Some comments on Weatherill’s article .( Jay Weatherill: South Australia can learn valuable lessons from nuclear waste facility at Eurajoki, Finland)Government appoints TWO Minerals Council members to the board of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC)
Coalition’s “clean coal” plan to power Gina, Clive, Adani in Galilee basin, REneweconomy. By Giles Parkinson on 1 March 2017 “……. the Coalition’s ties with the coal lobby have deepened. Sid Marris, a former analyst with the Minerals Council of Australia, and a 16-year veteran of News Ltd, has joined Turnbull’s staff as an advisor.
This week, the chairman of the Minerals Council of Australia, the most vocal coal lobby group, Vanessa Guthrie, was appointed to the ABC board despite not making the shortlist prepared by an independent panel.
The Minerals Council, it has been widely reported, supplied the lump of coal brought into Question Time last month by treasurer Scott Morrison, in the middle of a record-breaking heat wave. The coal was lacquered so Coalition ministers and MPs would not get their hands dirty……http://reneweconomy.com.au/coalitions-clean-coal-plan-power-gina-clive-adani-galilee-basin-35115/
Newspaper “THE AUSTRALIAN” wages war on renewable energy
The Australian’s war on renewables, The Australian newspaper has not allowed facts to get in the way of a good story in its sustained war on renewable energy. Norm Sanders reports. Independent Australia, 27 Feb 17
BY SEPTEMBER 2016, the coal lobby’s PR campaign was stalled — “clean coal” wasn’t selling. It was an obvious oxymoron, like “military intelligence”.
Then the South Australian Blackout gave the coal miners an unexpected break. Never mind that the blackout was caused by two tornadoes which blew transmission towers over. This was a golden opportunity to attack the renewables which are threatening the coal industry.
The Australian jumped in with gusto and began an extraordinary deluge of articles, editorials and cartoons denigrating renewables and the Labor State governments which supported them. Continue reading
Media and nuclear – Australia – theme for March 2017
The new media landscape – what does it mean for Australia and nuclear issues? For one thing, the decline in mainstream media means that it’s cheaper and easier for mainstream media, particularly the Murdochracy, to abandon paying for true journalism and just regurgitate propaganda from government and the nuclear industry.
Australia’s news media, print, radio and TV continue to be under pressure, as people turn ever more to a variety of digital sources. Traditional news media lose advertising revenue, and good journalists lose their jobs. I have written about this before. But now, it’s happening ever faster. Quality newspapers struggle, especially in the print versions. The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age are likely to move from a daily to a weekend only printing. Still, print survives, and newer print news, like The Saturday Paper and The Monthly might just surprise us all.
The ABC soldiers on, with TV,radio and online news, in a climate of political pressure,and of repeated cutting of its funds, and threats of more cutting. In some areas, such as ABC Radio National, one detects dumbing down of content. Late Night Live survives – Phillip Adams now calling it “Fake Night Live”
Online news – Independent Australia, Crikey, Online Opinion, New Matilda etc battle on for financial survival, as the media landscape becomes an ecosystem of competing digital sources. Here some very fine journalism appears, from the usually unpaid critics of the nuclear industry, including internationally known experts on the subject, notably Dr Jim Green and Dr Helen Caldicott. At the same time, the well-heeled nuclear lobby also contributes articles.
Social media is increasingly, where it’s at, especially for nuclear issues. Websites, Blogs, Facebook, Youtube, Twitter, Linked-In, Tumblr etc.
Environmental organisations have busy websites. But increasingly – it’s Youtube and Facebook that now lead the pack. Sadly, for Youtube, the pro nuclear lobby has many sophisticated propaganda videos. Australia’s under-funded Aboriginal and environmental groups lack the resources to make great use of Youtube.
For hot nuclear issues, Facebook sites, especially for South Australia. Some examples: nuclear fuel cycle watch south australia, Fight To Stop Nuclear Waste Dump In Flinders Ranges SA No High Level International Nuclear Waste Dump in South Australia enuff south australia . Some other sites: Central Australian Nuclear Free Alliance. west australia nuclear free alliance. Nuclear Spinbuster.
Twitter is, at present, under-used by Australia’s nuclear-free activists, though Friends of The Earth tweets at @NuclearFreeAus
Meanwhile Australia’s pro nuclear lobbyistsare very active, and use sophisticated algorithms to churn out multiple tweets from just one source. Fortunately a lot of these seem quite stupid, spending much time on infantile trolling of Dr Caldicott. Examples: @totterdell91 @thjr19 and a lot of their fake clones, often adopting female names e.g Marcelina, EcoWife
How do we manage in the new media ecosystem?
First, Australians who care about their country and their planet need to make better use of social media in particular. And, we need to be aware of the traps in it. Our public social media sites are viewed by the nuclear lobby and Australia’s government, (often lackey to the nuclear lobby). Personal information can be used against you. Mistaken, inaccurate, unwise statements can be used against the environmental cause.
Above all, the new media landscape means that we have to exercise judgement in what we read and write. Look for accuracy. Look for credible sources, and quote these. As Donald Trump has taught us – there’s so much “fake news” out there. I don’t think that Trump actually meant his own lies, here, But Trump has certainly been a force in hastening the already happening process of muddying the media waters.
Pine Gap protestors to be prosecuted: may be gaoled for 7 years
Pine Gap protesters to be prosecuted after Attorney-General gives go-
ahead http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-21/pine-gap-protesters-to-be-prosecuted/8290624By Tom Maddocks, The federal Attorney-General has approved the prosecution launched against protesters who broke into top-secret military base, Pine Gap.
In September last year, six anti-war activists were arrested after they breached the perimeter into the joint US-Australian defence facility outside Alice Springs.
However, they were freed and the charges laid against the group were thrown out of court because police failed to gain the consent of the federal Attorney-General before the prosecution began.
At the time, Judge Daynor Trigg described the legislation as “nonsense” and said the police prosecution was “flawed”.
In documents tendered to the Alice Springs Local Court today, Attorney-General George Brandis gave consent to prosecute.
The protesters, who live in Queensland, did not appear in court but their defence lawyer, Russell Goldflam, said they would contest the charges.
The Commonwealth offence of entering a prohibited area carries a maximum penalty of seven years in prison. The case will return to court next month and is eventually expected to head to the Supreme Court for trial by jury.
It is only the second time there will be a prosecution made under this act.
In 2005, four activists broke into Pine Gap and the matter proceeded to trial.
The group was convicted and fined but they appealed and the conviction was quashed and they were acquitted.
Inadequacy of Australia’s media reporting on environmental and renewable energy issues
What also isn’t included in any of the above articles is that China is also investing 2.5 trillion yuan, the equivalent of $US361 billion in renewable power generation by 2020.
Environmental spin: An example of media disunity on renewable energy, Independent Australia, Melanie McCartney 14 January 2017, We can’t keep ignoring the ginormous elephant that is renewable energy in our economic policy, writes Melanie McCartney.
LAST SUNDAY, I surfed the ABC news website and clicked onto this headline:
‘China fights pollution: New environmental police squad to battle heavy smog’.
The article seemed a little threadbare. When this occurs I search further and ideally for an article in the country relevant to the article. I like to get more details this way. I decided to try something different this week and scanned the headline blurbs on the first Google page.
I noticed that all of the articles, bar two, started the same:
‘Officials in Beijing create a new environmental police squad in the latest effort to fight China’s persistent…’………
What also isn’t included in any of the above articles is that China is also investing 2.5 trillion yuan, the equivalent of $US361 billion in renewable power generation by 2020.
On 5 January, Fortune reported:
The investment will create over 13 million jobs in the sector, the National Energy Administration (NEA) said in a blueprint document that lays out its plan to develop the nation’s energy sector during the five-year 2016 to 2020 period.
The announcement comes only days after Beijing, the Chinese capital, and other cities in China’s industrial north-east were again engulfed in hazardous smog, caused largely by coal-fired power generation.
The NEA said installed renewable power capacity including wind, hydro, solar and nuclear power will account for about half of new electricity generation by 2020.
Personally, I was aware of China’s five-year-planning but not of the lofty renewable energy target above until I started to write this. The Turnbull Government’s energy policies look dismal when compared to this news. It’s not right that the media has missed this, when so many Australians, especially Indigenous Australians care and value nature and worry about the repercussions of our climate changing. China is the world’s biggest investor not just in energy but in renewable energy. Its citizens need to be able to breathe, just like the developed countries. The rest of the developing countries will follow too.
We can’t keep ignoring the ginormous elephant that is renewable energy in our economic policy. This is harming not just investment hopes within our country and overseas investors but also within our communities. The uncertainty and lack of long-term planning only opens us up to further exploitation by multinational corporations and or foreign countries. China is the world’s biggest producer and investor in solar energy now.
Australia still has a chance, together — not on an elitist path, but closer to an egalitarianism one. One that questions authority. If journalists can’t or won’t do it, we, the people, will have to. It’s the pioneering Aussie way after all.
You can read more from Melanie McCartney on her blog or you can follow her on Twitter@CartwheelPrint. https://independentaustralia.net/environment/environment-display/environmental-spin-an-example-of-media-disunity-on-renewable-energy,9918#.WHlBFksjta4.twitter
Media secrecy allowed Australian territory to become highly radioactively contaminated
Dig for secrets: the lesson of Maralinga’s Vixen B The 
Conversation, Liz Tynan, 26 July 13 “……lack of knowledge about the British nuclear tests in Australia is not surprising. The tests were not part of the national conversation for many years. Even when older people remember that nuclear tests were held here, no-one knows the story of the most secret tests of all, the ones that left the most contamination: Vixen B.
Maralinga is a particularly striking example of what can happen when media are unable to report government activities comprehensively. The media have a responsibility to deal with complex scientific and technological issues that governments may be trying to hide. While Maralinga was an example of extreme secrecy, the same kind of secrecy could at any time be enacted again. With the Edward Snowden case, we have seen what can happen when journalists become complicit in government secrecy, and we have learned the press must be more rigorous in challenging cover-ups.
At Maralinga, part of our territory became the most highly contaminated land in the world. But the Australian public had no way of granting informed consent because no-one knew it was happening. Remediating the environmental contamination was delayed for decades for the same reason. While arguments might be mounted for the need for total secrecy at the time (although these arguments are debatable in the case of Vixen B), there was no reason to keep the aftermath totally secret as well. Continue reading
Adelaide Advertiser’s nauseous sycophantic account of Premier Weatherill’s nuclear jaunt to Finland
I knew that The Advertiser was the mouthpiece of the nuclear lobby, anyway, but their latest effort was really sick-making. A rave which portrays Premier Weatherill as some kind of democratic champion, and which is pushing the soft sell that the decision on nuclear waste importing will not happen soon, but be dragged on for years. (They don’t say this, but in the interim, the nuke lobby has time to get secret arrangements made – and money lent to South Australia, so that ultimately, it might all be just too committed to turn back.)A Premier with any spine might make a decision, a soon decision, and a wise one, to say no to the whole noxious scheme, – send home the business lobbyists and the propaganda spruikers like Geraldine Thomas, put the lid on the shonky Nuclear Royal Commission’s biased report, stop the silly nuke spinning Forums, and get on with running South Australia properly. Such an opportunity that State has, as a world leader in renewable energy!
Lack of trust more toxic than nuclear dump notion: Daniel Wills, The Advertiser September 23, 2016 “South Australia is still at the stage where it needs reassurance about the science, as well as the competency and motivations of a government that would oversee its administration.
No site has been selected to house the world’s high-level international waste for profit, should the state choose to build one, nor any explanation of how one would be picked. The State Government is yet to overturn laws that ban public money being spent on investigating the establishment of a nuclear dump or even to pick up the phone to ask places like Japan what they would pay…….
The Finnish operators say they would jump at the chance to form an alliance with SA to build a dump here…..
Mr Weatherill is likely to confirm before Christmas that the Government will begin the serious work of developing a robust business case…….
Expect the Government to seek money from overseas to undertake a major geological survey that rules out places too unsafe for disposal to occur. At a cost of up to $1 billion, this is too expensive for SA to fund itself, but could have the benefit of doubling as a discovery tool for new mining deposits.
From there, it is likely the offer will be thrown open to communities to show an interest, and estimates made of what they could receive. Even on the most extremely rapid timeline, that point is unlikely to have been reached by the time voters head to the polls in March 2018.
This project is multi-generational, with a point of no return years away. But it is a doubtful and open question as to whether our politics are up to the job…….Mr Weatherill has framed this as a great test of our democracy’s ability to consider difficult questions and come to wise solutions. … http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/opinion/lack-of-trust-more-toxic-than-nuclear-dump-notion-daniel-wills/news-story/e927e455e6f244f35a8b6743bc791adb
Adelaide Advertiser readers not all taken in by Premier Weatherill’s dishonest spiel about nuclear waste
Some comments on Weatherill’s article .( Jay Weatherill: South Australia can learn valuable lessons from nuclear waste facility at Eurajoki, Finland)
It is not a good legacy to leave behind, Jay. 100,000 years is a long time for something to go wrong and you’ll be remembered for it, if it does.
@Michael well, actually the Fins haven’t. Not any radioactive waste at all. But they hope too! Probably some time next decade, unless things go wrong. But they are c̶e̶r̶t̶a̶i̶n̶ c̶o̶n̶f̶i̶d̶e̶n̶t̶ hopeful that it will be fine, that is why they want to sell it to us. Not for money, because it has cost them so much more than they expected and taken so much longer. No for altruistic reasons, sortof.
Finland currently have two different types of operating reactors and the different fuel rods mean canisters are different for the two types of reactors they have. It also means that they drill different depth holes.
But Australia won’t be so lucky if SA imports high level waste from different countries because there will be all sorts of different reactors with many, many different fuel rod length and array dimensions. Lucky eh?
Well, that is if we stick to Finland’s quality KBS-3V system, and not try to sacrifice safety for price by using cheap steel and concrete vessels. When has safety ever been sacrificed for cost in SA? n̶R̶A̶H̶, R̶a̶i̶l̶ ̶u̶p̶g̶r̶a̶d̶e̶, s̶o̶u̶t̶h̶ ̶r̶o̶a̶d̶ ̶s̶u̶p̶e̶r̶w̶a̶y̶, a̶m̶b̶u̶l̶a̶n̶c̶e̶ ̶r̶a̶m̶p̶i̶n̶g̶…..
Pfffft! mere details, it only has to work without failure for 100,000 years!, http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/opinion/jay-weatherill-south-australia-can-learn-valuable-lessons-from-nuclear-waste-facility-at-eurajoki-finland/news-story/b8e2250210f4f2a3b0c6a60d9a8037d5
Welcome To The Nuclear State – wake-up song from Mike Roberts
The South Australian government is proposing to build a nuclear waste dump on traditional indigenous land in the stunningly beautiful Flinders Ranges. If plans come to fruition we may well be seeing high-level radioactive waste from around the world shipped into our pristine, clean green state hoping that a catastrophe from any of the inherent risks never eventuates. Mike Roberts’ song is a wake-up call about our scenario that will have impact both nationally and internationally.
Welcome to the Nuclear State – words and music Mike Roberts 2016
Players:
Mike Roberts – lead vocal, backing vocals, acoustic guitar
Quentin Eyers – slide guitar, bass guitar, drums, piano
Production – Quentin Eyers, Q the Music, Norwood, South Australia
Video Production – Jordan Roberts, FSR Media House
Photographs – Mike Roberts, Dianne Bills
http://www.mikerobertsmusic.com.au
info@mikerobertsmusic.com.au
Whyalla is a worry – residents not awake up to the nuclear waste economic and environmental dangers?
What’s happening in Whyalla? These articles come From February. I hope that Council and the newspaper editor have done their homework on nuclear waste, since then
Acting Whyalla mayor Tom Antonio has said that he is “positive” about nuclear energy’s future in South Australia ahead of his visit to the Lucas Heights nuclear reactor in Sydney next week.
The trip on February 9 will be made by a delegation from the Upper Spencer Gulf Common Purpose Group pending the findings of the Nuclear Fuel Cycle Royal Commission in South Australia….
Huge income and many jobs hinge on a proposal for a nuclear-waste repository in Whyalla in the wake of devastating news about the future of the Arrium steelworks.
Meanwhile, in an exclusive report, The Whyalla News can reveal that Whyalla City Council is close to declaring an interest in hosting a low-level nuclear waste repository…..
Three jeers to Today Tonight Adelaide reporter, Hendrik Gout
100% Renewables for SA Three jeers to Today Tonight Adelaide reporter, Hendrik Gout, turning the people he interviewed – fans of solar power in to seeming solar dislikers. Never let the truth get in the way of good fear-mongering story?
Could Mr Gout’s former job have something to do with it?
Today Tonight’s misleading report on renewables in South Australia, REneweconomy
By Sophie Vorrath & Giles Parkinson on 29 July 2016
Over the last few weeks we’ve been giving the Murdoch press a bit of a hard time over its regular publication of erroneous claims that South Australia’s electricity price rises and spikes are being caused by the state’s high penetration of renewable energy. But we should clarify; they are not the only offenders.
On Monday, the Adelaide branch of the Seven Network’s daily current affairs program, Today Tonight, ran with a similar anti-renewables slant, as it has done before. And, like much of the Murdoch media’s reporting, its chock full of errors.
The program opened by recalling South Australia’s November 2015 black-outs – a predictable starting point for a renewables witch hunt, considering that was the reaction of the mainstream media back when the outages occurred.
According to Today Tonight Adelaide reporter, Hendrik Gout, “the November night the lights went out” happened because of the “state’s reliance on ‘unreliant’ energy”.
Never mind that this is simply not true. As we reported at the time, “there was only one technology that abandoned its post on Sunday evening, and that was the massive transmission line linking Victoria and South Australia.”
And, as the Australian Energy Market Operator later concluded in a report, the black-out caused by a switch failure lasted much longer than needed because a gas-fired generator failed to follow instructions, causing the system to trip again. The blackout had nothing to do with renewables at all.
That claim should not be a surprise coming from Gout, who was a former senior staffer for South Australia Liberal David Ridgway, the party’s leader in the upper house.
The Coalition in South Australia is notoriously anti-wind, feeding rubbish data to The Australian last week that had to be retracted. Ridgway is also the instigator of an ongoing upper house inquiry into wind energy.
Gout’s program went on to interview two different South Australian business operators: one a farmer/irrigator in the Riverland region who complained – not without reason – that the state’s high power prices had made his business less competitive; and one a micro-brewer on the Murray, who similarly seemed to suggest that power supply difficulties had restricted the growth of the business.
But something didn’t quite gel with these interviews, so we decided to talk to the people ourselves……….
When we asked Beavis why the 30kW PV system wasn’t mentioned in the Today Tonight report, he told us in an emailed statement: “Our solar project was one of the main points I was aiming to get across. But from viewing the piece, it seemed to get lost in the edit.”
Beavis also told us that the solar system offsets 100 per cent of the brewery and houseboats’ power consumption……..http://reneweconomy.com.au/2016/today-tonights-misleading-report-renewables-south-australia-85014
Independent inquiry finds that the ABC is not biased
ABC cleared of ‘anti-business’ bias in independent review http://www.theage.com.au/business/media-and-marketing/abc-cleared-of-antibusiness-bias-in-independent-review-20160722-gqbp68.html Matthew KnottThe ABC has been cleared of systemic “anti-business” bias in a major review of its coverage, with former ANZ boss Mike Smith confessing he has rethought his negative perceptions of the broadcaster.
The independent editorial review, for which Mr Smith was a key adviser, has been one of the broadcaster’s most comprehensive yet. As well as analysing a week’s worth of ABC programming, the review included interviews with ABC business staff and submissions from business groups, think-tanks and unions.
Fairfax Media understands the review, which has not been released publicly, is overwhelmingly positive about the ABC’s coverage overall while making some criticisms.
Sources familiar with the review, led by longtime BBC adviser Kerry Blackburn, said they were relieved and surprised by its positive tone. In his submission, Mr Smith writes that when he began the review, he shared the widespread view in corporate Australia that the ABC was hostile to business and that its coverage of business issues was poor.
But after examining the broadcaster’s output in detail, he came to be impressed by the rigour and balance of most of the ABC’s business reporting.
Investments in wind have brought costs down- THE AUSTRALIAN got it SO wrong!
How The Australian got it hopelessly wrong on wind energy The Australian got its facts wrong on wind energy in South Australia. Investments in wind have brought costs down. Giles Parkinson Crikey, 22 July 16 The Murdoch media attack on the Australia wind industry knows no bounds, and not many facts either.
This week’s front-page “exclusive” in The Australian suggests South Australia’s wind turbines were producing significant amounts of “negative power” from the grid at the height of the recent electricity “crisis”. But the numbers it quotes are ridiculously wrong.
The story, by Adelaide bureau chief Michael Owen, suggests the state’s wind turbines were “producing about 5780MW” between 6am and 7am, but by mid afternoon were producing “negative 50MW”. Asanalysis from Ron Brakels observes, the report confuses energy terminology, apparently not knowing the difference between capacity and output.
In fact, the state’s wind turbines cannot produce 5780MW — they only have a combined capacity of 1600MW. There’s not even 5780MW of wind capacity in the whole country……
As SA Energy Minister Tom Koutsantonis told the ABC, that’s precisely why the government encouraged investments in wind and solar: to bring costs down. That has largely succeeded. https://www.crikey.com.au/2016/07/22/558133/
Corporations rejoice as The Age sacks a top investigative journalist
A pity that I can’t read the full article. Being on a low income, I don’t subscribe to any paid journal or newspaper. Well, I did, until today, subscribe to Fairfax’s The Age. But not any more.
It is a sad sacking of many staff, and I feel for all of them.
However, it says something a bit more about Fairfax, when they pick out a top investigative journalist. Michael West not only has confronted the big end of town with some very inconvenient facts, but – a worse crime – he has written about them in lively language that the peasantry can understand.
Watch now as the Business Pages of the Age become more obscurely written, and even more pro business. And along with that. The Age particpates in the general dumbing down of the Australian media.
Michael West among Fairfax redundancies, Crikey.com, Myriam Robin Media Reporter, May 13, 2016 Hard-hitting business journo Michael West is among those saying goodbye to Fairfax. Senior business reporter Michael West, whose work appeared in the Business Day sections of the Sydney Morning Herald and Age, is leaving Fairfax today.West confirmed his compulsory redundancy, but declined to comment further. In a tweet after this piece was published online, west wrote “told my skillset not aligned with fairfax strategy going forward”….. subscribers only http://www.crikey.com.au/2016/05/13/michael-west-fairfax-redundancy/
Sickening pro nuclear spin from THE AUSTRALIAN today
Here’s an example:
“…..Politically, the need for a centralised facility has bipartisan support across multiple levels of government. Socially, the government has moved from suggesting sites to prioritising community consultation in all stages of the project, especially site selection. Environmentally, international experience has demonstrated that highly engineered and well-regulated low- and intermediate-level repositories can be managed safely with no impact on the community or agricultural industry….”
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