Jennifer Marohasy

a forum for the discussion of issues concerning the natural environment

jennifer

Mixing Views on Climate

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Papers from the Managing Climate Change: Practicalities and Realities in a post-Kyoto Future conference held in Canberra on 4th April are now available at Tech Central Station.

This is perhaps a first conference where acknowledged ‘climate skeptics’ including Professor Bob Carter have given papers alongside Australian government representatives including Dr Brian Fisher from ABARE.

A delegate from the Chinese embassy spoke about the need for China to reduce its reliance on coal as an energy source and China’s intension to build possibly 6 new nuclear power stations over the next 15 years.

Senior Cliamte Negotiator from the US Department of State gave an interesting and fairly technical paper on US policy directions.

Papers also include a contribution from author of Taken by Storm and key contributor to the ‘hockey stick’ debate, Canadian Ross McKitrick.

The conference papers are supplemented with Background papers that include an analysis of global carbon trading prospects.

Warwick Hughes

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Early environmentalists wore the badge of ‘skeptic’ as an honor.

Thomas Huxley, a colleague of Charles Darwin, wrote: The improver of natural knowledge absolutely refuses to acknowledge authority, as such. For him, skepticism is the highest of duties; blind faith the one unpardonable sin.

In 2005 to be a skeptical environmentalist is to almost be a social outcast.

A former Environment Minister has described the problem to me as follows:

“While it may be true to say that we are all Greenies now, the great majority of Australians have little or no say in the environmental policies being put to governments, federal, state or local. These policies are now almost exclusively the domain of a network of conservation groups that are interlinked and interrelated. There is an extraordinary degree of unanimity among the green groups about the environmental problems and the solutions ensuring that one view, and one view only, is being received by the decision-makers.”

The problem is confounded by pressure on the science community to work in with the established green groups.

In a scathing review of science funding in Australia, James Cook University Professor Bob Carter has written:

“Current public debates in Australia on matters such as GM food, the health of the Great Barrier Reef, and the reality of climate change, are irredeemably in the hands of the spinmeisters.

“To capture government’s attention, and funding, requires the generation of a crisis in one of these politically sensitive areas. And for a government employee to speak out against a prevailing science or societal wisdom which generates research money for his employment agency is, rightly, perceived to be professional suicide.”

There remain a few passionate and skeptical environmentalists in Australia and even some on the internet.

Warwick Hughes‘ commentary always interests me mostly because it is accompanied by data – not his own but the governments.

Have a look:

http://www.warwickhughes.com/

Greenpeace wants nuclear waste sent to Australia

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I remember attending People for Nuclear Disarmament rallies in the early 1980s. We held placards and chanted – mostly against nuclear weapons testing at Muroroa Atoll by the French.

Twenty years later there has been no nuclear war. France now uses its nuclear technology to generate 80 percent of its electricity. France also specializes in reprocessing nuclear waste including spent nuclear fuel rods from Sydney’s Lucas Heights.

Lucus Heights is the base for the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO). ANSTO is undertaking a diverse range of nuclear-related research including developing radiopharmaceuticals and techniques for diagnosing and treating cancer, Alzheimer’s and multiple sclerosis.

Last Wednesday Greenpeace was successful in having a French Court of Appeal rule against the French company that processes ANSTO’s nuclear waste.

At issues is whether the company COGEMA, which has long specialized in reprocessing nuclear waste, has its paper work in order.

Greenpeace is hoping that the ruling could mean the nuclear waste from ANSTO has to be returned to Australia.

Why would Greenpeace want nuclear waste returned to Australia? I guess it could potentially be seen as a great publicity stunt.

Greenpeace is currently actively campaigning against nuclear power, reprocessing and waste dumping.

There are about 440 commercial nuclear power reactors operating in 31 countries supplying 17 per cent of the world’s electricity. 56 countries operate a total of 284 research reactors along the lines of Lucas Heights. 220 reactors power ships and submarines.

$10,000 funding limit misleading

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The impression from the media over the last week has been that green groups are now only going to get a maximum of $10,000 each year in funding from the government

The reality is quite different.

Some groups will have their federal government funding cut. The Queensland Conservation Council, for example, received $92,000 in funding under the Grants to Voluntary Environmental and Heritage Organisations Scheme (GVEHO) and will now receive a maximum of $10,000 under this scheme.

But the organization will continue to pick up government money from other sources.

Tax payer’s money is also likely to keep rolling in to WWF. This organization received over $15 million in federal government grants over the period 1996-2003. (See Australian Institute Report by Clive Hamilton and Andrew Macintosh titled Taming the Panda).

Not only will WWF continue to be funded by the federal government, but WWF is actually in-charge of providing federal government funding to community groups.

Through the WWF-administered, government-funded Threatened Species Network Community Grants program WWF provides funding of up to $50,000 per annum to green groups. This is part of the billion dollar Natural Heritage Trust Fund.

There is also the $1.4 billion National Action Plan for Salinity and Water Quality.

As part of the Federal Government’s $2 billion Australian Water Fund, $200 million will be available over the next 5 years for community grants of up to $50,000 to save and protect water resources through practical on-the-ground work.

And the list goes on, and on and on.

Is stressed dead?

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Today’s Australian (pg 6) states that 75 per cent of red gums along the Murray River are either dead, dying or stressed.

Imagine if a journalist ran the story: 75 per cent of Melbournians are either dead, dying or stressed.

The obvious question might be: So what percentage of Melbournians are dying? We know they are all stressed!

A problem for journalist Asa Waahlquist is that not even the scientists at the Murray Darling Basin Commission are making the distinction between stressed and dead. The official surveys that I am familiar with, that have been undertaken since March 2003, have not distinguished between stressed and dead trees.

Incredible, but true.

A Progressive Environmentalist?

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On Tuesday night Greg Bourne (CEO of WWF Australia) told a crowd at the Brisbane Institute that WWF was a progressive organization essentially because WWF believed in climate change and wanted to do something about it.

I am not sure that I can agree with this definition of ‘progressive’. Take the case of WWF and GM food crops. WWF has actively campaigned against GM. Yet this new innovative technology gives farmers the potential to increase or maintain yields while using less pesticide, less water, less land – a reduced ecological footprint for more food.

For example, the 90 per cent of Australian cotton growers who how plant the latest GM varieties use on average 80-90 per cent less insecticide while maintaining yields. New GM wheat varieties being developed in SA could produce more grain under much drier conditions – an important consideration if we accept some climate change scenarios.

After the lecture, I introduced myself to Bourne. In the course of the conversation he called me a luddite because I am skeptical about some of the ‘science’ underpinning IPCC climate change modeling.

This is interesting because I accept atmospheric carbon dioxide levels are increasing dramatically and something should be done about this.

What I don’t accept is many of their solutions for reducing emissions – I don’t consider them particularly effective, let alone progressive.

For example, Bourne suggested that it is OK for China to keep building old-technology, coal-fired power stations because the priority in China is “pulling people out of poverty, not climate change”.

According to Bourne, Australia is different. We already enjoy a reasonable standard of living therefore “the driver” should be the environment and we should oppose coal fired power stations.

This seems a totally discriminatory approach to a global environmental problem. And in the same breath Bourne suggested that communities can’t enjoy a reasonable standard of living if they don’t also look after their environment.

For some time I have remarked that if environmentalism is to deliver tangible environmental benefits, it will need to change. In my view environmentlism needs to be redefined in accordance with how natural systems actually operate and to embrace, rather than reject, technological innovation.

Much of my work has been dismissed by self proclaimed ‘progressive environmentalists’ on the basis that I work for the IPA and am therefore conservative and wrong. But I consider myself a social (as well as environmental) progressive.

Furthermore the IPA seems to have been one of the few organisations in Australia prepared to promote open discussion by providing a counterpoint on important environmental issues. On Line Opinion was also quick to publish my alternative perspective on the basis there is a need for real debate on these issues.

I hope that through this new blog (that I start with some trepidation) real debate on real environmental issues can be further faciliated. I am interested somewhat by what motivates people, but my real interest is in the facts-of-the-matter and how policies and systems can be put in place that will deliver real environmental protection and benefit both nationally and globally.

I agree with Bourne that change starts with the empowerment of individuals who want to make a difference – who want to be progressive.

But what does it really mean to be a progressive environmentalist?

If you really care about the environment should you buy GM food or organic food? Should we support China to “pull its people out of poverty” even if this means many more old-style, coal-fired power stations – or is there a better way?