Residents near Sally’s Flat, NSW, appalled at their area as potential radioactive trash site
Locals frightened by ‘appalling’ prospect of living near nuclear waste dump http://www.abc.net.au/am/content/2015/s4351066.htm Michael Edwards reported this story on Friday, November 13, 2015 Earlier this year landholders were invited to nominate land for the facility that will house almost all of Australia’s nuclear waste material. Sally’s Flat, north of Bathurst in central west New South Wales, is one of the areas that has been short-listed. Locals say they’re appalled at the prospect of living near a nuclear dump.
Michael Edwards reports.
MICHAEL EDWARDS: Twenty-eight landowners nominated their properties as a potential site for a nuclear waste dump. The Federal Government has whittled that list down to six potential areas – three in South Australia, one in the Northern Territory, one in Queensland and one in New South Wales.
Sally’s Flat, in the western New South Wales, is one of the places. It’s an area renowned for producing world-class wool.
LINO ALVAREZ: It’s a very fine place. There’s no industries here as such. Everybody works on the land.
MICHAEL EDWARDS: Lino Alvarez lives in Hill End, the nearest town to Sally’s Flat which is about ten kilometres away. The suggestion the area could be home to a nuclear waste dump scares him.
LINO ALVAREZ: It’s a disgusting proposition that in a lovely part of the world in which people come and enjoy from cities like Sydney, it will be a danger to everything. Continue reading
Govt releases 6 sites short-listed for Lucas Heights nuclear wastes returning from France etc
Six sites shortlisted for Australia’s first permanent nuclear waste dump revealed, SMH November 13, 2015 James Massola Political correspondent
The Turnbull government has finally released a shortlist of six sites that are in the running to host Australia’s first permanent nuclear waste dump for low-level and intermediate waste.
The six sites have been chosen from 28 voluntarily nominated sites around Australia and are at Sallys Flat in NSW, Hale in the Northern Territory, Cortlinye, Pinkawillinie and Barndioota in South Australia and Oman Ama in Queensland.
Following release of the much-anticipated shortlist, locals who live in the six locations will now be consulted over the next four months about what will eventually be a remote, 100-hectare site.
Resources Minister Josh Frydenberg said Australians should embrace the eventual construction of a permanent facility as it would allow Australian to continue to enjoy the benefits of nuclear medicine, for example………
“This is completely independent from the nuclear fuel cycle royal commission process underway in South Australia.”
Australia has the equivalent of about two Olympic-sized swimming pools of low-level nuclear waste at 100 sites across the country and the facility will store this waste, as well as low and intermediate-level radioactive waste from the Lucas Heights facility in Sydney.
The waste includes laboratory items such as paper, plastic and glassware, material from medical treatment and even radioactive soil………
Mr Frydenberg cautioned that under current legislation, “Australia can’t take another country’s waste” and thus, the possible expansion of the industry was not at this stage possible.
Australian-produced waste that had been sent to France, the US and Britain between 1996 and 2009 is due to be returned to Australia under international agreement, with a load from France currently enroute back to Australia and due to arrive at Port Kembla later this month. http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/six-sites-shortlisted-for-australias-first-permanent-nuclear-waste-dump-revealed-20151112-gkx8mo.html
Australian govt avoiding opposition from Aboriginals, as it selects nuclear waste dump sites
Is the Australian government in a hurry to reassure Sydney residents about the nuclear waste dump, and also scared of the potential powerful opposition by Aboriginal people? Australia is contractually bound to take back these wastes from France.
Native titles extinguished Significantly, native title has been extinguished on all the shortlisted sites.
Six areas make shortlist for nuclear waste storage, AFR, by Laura Tingle, 13 Nov 15, South Australia appears to be the most likely home for nuclear waste storage after the Turnbull government shortlisted six sites for a facility to store low-level radioactive waste.
Resources Minister Josh Frydenberg unveiled the list of six sites arising from a process in which landowners voluntarily nominated their land. A final decision is expected by the end of next year after long community consultations.
The six shortlisted sites are at locations near Sally’s Flat in NSW; Hale in the Northern Territory; Cortlinye, Pinkawillinie and Barndioota in South Australia; and Oman Ama in Queensland….
The federal low-level waste storage proposal is separate from the [South Australia Nuclear Fuel Chain Royal Commission] scheme originally raised by a nuclear energy inquiry commissioned by the Howard government – and recently canvassed by Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull – that would see Australian uranium exported and ultimately brought back as high-level waste…….. Continue reading
Australian govt: slap in the face for its own Standing Committee, on uranium sales to India
Australia Ignores Red Light On Uranium Exports To India, http://www.huffingtonpost.com.au/dave-sweeney/government-fails-india-ur_b_8547542.html?utm_hp_ref=australia Huffington Post, Dave Sweeney 13/11/2015, The federal government has delivered a stiff slap in the face to due process and evidence-based policy development by ignoring an unambiguous red light on planned uranium sales to India.
It was only two months ago that the Joint Standing Committee on Treaties delivered a well-considered report into the controversial plan to sell Australian uranium to India. The government-controlled Committee identified a number of practical steps needed to address safety, security and legal uncertainty around the deal.
Importantly the committee’s report clearly recommended against uranium sales at this time or under the current terms of the Australia-India Nuclear Co-operation Agreement, and outlined a series of pre-conditions required before any future sales to India.
These include the full separation of military and civil nuclear facilities, the establishment of an independent nuclear regulatory authority, a review of the adequacy and independence of the regulatory framework, IAEA verification that inspections of nuclear facilities are of best practice standard, improved decommissioning and radioactive waste planning and more.
But, earlier this week, the government chose to ignore these recommendations — emphatically stating that “the Government does not accept the Committee’s recommendation that exports of uranium to India should be deferred.” Continue reading
Australia’s obligations to Pacific climate migrants
Australia must not be afraid of its obligations to Pacific climate migrants, Guardian,
Richard Marles, 12 Nov 15 Australia’s humanitarian intake is from distant countries; as climate change leads some islanders to migrate, that will change. So must our approach “……While land is a necessary precondition for life, people live on these atolls because of the sea. It is the source of food, culture and legend. These are marine people whose ancient understanding of the wind and the waves still often transcends what modern equipment has to offer.
Yet as the greenhouse effect starts to take hold these winds are beginning to change. Predictable weather patterns in equatorial environments which produced constant temperatures, regular rains and seasonal storms are no longer behaving. Life is being disturbed.
Of all the climate change threats to coral atolls the most pressing is water security. On Tarawa atoll in Kiribati, half the fresh ground water supply is now permanently salty.
On Funafuti in Tuvalu there is no groundwater, which leaves people dependent on water tanks next to their homes – many of which have been provided by Australian aid. But even with extra tanks the water supply of the atoll amounts to about six weeks worth of water.
In November 2011 reduced rainfall brought the atoll to a point where the water supply was down to just a few days. Drastic water restrictions were imposed which essentially allowed for little more than the bare minimum of drinking water. Australian and New Zealand mercy flights had to airlift an emergency supply of water on to the island.
This community had lived on the atoll for centuries relying on highly predicable rainfall in order to have a supply of fresh water. Just a small shift in weather patterns had suddenly overwhelmed even the enhanced infrastructure to a point where there was almost no water. When winds and rain change, the conditions of life are thrown into question.
This question raises another for Australia. Kiribati and Tuvalu are in a region where Australia has enormous influence and great obligations. We are for both countries the natural development partner and by far the largest aid donor. In large measure it is this work which sits atop our calling card as a good global citizen. And we derive much from that reputation.
If climate change is beginning to raise the existential question in the Pacific then this also has implications for our obligations.
To be sure, the desire for the peoples of the Pacific to migrate because of climate change will not happen tomorrow. The focus of all these communities right now is naturally on how they maintain their homes, lives and cultures. And currently they see the critical role for Australia as playing its part in reducing greenhouse emissions and in supporting them with adaptation efforts.
But if climate change is placing the viability of communities in question, then inevitably some people will move as a result. So Australia being a destination for climate change migrants surely has to be up for discussion……..http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/nov/11/australia-must-not-be-afraid-of-its-obligations-to-pacific-climate-migrants
Australia’s ’empty promises’ on phasing out fossil fuel subsidies
Australia making ’empty promises’ on phasing out fossil fuel subsidies: report, SMH, Lucy Cormack November 12, 2015 Environment Reporter Australia and its fellow G20 nations are “paying fossil fuel producers to undermine their own policies on climate change”, a British think tank says.
In a report released on Thursday, the Overseas Development Institute questioned why the Australian government continued to provide more than $5 billion a year to support fossil fuel production, despite a G20 commitment to phase out subsidies six years ago.
The report, titled Empty Promises: G20 subsidies to oil, gas and coal production, comes ahead of the G20 summit in Turkey on November 15, and says that G20 governments collectively spend more than $640 billion a year to support the production of fossil fuels – almost four times the total of global subsidies for renewable energy.
“The G20 committed for the first time in 2009 to phase out fossil fuel subsidies. Six years later, very little has happened,” said Shelagh Whitley of the Overseas Development Institute, which jointly published the report with US-based Oil Change International.
According to the report, “production subsidies” are national subsidies delivered through direct spending and tax breaks, investments by majority state-owned enterprises and public finance from majority government-owned banks and institutions.
The report specifically excludes support to consumption of fossil fuels and consumption of fossil fuel-based electricity.
“We’ve done this work to focus on production subsidies, because [they] are what is driving the exploitation of reserves that we know we have to keep in the ground to avoid dangerous climate change,” Ms Whitley said.
“We’re putting this inventory together – which we shouldn’t really be doing, it should be governments doing it themselves … It’s potentially a precedent for what governments can do and it allows policy makers looking at this for reform.”
The report placed Russia at the top of the list for production subsidies, averaging around $23 billion each year, followed by the US providing more than $20 billion, Britain providing $9 billion, China giving just over $3 billion and Brazil about $5 billion.
“Without government support for production and wider fossil fuel subsidies, large swaths of today’s fossil fuel development would be even less profitable,” the report said, pointing to the Isaac Plains mine in the Bowen Basin of northern Queensland, which, valued at $628 million in 2012, sold for $1 in June this year.
Australian Conservation Foundation economist Matthew Rose said the report’s findings about Australia were shocking but unsurprising.
“It’s in the budget every year. The fuel tax credit scheme is a majority of that money, but it’s usually over $5 billion every year that we use to subsidise fuel of large corporations,” he said.
“Malcolm Turnbull, Greg Hunt and Julie Bishop can go to the Paris climate conference and say what they like, but looking ahead if they haven’t started phasing out subsidies in the budget in May and if they haven’t laid out a plan for what is happening to renewables past 2020, there is a problem.”
The Australian Conservation Foundation estimates that federal budget handouts that encourage pollution will amount to $47 billion in the four years between 2014-15 and 2017-18………. http://www.smh.com.au/environment/australia-making-empty-promises-on-phasing-out-fossil-fuel-subsidies-report-20151111-gkwbrb.html#ixzz3rKHM7RZj
UCL Australia – key player/driver in South Australia nuclear push
“University College London’s International Energy Policy Institute (IEPI), based at its Australia campus in Adelaide, undertakes economic, regulatory and policy research on how Australia could develop a nuclear energy industry and manage its externalities, including decommissioning and waste.”
UCL Australia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UCL_Australia 10 Nov 2015
UCL Australia is an international campus of the University College London, located on Victoria Square in Adelaide, South Australia.
Industry partnerships
UCL Australia has key corporate partnerships with two major resource and energy companies operating in South Australia: Santos and BHP Billiton. Santos’ South Australian interests include onshore and offshore oil and gas developments while BHP Billiton’s interest is concentrated on the expansion of the Olympic Dam mine- the world’s largest known deposit of uranium.
International Energy Policy Institute
The International Energy Policy Institute (IEPI) is housed on the Adelaide campus of University College London, Australia. In 2011, UCL signed a five-year $10 million partnership with BHP Billiton to establish the International Energy Policy Institute in Adelaide and an Institute for Sustainable Resources in London. Continue reading
Malcolm Turnbull all tied up over Climate Change and Paris Conference
Malcolm Turnbull: Verbal acrobatics required for Paris climate 
talks, Independent Australia, 8 November 2015, Malcolm Turnbull will need to utilise his obvious talent for rhetoric to convince a global audience at the Paris climate talks in November, as there is no substance to the Government’s “Direct Action” climate policy, says Noel Wauchope.
Australia’s new Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has an appealing and glib turn of phrase. He’s going to need that talent when he speaks at the United Nations Paris Climate Conference in late November.
The thing is, Malcolm has to sell to the conference Australia’s current policy on climate change. The Government’s “Direct Action” climate policy is unchanged, despite the departure of climate sceptic Tony Abbott. Its flagship is the Emissions Reduction Fund (ERF).
The ERF boils down to tax-payer handouts to polluting companies that volunteer to cut their greenhouse emissions. There is no enforcement policy, meaning that the companies get the money, and for a year or more, do not need to show that they have reduced emissions.
After a year, the government proposes a ‘safeguards mechanism’, to be explained fully then, so allowing the companies plenty of leeway to lobby to make it meaningless. ……..
What happened to Turnbull? Mark Kenny & James Massola wrote in The Age in February:
‘Amid feverish speculation over the leadership, unconfirmed reports also claimed Mr Turnbull had moved to assuage fears in the conservative wing of the party that his return to the leadership would see a reprise of the carbon tax or an emissions trading scheme. It was claimed Mr Turnbull had promised, in a secret deal, that there would be no such reprise if elected.’
More recently, Kenny expressed it in this way:
‘Turnbull has his hands tied, having lost the leadership in 2009 to Abbott for supporting emissions trading, and then having regained it in 2015 on the express condition of opposing it. Release from such Houdini-esque chains will take some doing.’…….
Turnbull’s support for nuclear waste dumping in Australia might go down okay at the Paris talks. There will be a strong push there for nuclear power to be portrayed as cure for a climate change. At present, “new nuclear” is hamstrung in the U.S. because there has to be a waste solution before it can go ahead. ……
However, to persuade the world on Australia’s entire climate inaction package is a task that will demand Turnbull’s very best linguistic acrobatics.
Malcolm Turnbull faces an epic task to keep faith with Liberal Coalition climate denialists, while making Australia’s pathetic climate policy look at all reasonable to the global audience. https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/malcolm-turnbull-verbal-acrobatics-required-at-the-paris-climate-talks,8356
Why interim storage at Lucas Heights is the least worst solution for returning nuclear wastes.
Dave Sweeney, Australian Conservation Foundation, 9 Nov 15 Last week Natalie Wasley (BNI) and myself spent a few days talking to a range of stakeholders in Sydney and Sutherland Shire and this note seeks to provide some context for the ENGO response to this development.
The BBC Shanghai left the French port of Cherbourg in mid-October carrying twenty five tonnes of Australian origin intermediate level waste returning here after reprocessing in France.
There has been controversy about the shipment, including safety and capacity concerns raised by Greenpeace about the vessel and a statement from the Indonesia’s Maritime Security Board that it can not pass through Indonesian waters. There is sure to be more domestic and international media attention when it arrives in Port Kembla (Wollongong), expected to be in early December.
After arrival in Kembla it is planned that the waste – which is in solid form inside a special transport container – will be moved by road to the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation’s Lucas Heights reactor facility in southern Sydney.
Some local residents are/will be calling for this material to not be stored in Sydney – this is an understandable response, but it is not one supported by the wider national nuclear free movement and key civil society partners.
We advocate that extended interim storage at Lucas Heights is the current least worst option as:
- ANSTO is already both the continuing producer of and home to the vast majority of Australia’s higher level radioactive waste
- ANSTO has certain tenure, a secure perimeter and is monitored 24/7 by Australian federal police
- Storing the waste at ANSTO means the waste will be actively managed as operations at the site are licensed for a further three decades – it also keeps waste management on the radar of the facility/people with the highest concentration of nuclear expertise and radiation response capacity in Australia
- Since the government realised in 2012 that the planned national waste dump at Muckaty would not be in place prior to the return of this waste, ANSTO has constructed and commissioned a new purpose built on site storage shed dedicated to housing this waste
- Extended interim storage at ANSTO helps reduce the political pressure to rush to find a ‘remote’ out of sight, out of mind dump site and increases the chances of advancing responsible management
- Storage at ANSTO has been publicly identified as a credible and feasible option by ANSTO, the nuclear industry lobby group, the Australian Nuclear Association and the federal nuclear regulator, the Australian Radiation and Nuclear Safety Agency (ARPANSA)
Importantly, this approach also provides the ability to have a circuit breaker in this long running issue in the form of an evidence based and open review of the best longer term management options.
Nothing about the nuclear industry, especially nuclear waste, is clean or uncomplicated and some in the wider community might be critical of this position.
However we believe that extended interim storage is the least worst approach and that coupled with a sustained ENGO call for a wider public review, is the path that is most likely to usefully advance the debate about future management options.
There is also an unusually high level of common acceptance that storage at Lucas Heights is the best option in the current circumstances – as well as ENGO’s this view is shared by the Sutherland Shire Council, local Greens and environmentalists, ANSTO and the Maritime Union.
Given this, pending a safety inspection upon the ship’s arrival, we do not forsee protest action aimed at disrupting the transfer of this waste from the Port to ANSTO – we want to see that happen with as low risk as possible. There are plans for a peaceful presence to witness the arrival and transfer and convey that while we (reluctantly) accept the need for this transport to occur we will not accept these shipments becoming routine and will actively resist moves to impose a national waste dump on remote communities or develop international waste dumps/storage in Australia.
Clearly this is an important message to convey in the context of the South Australian Nuclear Royal Commission and recent comments by PM Turnbull and other senior Coalition figures.
There is also both a real opportunity and need for a clear social and wider media profile at this time on the need for an open review of the best ways to manage this material and to end/reduce its production.
Nuclear fuel leasing – not economically viable for Australia
When nuclear reactors shut (as they are doing in USA) – where is the income stream to pay Australia for having all that radioactive trash?
Proponents are talking up the billions that might be made by swallowing our pride and making Australia the world’s nuclear waste dump. But they have been silent about the costs.
And the waste would need to be monitored and problems addressed for millenia
Wasting Australia’s Future: Why We Shouldn’t Become The World’s Nuclear Waste Dump, New Matilda, By Dr Jim Green on November 9, 2015 There are many good reasons why Australia should not set its sights on becoming a dumping ground for nuclear waste. Dr Jim Green takes up the case.
While sceptical about the prospects for nuclear power in Australia, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has given cautious support to the idea of a nuclear fuel leasing industry in Australia. Such an industry would involve uranium mining, conversion (to uranium hexafluouride), enrichment (increasing the ratio of uranium-235 to uranium-238), fuel fabrication, and disposal of the high-level nuclear waste produced by the use of nuclear fuel in power reactors overseas.
In the Prime Minister’s words: “We have got the uranium, we mine it, why don’t we process it, turn it into the fuel rods, lease it to people overseas, when they are done, we bring them back and we have got stable, very stable geology in remote locations and a stable political environment.”
Regardless of its merits, a nuclear leasing industry is an economic non-starter. That much is clear from the data provided in the latest edition of the International Atomic Energy Agency’s Nuclear Technology Review. Uranium miners could be compelled to participate in an Australian nuclear leasing industry. But try telling that to BHP Billiton. The company bluntly stated in its submission to the 2006 Switkowski Review: “BHP Billiton believes that there is neither a commercial nor a non-proliferation case for it to become involved in front-end processing or for mandating the development of fuel leasing services in Australia.”
And there’s no point appealing to the patriotic fervour of Australia’s uranium miners: they are majority foreign-owned. Continue reading
Australia’s demonstrated incompetence on dealing with radioactive trash
Wasting Australia’s Future: Why We Shouldn’t Become The World’s Nuclear Waste Dump, New Matilda, By Dr Jim Green on November 9, 201 “…….Is there any reason to believe that Australia would manage a deep underground repository any more responsibly than the US? No.
Is there any reason to believe that things might be worse in Australia? Yes.
The US has a wealth of nuclear expertise at its disposal; Australia has comparatively little.
Moreover, Australia has its own sordid history dealing with long-lived nuclear waste. In the late-1990s, the Australian government carried out a clean-up of the Maralinga nuclear test site. It was done on the cheap and many tonnes of plutonium-contaminated debris remain buried in shallow, unlined pits in totally unsuitable geology.
A number of scientists with inside knowledge of the Maralinga project publicly noted their concerns. Nuclear engineer Alan Parkinson said of the ‘clean up’: “What was done at Maralinga was a cheap and nasty solution that wouldn’t be adopted on white-fellas land.”
US scientist Dale Timmons said the government’s technical report was littered with “gross misinformation”. Geoff Williams, an officer with the Commonwealth nuclear regulator ARPANSA, said the ‘clean up’ was beset by a “host of indiscretions, short-cuts and cover-ups”. Nuclear physicist Prof. Peter Johnston said there were “very large expenditures and significant hazards resulting from the deficient management of the project”.
Barely a decade after the Maralinga ‘clean-up’, a survey revealed that 19 of the 85 contaminated debris pits have been subject to erosion or subsidence.
Australia’s demonstrated incompetence feeds back into the economic debate. Some − perhaps many − countries would surely think twice about entrusting nuclear waste to a country that has already proven that it is not up to the task.https://newmatilda.com/2015/11/09/wasting-australias-future-why-we-shouldnt-become-the-worlds-nuclear-waste-dump/
Costs of new nuclear, high, higher and astronomic
You’ll never guess how much this Australian nuclear power plant will cost, http://www.bizjournals.com/pittsburgh/blog/energy/2015/11/youll-never-guess-how-much-this-australian-nuclear.html Matt Stroud, energy reporter for the Pittsburgh Business Times. Nov 6, 2015 A nuclear power plant has never been built in Australia before, but Westinghouse is putting a price tag on a new one they’re hoping to build there.
The price? About $12.3 billion.
Australian state of South Australia should build the nation’s first nuclear power plant — Westinghouse executive Rita Bowser said that price was all inclusive, according to The Advertiser in Adelaide, South Australia. It would include land, environmental safeguards and construction.Australia has zero nuclear power plants — and is known for being extremely averse to nuclear energy; it won’t even allow nuclear ships into its ports.
The historical aversion won’t affect the price much, apparently; the company’s guesstimate is in line with its current Vogtle project in Georgia, which has been plagued by cost overruns. It’s less than a comparable Chinese project, set to cost $24 billion. And it’s cheap in comparison to a project proposed in Johannesburg that could cost $100 billion.
The South Australia project’s future is fluid at the moment: the Nuclear Royal Commission hasn’t even decided whether it wants to recommend a nuclear facility.
That decision is set to come in May 2016. Tokyo-based Toshiba Corp. (TYO: 6502) owns 87 percent of the Cranberry-based Westinghouse Electric Co.
Banks NAB and CBA support climate action (but watch out for nuclear investment)
This is a good start. But use of the words “low carbon”always needs to be taken with a grain of salt, as it is often code for “nuclear”
Would these banks back nuclear power as a “low carbon” option?
Banking On Climate Action, NAB And Commonwealth Bank Move To Support Paris Talks, New Matilda, By Thom Mitchell on November 6, 2015 The move has drawn praise from green groups, who are still warning both institutions need to back away from investments in coal. Thom Mitchell reports.
Two of Australia’s biggest banks stepped up their commitments to climate action, outlining how they will support the international push to limit the rise in average global temperatures to two degrees or less ahead of a major United Nations summit in Paris this December.
The Commonwealth and National Australia Banks confirmed they support the two degree target, with NAB even going as far as to committing to spending at least $18 billion by 2022 “to help address climate change and support the transition to a low carbon economy”. “NAB believes the financial sector has an important role to play in assisting the transition to a low carbon economy, through both the energy we purchase directly and through financing,” the institution said in a statement.
The $18 billion will be spent on “new lending, debt market activity, provision of risk management products, development of financing solutions and advisory activity”.
“Finance will be provided to our customers to undertake climate change mitigation such as renewable energy and energy efficiency including low carbon property, low emission transport, and climate change adaptation activities,” the statement reads. Continue reading
Trans Pacific Partnership final text confirms fears of critics
TPP Environment Fears Confirmed By Final Text https://newmatilda.com/2015/11/06/tpp-environment-fears-confirmed-by-final-text/
By Thom Mitchell on November 6, 2015 The content of the TPP is finally known, and it appears to be as bad as critics feared. Thom Mitchell reports.
The Trans Pacific Partnership leaves the door open for corporations to inhibit the ability of governments to legislate for environmental protection, critics of the biggest free trade deal in history said after the release of the final text yesterday.
Like many trade deals, the TPP includes ‘Investor State Dispute Settlement’ clauses which allow multinational corporations to sue governments in trade tribunals outside of national judiciaries if laws are passed that risk their profits. According to Dr Mathew Rimmer, a Professor of Intellectual Property and Innovation law at the Queensland University of Technology, “They have given foreign investors very broad ranging powers to go into investment tribunals to make complaints about decisions by government that affect their foreign investments.”
“There are some clauses there dealing with protection of the environment…and the right to regulate, but they aren’t absolute defences,” Dr Rimmer said.
The Executive Director of America’s influential Sierra Club, Michael Brune, said the fact that “the words ‘climate change’ don’t even appear in the text [is] a dead giveaway that this isn’t a 21st-century trade deal”.
“It sets us back further, empowering fossil fuel corporations to challenge our public health and climate safeguards in unaccountable trade tribunals while increasing dirty fossil fuel exports and fracking,” Brune said.
Over more than half a decade, the deal was negotiated in secret between 12 ‘Pacific Rim’ countries, including Australia, the United States, Canada, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Chile, Singapore, Vietnam and Brunei.
Adelaide’s January heatwave attributed to climate change
The findings are reported in the fourth issue of the American Meteorological Society’s report into extreme weather. The report looked at 33 extreme weather events around the world and analysed which could be attributed to human activity and which were the result of natural variability in weather patterns.
As David Mark reports, detecting the human hand in climate change is a developing area of climate science.
Continue reading
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