Climate change making Australia’s hot spells even more costly
Severe heat costs the Australian economy US$6.2 billion a year, New Scientist, May 2015 by Michael Slezak Heat stress costs the Australian economy a whopping US$6.2 billion a year – a finding that shows what other countries might be facing in areas where global warming will make extremely hot days more common. Continue reading
Next Australian stock exchange winner could be renewable energy
Could Renewable Energy be the Next Big ASX Winner? Money Morning 5 May 15 On Wednesday, Infratech Industries announced their intention to list on the ASX. It’s a bold move for the fledgling renewables company, which was established in April 2012.
The company is behind the $17.5 million floating solar panels project currently being expanded in South Australia. They say their tracking and cooling technology produces 57% more power than land-based solar panels. It’s a big deal for the entire solar industry.
Chief executive Raj Nellore says that soon, more capital will be required to keep up with demand. Of listing on the ASX, he said ‘once we get to a certain size, [it] makes sense’.
Infratech has partnered up with the Centre for NanoScale Science and Technology at Flinders University (CNST) for research. CNST has backing from the South Australian state government. So their funding — and the partnership with Infratech — is subject to budget changes.
There are other forces that might pressure Infratech to go public sooner rather than later. For example, they may need to raise money to expand their US operations too. Their US entity was opened in June 2014. They signed their first US customer — the City of Holtville, California — in November. That’s pretty much all they’ve done there.
Whenever they do float, they won’t be alone. A small group of renewable energy companies are already listed on the ASX.
Which renewable energy companies are currently on the ASX?
Wave power Carnegie Wave Energy [ASX:CWE] ………
Solar Dyesol [ASX:DYE] ……Enviromission [ASX:EVM]……..
Geothermal The Raya Group [ASX:RYG]……http://www.moneymorning.com.au/20150505/could-renewable-energy-be-the-next-big-asx-winner-cw.html
Greens leader Christine Milne steps down
Christine Milne resigns as Greens leader, will not contest 2016 election, SMH May 6, 2015 – Lisa Cox National political reporter The Greens will elect a new leader on Wednesday morning after Christine Milne revealed she would not contest the 2016 election and resigned as party leader……………
May 5 closing date for Nominations from landowners to host nuclear waste
South Australia, Western Australia, Victoria and the Northern Territory have legislation in place prohibiting the storage of radioactive waste from outside the state or territory. This means that the legality of nominations coming from these states or territories is compromised. The Federal Government, however, calls onto all Australian landowners fulfilling the criteria to submit applications, as the National Radioactive Waste Management Act 2012 allows the Minister to override state legislation if conflict arises. The question is just how voluntary the siting would be in that case, given that it undermines democratically made decisions?event of an accident) or indirectly affected
Let’s hope the opportunity to deal with radioactive waste won’t be wasted, SBS, Over the coming weeks and months we will find out whether the Federal Government’s new approach to finding a radioactive waste storage and disposal site will be more successful than past efforts. By Anica Niepraschk 1 MAY 2015 -Australia does not produce any high-level radioactive waste. It does however produce moderate amounts of low-level waste that could be disposed of in a shallow repository to be monitored for several hundred years, and long-lived intermediate-level waste that will need to be carefully managed for some thousands of years.
After more than 20 years of flawed and failed attempts to impose a dump on communities in South Australia and the Northern Territory, the Government has finally realised that a matter of such importance and extraordinary risks can’t be imposed on communities but has to be the result of a voluntary process.
In March, Industry Minister Ian McFarlane called on landowners across Australia to nominate their land to host a radioactive waste management facility. The two-month nomination period ends this Tuesday, May 5, which could give a first indication on where the Government is heading with its new approach.
It is worth having a look at how the process is set out and if it is really as voluntary as the Government claims. Continue reading
Environment Minister Greg Hunt’s hype about “Direct Action” doesn’t ring true
Greg Hunt hasn’t a lot to show for $660m spent on reducing greenhouse emissions, Guardian, Lenore Taylor, 1 May 15
While the environment minister is proclaiming a ‘stunning’ result, the money mostly went on projects begun under the previous government
Last week the government spent $660m to reduce Australia’s expected greenhouse emissions by 47m tonnes – a result the environment minister, Greg Hunt, described as “stunning” and one starry-eyed commentator suggested was so completely amazing it may have won the next election for the coalition.
So what stunning things did we get for our money? Did we start to transform our economy so we use less fossil fuel in the future? Did we buy lasting change? Not a lot. Mostly we spent it on making sure that projects begun under the former government kept going…….http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/may/01/greg-hunt-660m-spent-reducing-greenhouse-emissions
Recycling of rare earths – an industry already under way
Recycling gives old electronics new life JAMIE DUNCAN AAP MAY 01, 2015 Herald Sun
IMAGINE a world in which billions of dollars of gold, silver, platinum and other precious metals are thrown into a pit like rubbish.
IT seems unlikely, but it’s happening now at landfills around the globe.
- A recent United Nations University report found consumers threw out 41.8 million tonnes of unwanted electronics, or e-waste, in 2014 but recycled only 6.5 million tonnes.That discarded e-waste included an estimated $US52 billion ($A65.78 billion) of precious and other metals.Rose Read, recycling manager with MobileMuster (MobileMuster), says recycling components from e-waste is good for the economy and the environment.”The benefits are massive, and not just in terms of dollar value, but also the environmental benefits of slowing the rate of mining,” Ms Read told AAP.”The amount of energy it takes to recover product materials from a mobile phone is a tenth of digging them up.”MobileMuster is a federal government-accredited product stewardship scheme funded voluntarily by a range of mobile phone manufacturers and retailers that collects unwanted mobiles to recycle components.A similar scheme operates for end-of-life televisions.Consumer thirst for the latest technology is forcing the need to recycle e-waste, Ms Read said…….
- Recycling e-waste entails significant costs, hence the need for industry-funded stewardship schemes, but Ms Read says Australia could build a new, self-sustaining e-waste industry.
- Already, a lead smelter in South Australia is considering expanding to recycle circuit boards locally rather than send them overseas, she said.”There is a whole range of opportunities to create a new industry and employment,” she said.”A lot of new jobs could come out of this. There is some innovative new technology that we can use.”
A warning about paid trolls on social media
Already, trolls on Twitter have been running a scurrilous campaign against Dr Helen Caldicott. I believe that these Twitter trolls are Australia, and not connected with NASA or similar organisations. Their abusive tweets are so sill and insulting that I doubt that a serious agency would use them.
Internet Trolls May be Trained Government Agents According to Leaked Document Health Impact News Editor, 3 May 15 Glenn Greenwald, a journalist, constitutional lawyer, commentator, and author of three New York Times best-selling books on politics and law, has been working with NBC News in publishing a series of articles on how covert government agents infiltrate the Internet to “manipulate, deceive, and destroy reputations.”The information is based on documents leaked by National Security Agency (NSA) whistleblower Edward Snowden. Greenwald’s article, How Covert Agents Infiltrate the Internet to Manipulate, Deceive, and Destroy Reputations, is based on four classified documents produced by the British spy agency GCHQ, and presented to the NSA and three other English speaking agencies reportedly part of “The Five Eyes Alliance.”
In this shocking piece, Greenwald publishes a copy of a spy training manual used entitled: “The Art of Deception: Training for Online Covert Operations.” Greenwald writes that agencies like the NSA are “attempting to control, infiltrate, manipulate, and warp online discourse, and in doing so, are compromising the integrity of the internet itself.” Greenwald writes: Continue reading
Australian Labor Party to roll over on nuclear policy and become indistinguishable from Liberal
AUDIO Labor set to debate expanding Australia’s role in the global nuclear fuel cycle http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/breakfast/labor-set-to-debate-expanding-australias-role/6436276 1 May 2015 More uranium mining, more Australian involvement in the global nuclear fuel cycle, and the potential for taking back spent Australian nuclear fuel.
With the prospect of bi-partisan support, these options are all on the table with moves to free up the Labor Party’s nuclear policy at the ALP National Conference in Melbourne in July.
Labor in South Australia is already considering its nuclear options, with a Royal Commission set up earlier this year.
The nuclear re-think here in Australia comes as national nuclear societies meet in France over coming days to sign a Nuclear for Climate declaration.
What Australia’s nuclear lobby is most worried about
Pro nuclear Submissions for the Draft Terms of Reference for South Australia’s Nuclear Royal Commission gives an insight into the preoccupations of Australia’s nuclear lobby.
Dennis Matthews, of South Australia, took the trouble to analyse the themes raised in pro nuclear submissions.
The overwhelming concern of the nuclear lobby appears to be – the need to win over the public to supporting the nuclear industry – the necessity of “educating” the public. (It struck me that their idea of education might be similar to British tobacco’s idea of informing the public of the benefits of cigarette smoking.)
The second most important topic was the benefits of “Generation IV nuclear technology”, particularly Small Modular Recators. (They don’t even exist yet – but never mind)
Way behind these two topics, were arguments for the nuclear industry on grounds of economics, politics, locations for reactors, waste disposal, need to change Australia’s laws, and fixing climate change.
A very few submissions dealt with (in this order) military advantages, radiation no real threat, energy demand, Australia’s international role, benefits to Aborigines, expertise, and medical uses.
So I guess we can expect that the first onslaught of the pro nuclear campaign will be an allout publicity and “educational” effort – no doubt supported by a sycophantic media, and by educational institutions who know which side their bread is buttered.
ISSUES RAISED BY THE PRO-NUCLEAR SUBMISSIONS TO THE
DRAFT TERMS OF REFERENCE
SCARCE COMMISSION INTO EXPANDING THE NUCLEAR INDUSTRY Continue reading
Thousands rally across Australia against closure of Indigenous communities
Melbourne city centre blocked by protests over closure of Indigenous communities – as it happened, Guardian, Helen Davidson @heldavidson 1 May 15 [excellent report and pictures]
Thousands of people joined rallies in towns and cities around Australia and overseas to protest against threatened withdrawal of funding from remote communities Tens of thousands have attended reportedly peaceful rallies across Australia and New Zealand, protesting against the threat of closure of remote communities in Western Australia.
The largest rallies in Melbourne and Sydney began at 4pm, severely disrupting Friday peak hour traffic. The Melbourne rally blocked a major intersection and Flinders st Station. Protesters intend to move to Kings Domain where they will set up a makeshift camp for two nights.
Some protesters in Sydney have moved on to the Redfern Aboriginal tent embassy after thousands walked down Sydney’s George St, delaying some public transport.
Between 500 and 1000 attended a Perth rally, as well as thousands more across Sydney, Canberra, Darwin, Adelaide, Alice Springs, and 1,000 in four New Zealand cities. …..http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/live/2015/may/01/protests-at-proposed-closure-of-remote-indigenous-communities-live
Liberal MP Dan Tehan dares question Abbott strategy on Renewable Energy Target
Renewable energy target: Liberal MP Dan Tehan pushes for higher RET to end political stalemate, save jobs ABC TV 7.30 By Sabra Lane and Lucy Barbour A Liberal
MP is urging the Government to settle on a higher renewable energy target (RET) to prevent further job losses across the sector.
Companies from the trade-exposed energy intensive industry and the clean energy sector have told 7.30 they want the major parties to settle on a final target of 33,000 gigawatt hours (GWh).
The Member for Wannon, Dan Tehan, agrees and believes the Government should resolve the impasse swiftly. “[My constituents] have been saying that politics is put in front of jobs and what I have been reassuring them is that, as far as I’m concerned, what I want to see is jobs put before politics,” Mr Tehan told 7.30.
The RET mandates that 20 per cent of all Australia’s energy come from renewable sources by 2020.
The current target is legislated at 41,000 GWh, but electricity demand has dropped dramatically in recent years, meaning the amount generated will far exceed 20 per cent.
It is why the Coalition and Labor have been at loggerheads for months over what the target should be.
The Coalition will not budge from 32,000 GWh, while Labor is fixed on 33,500 GWh.
Businesses in ‘state of limbo’ as result of impasse
The community of Portland, in south-west Victoria, is fed up with the political stone-throwing and the latest push for agreement has been pushed by two of the region’s key businesses, Keppel Prince Engineering and Portland Aluminium.
Both companies rely on the RET debate being resolved to prevent further job losses.
The general manager of Keppel Prince, Steve Garner, said his company — which builds wind turbine towers — is in a “state of limbo”………….http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-04-30/liberal-mp-pushes-for-higher-ret-target-to-end-political-impasse/6435712
Abbott govt’s unreasonable delaying on decision about Renewable Energy target
a year and half has passed since the government set about reviewing a policy that they had made no mention of planning to cut during their election campaign. A review of the scheme had only just been concluded 12 months prior, saying no need to change it and no need to review it again.
So a few months later, and after spending several hundred thousand dollars, they find out what the earlier review had concluded. This scheme does not significantly increase household electricity bills, in fact if cut it is most likely to increase electricity bills.
But they decide they want to cut the scheme nonetheless
It has become a complete farce. Industry Minister Ian Macfarlane’s story for why he couldn’t accept lower cuts to the target have changed every few weeks.
Can Dan Tehan get Abbott to stop playing games over renewable energy?, Climate Spectator, TRISTAN EDIS 1 MAY, Backbench Liberal MP Dan Tehan’s seat of Wannon in southwest Victoria is probably suffering the most from the government’s decision to throw the future state of the Renewable Energy Target into uncertain turmoil.
His seat has one of the best land-based wind resources available in the world with a major power transmission line running right through the middle of it. There’s already several hundred megawatts of wind power capacity built, but also several thousand megawatts proposed in the area.
Meanwhile in the struggling town of Portland with high unemployment, one of Australia’s leading wind tower manufacturers and also wind servicing businesses, Keppel Prince, lays largely idle.
Construction of the wind farms proposed in the area would provide a very large employment boost to a region that badly needs it, while also providing a significant new income stream for local farmers that host the turbines.
His appearance on the ABC’s 7.30 Report last night clearly reflected an incredible degree of frustration with his own government’s lack of interest in giving the wind industry the regulatory stability required for it to come out of its coma…….. Continue reading
Australia’s coal lobby blamed for stalling the uranium deal with India
Is Australian coal-lobby blocking uranium deal with India?, Economic Times By IANS | 1 May, 2015, By Rekha Bhattacharjee SYDNEY: After India signed a deal with Canada on uranium imports during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Ottawa, questions are being raised as to why it has taken Canberra so long to clinch a similar pact.
While there are 1,300 mining firms in Australia, production is dominated by very large firms such as BHP Billiton, Rio Tinto, Xtrata,Shell Ch .. …
Australians heard the social media call from Aborigines threatened with removal from their lands
Family harnesses power of social media to drive protests against forced closures of Aboriginal communities, ABC Lateline By Ginny Stein 1 May 15 Pressure is growing across Australia against plans by West Australian Premier Colin Barnett to close scores of remote Aboriginal communities.
A call to protest has spread across social media with rallies in capital cities across the country. But the protests had their origins far from any big city.
Layangali Bieundurry and her brother Nelson Bieundurry are from Wangkatjungka, a remote Aboriginal community on the edge of the Great Sandy Desert with a permanent population of approximately 200 people.
Although internet access is slow in Wangkatjungka, the call to protest against the Government’s threat to close up to 150 communities started there thanks to family support, and then spread nationally and now globally. “We knew that all our family were on Facebook, so what we did, we just set the page up and started sending out messages throughout Facebook and that is how most of our family knew,” Ms Bieunderry said.
“And then other communities started to jump on Facebook and started realising what the Government [was] going to do to us in the remote communities.”
#SOSBlakAustralia has since emerged, connecting people, communities and organisations with similar interests and concerns through the Twittersphere. “I want it to go into the ears of Tony Abbott, that’s where I want it to go,” Mr Bieundurry said………
Throughout the Kimberley, the threat to close up to 150 remote Aboriginal communities has raised both fear and anger. At Wangkatjunga, there is disbelief that the next wave in a long history of dispossession may soon hit.
The State Government has not stated which communities may close, sparking fear across the state………http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-04-30/protest-against-forced-closure-aboriginal-communities/6431558
Australian Capital Territory could become Australia’s Silicon Valley of renewable energy
ACT pushes to expand its renewable energy industry http://www.canberratimes.com.au/act-news/act-pushes-to-expand-its-renewable-energy-industry-20150501-1mxt2w.html May 1, 2015 – Clare Colley Reporter at The Canberra Times The ACT could become Australia’s Silicon Valley of renewable energy development and a test site for new 
technology as it moves towards reaching its 90 per cent renewables target by 2020.
At the centrepiece of a new strategy to expand the renewable energy industry in the ACT is a $1.2 million Renewable Energy Innovation Fund collected from private companies as part of the government’s 200 megawatt wind auction. Continue reading
1 This month.
20 September –National Day of Action in Melbourne on the International Day of Peace
Help Aunty Sue Protect Her Land and Sacred Sites From Destructive Rocket Testing.
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Australians deserve the truth
about
AUKUS – https://aukuspublicinquiry.com/
PETITION – To: Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and the Australian Labor Government
of the week – Australians for War Powers Reform (AWPR)
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Antinuclear 