CLIMATE SCEPTIC LEADS FEDERAL GOVERNMENT REVIEW OF RENEWABLE ENERGY TARGET

Minister for the Environment, Greg Hunt, recently announced a review of the Government's Renewable Energy Target (RET).

 

The RET, set up under the Howard Government and expanded under Labor, mandates that 20% of energy will be derived from renewables by 2020.  This has obviously been a  bi-partisan approach to reducing greenhouse emissions. 

The target has already been reviewed a number of times but was again due for review under legislation this year by the Climate Change Authority (CCA) which the Abbott Government plans to abolish.  Although the Government has been unable to abolish the CCA as it does not have the numbers in the Senate, it has sidelined this independent body and set up its own review panel. The panel is led by businessman Dick Warburton, an acknowledged climate sceptic who is no friend of the renewable energy sector.  The background of the other three panel members has also not inspired critics with any confidence that the review will be even-handed.  

Indeed, comments by Prime Minister Abbott about upward pressures on electricity prices from renewables suggest the result he is looking for from the review.  Interestingly the Prime Minister does not mention the impact of improving infrastructure - the "poles and wires" component of the electricity grid - on the upward movement of prices.  This is yet another indication that the axe he wants to grind relates to climate change and clean energy and is not really about general concern about electricity pricing.

 In addition – and unsurprisingly - some of the major fossil fuel energy suppliers are calling for a reduction in the RET. They clearly do not want competition from clean energy sources which over time will become more competitive in price.

Those in the renewable energy sector are worried that the target will be reduced or even removed. They say that billions of dollars in investment will be significantly hurt if the target is substantially lowered.  Given the climate of uncertainty produced by comments from the Prime Minister and the apparent bias in the review panel, investment in renewables is likely to suffer even before the result of the review is announced.  

In an economic climate where jobs are going in manufacturing, logic would suggest that the Government would be anxious to encourage the expansion of the renewable energy sector.  The fact that it obviously has no interest in seeing this sector prosper suggests that ideology and not common sense is shaping policy. Is this lack of interest in renewables a sign that both Abbott and his Government still subscribe to the "climate change is crap" view?

The Government's review will present its findings to the Prime Minister's Department by mid-year.

The way this review has been organised – and the composition of the panel – is yet another indication of the Abbott Government's lack of concern about climate change.  There is certainly no sense of urgency about meeting the challenges we as a nation and our children and grandchildren are going to face in coming years.

WE DON'T WANT TO LIVE IN A GASFIELD - Clarence Valley Woman Writes to Prime Minister Abbott

Lynette Eggins, a Clarence Valley resident, emailed the letter below to Tony Abbott, the Australian Prime Minister on 5 November.

Dear Prime Minister Abbott

I was pleased to hear that you have taken the time to meet with Debbie Orr from Tara in Queensland concerning the impact the gas mining invasion in Queensland has had on her family and community. It is with disgust and disbelief that we read and hear about the treatment of our fellow Australians.

As I'm sure you are aware, gas mining companies propose to invade the Northern Rivers of NSW, an area of scenic beauty and farm land, an area that we live in for the peace, tranquility and natural richness it has to offer to all Australians and overseas visitors.

It is unacceptable to us that we become like Ms Orr and the many other similarly affected residents of Queensland. The Northern Rivers is very densely populated, unlike much of the gasfield areas of our northern neighbour state. If the industry goes ahead, how does your government propose to deal with the health and environmental impacts of such an invasive industry on our close communities?

The introduction of the 2km exclusion zone is quite frankly ludicrous. How can it be that some residents of our country are being offered protection and yet others will become collateral damage? How can the Government openly discriminate against its own constituents?

I am sure government bureaucrats have no idea of the impacts such an industry would have on the Northern Rivers. For example:  we often have severe rain events. This alone is enough to create an environmental disaster. With the massive maze of creeks and river systems running off the mountains the majority of the country is underwater at these times. What will happen with the chemicals, waste water and drilling fluids when it flows away with the flood water? Will we at other times, have the waste water sprayed on our roads and crops and injected into our water supply and rivers as is happening in Queensland?

The largest industry we have is tourism - who wants to come and look at gasfields? Can you imagine the impact such a toxic industry will have on tourism and our many sustainable industries such as the fisheries and farming?

Metgasco, one of the gas mining companies with a PEL over our area, has breached safety and environmental regulations numerous times, and they are only in the exploration stage. How can they possibly manage a gas field safely ?

We do not want to live in an industrialised landscape; we do not need the gas and the government knows it (there is enough gas in Bass Strait to serve Australia for millennia - BHP have stated this)

We are an educated population; we have done our research; we know the majority of the gas is for export and we know the long term toxic affects of the gas industry. Please don't treat us as fools.

We have been surveying our residents door to door, neighbour to neighbour, and an overwhelming majority of people do not want to live in gasfields. It is time for the Government to listen to its people – mining companies have no social licence to operate in the Northern Rivers, or elsewhere in NSW for that matter.

The people of the Northern Rivers will not sit back quietly and watch our land, water, health and sustainable industries be impacted by this invasive toxic industry.

Mr Abbott, will you be remembered as the Prime Minister who listened to and stood up for his people? Or the Prime Minister who allowed mining companies and government bureaucracy to force a toxic invasive industry on his constituents? The power is in your hands Mr Abbott.

I would be pleased if you would supply answers to my questions at your earliest possible convenience.

Yours sincerely

Lynette Eggins, mother, grandmother, business woman and resident of Australia, the lucky country - or is it?

THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT AND CLIMATE CHANGE

The Prime Minister (PM) Tony Abbott is pushing ahead with his election promise to repeal the carbon tax.  He is hoping to push this through before the end of the year even though the upper house - the Senate - remains under the control of the Labor Party (ALP) and the Greens until the new Senate is installed in July next year.  The PM is trying to persuade Labor to accept that he has a mandate for the change and that they should accede to his demand for its repeal early in the parliamentary sitting.  Behind his urging is the threat of a double dissolution some time in the new year if Labor does not fall into line.  Labor has so far rejected Abbott's demands.

The government has claimed that the repeal of the carbon tax will lead to a significant fall in electricity prices.  Environment Minister Greg Hunt has  claimed it will save households $3000 over six years.  A recent article by economic journalist Peter Martin (Why cut a nearly undetectable tax?) queries both claims about the impact of the tax and the impact of doing away with it.

But the fate of the carbon tax is only one issue related to climate change that has been in the news lately. The recent disastrous bushfires in NSW - particularly those in the Blue Mountains west of Sydney - have sparked some controversy about whether these fires are related to climate change.

Both Greg Hunt and the Prime Minister have denied that the fires have any connection to climate change.

In disputing the notion that climate change had any relationship to the fires, Mr Hunt claimed that he had checked Wikipedia to establish that bushfires had been frequent in Australia since before European settlement. It is truly astounding that we have a federal Minister claiming Wikipedia as a source of information on which he bases important public statements. It is also astonishing that Hunt dismisses so readily any notion that the extreme weather conditions we are experiencing could be associated with a changing climate.

The head of the United Nations climate change negotiations, Christiana Figueres,  indicated that there was a link between climate change and bushfires such as those raging in Australia, although she conceded that the World Meteorological Organisation had not yet established a direct link.  She stated, "but what is absolutely clear is the science is telling us that there are increasing heat waves in Asia, Europe and Australia; that these will continue in their intensity and frequency."

The Prime Minister refuted any connection between climate change and the bushfires, claiming Ms Figueres was "talking through her hat".   He stated,  "These fires are certainly not a function of climate change, they're a function of life in Australia."

Whether or not the fires can be directly attributed to climate change, it is obvious that weather conditions over a period of months created an extreme fire danger situation.  We had a warm dry winter followed by a much hotter spring than usual with strong winds.

Scientists are telling us that, as the climate warms, we can expect more severe weather, including more frequent, and fiercer, bushfires. That would appear to have been happening in recent years - with the horrific fires in Victoria in 2009, serious fires in Tasmania early last year and  now the fires around Sydney-Newcastle this month.

Ostrich-like behaviour from both the federal Environment Minister, who is responsible for the Government's "Direct Action" plan to reduce carbon emissions, and from the Prime Minister only serves to make them look foolish both in this country and abroad. It certainly does not make climate change go away or lessen the need for an effective response to this very serious issue.