Jennifer Marohasy

a forum for the discussion of issues concerning the natural environment

Archives for October 2005

Tree Clearing in Queensland: One Man’s Battle Against Bureaucracy

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About six years ago Ashley McKay a softly spoken cattleman from south western Queensland was prosecuted by the Queensland Government for clearing cypress pine on his property. McKay had a permit to clear trees from the Department of Natural Resources and Mines (DNRM), but not a permit from the Department of Primary Industries (QDPI) Forestry Division. The second permit was apparently necessary to clear the pine trees scattered amongst the other trees.

It is now folklore in western Queensland that the decision by government bureacrats to prosecute the local hero was taken because McKay appeared on national television program Sixty Minutes speaking out against the government and then new Queensland Vegetation Management Act 1999.

Thousands of cattleman are being investigatged for illegal clearing under the legislation which many claim is unworkable.

The advice has been if your prosecuted, plead guilty because government and the courts will show no mercy if you take a stand.

Ashley McKay was proof of that. He has fought six court cases over the original charge of illegally clearing cypress pine. A central issue, continually disputed, is whether or not the original tree clearing permit permitted the clearing of the cypress pine trees.

I waded through the 77 page Decision handed down in August last year following ’round five’. It seemed to me that McKay had lost big time as he was found guilty and fined $270,000 and by the Chief Magistrate.

Some weeks later Property Rights Australia, an organisation founded in part to help McKay fight government, announced he would appeal the decision.

Last Friday the District Court in Queensland upheld the Appeal and reduced the charge from $270,000 to $10,000. I was amazed.

The Queensland Government could yet appeal this decision.

While Ashley fights on. The odd Constitutional law expert is starting to take an interest in the Vegetation Mangement Act 1999 and consider whether indeed it is constitutional, click here for a review by Prof Suri Ratnapala.
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Campaigns by the Wilderness Society have given the impression that western Queensland has been turned into wasteland as a consequence of tree clearing. But according to the State Government report Land Cover Change in Queensland 1999-2001 (Department of Natural Resources and Mines, published January 2003) even during the height of clearing, the annual clearing rate was 0.71 per cent of the 81 million hectares of woodland, forest and shrub cover across Queensland. According to page 14 of the same report, there has been a 5 million hectares increase in the area classified as woody vegetation over the period 1992 to 2001.

In other words, while large areas have been cleared, larger areas have regrowth.

Official statistics from the Queensland Herbarium (a part of the government’s Environment Protection Agency) show 81 percent of Queensland is covered in remnant vegetation – a figure that has remained constant over the last decade.

The dictionary definition of ‘remnant’ is ‘little or few that remains, a fragment or scrap’. Interestingly in Queensland ‘remnant’ is the dominant vegetation classification. Use of the word ‘remnant’ is deceptive as it suggests only a small amount of natural vegetation remains when in reality over 80 per cent remains.

The current legislative definition of ‘remnant’ is vegetation with 50 percent of its original cover and 70 per cent of its original height. Trees re-grow, so the relatively high level of remnant vegetation cover in Queensland is at least in part achieved by ‘re-growth’ turning into ‘remnant’ over a period of time.
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I’ve written about how hard it can be to understand the ABS tree clearing statistics here, http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=2098

Should We Take a Faith-Based Approach to AGW?

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In today’s The Age Geoff Strong repeats federal Environment Minister Ian Campbell’s announcement of last week in The Australian, and Tim Flannery’s recommendation in The Weather Makers, that we should stop debating the science of global warming and just accept a human influence on climate.

But why would a secular society that respects evidence and the scientific process ever stop researching and debating an issue as important as climate change?

Let’s say we all broadly accepted the pronouncements of the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the Tim Flannery’s and Geoff Strong’s of the world – that is we all broadly accepted anthropogenic global warming (AGW). Wouldn’t we nevertheless still encourage debate and discussion and fund scientists to continue to scrutinize the emerging theories and test the predictions?

We still fund scientists to challenge and debate Einstein‘s Theory of Relativity.

As I understand it, the difference between science and a religion is that the latter is essentially faith-based. There is no real potential for debate of the core issue. Growing up in a Christian community I’ld always been told belief in God is ultimately a question of faith.

I am an atheist, however, I respect those who believe in God and I don’t challenge their belief, because I understand that it is ultimately a question of faith.

Is this how we want to proceed with global warming issues? If this is the case then let’s remove the discussion from the discipline of science and let us proceed as we might with an issue of faith.

I hear the followers of Tim Flannery et al say, but Jennifer, it is not that we don’t want discussion, it is just that if there was less debate there would be more action.

Really? As far as I can tell we’ve got Kyoto and while the Australian government hasn’t signed up it is intent on meeting its Kyoto targets.

Furthermore, neither the Prime Minister of Australia nor the President of the United States have recently denied the theory of anthropogenic global warming (AGW). Quite the contrary! Didn’t President Bush go along with all the rhetoric at the recent meeting in Scotland? Prime Minister Howard just says it doesn’t make economic sense – he doesn’t argue the science. If the Australian Conservation Foundation and a few others weren’t so opposed to nuclear power we could start putting in place plans to swap from coal to nuclear etcetera and really do something about the rising atmospheric carbon dioxide levels. There are no shortage of real technical and political options all of which will have economic and environmental implications.

Couldn’t one of more of these options be pursued while the debate about the science of climate change was encouraged?

Unless we want to insist that AWG is a core belief – a faith – then criticism and debate should really be encouraged?

Recycle Sewerage Through The Local Aquifer

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I chaired a water seminar for Martin Leet of The Brisbane Institute a couple of weeks ago. Martin has put a report together on the event, click here. I introduced the seminar by suggesting there was nothing more important, after water, than the exchange of information. The first speaker, Blair Nancarrow from CSIRO Land and Water, promptly explained how you could provide people with all the information in the world, but if they didn’t trust you, or the process, you would get nowhere.

Blair was specifically talking about the difficulty of getting people to accept that recycled waste water from sewerage treatment plants can be made safe to drink.

Various studies have indicated that recycling is a real option for many Australian cities and probably one of the best option for securing Brisbane’s water supply in the medium term. But it is politically difficult.

The Mayor of Toowoomba, a regional centre 100 odd kilometers to the west of Brisbane, is trying to force the concept on residents and she is encountering a heap of resistance.

Interestingly, according to Blair’s survey work people are more likely to accept recycled waste water if it comes via an underground aquifer – rather than straight from the treatment plant.

The Western Australian Government has perhaps picked up on this finding with an announcement today that it is considering “injecting” treated waste water into a local aquifer:

The Western Australian Government is examining ways to convert waste water into drinking water. The Managed Aquifer Recharge Project will look at the potential to inject treated waste water into aquifers and then reclaim the water for irrigation and hopefully for drinking. Premier Geoff Gallop says 100 gigalitres of waste water is pumped into the ocean each year. Dr Gallop says while $3 million will be spent on the study, similar schemes are already in operation across the world.

I was interested to read that this recycling project could recover perhaps 100 gigalitres of water. The proposed Perth desalination plant was only going to deliver 45 gigalitres – about the same amount that could be produced by reducing tree cover in the catchment.

And a cautionary note on water restrictions:

Before it started raining here in Brisbane, the local city council introduced water restrictions with much fanfare about how we should all do the right thing by the environment and not water our gardens, shower together, etcetera, etcetera. Anyway, the restrictions have proven so popular we have saved twice as much water as intended. The Mayor is now complaining because there will be a hole in his budget from all the water savings – water Brisbane residents won’t be paying for.

GW Politics – An Update

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Some of my colleagues were amazed to see The Australian newspaper run Environment Minister Campbell on its front page yesterday with some anxious comments about the threat of global warming.

On the same day former NSW Premier Bob Carr launched a new $10 million institute dedicated to educating us about global warming.

What does it all mean? Here are a few comments, initially from letters to the editor of The Australian and then from the Prime Minister:

Since this is all about greenhouse scaremongering, he [Minister Campbell] should also ask his advisers what the safe level of greenhouse gas really is. That should stump the lot of them. …it is really [also] all about frightening people into supporting the use of nuclear energy for domestic and industrial power generation.
James Stuart, Griffith, ACT, 28th October

At last, the Howard Government acknowledges the very real threat of climate change. But time will tell if it is willing to take some real action on this issue. As the nation with the industrialised world’s highest per capita greenhouse-gas emissions, Australia has an obligation to provide some real solutions. Solar – yes, wind – yes, energy efficiency and renewable technologies – yes, but don’t be mistaken, Senator Campbell, nuclear power will not be in the mix.
Michaela Stubbs, Northcote, Vic, 28th October

I’m pleased that the Environment Minister has come to the realisation that global warming is man-made and a threat to the planet – better late than never. But his solutions to the problem are a bit simplistic – that of exploring all possible technologies as if they will provide the answers. We could make a start by signing up to the Kyoto Protocol…
Harry Cohen, Nedlands, WA, 28th October

If Australia were to sign the Kyoto Protocol in its present form, that would sell out in the interests of Australian industry and Australian jobs. The Kyoto Protocol is anti-Australian jobs particularly in the resource sector because it imposes burdens on Australian industry that it doesn’t impose on like industries in countries like Indonesia and China…
John Howard, Prime Minister, 27th October

GM Politics – An Update

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I was getting bored with all the posturing about how Australian farmers would be sued for growing canola contaminated with genetically modified (GM) material, but now it seems there has been some resolution to the issue.

Melissa Marino reported in today’s The Age that canola with traces of genetically modified material will be allowed to be traded after an agreement by federal and state agriculture ministers:

The agreement, made yesterday at the Primary Industries Ministerial Council meeting in Launceston will tolerate levels of GM material of up to 0.9 per cent after a spate of contaminated canola was detected in crops this year.

Moratoriums imposing a nil tolerance, including in Victoria, would now be lifted to allow for the unintended or accidental presence of GM canola in conventional canola crops in a move applauded by farmer groups but denounced by anti-GM groups, including Greenpeace.

Victorian Agriculture Minister Bob Cameron said this year’s harvest could now go ahead without disruption. No farmers would be prosecuted for growing conventional canola with trace levels of GM material, he said.

Mr Cameron said a threshold for the presence of GM material at 0.9 per cent was consistent with the standard accepted by the European Union. Under the agreement, seed companies would be required to reduce the traces of GM material in conventional canola to 0.1 per cent over the next two planting seasons, he said.

It is a blow to Greenpeace who have until recently campaigned hard against the commercial planting of GM canola on the basis of the perception we can keep Australia GM free. Nevermind that we have been eating vegetable oil from cotton seed from locally grown GM cotton plants for nearly ten years!

The whole saga is really quite extraordinary:

1. That Australian state governments placed moratoriums banning the planting of a food crop (specifically GM canola) on the basis of fear of a technology used in many other countries including Canada, China and the US, and then,

2. That traces of GM material were found in the conventional (non-GM) canola.

As I have detailed in a previous post, the contamination is probably from a conventional Australian canola breeding program that exchanged germplasm with an overseas companies and in the exchange of germplasm the impurity/the Topas 19/2 was introduced.

Topas 19/2 includes a gene from a soil bacteria that confers herbicide resistance. The same gene, known as the pat gene has been used as a marker in a wide range of research in a variety of crops around the world. The pat gene is a Bayer creation and a product of biotechnology/genetic engineering/genetic modificiation.

In another post I suggested that with a form of GM canola now established in Australia, Greenpeace really needs a new campaign.

Maybe they are going to now focus on GM cotton? Greenpeace recently asked CSIRO for documentation on the water use, soil impact and effect on other insects of GM cotton through a freedom of information request. CSIRO have apparently responded by asking for $21,000 – the cost of getting 1,000 hours of documentation together.

This summer marks the tenth anniversary of the planting of GM cotton in Australia. The crop has been a phenomenal success with 90% of cotton growers planting the stuff and pesticide application rates down an average 88% last season. Cotton has been exempt from the bans on GM food crops on the basis it is grown primarily for fibre (not food). Nevermind that 35% of the vegetable oil we eat in Australia is from cotton seed.

While we in Australia become ever more tangled in GM politics, in other parts of the world real research is happening. A latest breakthrough includes Danish scientists showing that it is possible to produce plants which change colour in the presence of specific compounds within the soil. In particular they’ve found a gene that can turns a plant red if explosive residues are present. This is what the blushing plants look like: http://www.gizmag.com.au/go/2568/gallery/ .

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Thanks to Roger Kalla for many of the above links and some of the above information.

Galarrwuy Yunupingu Says Yes to Nuclear Waste

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The Northern Territory Chief Minister, Clare Martin, has said she will fight “tooth and nail” the building of even a small nuclear waste facility in the Territory.

Australia produces nuclear waste at Lucus Heights., where the Sydney facility undertakes nuclear-related research including for diagnosing and treating cancer, Alzheimer’s and multiple sclerosis.

The preferred site for storing the waste from Lucas Height, which is apparently a Federal Government responsibility, is Woomera, but the South Australian government has said “no”.

The Northern Territory looks set to end up with the waste facility because the Commonwealth can force it on a Territory.

I have previously written that former Prime Minister Bob Hawke and researcher Geoff Hudson have both endorsed the Australian outback/the Northern Territory as a good place to store not only Sydney’s waste, but the world’s nuclear waste.

I was facinated to read today that an Aboriginal leader is now backing the concept of at least a small nuclear waste facility in the Territory.

According to ABC Online, Galarrwuy Yunupingu says he would be happy to consider a waste dump on his tribal land.

Mr Yunupingu said a [nuclear] dump on Gumatj Land could mean sealed roads, infrastructure and long-term benefits to Aboriginal people as well an oncology unit for Darwin’s Hospital.

He says the dump is an issue of national importance, with over 400,000 Australians receiving radioactive medical treatment each year.

He says Chief Minister Clare Martin should admit that a dump could be safely built in the Territory.

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I lived for the first few years of my life (1963-1971) at a place called Coomalie Creek just ‘around the corner’ from the first big uranium mine in Australia at Rum Jungle. The mine site has since been reabilitated and looks like this, View image (100kbs).