NASA scientist and European Space Agency dismayed at CSIRO climate research cuts
‘Dismay’: NASA scientist appeals to CSIRO not to cut global climate efforts, The Age, May 12, 2016 Peter Hannam Environment Editor, The Sydney Morning Herald
A top scientist from US space agency NASA has appealed to CSIRO to abandon plans to cut a key monitoring program that it says will undermine Australia and the world’s ability to monitor and predict climate change. Continue reading
Climate Change Authority report recommending ‘a mandatory carbon price’ held back until after election
May 6, 2016. A report that recommends putting a price on emissions from the electricity sector has been held back by the Climate Change Authority until after the election, prompting calls from Labor and the Greens that it be made public to inform debate.
The independent authority, whose board is now dominated by appointments made last October by Environment Minister Greg Hunt, was to have released its policy options paper for the power industry by the end of April. http://www.theage.com.au/federal-politics/federal-election-2016/climate-change-authority-report-recommending-a-mandatory-carbon-price-held-back-until-after-election-20160506-gonw88.html
Climate change doesn’t get a mention in Turnbull’s budget
Turnbull’s first budget ignores climate change and dumps clean energy: That’s #innovative?, Independent Australia , Giles Parkinson 5 May 2016 So much for Turnbull’s trumpeting of a ‘transitional economy’ with zip $ for climate initiatives and $1.3 billion stripped from the Australian Renewable Energy Agency.RenewEconomy‘s Giles Parkinson reports.
CLIMATE CHANGE, prime minister Malcom Turnbull once said, is the ultimate long-term problem that needs to be acted on urgently. But in his first budget as government leader, it is as though the issue does not exist.
Climate change was not even mentioned as a word, or a concept, or even an issue — despite Tuesday’s budget apparently being about growth and jobs for the future. T
here was no new money for climate initiatives and the only mention renewable energy got was to confirm that $1.3 billion in funds would be stripped from the Australian Renewable Energy Agency.
“There was nothing in the speech, not a word,”Professor John Hewson, a former leader of Liberal Party, told the SolarExpo conference in 2016.
“The slogan is jobs and growth. I would have though that one of the most significant sectors for economic and jobs growth is renewables — I am staggered that it didn’t get a mention in the speech or in the documents.”
Hewson said the decision to remove funding from ARENA was an “absolute tragedy.”
In the budget papers, for instance, there is no extra funding for the Direct Action plan that Turnbull once ridiculed and dismissed as a “fig-leaf” for a climate policy and now forms the basis of the government’s emissions reductions plan, including the Paris agreement it signed just a few weeks ago.
Once the government has spent the current $2.5 billion allocation for handouts to polluters to do pretty much what they were doing anyway, there is zero extra funding for emissions abatement.
The Coalition government might have been expected to shift towards a “modified” scheme that would see Direct Action evolve with its safeguards mechanism to become a baseline and credit scheme. But that’s what Labor suggested last week, and rather than accept the tentative offer of a return to a bipartisan approach to climate policies, the government slammed the door.
It slammed the door, too, on renewable energy innovation. The $1.3 billion of unallocated funds for the Australian Renewable Energy Agency remains excised from the budget papers – even though it remains legislated – while $1 billion is transferred from the Clean Energy Finance Corporation and rebadged as a new Clean Energy Innovation Fund.
Don’t expect Labor to stand in the way of that initiative. It voted with the Coalition earlier this week against a Greens motion to protect ARENA, and has since blamed NGOs for not standing up to the Coalition move to de-fund ARENA,so it won’t stand up either.
For his part, Australian Solar Council chief John Grimes was taking a stand on the matter, telling the Energy Storage Conference in Melbourne on Wednesday that the federal government had “taken a backwards step” in defunding ARENA, and not making the Agency’s competitive grants available any more……..https://independentaustralia.net/environment/environment-display/turnbulls-first-budget-ignores-climate-change-and-dumps-clean-energy-thats-innovative,8955
Australian govt not able to meet its Emissions Reduction goal
Budget 2016: Funding hole may leave Emissions Reduction Fund out of money, think tank says, ABC News, 4 May 16 By environment reporter Sara Phillips The Coalition may be left without a functioning climate policy after no new funding was announced for one its flagship climate policies in last night’s budget, according to a think tank specialising in climate change.
The Emissions Reduction Fund (ERF) is the centrepiece of the Direct Action policy and is designed to do the heavy lifting in reducing Australia’s emissions.
After two auctions to purchase emissions reductions from businesses last year, around half its funding was exhausted.
A third auction was held last week, with the results yet to be announced, leading the Climate Institute to speculate that the ERF may now be running low.
“If the next two auctions are anything like the last two then we will run out of money in that Emissions Reduction Fund a bit later this year — well before the next election cycle,” said John Connor, chief executive the Climate Institute. Continue reading
New legal case against Adani coal mine now underway
Activists launch fresh court challenge over Carmichael coalmine ‘Australian Conservation Foundation argues emissions from coal mined from Adani’s project
will put the Great Barrier Reef at risk by exacerbating climate change’ Michael Slezak | The Guardian Australia http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/may/03/activists-launch-fresh-court-challenge-over-carmichael-coalmine 3 May 16:
” … If successful, the case will have ramifications beyond the Carmichael mine or even the Great Barrier Reef. It could have implications for any fossil fuel development, and require the minister to consider the effect of the burned fuel on any world heritage area – like the forests in Tasmania, for example.
“This is the first case of its kind to be heard in Australia,” said O’Shanassy. “The court will be asked to examine a section of Australia’s national environment law that has never before been tested in court. If this case is successful it will strengthen climate change considerations and world heritage protection in Australian law.” The hearing at the federal court in Brisbane is expected to go for two days. Hunt and Adani will be represented.”
Adani Big Coal Case Could Make It Harder To Get Mines Approved ‘A landmark case that could “put a brake on Australia’s fossil fuel exports” kicked off this morning in the Federal Court, in a precedent-setting bid to invalidate Environment Minister Greg Hunt’s approval of the largest coal mine the nation would ever see’ Thom Mitchell | New Matilda https://newmatilda.com/2016/05/03/adani-case-coal-mines-approved/ 3 May 16:
” … Under the United Nations process, the country that burns fossil fuels is responsible for them. Who exported the fossil fuels is considered irrelevant. And that was why Hunt, and all governments to date, largely ignored the damage Australia’s fossil fuels exports do to our environment when making approval
decisions.
The Australian Conservation Foundation is trying to change that. They’re arguing that irrespective of where the coal is burnt, it will have a serious impact on the Reef, and that this impact will be felt irrespective of how the United Nations framework on climate change works. … “
More research needed into climate change – bushfire links
Senate inquiry told of need for more research into bushfire-climate change links May 3, 2016 BLAIR RICHARDS State Political Reporter Mercury CALLS for more research into the links between climate change and bushfires and for greater national firefighting capacity have emerged from a Senate inquiry into the Tasmanian Wilderness fires.
The Senate’s environment and communications reference committee is examining the response to the fires that blazed through more than 20,000ha of the state’s Wilderness World Heritage Area in January and February.
The inquiry has received 24 submissions from stakeholders including scientific and conservation organisations, government agencies and individuals.
Some submissions called for more research into the impact of climate change on fire risk:…….
THE Australian Conservation Foundation said the fires should be a “wake-up call” for Australian governments to act on climate change.
However, the Tasmanian Government’s submission said the forecast outlook for the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area was classified as “normal”.
The Senate committee is due to report by May 30. http://www.themercury.com.au/news/politics/senate-inquiry-told-of-need-for-more-research-into-bushfireclimate-change-links/news-story/4ab57529e85c2a55a9ec82fbd64a2f0e
Ocean temperatures on Tasmania’s East Coast are among the fastest-rising in the world
OCEAN temperatures on Tasmania’s East Coast are now among the most rapidly warming in the world, with oyster, salmon, rock lobster and abalone industries feeling the impact.
http://www.themercury.com.au/news/tasmania/ocean-temperatures-on-tasmanias-east-coast-are-among-the-fastestrising-in-the-world/news-story/70e83dcbe51376aa439a53cd2d8d32f7
‘Perilous’: Bureau of Meteorology boss Rob Vertessy exits with climate warning
Australia faces a “perilous” water security future from climate change even as the Turnbull government eyes budget cuts to water programs and CSIRO halves climate investment, Rob Vertessy, the outgoing head of the Bureau of Meteorology, says.
Reservoirs in the Murray-Darling basin are now close to their lowest levels since the Millennium Drought and Tasmania is also facing “serious” issues”, Dr Vertessy told Fairfax Media on Friday, his final day as the bureau’s chief.
Approval of Adani’s Queensland coalmine faces another legal challenge
‘Conservationists claim the state government failed to ensure the planned Carmichael mine was ecologically sustainable’
Joshua Robertson | The Guardian Australia
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/apr/27/approval-of-adanis-queensland-coalmine-faces-another-legal-challenge
“Adani’s plan for Australia’s largest coalmine faces yet another snag, with a conservation group mounting what is now the eighth legal challenge to the contentious project. …
The Coast and Country spokesman, Derec Davies, said the decision to grant environmental authority to the Galilee basin mine “ignored climate change totally and failed to properly take account of the true jobs figures – 1,464 net jobs not the 10,000 advocated”. …
The federal court is yet to rule on an Australian Conservation Foundation appeal against federal
environmental approval of the mine. … representatives of the mine site’s traditional owners, the Wangan and Jagalingou people, have several legal actions under way to challenge a land use deal with Adani … “
6 reasons why Australia’s Liberal Coalition government’s climate scare campaign is wrong
Labor, and those in the Coalition who understand that climate change is a thing, are actually converging in their ideas about what policies Australia should adopt. They are moving towards sectoral, and maybe intensity-based, trading schemes and towards using a suite of policies (energy efficiency, vehicle standards, regulations) to get to our targets. And every interest group with a stake in this argument – business, environment groups, investors – are desperately willing the major parties to find some kind of consensus. The Business Council of Australia said Labor’s policy could be a “platform for bipartisanship”. They are right.
And the barren, stupid climate wars and dumb fact-free scare campaigns are a guaranteed recipe for a terrible economic and environmental failure.
Why Coalition climate scare campaign is not credible and makes no sense, http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2016/apr/27/why-coalition-climate-scare-campaign-is-not-credible-and-makes-no-sense Guardian, Lenore Taylor
Malcolm Turnbull is attempting to discredit Labor’s new emissions plan. Here are six reasons the government’s campaign is wrong
1. The prime minister says that by promising to cut emissions by 45% by 2030, rather than 26% to 28% (as the government has pledged) Labor is “doubling the burden” on Australians. But modelling commissioned by the Coalition from leading economist and former Reserve Bank board member Warwick McKibbinshowed that a 45% cut would shave between 0.5% and 0.7% from gross domestic product (GDP) by 2030, whereas a 26% cut would shave between 0.2 and 0.3%. In other words the difference in the economic cost of the Coalition’s target and Labor’s target is about 0.3% of GDP in 2030. That’s 0.3% of an estimated GDP of over $3.5 trillion. It’s not hard to work out that is not doubling an economic burden. Continue reading
Urgent need to end $7.7 Billion Fossil Fuel Subsidies
$7.7 Billion Fossil Fuel Subsidies ‘Like Being In Bed With Big Tobacco’ , New Matilda, By Thom Mitchell on April 26, 2016 Calls for an end to fossil fuel subsidies are growing louder in the lead up to Treasurer Scott Morrison’s May 3 budget, with a diverse coalition of advocates demanding an end to the $7.7 billion free ride they claim the fossil fuel industry gets each year.
At a press conference in Canberra this morning academics, religious leaders, renewable energy interests and unionists said it was illogical and counter-productive for the government to continue to subsidise fossil fuels if it’s serious about transitioning to clean energy.
“Continuing to fund polluters when we know the damage being done to the environment is unforgivable intergenerational theft,” said Luke Stickels, from the Australian Education Union.
“It is grossly foolish and unfair. Developing our nation’s future is foremost in the minds of educators in schools across the country, but that future is not secure when the government continues to defy the urgent public desire for strong action on climate change,” he said.
In a letter sent late March, a group of more than 50 civil society groups spelled out the savings they believe could be made if the government winds back subsidies to the industries which are fuelling climate change. They urged the government to:
● End nonagricultural fuel tax credits, boosting the budget by $5.5 billion in 2016/17
● End exploration and prospecting deductions for the mining industry ($650m)
● End statutory effective life caps for the oil and gas sector ($349m)
● End the concessional rate of excise levied on aviation gasoline and aviation turbine fuel ($1.24b)
● Confirm that the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility will not invest in fossil fuel projects or in infrastructure that primarily assists such projects
This morning, former Anglican Church Bishop George Browning reiterated that the government “must stop handing over billions of our dollars to the fossil fuel industry, whose activities are driving dangerous climate change”.
“Science and Christianity are on the same page in urging human responsibility in the face of escalating climate change,” he said. “The clock is ticking. We cannot sit on our hands any longer.”……..https://newmatilda.com/2016/04/26/govt-urged-to-pull-the-handbreak-on-fossil-fuel-industrys-7-7-billion-free-ride/
Australian govt might have to back down on its cuts to CSIRO climate research
CSIRO eyes alternative plan to climate job cuts as Chairman Thodey faces inquiry, The Age, April 24, 2016 Peter Hannam Environment Editor, The Sydney Morning Herald CSIRO is expected to offer an alternative to deep cuts of its climate science program as soon as this week in a bid to defuse criticism as a Senate committee prepares to widen its inquiry to include chairman David Thodey.
Mr Thodey is scheduled to address the committee in Canberra on Wednesday. Unusually, the chairman has asked the session be held in camera and that he not be joined by CSIRO management, Fairfax Media has been told.
Speculation of a resolution was fanned by Environment Minister Greg Hunt last week breaking his silence on the cuts, which originally targeted as many as 110 of the 140 staff in the key Oceans & Atmosphere division……..
Instead, senior CSIRO staff now expect the agency to pare back the planned cuts and offer a “face-saving” alternative of a special climate unit, possibly headquartered in Hobart……http://www.theage.com.au/environment/climate-change/csiro-eyes-alternative-plan-to-climate-job-cuts-as-chairman-thodey-faces-inquiry-20160424-godtal.html.
Malcolm Turnbull – fine words, but actually retreating on climate action
‘Walking in the other direction’: Malcolm Turnbull’s broad retreat on climate, The Age April 22, 2016 Peter Hannam Environment Editor, The Sydney Morning Herald When Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull rose to address the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Paris late last year, he told the world Australia would meet the challenges of global warming “with confidence and optimism”.
You don’t turn off R&D spending when there’s a revolution under wayAndrew Blakers, Centre for Sustainable Energy Systems, ANU
Australia’s carbon emissions target – slicing 2000 levels by about 19 per cent by 2030 – would halve pollution on a per capita basis, “one of the biggest reductions” of any G20 nation, Turnbull said. The government would also double “clean energy innovation” investment over the next five years, and carve out $1 billion from the existing aid budget to help threatened Pacific neighbours build “climate resilience” and cut emissions……….
The pact, which the government plans to ratify later this year if re-elected, aims to limit global temperature increases to between 1.5 and 2 degrees of pre-industrial levels – even if current national offers fall far short of the greenhouse gas reductions needed.
But in the four months since Turnbull’s speech, climate news from abroad and at home has been anything but positive………..
For policy areas directly under Turnbull’s control, it’s been a dismal few months for climate action, not least CSIRO’s assault on climate science launched on February 4 that will see dozens of leading researchers sacked among as many as 450 jobs to go.
Despite pleas of budget penury, the government somehow managed to find $15.4 million a couple of weeks later for a new Oil, Gas and Energy Resources Growth Centre to, among other things, “foster community support” for non-renewables, including coal and nuclear energy.
It is also forked out $3.3 million to two researchers to examine the effects of wind farms on health. Just four researchers made submissions for the cash, a remarkably small number, according to Sydney University public health expert, Simon Chapman.
Taken for granted
And a fresh concern surfaced this week with 61 leading scientists writing to Turnbull decrying the government’s decision last month to end grants from the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA).
Set up by the Rudd-Gillard government, the agency still had $1.3 billion in funding to disperse by 2022.
Instead, it will now work with the Clean Energy Finance Corp to offer $100 million in loans annually for 10 years to foster “clean and renewable energy”. ARENA still has $130 million to be allocated, with “high interest” from potential proponents, Hunt says.
The proposed end of ARENA’s grant funding removes “an essential component of technology innovation”, the mostly solar researchers said in the letter obtained by Fairfax Media.
Forty years of such grants over had allowed Australia to contribute “very far above its weight” in renewable energy. By contrast, reliance on equity returns “have rarely been effective” in advancing early-stage research, the scientists said.
Richard Corkish, chief operating officer of UNSW-based Australian Centre for Advanced Photovoltaics, said his facility faced “an existential threat” if the $4 million in annual ARENA funds ended. The school continues to spawn world-leading technology, including new types of solar cells using abundant, non-toxic materials.
“ARENA is our major funding source,” Corkish says.
Andrew Blakers, who led development of the solar PV technology being adopted by the world’s largest producers, said all new electricity investment in Australia over the past five years had been in solar or wind energy.
“This is incredible”, says Blakers, who heads the Centre for Sustainable Energy Systems at the Australian National University. “You don’t turn off R&D spending when there’s a revolution under way.”
………Greens deputy leader Larissa Waters said there’s “an obvious disconnect between the Prime Minster’s rhetoric in Paris last year and his actions in Canberra”.
“Presiding over cuts to CSIRO’s world-leading climate research and gutting renewable technology research is stupid on so many levels.
“The government is tipping new money into fossil fuel research so that the big mining companies profiting off the world’s warming don’t have to pay for research themselves,” Waters says……..http://www.theage.com.au/environment/climate-change/walking-in-the-wrong-direction-malcolm-turnbulls-broad-retreat-on-climate-20160420-goat2p.html
Australia needs action, not just Turnbull’s words, to save the Great Barrier Reef
Climate deal won’t stop Great Barrier Reef from getting ‘cooked’, say Greens, Guardian, 23 Apr 16 Australia’s lack of action on pollution reduction targets has made the country a laughing stock on the international stage, according to senator Larissa Waters Australia’s lack of follow-through on climate change will leave the Great Barrier Reef “completely cooked” despite it signing the Paris climate deal, the Greens say…….
“Unfortunately, minister Hunt likes to bandy about some figures but Australia has been a laughing stock on the international stage,” she said.
“Our pollution reduction targets are so far below the science and people know that our policies aren’t even getting us towards those very low targets.”
Senator Waters rejected the government’s commitment of a further $11m on projects to continue improving water quality on the Great Barrier Reeffollowing a study this week showing 93% of the reef was bleached.
She pointed to the Queensland and federal government’s backing of the Adani coal mine, which critics say will further imperil the reef. “We need to really have a change of policy when it comes to approving every coal mine anyone ever thinks of and instead really fund and support the transition and speed it up to clean-energy,” Senator Waters said. http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/apr/23/climate-deal-wont-stop-great-barrier-reef-from-getting-cooked-say-greens
ANOTHER Liberal Senator doubts the science of climate change!
Senator agrees climate science ‘not settled’ http://www.skynews.com.au/news/politics/federal/2016/04/21/senator-agrees-climate-science–not-settled-.html 21 April 2016 Deputy Nationals leader Fiona Nash has supported her coalition colleague Liberal Senator George Brandis’ view that the science on climate change is not settled.
Labor has condemned Senator Brandis after he told parliament he was not ‘at all’ convinced there is a scientific consensus about climate change.
‘It doesn’t seem to me that the science is settled at all,’ Senator Brandis said on Tuesday during debate on the tabling of documents relating to the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO).
‘The commitment of Senator Brandis to addressing the impacts of climate change is so shallow, he hasn’t made up his mind whether it actually exists yet,’ environment spokesman Mark Butler and shadow attorney-general Mark Dreyfus said in a statement.
Senator Nash told Sky News she agrees there are ‘varying views’ between scientists on climate change..
‘I don’t think it is certainly necessarily settled,’ she said. ‘I think we should be taking every precaution that we ensure the planet is healthy.’
The NSW Senator says she was not sure whether her view on climate science was shared by her cabinet colleagues
‘I think you would have to ask the other cabinet ministers but it’s certainly my view.’
– See more at: http://www.skynews.com.au/news/politics/federal/2016/04/21/senator-agrees-climate-science–not-settled-.html#sthash.4k3e4pDd.dpuf– See more at: http://www.skynews.com.au/news/politics/federal/2016/04/21/senator-agrees-climate-science–not-settled-.html#sthash.4k3e4pDd.dpuf– See more at:http://www.skynews.com.au/news/politics/federal/2016/04/21/senator-agrees-climate-science–not-settled-.html#sthash.4k3e4pDd.dpuf
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