A race against time — Beyond Nuclear International
An ICAN founder dedicates his life to ending nuclear weapons
A grandmother explains the Australian Religious Response to Climate Change
Our Future || Caring for planet is a moral responsibility https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/6244511/caring-for-planet-is-a-moral-responsibility/?cs=14246 Thea Ormerod, 30 June 19
I am a grandmother with eight grandchildren. Sometimes I lie awake at night worrying about how our changing climate is going to affect their future.
I attend the church of Our Lady of Fatima at Kingsgrove.
It was signed by 153 religious leaders from across the spectrum, many of them in very senior roles.
Climate change and the burning of fossil fuels is a moral issue. Saving the world is a spiritual matter. I don’t interpret spiritual as “other worldly”.
Spirituality for me is about being responsible and reasonable, which shows in healthy relationships.
You see the fruits in laughter, peace and kindness towards each other. In his time on earth, Jesus himself was less interested in rules and who was or wasn’t praying.
He was interested in who was caring about people, especially people who are suffering.
Today, the people who have been hit hardest by climate change are mostly in developing countries, and they’ve done nothing to contribute to the problem.
Those suffering most in Australia are largely people in rural and regional areas. They are on the frontline of droughts, bushfires, intense heat and flooding, left grieving for lost herds and ruined crops.
But people in these areas are being sold short by politicians who are not planning for a more sustainable future, which includes an orderly transition away from the mining and burning of fossil fuels.
Many other nations are making big commitments to reduce emissions but Australia is out of step.
Our elected representatives may think politics is not about religion or spirituality. But it is about morality and caring about people.
Tiny nations challenge Australia’s carbon ‘carryover credits’
Tiny nations challenge Australia’s carbon ‘carryover credits’ SMH Peter Hannam, June 30, 20Nations from Senegal to Tuvalu have used a United Nations climate conference to challenge the Morrison government’s use of carbon “carryover credits” to virtually halve Australia’s abatement ambition out to 2030.
The conference that wrapped up at the end of last week in Bonn, Germany, debated among other things, the rules of the Paris Agreement.
The discussions included whether nations including Australia should be allowed to count the surplus it expects to generate during the Kyoto Protocol period that runs to 2020.
On the government’s projections, 328 million tonnes of Australia’s pledged cut of about 695 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent could be met by counting the Kyoto surplus for the Paris pledge over the decade from 2021-2030.
Among the nations that opposed the use of “carryover credits” at the Bonn conference included the Association of Small Island states, including Tuvalu.
South Korea, the European Union and New Zealand were also against using Kyoto surplus, according to Kate Dooley, a researcher with the the Climate and Energy College at the University of Melbourne, who was an observer at the Bonn conference.
“Discussions here in Bonn have made it clear that most countries do not accept the carry-over of Kyoto units into the Paris Agreement,” Dr Dooley said.
“The world’s most vulnerable countries have spoken out to say that accounting tricks, such as those the Australian government intends to use, are not consistent with limiting warming to 1.5 degrees.”
…….. The Bonn talks were largely focused on preparing the rules for Article 6 of the Paris Agreement ahead of a Conference of the Parties (COP25) summit in Santiago, Chile later this year. The article is one of the main unresolved issues from the pact signed in Paris in 2015.
The Carbon Pulse newswire said while the new text agreed at Bonn had the potential to scupper Australia’s plans to use Kyoto credits without a specific prohibition in place they would still be able to be banked.
Still, the newswire quoted Gilles Dufrasne of Carbon Market Watch as raising the issue of how such credits had undermined nations’ abatement efforts.
“We have seen how damaging this has been under the Kyoto Protocol and we cannot afford to repeat the experience under the Paris Agreement,” Mr Dufrasne said. “It is very important that [Kyoto Protocol] units are not allowed for use towards [national targets}.” https://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/tiny-nation-s-challenge-australia-s-carbon-carryover-credits-20190630-p522n0.html
Chernobyl has blown up twice — Beyond Nuclear International
First the reactor, and now the astonishingly good TV series
via Chernobyl has blown up twice — Beyond Nuclear International
Dispute in USA over reclassifying some high level nuclear waste



A top Department of Energy official is fighting what he says are misconceptions about a new policy on which Hanford and other nuclear weapons complex waste must be treated and disposed of to the stringent standards required for high level radioactive waste.
The DOE undersecretary for science, Paul Dabbar, said as of now there is no change proposed for waste handled as high level at Hanford.
“We’re proposing nothing here,” he said. “We don’t have any plans to propose anything in Washington state.”
But key state of Washington officials are not buying his explanation……..
When the new DOE policy on classifying high level waste was announced earlier this month, Washington state Gov. Jay Inslee and Attorney General Bob Ferguson said in a joint statement that all options would be considered to stop “this reckless and dangerous action.”
STATE: HANFORD WASTE COULD BE RECLASSIFIED Continue reading
Chernobyl — daryanenergyblog
HBO’s Chernobyl series has gotten a lot of people talking about that fateful night back in April 1986. While I’ve not seen the series in full yet, I am sufficiently familiar with the accident to know the chain of events. And from what I have seen, they seem to have mostly engaged in a lot […]
June 30 Energy News — geoharvey
Opinion: ¶ “American Farmers Can’t Afford This Administration’s Climate Apathy” • If only American farmers had the luxury of sharing this administration’s indifference to climate change. While millions of farmers are reeling from damage by rapidly shifting weather patterns, Trump’s agriculture chief just advises them to check the weather forecast. [The Hill] ¶ “How James […]
G-20: Trump Deeply Disgraces and Damages the USA with his Fawning Bromance with Putin; Trump Again Refuses to Reveal Discussions with Putin — Mining Awareness +
“Trump deeply disgraces & damages our nation in his fawning bromance with Putin—an engraved invitation to Russian military agents reving up their 2020 machine for hacking, disinformation, deceptive social media & newer weapons of sabotage” (US Senator Blumenthal, 28 June 2019) From US Senator Reed: “Reed: Instead of Joking About Russian Interference in U.S. Elections, […]
Trump Praises Saudi Crown Prince at G-20 Meeting — Mining Awareness +
From VOA News: “Trump Praises Saudi Crown Prince at G-20 Meeting By VOA News June 28, 2019 09:23 PM VOA’s White House Bureau Chief Steve Herman in Osaka, Japan, and Dorian Jones in Istanbul contributed to this report. U.S. President Donald Trump praised Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman as the two met on […]
via Trump Praises Saudi Crown Prince at G-20 Meeting — Mining Awareness +