on to the climate change convention," she said.
"Australia could play a constructive role if it wanted to, even as an observer, but unfortunately it seems to use its position to make sure that the rest of the world doesn't move beyond what Australia is prepared to agree to."
The high level section of the conference will be opened by UN secretary-general Kofi Annan.
Former World Bank chief economist Sir Nicholas Stern, whose review of the possible impact of climate change on world economics made a huge impact on the issue last week, is also expected to address the conference.
Opposition environment spokesman Anthony Albanese, whose Labor Party has a policy of ratifying Kyoto, is also in Nairobi.
- AAP
Friday, November 10, 2006
Subsidies to pay for green power drive
Wendy Frew Environment Reporter
November 10, 2006
SMH
NSW taxpayers will subsidise investment in renewable energy projects in other states and pay more to subsidise energy-intensive industries such as aluminium and steel under a State Government scheme announced yesterday.
The Government's decision to make energy retailers buy 15 per cent of their electricity supply from clean sources such as wind and solar by 2020 will add only $1 a week to consumer power bills, the Premier, Morris Iemma, said.
He said the scheme would cut the state's greenhouse gas pollution by 115 million tonnes - the equivalent of taking 25 million cars off the road for 12 months - and stimulate investment in renewable energy generation.
"The need to act on climate change and greenhouse gas emissions is clear," he said.
The "green" electricity could be sourced from anywhere in the National Electricity Market (which does not include Western Australia or the Northern Territory).
That meant NSW taxpayers would get the cheapest renewable energy available rather than relying on projects inside NSW, the chief executive of the Renewable Energy Generators of Australia, Susan Jeanes, said. "For example, the optimum sites for wind are found in South Australia and Tasmania," she said.
However, Greenpeace said the scheme could mean NSW would miss out on jobs and investment associated with renewable energy, making it more difficult to move away from coal-fired power.
"Overwhelmingly, our response [to the scheme] is positive, but we want NSW to start moving away from coal, not just offsetting its greenhouse gas emissions in other states," Greenpeace's energy campaigner, Mark Wakeham, said.
The increased price of power associated with the scheme will not flow to "energy-intensive users" such as the aluminium and steel industries. Mr Wakeham said that meant taxpayers would further subsidise those industries, which already receive tens of millions of dollars in electricity discounts.
The Opposition's environment spokesman, Michael Richardson, said it would have preferred a scheme that encouraged investment in NSW.
He called for NSW to fund research into so-called "clean-coal" technology to reduce greenhouse gas pollution from coal-fired power plants.
The renewable energy target follows a similar scheme in Victoria, which has a 10 per cent green power target by 2016. South Australia has a 20 per cent target by 2014, much of which has been met by Federal Government support for renewable energy.
Almost all of Tasmania's power is provided by renewable energy.
Mr Iemma also announced planning approval for a $220 million wind farm south of Tarago. Until now, there was no market for the cleaner but more expensive electricity generated by wind farms.
The Government's energy plan also includes a continued push for a national emissions trading scheme and curbing demand for electricity.
It also made a commitment to stabilising greenhouse gas pollution at 2000 levels by 2025, and cutting them by 60 per cent by 2050.
AT THE COALFACE
- In 2005, 90 per cent of NSW's electricity came from coal-fired power.
- Electricity generation contributes about one-third of greenhouse emissions in NSW.
- Only 6.1 per cent of the state's electricity consumption is from renewable sources.
November 10, 2006
SMH
NSW taxpayers will subsidise investment in renewable energy projects in other states and pay more to subsidise energy-intensive industries such as aluminium and steel under a State Government scheme announced yesterday.
The Government's decision to make energy retailers buy 15 per cent of their electricity supply from clean sources such as wind and solar by 2020 will add only $1 a week to consumer power bills, the Premier, Morris Iemma, said.
He said the scheme would cut the state's greenhouse gas pollution by 115 million tonnes - the equivalent of taking 25 million cars off the road for 12 months - and stimulate investment in renewable energy generation.
"The need to act on climate change and greenhouse gas emissions is clear," he said.
The "green" electricity could be sourced from anywhere in the National Electricity Market (which does not include Western Australia or the Northern Territory).
That meant NSW taxpayers would get the cheapest renewable energy available rather than relying on projects inside NSW, the chief executive of the Renewable Energy Generators of Australia, Susan Jeanes, said. "For example, the optimum sites for wind are found in South Australia and Tasmania," she said.
However, Greenpeace said the scheme could mean NSW would miss out on jobs and investment associated with renewable energy, making it more difficult to move away from coal-fired power.
"Overwhelmingly, our response [to the scheme] is positive, but we want NSW to start moving away from coal, not just offsetting its greenhouse gas emissions in other states," Greenpeace's energy campaigner, Mark Wakeham, said.
The increased price of power associated with the scheme will not flow to "energy-intensive users" such as the aluminium and steel industries. Mr Wakeham said that meant taxpayers would further subsidise those industries, which already receive tens of millions of dollars in electricity discounts.
The Opposition's environment spokesman, Michael Richardson, said it would have preferred a scheme that encouraged investment in NSW.
He called for NSW to fund research into so-called "clean-coal" technology to reduce greenhouse gas pollution from coal-fired power plants.
The renewable energy target follows a similar scheme in Victoria, which has a 10 per cent green power target by 2016. South Australia has a 20 per cent target by 2014, much of which has been met by Federal Government support for renewable energy.
Almost all of Tasmania's power is provided by renewable energy.
Mr Iemma also announced planning approval for a $220 million wind farm south of Tarago. Until now, there was no market for the cleaner but more expensive electricity generated by wind farms.
The Government's energy plan also includes a continued push for a national emissions trading scheme and curbing demand for electricity.
It also made a commitment to stabilising greenhouse gas pollution at 2000 levels by 2025, and cutting them by 60 per cent by 2050.
AT THE COALFACE
- In 2005, 90 per cent of NSW's electricity came from coal-fired power.
- Electricity generation contributes about one-third of greenhouse emissions in NSW.
- Only 6.1 per cent of the state's electricity consumption is from renewable sources.
Only a decade left to avoid climate change, says thinktank
James Randerson and agencies
Thursday November 9, 2006
The Guardian
The world has less than a decade to reverse the growth in greenhouse gas emissions if dangerous climate change is to be avoided, according to a report from a thinktank that goes further than the landmark Stern review last week.
Lord Stern's report said that unless greenhouse emissions were tackled the world faced an economic downturn on a par with the great depression.
Yesterday's report from the Institute of Public Policy Research suggests Lord Stern's analysis was too conservative and governments need to move further and faster. To minimise the risk of a 2C rise - seen as the threshold for dangerous climate change - the authors say global carbon dioxide emissions would need to peak between 2010 and 2013.
By 2015 to 2020 the world would need to be cutting carbon emissions by 4%-5% annually and by mid century CO2 levels should be 70%-80% below what they were in 1990, say Paul Baer and Michael Mastrandrea, experts in risk analysis. The government's "aspiration" is to cut carbon emissions by 60% by 2050. "It is the timetable for action, above all, that our research shows we urgently need to rethink," wrote Simon Retallack, head of the IPPR's climate change team, in a foreword to the report. "We do not have decades in which to bend the CO2 curve: we have less than 10 years. The gap between what is necessary and what seems feasible clearly looms large. But if we want to avoid significant risks of appalling global harm we will need to re-examine what is feasible."
If the global average temperature rises by more than 2C, the report predicts, more than 2 billion people will be affected by drought and some of the world's most diverse ecosystems, including coral reefs and the Amazon rainforest, will be severely damaged.
But Sir David King, the government's chief scientific adviser, told the Guardian in an interview ahead of publication of the Stern review that it was looking increasingly unlikely that the world would be able to stay below the 2C threshold. Carbon dioxide levels are 383 parts per million and rising at 2ppm per year. He believed it would be politically realistic to stabilise CO2 at between 450 and 550 ppm, which would translate into a global average temperature rise of 2.2 to 3.5C.
Yesterday Tony Blair received a petition signed by 150,000 people and delivered by six children. The petition, from the Stop Climate Chaos Coalition, called for a climate change bill in next week's Queen's speech to cut UK CO2 emissions by at least 3% annually.
Related articles
01.11.2006: Give EU more power to tackle climate change, says Balls
31.10.2006: Reaction to the Stern review on climate change
31.10.2006: Has the world finally woken up to climate change?
31.10.2006: Britain to push for global climate deal by 2008
31.10.2006: Comment: George Monbiot
31.10.2006: Profile: Nicholas Stern
31.10.2006: Leader: Stern warning on climate change
30.10.2006: Brown: Britain must lead way towards low-carbon world
30.10.2006: Stern review on economic impact of climate change sparks push for carbon trading
30.10.2006: Stern report: the key points
29.10.2006: Focus: Ten years to save the planet from mankind
28.10.2006: Figures reveal Europe falling far short of climate targets
26.10.2006: Tackle climate change or face deep recession, world's leaders warned
25.10.2006: Cameron presses for annual carbon targets
25.10.2006: Ministers bow to pressure for climate bill
20.10.2006: Blair warns of climate change 'tipping points'
20.10.2006: UK seeks early entry for airlines in EU green plan
13.10.2006: Government plans climate change law
05.10.2006: Greenpeace challenges 'flawed' energy review
04.10.2006: Study warns of costs of climate change as leaders meet
Thursday November 9, 2006
The Guardian
The world has less than a decade to reverse the growth in greenhouse gas emissions if dangerous climate change is to be avoided, according to a report from a thinktank that goes further than the landmark Stern review last week.
Lord Stern's report said that unless greenhouse emissions were tackled the world faced an economic downturn on a par with the great depression.
Yesterday's report from the Institute of Public Policy Research suggests Lord Stern's analysis was too conservative and governments need to move further and faster. To minimise the risk of a 2C rise - seen as the threshold for dangerous climate change - the authors say global carbon dioxide emissions would need to peak between 2010 and 2013.
By 2015 to 2020 the world would need to be cutting carbon emissions by 4%-5% annually and by mid century CO2 levels should be 70%-80% below what they were in 1990, say Paul Baer and Michael Mastrandrea, experts in risk analysis. The government's "aspiration" is to cut carbon emissions by 60% by 2050. "It is the timetable for action, above all, that our research shows we urgently need to rethink," wrote Simon Retallack, head of the IPPR's climate change team, in a foreword to the report. "We do not have decades in which to bend the CO2 curve: we have less than 10 years. The gap between what is necessary and what seems feasible clearly looms large. But if we want to avoid significant risks of appalling global harm we will need to re-examine what is feasible."
If the global average temperature rises by more than 2C, the report predicts, more than 2 billion people will be affected by drought and some of the world's most diverse ecosystems, including coral reefs and the Amazon rainforest, will be severely damaged.
But Sir David King, the government's chief scientific adviser, told the Guardian in an interview ahead of publication of the Stern review that it was looking increasingly unlikely that the world would be able to stay below the 2C threshold. Carbon dioxide levels are 383 parts per million and rising at 2ppm per year. He believed it would be politically realistic to stabilise CO2 at between 450 and 550 ppm, which would translate into a global average temperature rise of 2.2 to 3.5C.
Yesterday Tony Blair received a petition signed by 150,000 people and delivered by six children. The petition, from the Stop Climate Chaos Coalition, called for a climate change bill in next week's Queen's speech to cut UK CO2 emissions by at least 3% annually.
Related articles
01.11.2006: Give EU more power to tackle climate change, says Balls
31.10.2006: Reaction to the Stern review on climate change
31.10.2006: Has the world finally woken up to climate change?
31.10.2006: Britain to push for global climate deal by 2008
31.10.2006: Comment: George Monbiot
31.10.2006: Profile: Nicholas Stern
31.10.2006: Leader: Stern warning on climate change
30.10.2006: Brown: Britain must lead way towards low-carbon world
30.10.2006: Stern review on economic impact of climate change sparks push for carbon trading
30.10.2006: Stern report: the key points
29.10.2006: Focus: Ten years to save the planet from mankind
28.10.2006: Figures reveal Europe falling far short of climate targets
26.10.2006: Tackle climate change or face deep recession, world's leaders warned
25.10.2006: Cameron presses for annual carbon targets
25.10.2006: Ministers bow to pressure for climate bill
20.10.2006: Blair warns of climate change 'tipping points'
20.10.2006: UK seeks early entry for airlines in EU green plan
13.10.2006: Government plans climate change law
05.10.2006: Greenpeace challenges 'flawed' energy review
04.10.2006: Study warns of costs of climate change as leaders meet
Thursday, November 09, 2006
NSW to set greenhouse gas targets
SMH
Wendy Frew, Environment Reporter
November 9, 2006 - 11:02AM
NSW is to set mandatory renewable energy targets to cut greenhouse gas pollution and direct investment to the renewable energy sector.
Premier Morris Iemma today promised legislation would be introduced after next year's election to ensure 10 per cent of the electricity consumed in NSW by 2010 would come from clean sources of energy such as solar and wind power.
That will rise to 15 per cent by 2020.
Premier Morris Iemma said that, at its peak, in 2020, the scheme would cost taxpayers no more than $1 a week, while cutting greenhouse gas pollution in NSW by 115 million tonnes.
The targets will act as a much-needed stimulus to the renewable sector, which has lost ground because of a lack of support from the Federal Government. Coal is a far cheaper source of energy for electricity.
The Premier also announced planning approval for a new $220 million wind farm south of Tarago. Up until now, planning approval for such projects had been almost meaningless because there was no market for the cleaner but more expensive electricity generated by wind farms.
The Government's energy plan also includes legislating a cut in state greenhouse gas emissions, a continued push for a national emissions trading scheme and further work on curbing demand for electricity.
The Government has committed to stabilising greenhouse gas pollution at 2000 levels by 2025, and cutting them by 60 per cent by 2050.
At a press conference this morning, Mr Iemma said Australia needed a national carbon emissions trading scheme because greenhouse pollution did not recognise state boundaries.
However, he made no comment on the Government's continued support for massive exports of coal from the state, which generate significant greenhouse pollution in other countries.
Wendy Frew, Environment Reporter
November 9, 2006 - 11:02AM
NSW is to set mandatory renewable energy targets to cut greenhouse gas pollution and direct investment to the renewable energy sector.
Premier Morris Iemma today promised legislation would be introduced after next year's election to ensure 10 per cent of the electricity consumed in NSW by 2010 would come from clean sources of energy such as solar and wind power.
That will rise to 15 per cent by 2020.
Premier Morris Iemma said that, at its peak, in 2020, the scheme would cost taxpayers no more than $1 a week, while cutting greenhouse gas pollution in NSW by 115 million tonnes.
The targets will act as a much-needed stimulus to the renewable sector, which has lost ground because of a lack of support from the Federal Government. Coal is a far cheaper source of energy for electricity.
The Premier also announced planning approval for a new $220 million wind farm south of Tarago. Up until now, planning approval for such projects had been almost meaningless because there was no market for the cleaner but more expensive electricity generated by wind farms.
The Government's energy plan also includes legislating a cut in state greenhouse gas emissions, a continued push for a national emissions trading scheme and further work on curbing demand for electricity.
The Government has committed to stabilising greenhouse gas pollution at 2000 levels by 2025, and cutting them by 60 per cent by 2050.
At a press conference this morning, Mr Iemma said Australia needed a national carbon emissions trading scheme because greenhouse pollution did not recognise state boundaries.
However, he made no comment on the Government's continued support for massive exports of coal from the state, which generate significant greenhouse pollution in other countries.
Wednesday, November 08, 2006
Wind farm blast for Greens
The Australian
Ewin Hannan
November 06, 2006
STEVE Bracks has launched a fresh attack on the Greens, accusing the minor party of lukewarm support for wind farms, a position he said was "ridiculous".
The Premier accused the Greens of trying to impose onerous "deep-green" requirements on drought relief payments to farmers and of stifling the development of water resources.
His criticisms came despite Labor giving indications it would allocate preferences in the November 25 state election to theGreens ahead of the Family First party.
Announcing plans to offer a $1000 rebate to households that connected water tanks to their laundries and toilets, Mr Bracks sought to contrast Labor's environmental credentials with those of the Greens.
The Greens are campaigning to stop the Bald Hills wind farm in the seat of Gippsland South, saying that while renewable energy projects were preferable to coal and nuclear power, they should be appropriately located.
Greens candidate Jackie Dargaville, who is contesting the seat held by Nationals leader Peter Ryan, has said that in coastal areas with tourism potential, wind farming is "not necessarily the way to go unless that's what the community wants".
Mr Bracks criticised the position, saying: "The reality is that one of the ways we're going to reduce greenhouse gas is to have wind power, alongside hydro, solar ... and clean coal.
"The Greens' perceived opposition to wind power is a wrong call, and it's rejected by the wider environmental movement."
Ewin Hannan
November 06, 2006
STEVE Bracks has launched a fresh attack on the Greens, accusing the minor party of lukewarm support for wind farms, a position he said was "ridiculous".
The Premier accused the Greens of trying to impose onerous "deep-green" requirements on drought relief payments to farmers and of stifling the development of water resources.
His criticisms came despite Labor giving indications it would allocate preferences in the November 25 state election to theGreens ahead of the Family First party.
Announcing plans to offer a $1000 rebate to households that connected water tanks to their laundries and toilets, Mr Bracks sought to contrast Labor's environmental credentials with those of the Greens.
The Greens are campaigning to stop the Bald Hills wind farm in the seat of Gippsland South, saying that while renewable energy projects were preferable to coal and nuclear power, they should be appropriately located.
Greens candidate Jackie Dargaville, who is contesting the seat held by Nationals leader Peter Ryan, has said that in coastal areas with tourism potential, wind farming is "not necessarily the way to go unless that's what the community wants".
Mr Bracks criticised the position, saying: "The reality is that one of the ways we're going to reduce greenhouse gas is to have wind power, alongside hydro, solar ... and clean coal.
"The Greens' perceived opposition to wind power is a wrong call, and it's rejected by the wider environmental movement."
Rescue plan for city water supplies
The Australian
Dennis Shanahan and Verity Edwards
November 07, 2006
URGENT measures to ensure Adelaide and several Victorian towns don't run out of drinking water will be tabled at today's summit on the drought-stricken Murray-Darling Basin.
As part of a $2 billion national water project, there are plans to create new water storages along the Murray in South Australia and build a desalination plant to produce 30 million litres a day.
The summit, called by John Howard, comes as the water shortage crisis in Australia shifts from the availability of water for farmers to providing enough drinking water for cities and towns.
The Victorian Government's proposal targets the centre of the state, with plans to boost drinking water supplies in the region of Ballarat and Bendigo with pipes linking the Campaspe and Goulburn rivers.
There are fears in federal cabinet that the failure of autumn rains next year will lead to an unprecedented drought and water shortages, with dams drying up in April-May.
In another bid to win over regional voters, the Government has agreed to extend drought relief to small businesses for the first time.
The decision, taken by cabinet yesterday, will pump much-needed emergency funds into regional towns. Small business owners, such as harvesters and farm contractors, will be able to apply for the relief, provided a majority of their income is derived from primary production.
The Prime Minister will today outline the drought package, which will build on the $910 million recently announced in further assistance to drought-stricken farmers.
The Murray-Darling Basin last month recorded its lowest ever October inflow of 77 gigalitres, compared to the average 1100 gigalitres.
Mr Howard and premiers Mike Rann, Steve Bracks and Morris Iemma will try today to drastically accelerate the revival of the Murray-Darling Basin.
The Prime Minister said yesterday progress on the National Water Initiative and the aim of pumping an extra 500gigalitres into the Murray was too slow. "The progress with implementing that plan has been slower than I would have liked," Mr Howard said.
He said today's meeting in Canberra with the premiers of NSW, South Australia and Victoria "will be an opportunity for an agreement to accelerate progress" for the basin and discuss the drought.
He said the federal Government and the states had "hammered out" a National Water Initiative three years ago.
"One of the things I will raise with the premiers is accelerating the implementation of the plan that we all agreed on some years ago," he said.
South Australia has previously proposed building a weir on the Murray and using lakes as extra storages as well as building a $100 million desalination plant.
South Australian Premier Mr Rann said yesterday that he would lobby the Prime Minister and other premiers for a reversal of the Snowy Mountains Hydro electricity scheme decision to withhold water for release into the Murray-Darling system.
"There's actually quite a bit of water that's locked up, including behind one dam which isn't even being used for electricity purposes," Mr Rann said.
He said he would put a "whole range of options on the table" regarding water security for people living in South Australian cities and towns, including water storage along the Murray and its lakes and a desalination plant.
"One of the options that's before us is the construction of a weir at Wellington," Mr Rann said.
Mr Howard said the premiers had agreed on "quite a big plan" before and he was considering a $2 billion shopping list from state governments for water-saving projects, including massive pipelines, recycling and desalination plants.
As part of a national scheme of "big ticket" water projects, the West Australian Government is looking at a $617million pipeline from the Yarragadee aquifer to metropolitan Perth, and the Queensland Government has proposed a $500million pipeline in the southeast.
The NSW Government wants to spend $390 million for recycling effluent in western Sydney for industry, park watering and environmental flows in the Hawkesbury and Nepean rivers.
Labor environmental spokesman Anthony Albanese accused Mr Howard of playing cynical politics by holding the water meeting on Melbourne Cup day and when the Reserve Bank is expected to raise interest rates.
"The Prime Minister is more concerned about politics than water or climate change," Mr Albanese said.
"The fact is, climate change is cutting water flows in the Murray-Darling Basin right now. In November 2003 the Howard Government promised to give the Murray River 500gigalitres within five years under the Living Murray First Step program. Not a single drop has actually been returned," Mr Albanese said.
Mr Howard rejected Mr Albanese's claim and said the talks were being held on most convenient day.
"It will be on in the morning. Mr Bracks has got plenty of time to get back for the Melbourne Cup," Mr Howard said.
Federal Agriculture Minister Peter McGauran said the Government would not be forcing farmers to give up allocated water rights, although he warned of dire consequences if there were no seasonal autumn rains next year.
"We need cool heads and we can't be panicked into making snap decisions on water allocations," he said.
"The Prime Minister is going to work through these issues carefully with the heads of the various states with a direct involvement and responsibility, and we know that even an average autumn rainfall next year won't give the irrigators what they require in 2007 and possibly 2008."
The South Australian desalination plant would provide drinking water and boost the Murray flow. The water would also supply BHP's $5billion Olympic Dam extension.
Dennis Shanahan and Verity Edwards
November 07, 2006
URGENT measures to ensure Adelaide and several Victorian towns don't run out of drinking water will be tabled at today's summit on the drought-stricken Murray-Darling Basin.
As part of a $2 billion national water project, there are plans to create new water storages along the Murray in South Australia and build a desalination plant to produce 30 million litres a day.
The summit, called by John Howard, comes as the water shortage crisis in Australia shifts from the availability of water for farmers to providing enough drinking water for cities and towns.
The Victorian Government's proposal targets the centre of the state, with plans to boost drinking water supplies in the region of Ballarat and Bendigo with pipes linking the Campaspe and Goulburn rivers.
There are fears in federal cabinet that the failure of autumn rains next year will lead to an unprecedented drought and water shortages, with dams drying up in April-May.
In another bid to win over regional voters, the Government has agreed to extend drought relief to small businesses for the first time.
The decision, taken by cabinet yesterday, will pump much-needed emergency funds into regional towns. Small business owners, such as harvesters and farm contractors, will be able to apply for the relief, provided a majority of their income is derived from primary production.
The Prime Minister will today outline the drought package, which will build on the $910 million recently announced in further assistance to drought-stricken farmers.
The Murray-Darling Basin last month recorded its lowest ever October inflow of 77 gigalitres, compared to the average 1100 gigalitres.
Mr Howard and premiers Mike Rann, Steve Bracks and Morris Iemma will try today to drastically accelerate the revival of the Murray-Darling Basin.
The Prime Minister said yesterday progress on the National Water Initiative and the aim of pumping an extra 500gigalitres into the Murray was too slow. "The progress with implementing that plan has been slower than I would have liked," Mr Howard said.
He said today's meeting in Canberra with the premiers of NSW, South Australia and Victoria "will be an opportunity for an agreement to accelerate progress" for the basin and discuss the drought.
He said the federal Government and the states had "hammered out" a National Water Initiative three years ago.
"One of the things I will raise with the premiers is accelerating the implementation of the plan that we all agreed on some years ago," he said.
South Australia has previously proposed building a weir on the Murray and using lakes as extra storages as well as building a $100 million desalination plant.
South Australian Premier Mr Rann said yesterday that he would lobby the Prime Minister and other premiers for a reversal of the Snowy Mountains Hydro electricity scheme decision to withhold water for release into the Murray-Darling system.
"There's actually quite a bit of water that's locked up, including behind one dam which isn't even being used for electricity purposes," Mr Rann said.
He said he would put a "whole range of options on the table" regarding water security for people living in South Australian cities and towns, including water storage along the Murray and its lakes and a desalination plant.
"One of the options that's before us is the construction of a weir at Wellington," Mr Rann said.
Mr Howard said the premiers had agreed on "quite a big plan" before and he was considering a $2 billion shopping list from state governments for water-saving projects, including massive pipelines, recycling and desalination plants.
As part of a national scheme of "big ticket" water projects, the West Australian Government is looking at a $617million pipeline from the Yarragadee aquifer to metropolitan Perth, and the Queensland Government has proposed a $500million pipeline in the southeast.
The NSW Government wants to spend $390 million for recycling effluent in western Sydney for industry, park watering and environmental flows in the Hawkesbury and Nepean rivers.
Labor environmental spokesman Anthony Albanese accused Mr Howard of playing cynical politics by holding the water meeting on Melbourne Cup day and when the Reserve Bank is expected to raise interest rates.
"The Prime Minister is more concerned about politics than water or climate change," Mr Albanese said.
"The fact is, climate change is cutting water flows in the Murray-Darling Basin right now. In November 2003 the Howard Government promised to give the Murray River 500gigalitres within five years under the Living Murray First Step program. Not a single drop has actually been returned," Mr Albanese said.
Mr Howard rejected Mr Albanese's claim and said the talks were being held on most convenient day.
"It will be on in the morning. Mr Bracks has got plenty of time to get back for the Melbourne Cup," Mr Howard said.
Federal Agriculture Minister Peter McGauran said the Government would not be forcing farmers to give up allocated water rights, although he warned of dire consequences if there were no seasonal autumn rains next year.
"We need cool heads and we can't be panicked into making snap decisions on water allocations," he said.
"The Prime Minister is going to work through these issues carefully with the heads of the various states with a direct involvement and responsibility, and we know that even an average autumn rainfall next year won't give the irrigators what they require in 2007 and possibly 2008."
The South Australian desalination plant would provide drinking water and boost the Murray flow. The water would also supply BHP's $5billion Olympic Dam extension.
Stern raises stakes on climate change action
The Age
Jewel Topsfield
November 4, 2006
FORMER World Bank economist Sir Nicholas Stern warns that Australia must provide incentives for new technologies that reduce greenhouse gas emissions or they will not be used.
He said Australia faced "severe water stress" and rising sea levels if the globe continued to heat at the current pace, of particular concern as most Australian cities were on the coast.
In an alarming report to the British Government, Sir Nicholas this week predicted climatic and economic disaster if urgent action was not taken on global warming.
His latest warning came as the Australian Government wrote to the United Nations complaining about a report that challenged the Government's line that Australia was on track to meet its greenhouse gas emissions target.
At the same time, the Opposition and environment groups called for changes to environmental laws, which would force the Government to assess greenhouse emissions when considering whether to approve major new projects, such as coalmines.
Sir Nicholas stopped short of calling on Australia to join a carbon trading scheme.
"What's important is that each country acts strongly because if one country says I'm not going to do anything until everybody does everything, then that's a recipe for nothing happening and, of course, nothing happening is the most dangerous thing of all," he told the ABC.
"You could say all coal-fired power stations in Australia after some date should be carbon capture and storage. That's Australia's call and if that's the way Australia decides to do it, that would be a way of going forward which wouldn't necessarily be getting involved in a carbon trading scheme," he said.
However, he warned: "People have got to have an incentive to use these new methods or many would not do so."
The Howard Government has claimed it is on track to meet its Kyoto emissions target of an 8 per cent increase between 1990 and 2012, despite not ratifying the protocol. But figures from the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change released this week show that Australia increased its emissions by 25 per cent between 1990 and 2004.
The Australian Greenhouse Office has written to the UN, claiming the result was inaccurate because it did not include greenhouse gas savings from reducing land clearing.
Environment Minister Ian Campbell said when land use changes were included, Australia's net emissions had increased by only 2 per cent from 1990 to 2004.
Green groups, Labor and the Democrats said yesterday a bill to amend Australia's major environmental legislation, now before Parliament, was a missed opportunity to protect Australia from climate change. Labor will move amendments to the bill in the Senate this month.
■For the first time in its 32-year history, the International Energy Agency will urge governments next week to speed up the construction of nuclear power plants as part of a cheaper, cleaner and safer global energy strategy, the Financial Times reports.
Jewel Topsfield
November 4, 2006
FORMER World Bank economist Sir Nicholas Stern warns that Australia must provide incentives for new technologies that reduce greenhouse gas emissions or they will not be used.
He said Australia faced "severe water stress" and rising sea levels if the globe continued to heat at the current pace, of particular concern as most Australian cities were on the coast.
In an alarming report to the British Government, Sir Nicholas this week predicted climatic and economic disaster if urgent action was not taken on global warming.
His latest warning came as the Australian Government wrote to the United Nations complaining about a report that challenged the Government's line that Australia was on track to meet its greenhouse gas emissions target.
At the same time, the Opposition and environment groups called for changes to environmental laws, which would force the Government to assess greenhouse emissions when considering whether to approve major new projects, such as coalmines.
Sir Nicholas stopped short of calling on Australia to join a carbon trading scheme.
"What's important is that each country acts strongly because if one country says I'm not going to do anything until everybody does everything, then that's a recipe for nothing happening and, of course, nothing happening is the most dangerous thing of all," he told the ABC.
"You could say all coal-fired power stations in Australia after some date should be carbon capture and storage. That's Australia's call and if that's the way Australia decides to do it, that would be a way of going forward which wouldn't necessarily be getting involved in a carbon trading scheme," he said.
However, he warned: "People have got to have an incentive to use these new methods or many would not do so."
The Howard Government has claimed it is on track to meet its Kyoto emissions target of an 8 per cent increase between 1990 and 2012, despite not ratifying the protocol. But figures from the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change released this week show that Australia increased its emissions by 25 per cent between 1990 and 2004.
The Australian Greenhouse Office has written to the UN, claiming the result was inaccurate because it did not include greenhouse gas savings from reducing land clearing.
Environment Minister Ian Campbell said when land use changes were included, Australia's net emissions had increased by only 2 per cent from 1990 to 2004.
Green groups, Labor and the Democrats said yesterday a bill to amend Australia's major environmental legislation, now before Parliament, was a missed opportunity to protect Australia from climate change. Labor will move amendments to the bill in the Senate this month.
■For the first time in its 32-year history, the International Energy Agency will urge governments next week to speed up the construction of nuclear power plants as part of a cheaper, cleaner and safer global energy strategy, the Financial Times reports.
PM's stance on climate change immoral
The Age
By Robyn Eckersley
November 8, 2006
Other related coverage
* China soon to become biggest polluter
* UN pressures Canberra over climate change
* Stern raises stakes on climate change action
Prime Minister John Howard has long maintained the Kyoto Protocol is flawed because it excludes major carbon emitters in the developing world. In Parliament last week, in defiance of the British Stern report, he declared that it would be foolish for Australia to embark on a carbon trading scheme, because developing countries would enjoy a free ride at our expense.
Yet the Prime Minister's stance directly contravenes Australia's obligations under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change 1992. The fundamental environmental justice principle running through this convention, which Australia has signed and ratified, is that parties should take steps to protect the climate "on the basis of equity and in accordance with their common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capacities" (article 3(1)). The convention provides that developed countries must "take the lead in combating climate change". Developed countries have benefited from a long history of exploiting fossil fuels and are responsible for the bulk of past emissions. They also have a greater economic capacity to absorb emission reductions and develop technological alternatives.
These environmental justice principles also served as the cornerstone of the Berlin mandate, which framed the negotiations for the Kyoto Protocol. Developing countries, including growing aggregate emitters such as China, are not expected to undertake mandatory emissions reduction until developed countries have shown the way. For the Prime Minister to maintain that the protocol is flawed because it allows free riders, flies in the face of the principles of the Kyoto Protocol's parent convention. The main reason the Kyoto Protocol is suboptimal, in both environmental and political terms, is because the world's biggest aggregate carbon polluter (the US) and the world's second biggest per capita carbon polluter (Australia) have defected.
The idea that a rich country such as Australia should not reduce its oversized per capita carbon footprint unless poorer countries also take measures to reduce their tiny per capita footprint is to kick the ladder down. It denies poorer countries the opportunity to improve the livelihoods of their peoples and avoids Australia's obligations under the convention. Such a stance is morally and politically unjustifiable.
Robyn Eckersley teaches global politics at the University of Melbourne.
By Robyn Eckersley
November 8, 2006
Other related coverage
* China soon to become biggest polluter
* UN pressures Canberra over climate change
* Stern raises stakes on climate change action
Prime Minister John Howard has long maintained the Kyoto Protocol is flawed because it excludes major carbon emitters in the developing world. In Parliament last week, in defiance of the British Stern report, he declared that it would be foolish for Australia to embark on a carbon trading scheme, because developing countries would enjoy a free ride at our expense.
Yet the Prime Minister's stance directly contravenes Australia's obligations under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change 1992. The fundamental environmental justice principle running through this convention, which Australia has signed and ratified, is that parties should take steps to protect the climate "on the basis of equity and in accordance with their common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capacities" (article 3(1)). The convention provides that developed countries must "take the lead in combating climate change". Developed countries have benefited from a long history of exploiting fossil fuels and are responsible for the bulk of past emissions. They also have a greater economic capacity to absorb emission reductions and develop technological alternatives.
These environmental justice principles also served as the cornerstone of the Berlin mandate, which framed the negotiations for the Kyoto Protocol. Developing countries, including growing aggregate emitters such as China, are not expected to undertake mandatory emissions reduction until developed countries have shown the way. For the Prime Minister to maintain that the protocol is flawed because it allows free riders, flies in the face of the principles of the Kyoto Protocol's parent convention. The main reason the Kyoto Protocol is suboptimal, in both environmental and political terms, is because the world's biggest aggregate carbon polluter (the US) and the world's second biggest per capita carbon polluter (Australia) have defected.
The idea that a rich country such as Australia should not reduce its oversized per capita carbon footprint unless poorer countries also take measures to reduce their tiny per capita footprint is to kick the ladder down. It denies poorer countries the opportunity to improve the livelihoods of their peoples and avoids Australia's obligations under the convention. Such a stance is morally and politically unjustifiable.
Robyn Eckersley teaches global politics at the University of Melbourne.
Howard takes wind from the sails of alternative energy
SMH
Water mark … boat ramps on Lake Hume have been left high and dry. A Herald /ACNielsen poll shows 91 per cent of Australians regard climate change as a serious issue.
Water mark … boat ramps on Lake Hume have been left high and dry. A Herald /ACNielsen poll shows 91 per cent of Australians regard climate change as a serious issue.
AdvertisementAdvertisement
Phillip Coorey Chief Political Correspondent
November 8, 2006
SYDNEY'S coastline would need to be festooned with windmills if clean, renewable energy was to generate enough electricity to replace that produced by fossil fuels or nuclear power, the Prime Minister said yesterday.
John Howard was responding to a Herald/ACNielsen poll that found 91 per cent regarded climate change as a serious issue.
More than 60 per cent were unhappy with the Federal Government's response to the challenge and were willing to pay more in taxes and for services if it helped.
Mr Howard said he found the results "quite unsurprising" and natural given the recent publicity on climate change.
He said he was particularly taken by the poll's finding that, when canvassed with energy options on how to best tackle global warming, almost 50 per cent opted for solar power.
Mr Howard said he could understand why people preferred solar power, but it and wind power would never be mainstream generators of electricity.
"Solar is a nice, easy soft answer. There is a vague idea in the community that solar doesn't cost anything and it can solve the problem. It can't …
"Solar and all these other things can make a contribution at the margins, but unless you want to have a windmill every few hundred feet starting at South Head and going down to Malabar … you simply won't be able to generate enough power from something like wind in order to take the load of the power that is generated by the use of coal and gas and, in time, I believe, nuclear.
"In the end, if you look years ahead, there are only two ways of generating the electricity that this nation needs - either through the current methods of fossil fuel use or through a combination of that in a cleaner form but with nuclear power."
Mr Howard said he understood what the opinion polls were telling him, but they would never dictate policy.
"I read what people say, I understand it, I'm sympathetic but in the end I've got to call it as it is, and calling it as it is means I have to say that solar and wind will not replace conventional power stations."
Mr Howard doubted he would meet the former US vice-president Al Gore, due to revisit Australia soon. Mr Gore, who lost controversially to George Bush in the presidential election in 2000, visited Australia recently to promote the film An Inconvenient Truth.
"We ought to be realistic," Mr Howard said. "I don't know I'm at the top of his popularity list. I am, after all, a rather close friend of somebody he's not very keen on."
Tuesday, November 07, 2006
Dire warnings for the earth's survival
Bega District News
Tuesday, 7 November 2006
DIRE warnings for our future if our governments and we don't change our ways were delivered at the Sustainable Future Forum in the Bermagui Community Hall on Sunday.
The speakers for the day were Matthew Nott of Clean Energy for Eternity, anti-nuclear campaigner Helen Caldicott, concerned local resident Pat Thompson, Chris Allen of the Bega Eco-Neighbourhood Development, Dean Turner of The Crossing Land Education Centre and Suzanne Foulkes of Friends of the Five Forests.
The major concerns voiced by the speakers were climate change, water shortages, nuclear energy and depleted oil stocks.
Most pointed out that 92 per cent of those surveyed thought that the Commonwealth was not doing enough to invest in clean, renewable energy.
Ms Suzanne Foulkes of the Friends of the Five Forests said it was not a time for further political spin and prevarication.
"With both State and Federal elections due in 2007 we have to make it very clear to ministers and to candidates that we know the problems are not being properly addressed and that the environment is the political issue.
"It is vitally important that the continued destruction of our forests is halted and deforestation included on the agenda of any debate on climate change.
"The report released last week by Nicholas Stern, UK economist, makes the point that 'Action to avoid further deforestation should be an urgent priority'.
Ms Foulkes said local maps showed that virtually every major water catchment in the south east is in State Forests' hands.
"All of them have been logged severely and burned repeatedly over the last 40 years; every stream is silted up, every estuary has suffered heavy sedimentation which suffocates the natural water plants and prevents fish breeding.
"Forestry practices that are destroying our forests and the water transpiration cycles that our rainfall depends on.
"Water transpiration from trees returns water to the atmosphere.
"Deforestation causes diminished rainfall and increased desertification.
"The trees and their understorey plants retain water in the soil and keep it moist, they protect the land surface from landslides and erosion and prevent sediment runoff into streams.
"When the trees are removed these forests lose the ability to function as water catchments should."
Ms Foulkes said water was the highest value product that could be obtained from native forests.
"It is now very clear that the Australian people are way ahead of their governments in wanting action to prevent the inevitable collapse of the ecosystems that are our life-giving natural heritage."
Dr Helen Caldicott put dread into the hearts of all those at the forum as she spoke forcibly of the dangers of uranium mining, enriching uranium and nucelar energy.
She said the nuclear energy industry was a potent global warmer and reminded everyone that recently one of Sweden's plants was two minutes away from a meltdown which would have been as bad as Chernobyl.
Dr Caldicott, a paediatrician, said the genes of future generations would be affected by small amounts of radioactive fallout, but plutonium was far worse, with only a millionth of a gram causing lung cancer, liver cancer and, getting into the embryo, causing all kinds of genetic mutations.
She said that depleted uranium from USA weapons was still hanging around Iraqi fields and since the war started the incidence of children's cancer and deformed babies has risen by 700 per cent.
Dr Caldicott said there were plenty of other energy sources that could be used - solar, wind, geo-thermal, tidal - everything except nuclear.
"When we sell uranium we are selling cancer," she said
She said she did not think Prime Minister Howard would back a nuclear power station, despite his recent statements.
She believes the public will protest so much about it that he will withdraw and go for what he has already probably promised US president George Bush - the storing of the US nuclear waste in Australia.
Mr Chris Allen spoke about Bega Eco-Neighbourhood Development project that aims to be socially, ecologically and economically sustainable based on permaculture principles.
There will be mandatory standards for energy-efficient housing, a stand-alone water supply system harvesting rainwater and stormwater, a centralised system for the collection and treatment of domestic grey water, mandatory dry-composting toilets and a grid interactive neighbourhood-owned solar power system.
Ms Pat Thompson spoke about what people could do as individuals to stop using so much energy, such as turning off lights and electrical appliances at the wall and using solar energy.
Mr Dean Turner said civilisations that cut down their trees would collapse and experience political turmoil.
He said Australia has cut down a quarter of its forests whereas Japan decided 150 years ago that it would maintain three-quarters of its forests and it has.
He said that at The Crossing young people were educated to look after the land, save water, save the forests and their biodiversity.
Dr Matthew Nott said it was necessary to find solutions as soon as possible to overcome the problems of oil depletion, climate change and drought.
"In the Bega Valley Shire we are completely dependent on road transport for everything so when the oil runs out we shall be in a desperate situation unless we change our ways.
"Climate change is happening here and now and you can see its effects," he said.
"The solutions should come from individuals, local, state and federal governments.
"On the individual level we could buy hybrid cars, fluorescent lights, switch appliances off at the main, drive slower, ride a bike to work or school, put in a solar hot water system, plant trees and fly less.
´On a community level we must lobby politicians to get behind clean renewable energy such as wind farms and solar banks and encourage eco-tourism."
Dr Nott said the Bega Valley Shire Council was backing his target of 50/50 by 2020 (50 per cent reduction in energy use and a 50 per cent increase in energy).
Many of the speakers at the forum said Australia should be a world leader in promoting renewable energy.
Tuesday, 7 November 2006
DIRE warnings for our future if our governments and we don't change our ways were delivered at the Sustainable Future Forum in the Bermagui Community Hall on Sunday.
The speakers for the day were Matthew Nott of Clean Energy for Eternity, anti-nuclear campaigner Helen Caldicott, concerned local resident Pat Thompson, Chris Allen of the Bega Eco-Neighbourhood Development, Dean Turner of The Crossing Land Education Centre and Suzanne Foulkes of Friends of the Five Forests.
The major concerns voiced by the speakers were climate change, water shortages, nuclear energy and depleted oil stocks.
Most pointed out that 92 per cent of those surveyed thought that the Commonwealth was not doing enough to invest in clean, renewable energy.
Ms Suzanne Foulkes of the Friends of the Five Forests said it was not a time for further political spin and prevarication.
"With both State and Federal elections due in 2007 we have to make it very clear to ministers and to candidates that we know the problems are not being properly addressed and that the environment is the political issue.
"It is vitally important that the continued destruction of our forests is halted and deforestation included on the agenda of any debate on climate change.
"The report released last week by Nicholas Stern, UK economist, makes the point that 'Action to avoid further deforestation should be an urgent priority'.
Ms Foulkes said local maps showed that virtually every major water catchment in the south east is in State Forests' hands.
"All of them have been logged severely and burned repeatedly over the last 40 years; every stream is silted up, every estuary has suffered heavy sedimentation which suffocates the natural water plants and prevents fish breeding.
"Forestry practices that are destroying our forests and the water transpiration cycles that our rainfall depends on.
"Water transpiration from trees returns water to the atmosphere.
"Deforestation causes diminished rainfall and increased desertification.
"The trees and their understorey plants retain water in the soil and keep it moist, they protect the land surface from landslides and erosion and prevent sediment runoff into streams.
"When the trees are removed these forests lose the ability to function as water catchments should."
Ms Foulkes said water was the highest value product that could be obtained from native forests.
"It is now very clear that the Australian people are way ahead of their governments in wanting action to prevent the inevitable collapse of the ecosystems that are our life-giving natural heritage."
Dr Helen Caldicott put dread into the hearts of all those at the forum as she spoke forcibly of the dangers of uranium mining, enriching uranium and nucelar energy.
She said the nuclear energy industry was a potent global warmer and reminded everyone that recently one of Sweden's plants was two minutes away from a meltdown which would have been as bad as Chernobyl.
Dr Caldicott, a paediatrician, said the genes of future generations would be affected by small amounts of radioactive fallout, but plutonium was far worse, with only a millionth of a gram causing lung cancer, liver cancer and, getting into the embryo, causing all kinds of genetic mutations.
She said that depleted uranium from USA weapons was still hanging around Iraqi fields and since the war started the incidence of children's cancer and deformed babies has risen by 700 per cent.
Dr Caldicott said there were plenty of other energy sources that could be used - solar, wind, geo-thermal, tidal - everything except nuclear.
"When we sell uranium we are selling cancer," she said
She said she did not think Prime Minister Howard would back a nuclear power station, despite his recent statements.
She believes the public will protest so much about it that he will withdraw and go for what he has already probably promised US president George Bush - the storing of the US nuclear waste in Australia.
Mr Chris Allen spoke about Bega Eco-Neighbourhood Development project that aims to be socially, ecologically and economically sustainable based on permaculture principles.
There will be mandatory standards for energy-efficient housing, a stand-alone water supply system harvesting rainwater and stormwater, a centralised system for the collection and treatment of domestic grey water, mandatory dry-composting toilets and a grid interactive neighbourhood-owned solar power system.
Ms Pat Thompson spoke about what people could do as individuals to stop using so much energy, such as turning off lights and electrical appliances at the wall and using solar energy.
Mr Dean Turner said civilisations that cut down their trees would collapse and experience political turmoil.
He said Australia has cut down a quarter of its forests whereas Japan decided 150 years ago that it would maintain three-quarters of its forests and it has.
He said that at The Crossing young people were educated to look after the land, save water, save the forests and their biodiversity.
Dr Matthew Nott said it was necessary to find solutions as soon as possible to overcome the problems of oil depletion, climate change and drought.
"In the Bega Valley Shire we are completely dependent on road transport for everything so when the oil runs out we shall be in a desperate situation unless we change our ways.
"Climate change is happening here and now and you can see its effects," he said.
"The solutions should come from individuals, local, state and federal governments.
"On the individual level we could buy hybrid cars, fluorescent lights, switch appliances off at the main, drive slower, ride a bike to work or school, put in a solar hot water system, plant trees and fly less.
´On a community level we must lobby politicians to get behind clean renewable energy such as wind farms and solar banks and encourage eco-tourism."
Dr Nott said the Bega Valley Shire Council was backing his target of 50/50 by 2020 (50 per cent reduction in energy use and a 50 per cent increase in energy).
Many of the speakers at the forum said Australia should be a world leader in promoting renewable energy.
Caldicott rejects PM's nuclear power stance
ABC Online
A prominent anti-nuclear campaigner has rejected comments by the Prime Minister that nuclear power production should be an option in Australia.
Dr Helen Caldicott was the main speaker at an energy forum in Adelaide last night.
She says advances in technology means that renewable energy is a much better option.
Dr Caldicott also dismisses John Howard's comment that world attitudes to nuclear power are changing.
"I think he's kidding himself. I feel very strongly the sentiment in Australia is we will never accept nuclear power. We don't need it," she said.
"If ever there's a chance for us to become an energy superpower, it's to cover every house with solar panels and have wind farms everywhere."
Print-friendy versionPrint Send to a friendEmail
A prominent anti-nuclear campaigner has rejected comments by the Prime Minister that nuclear power production should be an option in Australia.
Dr Helen Caldicott was the main speaker at an energy forum in Adelaide last night.
She says advances in technology means that renewable energy is a much better option.
Dr Caldicott also dismisses John Howard's comment that world attitudes to nuclear power are changing.
"I think he's kidding himself. I feel very strongly the sentiment in Australia is we will never accept nuclear power. We don't need it," she said.
"If ever there's a chance for us to become an energy superpower, it's to cover every house with solar panels and have wind farms everywhere."
Print-friendy versionPrint Send to a friendEmail
Clean Energy for Eternity
By RICHARD MOFFATT
CLIMATE change is an extremely scary and challenging issue for us all to face.
It is not the least bit surprising to see a large proportion of the population denying climate change or slotting it in the 'too hard basket'.
Others just ignore it, or tell themselves that they play two small a part to make a difference.
The thing we resist the most as human beings is change. The greater the change, the greater the resistance.
But we have the ability to prevent a worsening climate situation and our individual efforts can make an enormous difference.
Clearly prevention is the most sensible path. In living history we have seen some monumental changes come from the 'too hard basket' - efforts such as the ozone layer, abolition of apartheid and the non-smoking movement.
When enough of the population are talking about a problem, change will follow.
Clean Energy for Eternity is planning a massive landscape sculpture in the Bega Valley. It involves discarded washing machines, dishwashers and dryers.
These taken-for-granted, energy insatiable devices that are servants to our consumerist lifestyles will be rearranged in a thought provoking moment of madness in the near future.
Keeping climate change in the general conversation is part of CEFE's commitment to raising awareness.
Preventing climate change is about common sense, firstly reducing power consumption and secondly by using clean energy.
Clean energy is available to your door through the existing power grid system. Connection is as simple as a phone call or completing an online application.
Climate change is our responsibility. You can choose to make a difference.
CLIMATE change is an extremely scary and challenging issue for us all to face.
It is not the least bit surprising to see a large proportion of the population denying climate change or slotting it in the 'too hard basket'.
Others just ignore it, or tell themselves that they play two small a part to make a difference.
The thing we resist the most as human beings is change. The greater the change, the greater the resistance.
But we have the ability to prevent a worsening climate situation and our individual efforts can make an enormous difference.
Clearly prevention is the most sensible path. In living history we have seen some monumental changes come from the 'too hard basket' - efforts such as the ozone layer, abolition of apartheid and the non-smoking movement.
When enough of the population are talking about a problem, change will follow.
Clean Energy for Eternity is planning a massive landscape sculpture in the Bega Valley. It involves discarded washing machines, dishwashers and dryers.
These taken-for-granted, energy insatiable devices that are servants to our consumerist lifestyles will be rearranged in a thought provoking moment of madness in the near future.
Keeping climate change in the general conversation is part of CEFE's commitment to raising awareness.
Preventing climate change is about common sense, firstly reducing power consumption and secondly by using clean energy.
Clean energy is available to your door through the existing power grid system. Connection is as simple as a phone call or completing an online application.
Climate change is our responsibility. You can choose to make a difference.
Green energy getsthumbs up from 2500 ACT marchers
The Canberra Times
Sunday, 5 November 2006
Brad Watts
PEOPLE power triumphed over non-renewable power in Canberra yesterday in a potent show of support for green energy.
More than 2500 people with bicycles, tricycles, scooters and dogs paraded through Civic for the Walk Against Warming march.
Designed to highlight the importance of renewable energy and condemn the burning of fossil fuels, the Greens and Conservation Council-led march from the ACT Legislative Assembly to Glebe Park attracted an assortment of participants including jugglers, musicians, dancers, clowns and a man on stilts dressed as a blowfly.
The International Day of Action on Climate Change, held right across Australia including in regional areas, inspired different meanings for marchers including Raphaela Mazzone, 22, of Rivett who was dressed in green and carrying a sign saying: "Just do it".
"I believe climate change is one of the most important problems we face today," she said.
"We should all work towards finding a solution."
Garth Cogin, of Campbell, was equally passionate about the cause, saying it was time people made a difference.
"We should be providing investment for renewable energy - I think solar and wind power is the solution."
As part of the demonstration, the Greens Party announced plans to introduce a climate change remedy Bill into Federal Parliament.
Proudly wearing a Greens t-shirt, environmentalist and WA Senator Rachel Siewert said the Bill called for a 90 per cent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
"We are hoping the Government will support it. If John Howard wants to get into bed with big business, he can at least make a recommendation for industry to stop burning fossil fuels," she said.
Senator Siewert described the large-scale event as a "fantastic turn-out" and much more than was expected.
The overall theme of the march was aimed at changing people's minds and switching to energy efficient light bulbs, installing solar hot water, walking to the shops instead of driving and reducing own greenhouse gas emissions. It was also about sending a powerful message to government, she said. "The Government is still in denial on this issue."
Sunday, 5 November 2006
Brad Watts
PEOPLE power triumphed over non-renewable power in Canberra yesterday in a potent show of support for green energy.
More than 2500 people with bicycles, tricycles, scooters and dogs paraded through Civic for the Walk Against Warming march.
Designed to highlight the importance of renewable energy and condemn the burning of fossil fuels, the Greens and Conservation Council-led march from the ACT Legislative Assembly to Glebe Park attracted an assortment of participants including jugglers, musicians, dancers, clowns and a man on stilts dressed as a blowfly.
The International Day of Action on Climate Change, held right across Australia including in regional areas, inspired different meanings for marchers including Raphaela Mazzone, 22, of Rivett who was dressed in green and carrying a sign saying: "Just do it".
"I believe climate change is one of the most important problems we face today," she said.
"We should all work towards finding a solution."
Garth Cogin, of Campbell, was equally passionate about the cause, saying it was time people made a difference.
"We should be providing investment for renewable energy - I think solar and wind power is the solution."
As part of the demonstration, the Greens Party announced plans to introduce a climate change remedy Bill into Federal Parliament.
Proudly wearing a Greens t-shirt, environmentalist and WA Senator Rachel Siewert said the Bill called for a 90 per cent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
"We are hoping the Government will support it. If John Howard wants to get into bed with big business, he can at least make a recommendation for industry to stop burning fossil fuels," she said.
Senator Siewert described the large-scale event as a "fantastic turn-out" and much more than was expected.
The overall theme of the march was aimed at changing people's minds and switching to energy efficient light bulbs, installing solar hot water, walking to the shops instead of driving and reducing own greenhouse gas emissions. It was also about sending a powerful message to government, she said. "The Government is still in denial on this issue."
We'll pay to beat climate crisis: voters
SMH
Phillip Coorey Chief Political Correspondent
November 7, 2006
ALMOST two-thirds of Australians are prepared to pay more tax and more for essentials if it helps to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, according to a Herald/ACNielsen poll.
The finding comes as the Prime Minister, John Howard, prepares for a crisis summit with premiers today on the Murray-Darling river system. They will discuss restricting environmental flows to save towns and irrigators, as well as withdrawing water licences. The Murray-Darling Basin Commission will brief the summit on the severe impact of the drought on towns and irrigators.
The poll found 63 per cent would accept higher taxes and paying more for goods and services if it eased global warming.
The poll was taken from Thursday to Saturday last week following days of heated parliamentary debate on climate change.
It found 91 per cent of voters regarded global warming as serious, and 62 per cent were unhappy with the Federal Government's response.
Almost half of those polled cited solar power as the best way to tackle global warming, 19 per cent backed a carbon tax on fossil fuels and 17 per cent supported nuclear power. Only 9 per cent advocated using their cars less.
During debate last week on climate change Mr Howard ruled out a carbon tax or other levies on fossil fuels that would drive up the price of power and other services and cost jobs.
He said cleaning up emissions from fossil fuels was the best course of action, which over time would increase the price of coal-fired power and eventually bring the more expensive nuclear power into contention.
A Government commissioned report into the nuclear cycle to be handed down soon is expected to find nuclear power to be about 15 years from being viable, but only if a carbon tax or emissions trading scheme is imposed.
Labor is advocating reduced emissions targets, ratifying the Kyoto Protocol and investing heavily in renewable energy. The Labor leader, Kim Beazley, has baulked at conceding his measures would make energy more expensive.
Climate change has been given added impetus by the drought. Mr Howard and the premiers will discuss the parlous state of the Murray-Darling, whose main dams will run dry in six months without good rains.
The premiers of NSW, Morris Iemma, South Australia, Mike Rann, and Victoria, Steve Bracks, and the Queensland Deputy Premier, Anna Blight, will attend.
They will discuss withdrawing water rights from some farmers and short-term cuts in environmental flows to the river so spare water can be directed to irrigators and towns. One senior government source said it was important to "look after people first".
Mr Howard said yesterday he would press the premiers to accelerate the implementation of the 2004 national water initiative, which involves the trading of water rights and other measures designed to encourage the more efficient use of water. "The progress with it is too slow," he said.
The parliamentary secretary for water, Malcolm Turnbull, rejected suggestions that buying out major irrigators at the top of the basin, such as the cotton farm Cubbie Station in Queensland, would have measurable effects at the end of the Murray River. Ms Bligh will be proposing a buyout today.
The conservative media mogul Rupert Murdoch said yesterday he had had a change of heart on climate change and believed global action was needed, though not in the form of the Kyoto Protocol. "I have to admit that, until recently, I was somewhat wary of the warming debate. I believe it is now our responsibility to take the lead on this issue," he said in Tokyo.
"Some of the presumptions about extreme weather … may seem far-fetched. What is certain is that temperatures have been rising and that we are not entirely sure of the consequences. The planet deserves the benefit of the doubt."
PM steams ahead on clean coal despite polls
Canberra Times
Andrew Fraser
Prime Minister John Howard has dismissed polling which shows an overwhelming majority of Australians want the Government to ratify the Kyoto Protocol, levy greenhouse polluters and end the nation's reliance on coal.
Mr Howard told Parliament yesterday that cleaning up coal-fired power was the "most important" action to fight climate change and quoted Labor premiers Peter Beattie and Steve Bracks as coal industry supporters and former federal Labor Finance Minister Peter Walsh as an opponent of Kyoto because it would do untold economic harm to Australia.
"Our position is very clear," MrHoward said. "For two years [starting with a white paper] we have been arguing the cause of clean coal technology and today we have seen the premiers of Queensland and Victoria blow the Leader of the Opposition [Kim Beazley] out of the water."
The Newspoll, commissioned by Greenpeace, the Nature Conservation Council and GetUp, found 79per cent of Australians (71 per cent of Coalition voters) wanted Kyoto ratified. Nine in 10 Australians wanted a shift away from coal and four out of five agreed that greenhouse polluters should be made to pay for their emissions.
Mr Howard sought to discount the survey as an "online poll", implying that it recorded only the responses of people who wanted to contribute.
However, Greenpeace's Danny Kennedy emphasised that the Newspoll was a nationwide telephone survey.
Deputy Opposition Whip Michael Danby raised the issue in the House, noting the survey was conducted last weekend among a sample of 1200 adults aged 18 and over with the results "post-weighted" to Australian Bureau of Statistics population estimates. This gives it the same credibility as the fortnightly Newspolls, published in The Australian, on the nation's voting intentions.
However, Mr Howard said, "I think it is the job of political leaders in this country to read opinion polls but to do what they think is right for Australia. It is as simple as that."
He branded Mr Beazley an "11th-hour convert" to Kyoto ratification and said, "Let me tell the Australian people: we listen to their views on this issue. We are aware of the need to take practical measures to address greenhouse gas emissions, but I say to them: we are not going to take measures that destroy the great comparative advantage that this country has, we are not going to be panicked into knee-jerk responses that will hobble great productive Australian industries with enormous costs that are not borne by their competitors overseas."
Australians would have to accept that fighting climate change would cost more money in the future, MrHoward said.
"I think that people, over time, will adjust but they will have to accept that things will become more expensive," he said in a radio interview.
The survey found that four in five Australians agreed that they "should be prepared to pay a little more for their energy to help investment in renewable energy sources".
Democrats leader and energy spokeswoman Lyn Allison said this flew in the face of Mr Howard's consistent arguments that Australians were not prepared to pay more for energy.
"Clearly the Prime Minister has spent too much time pandering to the coal industry and not enough time listening to his constituents," she said.
Dismissing Mr Howard's announcement this week of $60million for 42 energy projects as "small handouts", she said, "I can only hope that public opinion will serve as a wake-up call and force the Prime Minister into real action."
Andrew Fraser
Prime Minister John Howard has dismissed polling which shows an overwhelming majority of Australians want the Government to ratify the Kyoto Protocol, levy greenhouse polluters and end the nation's reliance on coal.
Mr Howard told Parliament yesterday that cleaning up coal-fired power was the "most important" action to fight climate change and quoted Labor premiers Peter Beattie and Steve Bracks as coal industry supporters and former federal Labor Finance Minister Peter Walsh as an opponent of Kyoto because it would do untold economic harm to Australia.
"Our position is very clear," MrHoward said. "For two years [starting with a white paper] we have been arguing the cause of clean coal technology and today we have seen the premiers of Queensland and Victoria blow the Leader of the Opposition [Kim Beazley] out of the water."
The Newspoll, commissioned by Greenpeace, the Nature Conservation Council and GetUp, found 79per cent of Australians (71 per cent of Coalition voters) wanted Kyoto ratified. Nine in 10 Australians wanted a shift away from coal and four out of five agreed that greenhouse polluters should be made to pay for their emissions.
Mr Howard sought to discount the survey as an "online poll", implying that it recorded only the responses of people who wanted to contribute.
However, Greenpeace's Danny Kennedy emphasised that the Newspoll was a nationwide telephone survey.
Deputy Opposition Whip Michael Danby raised the issue in the House, noting the survey was conducted last weekend among a sample of 1200 adults aged 18 and over with the results "post-weighted" to Australian Bureau of Statistics population estimates. This gives it the same credibility as the fortnightly Newspolls, published in The Australian, on the nation's voting intentions.
However, Mr Howard said, "I think it is the job of political leaders in this country to read opinion polls but to do what they think is right for Australia. It is as simple as that."
He branded Mr Beazley an "11th-hour convert" to Kyoto ratification and said, "Let me tell the Australian people: we listen to their views on this issue. We are aware of the need to take practical measures to address greenhouse gas emissions, but I say to them: we are not going to take measures that destroy the great comparative advantage that this country has, we are not going to be panicked into knee-jerk responses that will hobble great productive Australian industries with enormous costs that are not borne by their competitors overseas."
Australians would have to accept that fighting climate change would cost more money in the future, MrHoward said.
"I think that people, over time, will adjust but they will have to accept that things will become more expensive," he said in a radio interview.
The survey found that four in five Australians agreed that they "should be prepared to pay a little more for their energy to help investment in renewable energy sources".
Democrats leader and energy spokeswoman Lyn Allison said this flew in the face of Mr Howard's consistent arguments that Australians were not prepared to pay more for energy.
"Clearly the Prime Minister has spent too much time pandering to the coal industry and not enough time listening to his constituents," she said.
Dismissing Mr Howard's announcement this week of $60million for 42 energy projects as "small handouts", she said, "I can only hope that public opinion will serve as a wake-up call and force the Prime Minister into real action."
Monday, November 06, 2006
Power Failure in Germany Triggers Blackouts in Europe (Update1)
By Maria Sheahan and Francois de Beaupuy
Nov. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Power failure in a German electricity grid operated by E.ON AG caused blackouts across western Europe last night, depriving millions of homes of electricity, disrupting trains and risking outages to hospitals and airports.
About 5 million households in France went without power for as much as an hour in the nation's biggest outage since 1978, Andre Merlin, the director of Reseau de Transport d'Electricite, France's power-grid operator, told the press today.
Overall, some 10 million households across Belgium, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Spain, and Eastern Europe may have been affected, Merlin said. The grid failure in Germany led to the biggest pan- European power collapse in at least 30 years through a domino effect that swept through Western and Eastern Europe, he said.
``The main risk was a total blackout in Germany which could have spread to the rest of Europe,'' Merlin said. ``The likelihood of a significant incident is very weak,'' he said, adding ``a blackout is always possible, but we do everything to avoid it.''
E.ON, Germany's biggest utility, said today it may have triggered the blackouts by disconnecting a high-voltage power line over the river Ems in northwest Germany to let a ship pass safely, which in turn led a power grid in the region to overload.
`Priority Customers'
An automated safety system then went into play, selectively blocking power representing about 8 percent to 10 percent of electricity consumption in countries like France, Italy and Spain to safeguard ``priority customers, especially hospitals,'' Merlin said on today's conference call.
``This loss of production had to be quickly compensated for by a reduction in electricity consumption, not only in Germany but in the whole of Europe,'' Merlin said. Selective cuts ``allowed us to avoid a total blackout across the whole of France for several hours or days.''
Dusseldorf, Germany based E.ON is investigating the cause of the failure and will publish a statement ``as soon as there are more precise findings.'' The lights went out in many regions of Europe at 10:10 p.m., and power was restored by 11 p.m., E.ON said in a statement e-mailed today.
In Germany, Cologne-Bonn airport lost power and had to rely on an emergency generator, Deutsche Presse-Agentur reported, citing a spokesman for the Cologne city government. The German rail system also suffered, with at least 100 trains stranded carrying more than 1,000 people, Agence France-Presse reported.
In France, the power cut stopped a dozen high-speed trains for about half an hour, according to SNCF, France's national train operator. French fire brigades were called to help free people from lifts, AFP said.
European Inquiry?
Italy's energy authority will call for an inquiry by the European Union's Council of European Energy Regulators, which is due to meet on Nov. 7, Ansa reported, citing the regulator's Chairman Alessandro Ortis. Power was cut in parts of the Italian regions of Piedmont, Liguria and Puglia, La Repubblica said.
The power outage also affected Austria, Croatia and the Netherlands, according to press reports. Parts of the Belgian regions of Flanders and Wallonia were affected, while Brussels was spared the blackout, Belga reported, citing an official from Sibelga, which distributes electricity in the Belgian capital.
``Consumption wasn't very high last night,'' Merlin said. France was importing 3,200 megawatts from Germany last night, while exporting almost treble that amount of electricity to the U.K., Belgium, Switzerland and Italy.
Call for Reinforcements
The head of France's power-grid operator couldn't immediately assess the cost of the incident, and couldn't say whether it would lead to litigation. He called for the creation of a Europe-wide electricity network coordination center which would supplement the role of national grid operators.
``Infrastructures aren't obsolete, though they need to be reinforced'' as European electricity consumption grows by 1.5 percent to 2 percent per year, Merlin said. ``We need more interconnections.''
Italy in September 2003 had its biggest blackout since World War II, which left almost 56 million people without electricity for as long as 18 hours after a tree struck a power line in Switzerland. Critics said at the time the blackout may have been exacerbated by Swiss grid operators failing to warn Italian utilities on time.
RWE AG, Germany's largest power producer, last year suffered at least 10 million euros ($12.7 million) in damages from snow storms that caused blackouts for about 250,000 people in western Germany. Storms and snow toppled pylons and iced power lines in North Rhine-Westphalia.
To contact the reporter on this story: Maria Sheahan in Frankfurt at msheahan1@bloomberg.net .
Last Updated: November 5, 2006 12:09 EST
Nov. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Power failure in a German electricity grid operated by E.ON AG caused blackouts across western Europe last night, depriving millions of homes of electricity, disrupting trains and risking outages to hospitals and airports.
About 5 million households in France went without power for as much as an hour in the nation's biggest outage since 1978, Andre Merlin, the director of Reseau de Transport d'Electricite, France's power-grid operator, told the press today.
Overall, some 10 million households across Belgium, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Spain, and Eastern Europe may have been affected, Merlin said. The grid failure in Germany led to the biggest pan- European power collapse in at least 30 years through a domino effect that swept through Western and Eastern Europe, he said.
``The main risk was a total blackout in Germany which could have spread to the rest of Europe,'' Merlin said. ``The likelihood of a significant incident is very weak,'' he said, adding ``a blackout is always possible, but we do everything to avoid it.''
E.ON, Germany's biggest utility, said today it may have triggered the blackouts by disconnecting a high-voltage power line over the river Ems in northwest Germany to let a ship pass safely, which in turn led a power grid in the region to overload.
`Priority Customers'
An automated safety system then went into play, selectively blocking power representing about 8 percent to 10 percent of electricity consumption in countries like France, Italy and Spain to safeguard ``priority customers, especially hospitals,'' Merlin said on today's conference call.
``This loss of production had to be quickly compensated for by a reduction in electricity consumption, not only in Germany but in the whole of Europe,'' Merlin said. Selective cuts ``allowed us to avoid a total blackout across the whole of France for several hours or days.''
Dusseldorf, Germany based E.ON is investigating the cause of the failure and will publish a statement ``as soon as there are more precise findings.'' The lights went out in many regions of Europe at 10:10 p.m., and power was restored by 11 p.m., E.ON said in a statement e-mailed today.
In Germany, Cologne-Bonn airport lost power and had to rely on an emergency generator, Deutsche Presse-Agentur reported, citing a spokesman for the Cologne city government. The German rail system also suffered, with at least 100 trains stranded carrying more than 1,000 people, Agence France-Presse reported.
In France, the power cut stopped a dozen high-speed trains for about half an hour, according to SNCF, France's national train operator. French fire brigades were called to help free people from lifts, AFP said.
European Inquiry?
Italy's energy authority will call for an inquiry by the European Union's Council of European Energy Regulators, which is due to meet on Nov. 7, Ansa reported, citing the regulator's Chairman Alessandro Ortis. Power was cut in parts of the Italian regions of Piedmont, Liguria and Puglia, La Repubblica said.
The power outage also affected Austria, Croatia and the Netherlands, according to press reports. Parts of the Belgian regions of Flanders and Wallonia were affected, while Brussels was spared the blackout, Belga reported, citing an official from Sibelga, which distributes electricity in the Belgian capital.
``Consumption wasn't very high last night,'' Merlin said. France was importing 3,200 megawatts from Germany last night, while exporting almost treble that amount of electricity to the U.K., Belgium, Switzerland and Italy.
Call for Reinforcements
The head of France's power-grid operator couldn't immediately assess the cost of the incident, and couldn't say whether it would lead to litigation. He called for the creation of a Europe-wide electricity network coordination center which would supplement the role of national grid operators.
``Infrastructures aren't obsolete, though they need to be reinforced'' as European electricity consumption grows by 1.5 percent to 2 percent per year, Merlin said. ``We need more interconnections.''
Italy in September 2003 had its biggest blackout since World War II, which left almost 56 million people without electricity for as long as 18 hours after a tree struck a power line in Switzerland. Critics said at the time the blackout may have been exacerbated by Swiss grid operators failing to warn Italian utilities on time.
RWE AG, Germany's largest power producer, last year suffered at least 10 million euros ($12.7 million) in damages from snow storms that caused blackouts for about 250,000 people in western Germany. Storms and snow toppled pylons and iced power lines in North Rhine-Westphalia.
To contact the reporter on this story: Maria Sheahan in Frankfurt at msheahan1@bloomberg.net .
Last Updated: November 5, 2006 12:09 EST
Saturday, November 04, 2006
Nuclear power on agenda
SMH
November 4, 2006 - 4:25PM
Prime Minister John Howard has put nuclear power firmly on the election campaign agenda, creating a clear demarcation between the coalition and the strongly anti-nuclear Labor and green groups.
Mr Howard, attending the Queensland Liberal conference in Brisbane, said he would do nothing to put the mining industry at risk by taking a panicky approach to greenhouse emissions.
His assurance follows the leaking of the findings of the government's nuclear energy task group, headed by former Telstra boss Ziggy Switkowski, which said nuclear power could be commercially viable within 15 years.
Mr Howard said nuclear power was potentially the cleanest and greenest of all forms of energy.
He said Australia needed a response to climate change which protected Australia's national interest and preserved its competitive advantage.
"Wouldn't it be an extraordinary national paradox if this country had achieved great prosperity, in no small measure due to the resources that providence has given us, and we are then to be knee-jerked into a response to global warming that crippled the very industries that gave us that prosperity," he said.
"And we would be foolish, from the national interest point of view, with our vast resources of uranium, to say that we are not going to consider nuclear power."
In the late 1960s the coalition government seriously considered a nuclear power station at Jervis Bay, NSW.
But the plan was shelved because nuclear power couldn't compete with power from abundant coal.
Resources Minister Ian Macfarlane said the reality now was that nuclear power would be competitive within 15 years, as requirements to capture carbon pushed up the cost of electricity from fossil fuels.
He said the next step was a public nuclear energy debate which used facts rather than fear.
"We want to see debate that is based in understanding and knowledge, not a debate based on scare tactics," he said.
The proposal prompted a strong reaction from Labor and green groups.
In Sydney, Labor environment spokesman Anthony Albanese told the Walk Against Warming rally the government was again pushing its nuclear fantasy.
He added it was unsurprising the government inquiry, which he said was made up of nuclear advocates, supported nuclear energy.
"Australians want to live with a solar panel on their roofs, not next door to a nuclear reactor," he said.
Opposition resources spokesman Martin Ferguson said Australia was a fossil fuel dependent economy with more than 600 years of coal reserves and there was no way nuclear power was going to stack up.
"Other nations will go nuclear ... our responsibility is to reduce our emissions through clean coal technology while also promoting the growth of renewables," he said in Melbourne.
Greens leader Bob Brown said Australia was now facing the dangers of both climate change and a nuclear power industry.
"Nuclear cannot and will not address climate change. It would take one to two decades to get going, ensure a major waste dump in Australia and inevitably encourage proliferation in neighbouring countries," he said.
Greenpeace said nuclear power wasn't clean or green, and never would be.
"Even if these technologies were feasible and safe, they wouldn't be able to contribute to reducing emissions for decades. That's just too late," Greenpeace spokesman Danny Kennedy said in a statement.
Wilderness Society nuclear campaigner Imogen Zethoven said the government was working towards establishing a toxic nuclear industry in 15 years, when renewable energy technologies were available now.
"The prime minister should be transforming Australia into a renewable energy power house not a nuclear waste dump for the rest of the world, an outcome that will be assured if we go down the nuclear energy path."
AAP
November 4, 2006 - 4:25PM
Prime Minister John Howard has put nuclear power firmly on the election campaign agenda, creating a clear demarcation between the coalition and the strongly anti-nuclear Labor and green groups.
Mr Howard, attending the Queensland Liberal conference in Brisbane, said he would do nothing to put the mining industry at risk by taking a panicky approach to greenhouse emissions.
His assurance follows the leaking of the findings of the government's nuclear energy task group, headed by former Telstra boss Ziggy Switkowski, which said nuclear power could be commercially viable within 15 years.
Mr Howard said nuclear power was potentially the cleanest and greenest of all forms of energy.
He said Australia needed a response to climate change which protected Australia's national interest and preserved its competitive advantage.
"Wouldn't it be an extraordinary national paradox if this country had achieved great prosperity, in no small measure due to the resources that providence has given us, and we are then to be knee-jerked into a response to global warming that crippled the very industries that gave us that prosperity," he said.
"And we would be foolish, from the national interest point of view, with our vast resources of uranium, to say that we are not going to consider nuclear power."
In the late 1960s the coalition government seriously considered a nuclear power station at Jervis Bay, NSW.
But the plan was shelved because nuclear power couldn't compete with power from abundant coal.
Resources Minister Ian Macfarlane said the reality now was that nuclear power would be competitive within 15 years, as requirements to capture carbon pushed up the cost of electricity from fossil fuels.
He said the next step was a public nuclear energy debate which used facts rather than fear.
"We want to see debate that is based in understanding and knowledge, not a debate based on scare tactics," he said.
The proposal prompted a strong reaction from Labor and green groups.
In Sydney, Labor environment spokesman Anthony Albanese told the Walk Against Warming rally the government was again pushing its nuclear fantasy.
He added it was unsurprising the government inquiry, which he said was made up of nuclear advocates, supported nuclear energy.
"Australians want to live with a solar panel on their roofs, not next door to a nuclear reactor," he said.
Opposition resources spokesman Martin Ferguson said Australia was a fossil fuel dependent economy with more than 600 years of coal reserves and there was no way nuclear power was going to stack up.
"Other nations will go nuclear ... our responsibility is to reduce our emissions through clean coal technology while also promoting the growth of renewables," he said in Melbourne.
Greens leader Bob Brown said Australia was now facing the dangers of both climate change and a nuclear power industry.
"Nuclear cannot and will not address climate change. It would take one to two decades to get going, ensure a major waste dump in Australia and inevitably encourage proliferation in neighbouring countries," he said.
Greenpeace said nuclear power wasn't clean or green, and never would be.
"Even if these technologies were feasible and safe, they wouldn't be able to contribute to reducing emissions for decades. That's just too late," Greenpeace spokesman Danny Kennedy said in a statement.
Wilderness Society nuclear campaigner Imogen Zethoven said the government was working towards establishing a toxic nuclear industry in 15 years, when renewable energy technologies were available now.
"The prime minister should be transforming Australia into a renewable energy power house not a nuclear waste dump for the rest of the world, an outcome that will be assured if we go down the nuclear energy path."
AAP
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