Jennifer Marohasy

a forum for the discussion of issues concerning the natural environment

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Guilty Until Proven Innocent Says Auditor-General

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“Last week the Auditor-General stated that farmers have escaped land clearing prosecutions because the State Government had ‘problems with meeting the evidence requirements’ under NSW native vegetation laws,” said a spokesperson for the NSW Regional Community Survival Group, Doug Menzies.

A media release from the group issued earlier today began:

“Farming families are demanding an official apology from the NSW Auditor-General who last week implied that farmers should have been prosecuted for clearing 30,000 hectares of land in 2005.

… The Regional Community Survival Group is made up of farmers from western NSW who are fed up with bureaucratic and nonsensical laws that are preventing farmers from controlling infestations of woody weeds that have invaded up to 20 million hectares (an area three times the size of Tasmania) in western NSW.

“The Auditor-General implies that farming families have carried out illegal land clearing yet in his own report he clearly states that no prosecutions in relation to land clearing were successful when contested in court between 1998 and 2005.

“I was led to believe that a foundation stone of the Australian legal system was the benefit of the presumption of innocence until proven guilty by evidence presented in a court of law?

“By implying that farmers have escaped prosecution the Auditor-General has effectively branded farming families as having engaged in illegal land clearing activities – an outrageous suggestion,” said Mr Menzies.

The Regional Community Survival Group is concerned that the comments of the Auditor-General could prejudice land clearing cases currently before the NSW Land and Environment Court.

“We demand an apology from the Auditor-General and seek clarification from the NSW Attorney-General on how the comments of the Auditor-General could potentially prejudice land clearing cases currently before the courts.

“We also have serious concerns on how diligently the Auditor-General investigated the issue of land clearing in NSW.

“The Auditor-General obtained the vast majority of his information from government agencies that are pandering to Sydney-based green groups,” said Mr Menzies.

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Read the full report — which does seem to ignore the concept of ‘presumption of innocence’ — published by the NSW Auditor-General and titled ‘Regulating the Clearing of Native Vegetation: Follow-up of 2002 Performance Audit’ by clicking here.

How to Save the Baiji?

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The Yangtze River Dolphin, also known as the baiji, is perhaps the most endangered of the world’s large mammals. The last confirmed sighting was of a single adult in September 2004.

The journal Conservation Biology recently published three short papers [1] on the current state of baiji conservation and plans to save the species.

There is no single agreed plan, rather several disputed and contentious plans which can perhaps be summarized as four options:
1. Leave the baiji where they are.
2. Move individuals to the Institute of Hydrobiology dolphinarium in Wuhan, Hubei Province.
3. Move individuals to a 21-km oxbow lake originally part of the Yantze River at Tian-e-Zhou, Hubei Province.
4. Move individuals somewhere else.

The first option has been advocated by Professor Guang Yang and colleagues [1] on the basis that the chances of successfully finding, capturing and establishing a genetically viable ex situ population of baiji is unlikely. They argue that the baiji is essentially a lost cause, that available resources should be prioritized, and would be better spent on saving the finless porpoise population of the Yangtze river.

Drs Randall Rheeves and Nick Gales [1] reject the notion of leaving the baiji in situ. They claim that the baiji will surely go extinct if left in the Yangtze because of harmful fishing practices as well as increasingly river traffic, water pollution and habitat loss. They claim that it is more important to save the baiji than the finless porpoise. They explain that finless porpoises can be found from Japan to Iran in a narrow band of coastal continental shelf water while the baiji are only found in the Yangtze and “their disappearance would be like snapping off a complete branch from the tree of mammalian radiation.” They claim it should not come down to a choice between finless porpoises and baiji, that both can be saved.

There seems general agreement that moving baiji to the dolphinarium at Wuhan (Option 2) is not a good idea because previous attempts to establish a breeding colony there have failed.

Guang Yang et al. argue that moving baiji to the Tian-e-Zhou seminatural reserve (Option 3) is not a good idea because it “potentially compromises not only the future of the currently increasing finless porpoise population but would represent a major risk to the baiji due to potential for agonistic interactions, disease transmission, and competition for limited resources.”

A single baiji female released there in 1995 died of entanglement (presumably in fishing nets) but was already emaciated.

In contrast Drs Reeves and Gales argue that moving baiji to the Tian-e-Zhou reserve is the best option because finless porpoises have similar requirements to the baiji and the reserve has proven success for breeding the porpoises.

Drs Reeves and Gales propose that the population of finless porpoises now in the reserve be moved elsewhere, so there is no potential for competition with the baiji.

But, what about moving the baiji elsewhere – finding another seminatural reserve (Option 4)?

I’m inclined to think that if the finless porpoise population is doing well in the Tian-e-Zhou reserve, leave it alone. Find somewhere else for the baiji and begin preparing this new environment in anticipation of finding enough individuals to capture for translocation.

If enough baiji are never found for translocation, if the species does go extinct, then the new reserve could be used for the hopefully expanding finless porpoise population.

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[1] Thanks to Libby for sending me the papers:

* Guang Yang et al. 2006 ‘Conservation Options for the Baiji: Time for Realism?’ Conservation Biology Volume 20, Number 3, pgs 620-622

* Randall Reeves & Nicholas Gales. 2006 ‘Realities of Baiji Conservation’ Conservation Biology Volume 20, Number 3, pgs 626-628

* Ding Wang et al. 2006 ‘Conservation of the Baiji: No Simple Solution’ Conservation Biology Volume 20, Numbers 3, pgs 623-625

I’ve previously posted ‘Worrying About the Baiji’ .

Humane Society To Sue Japanese Whalers

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The Australian Federal Court ruled last friday that environment group the Humane Society International (HSI) could sue Japanese whaling company Kyodo Senpaku Kaisha Ltd to get an injunction forcing the Australian government to stop whaling within the Australian Whale Sanctuary in Antarctica.

According to Channel Nine News:

“In May last year, Federal Court Justice James Allsop refused the group permission to proceed with the case, after federal Attorney-General Philip Ruddock raised concerns it could spark a diplomatic incident between Australia and Japan.

But the court’s full bench found Justice Allsop made an error in deciding HSI’s case should not have gone ahead because it might have been ignored by the company, as Japan did not recognise the sanctuary.

Chief Justice Michael Black and Justice Ray Finkelstein also said in their judgment that too much consideration was given to Mr Ruddock’s concerns.

HSI wildlife and habitat program manager Nicola Beynon said it was an important decision that allowed the group to “take the fight” directly to the company.“

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Thanks Ann for sending me the link.

Dams Leaving Us High & Dry: Ian Mackay

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Ian Mackay [1] has just returned from visiting south east Queensland’s many water storages. He clocked up 1,800 kilometres over the four days and this is what he found:

1. In pictures: http://www.stoppress.com.au/ .

2. In words:

“Dam after dam, dams well away from areas of population pressure, were well below critical level. Several were even at zero.

It was seeing the two and a half metre tree growing just a little above the waterline at Moogerah Dam, though, that really drove it home.

Plainly the dam hadn’t been filled beyond this level for years.

Dates scrawled at the side of the spillway wall, indicating when the dam had overflowed only confirmed it. There was the mark for the memorable Australia Day floods of 1974, but nothing after 1976. The towering, impressively curved dam wall, tightly wedged between two massive hills, had been touted as something of an engineering feat when completed in the early sixties.

Despite all the hopes behind its construction, it was clear that it had been holding back a dwindling water reserve for years.

Moogerah Dam — the name means either “place of storms” or “meeting place of storms” depending who you ask — is currently holding only 7% of its capacity.

The water ski cottages hugging what was once its shore line and the twice-extended boat ramp tell the tale of a water level that has receded over a much longer time period than just the last few years.

One friend tells me of watching enormous eels thunder over the spillway back in the early seventies. Another speaks wistfully of water skiing over the top of what is now a great isthmus jutting into the dwindling pond. Tall grass now covers the spillway area and fishermen drive the considerable length of the isthmus to cast a line. Pelicans, stilts and cormorants share the receding shoreline with grazing cattle in scenes that wouldn’t be out of place around a drying billabong much further inland.

But Moogerah is far from alone.

Most of the Sunwater storages throughout the southeast are well under a third full [2].

Nearby Maroon Dam, which also drains the impressive towering peaks of the Border Ranges stands at 21%; Bjelke-Petersen Dam collecting water from a wide catchment in the South Burnett, including the Bunya Mountains holds just 3% of its 125 000 megalitre capacity.

Atkinson Dam, near Lowood is at 0%; its picnic grounds understandably deserted, its remaining water puddle far off in the distance behind the water skiing signs.

All these dams share a common thread of optimism, the hope that the provision of a dependable water supply would somehow “drought-proof” the state and facilitate enhanced agriculture and easier living. To many who share this dream that dams equate to a certainty of water supply, the present crisis is wholly attributable to our not having added to our portfolio of existing dams.

Now, four decades on, it might be as well to reflect on the reality.

South East Queensland gets nightly updates of the levels of the major domestic storages. Somerset, Wivenhoe and North Pine Dams are collectively at around 29%. These figures look almost respectable compared to those previously mentioned, but anxiety about their low levels has lead to severe restrictions.

Property owners on the shores of Somerset Dam speak of having to regularly extend their fences out into what had been dam, of their cattle now grazing on land recently exposed and now covered in grass.

The simple fact is that our dams are failing us.

It’s not the engineers’ fault. They built dams that held back water when it rained, but there’s that other variable that is well out of the control of every engineer, and also, as he has repeatedly rued, our Premier.

“I can’t make it rain,” says Peter Beattie.

What he could do, though, is recognize that our water crisis comes from an almost total reliance on dams for water supply. Dams in the area of greatest population growth aren’t in fact the lowest. Changing rainfall patterns mean that Moogerah is getting fewer of the storms that gave it both its name and its desirability as a dam-site.

Instead, his assessment of the situation is that if our existing dams aren’t holding enough water, then plainly we need more of them……… if your wallet doesn’t contain much money, then obviously you need more wallets.

His newly announced additions include a mega-dam at Traveston across the Mary River, a smaller dam at Wyaralong across Teviot Brook near Boonah and raising of both Borumba and Hinze dams and a few other storages as well.

It’s an assessment he hopes will be shared by voters, at least those who still share that axiomatic “dam equals more water” connection. Many though, are questioning how dams that can’t possibly begin to fill until at least 2011 will be any use at all in a crisis that could well crunch in just two years time if significant rains don’t fall.

The Beattie government’s newest, the Paradise Dam that drowns the Burnett River, northwest of Childers, was recently named in an international list of failed dams. It was hoped that after the wall was completed last year, the dam would fill quickly but it is currently at only 15%. It is an expensive fulfillment (no pun intended) of an electoral promise for which we’ll still be paying years hence.

You can understand why there’s far more outcry about the Mary and Wyaralong Dams than from just those who stand to be displaced. Councils the length of the Mary have spoken out in opposition, and rural groups, environmentalists and church groups have added a long list of concerns.

Many are comparing Premier Beattie’s approach and vision to that of Joh Bjelke-Petersen.

Making the long walk, down through the cracked mud toward the receding shoreline of Bjelke-Petersen Dam, you can almost feel the vision splendid evaporating as surely as the dam’s contents.

While many farmers we encountered were making the most of the opportunity to excavate and deepen their dams in anticipation of eventual rain, no such activity was taking place in the bigger dams. It seemed it was simply easier to just build a new one.

At a time when most water authorities are diversifying their supply options, shouldn’t a first priority be reflecting on the success of the status quo?

The red dots tell the story.

Without good run-off rain, a dam is just an expensive wall.

It’s time we faced the fact that our dams aren’t working.“

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[1] Ian Mackay is a teacher, poet and environmentalist from the Mary Valley. For the last ten years he has been President of the Conondale Range Committee, one of the Sunshine Coast’s longest serving environment groups.

[2] Sunwater information comes from www.sunwater.com.au click on lower left hand information option.

Global Warming Icon ‘Hit For Six’

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If you do a search at this blog site for ‘hockey stick’, Google will provide you with about 70 links and the first will link to a question I posted a year ago:

“What is the evidence for the medieval warm period? My understanding is that the Vikings were able to settle Greenland and grow grapes in Canada over several hundreds of years because the climate was significantly warmer. Yet this period is not evident in the famous ‘hockey stick’ graph.”

The Graph
hockey stick graph_blog
[from BBC News]

The graph was the creation of Dr Michael Mann, et al, and was used by the United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to conclude in their influential 2001 assessment report that the 1990s was the warmest decade and 1998 the warmest year of the last millenium.

Indeed the ‘hockey stick’ has emerged as something of an icon for believers in anthropogenic global warming (AGW), while global warming skeptics have dismissed it as shoddy science and another example of ‘believers’ using models to support a position at odd with the evidence in particular the existence of the medieval warm period.

Now a prominent statistician who is also a Univeristy Professor, Chair of the National Academy of Sciences Committee on Applied and Theoretical Statistics, and a member of the board of the American Statistical Association, has published a rather damning report on the hockey stick. As Paul Williams commented in the thread following my blog post last Friday, “… the hockey stick has just been hit for six”!

Following are some of the conclusions from Dr Edward Wegman as summarized by the US House Committee on Energy and Commerce:

1. Mann et al., misused certain statistical methods in their studies, which inappropriately produce hockey stick
shapes in the temperature history. Wegman’s analysis concludes that Mann’s work cannot support claim that
the1990s were the warmest decade of the millennium.

Report: “Our committee believes that the assessments that the decade of the 1990s was the hottest
decade in a millennium and that 1998 was the hottest year in a millennium cannot be supported by
the MBH98/99 analysis. As mentioned earlier in our background section, tree ring proxies are
typically calibrated to remove low frequency variations. The cycle of Medieval Warm Period and
Little Ice Age that was widely recognized in 1990 has disappeared from the MBH98/99 analyses,
thus making possible the hottest decade/hottest year claim. However, the methodology of
MBH98/99 suppresses this low frequency information. The paucity of data in the more remote past
makes the hottest-in-a-millennium claims essentially unverifiable.”

2. A social network analysis revealed that the small community of paleoclimate researchers appear to review
each other’s work, and reuse many of the same data sets, which calls into question the independence of peerreview and temperature reconstructions.

Report: “It is clear that many of the proxies are re-used in most of the papers. It is not surprising that
the papers would obtain similar results and so cannot really claim to be independent verifications.”

3. Although the researchers rely heavily on statistical methods, they do not seem to be interacting with the
statistical community.

Report: “As statisticians, we were struck by the isolation of communities such as the paleoclimate
community that rely heavily on statistical methods, yet do not seem to be interacting with the
mainstream statistical community. The public policy implications of this debate are financially
staggering and yet apparently no independent statistical expertise was sought or used.”

4. Authors of policy-related science assessments should not assess their own work.

Report: “Especially when massive amounts of public monies and human lives are at stake,
academic work should have a more intense level of scrutiny and review. It is especially the case
that authors of policy-related documents like the IPCC report, Climate Change 2001: The Scientific
Basis, should not be the same people as those that constructed the academic papers.”

5. Policy-related climate science should have a more intense level of scrutiny and review involving statisticians.
Federal research should involve interdisciplinary teams to avoid narrowly focused discipline research.

Report: “With clinical trials for drugs and devices to be approved for human use by the FDA, review
and consultation with statisticians is expected. Indeed, it is standard practice to include statisticians
in the application-for-approval process. We judge this to be a good policy when public health and
also when substantial amounts of monies are involved, for example, when there are major policy
decisions to be made based on statistical assessments. In such cases, evaluation by statisticians
should be standard practice. This evaluation phase should be a mandatory part of all grant
applications and funded accordingly.”

6. Federal research should emphasize fundamental understanding of the mechanisms of climate change, and
should focus on interdisciplinary teams to avoid narrowly focused discipline research.

Report: “While the paleoclimate reconstruction has gathered much publicity because it reinforces a
policy agenda, it does not provide insight and understanding of the physical mechanisms of climate
change… What is needed is deeper understanding of the physical mechanisms of climate change.”

Read the full report here: http://energycommerce.house.gov/108/home/07142006_Wegman_Report.pdf .

13 Worst Things To Happen To the Australian Environment?

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Melbourne-based think tank the Institute of Public Affairs publishes a quarterly journal of politics and public affairs called ‘Review’.

The last Review devoted 8 pages to the ‘Top 20 books you must read before you die’.

The list included John Stuart Mill ‘On Liberty’ (1859), Ayn Rand ‘Atlas Shrugged’ (1957), Friedrich Hayek ‘The Road to Serfdom’ (1944) and George Orwell ‘Animal Farm’ (1945).

Following the “overwhelming response to our list of books” the Executive Director of the IPA, John Roskam, has suggested the next IPA Review include a list of the “the 13 worst things to happen to Australia” (in a policy sense).

It got me thinking. What are the 13 worst things to happen to the Australian environment … after rabbits?

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I’m a Senior Fellow at the IPA.