Senators David Leyonhjelm and Bob Day salivate over thought of free nuclear-powered electricity
The Conservation Council of SA this week said it did not support an expansion of SA’s role.
“Uranium mining in SA has a history of very significant environmental impacts that show no signs of abating,” spokesman Jim Green said.
“All forms of energy generation have some environmental impact … nuclear power brings with it a range of unavoidable risks to public health and safety that other energy options simply do not.”
Senators David Leyonhjelm and Bob Day want atomic industry advanced 
to make nuclear submarines viable TORY SHEPHERD POLITICAL EDITOR THE ADVERTISER JUNE 03, 2015 CHEAP or free power for South Australia is an “excellent” idea, crucial crossbench Senator David Leyonhjelm says, arguing it could come through a nuclear or a coal deal.
The Liberal Democrat also joined South Australian Senator Bob Day in calling for Australia to get nuclear-powered submarines.
The Advertiser revealed earlier this year that Liberal Senator Sean Edwards was working on a plan to earn billions of dollars by storing nuclear waste and generating nuclear power, and using that money to deliver free electricity and abolish state taxes.
That would make SA a magnet for investment, he said. Continue reading
Senator moves to punish Greenpeace for its international Great Barrier Reef campaign
THE campaign over the Great Barrier Reef has erupted into all-out war between the Federal Government and Greenpeace,
Coalition Senator Matt Canavan yesterday moved for punitive action to be taken against Greenpeace over its Reef campaign in which it sought to have the World Heritage area listed by UNESCO as “in danger”.
Senator Canavan has written to Federal Environment Minister Greg Hunt, urging him to investigate whether Greenpeace’s registration as a tax-deductible organisation can be withdrawn.
Australia’s nuclear lobby keen to “educate” schoolchildren
Forget the nuclear family we are soon going to have nuclear classrooms if ANSTO has its way BRUCE MCDOUGALL THE DAILY TELEGRAPH MAY 28, 2015
AUSTRALIA’S nuclear facility at Lucas Heights is spearheading a major push to encourage schoolchildren to become scientists.
Thousands of secondary students have been invited to tour the country’s only operational nuclear reactor, meet its scientists and study their research programs.
As Federal Education Minister Christopher Pyne launched a plan to make maths and science compulsory in the final year of school, 250 students arrived at Lucas Heights yesterday to work on special projects.
The Year 9 and Year 10 students from seven schools took part in a series of competitive challenges at the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO)……http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/nsw/forget-the-nuclear-family-we-are-soon-going-to-have-nuclear-classrooms-if-ansto-has-its-way/story-fni0cx12-1227372012172
Australia’s public sector now losing its climate change experts
Canberra’s climate change brain drain becoming critical, The Mandarin 28 May 15 by David DonaldsonClimate change expertise is being lost from the public sector as the government fails to fill board vacancies and departments stop commissioning climate policy modelling from ABARES. Continue reading
Federal and Western Australian govts systematic attack on environmental critics
Funding withdrawal from Environmental Defender’s Office criticised as ‘systematic attack’ on community groups, ABC News, By Stephanie Dalzell, 28 May 15, The Conservation Council of Western Australia has accused the State and Federal Governments of launching a “systematic attack” on community groups which scrutinise policy decisions.
The criticism comes after WA’s Environmental Defender’s Office (EDO) had its funding completely withdrawn by the State Government, effective from the end of this financial year.
The decision follows similar action by the Federal Government in 2013.
The EDO, which also relies on grants and donations, said the combined cut in state and federal funding would leave it with a gap of $250,000 in annual operating expenses. Conservation Council director Piers Verstegen said the cut appeared to be a direct response to the EDO’s advocacy for groups which challenged policy or development decisions.
“The EDO is an extremely important organisation in our community and it brings scrutiny to environmental issues often where government make bad decisions or go wrong in relation to environmental management,” he said. “I think the Government’s keen to remove that scrutiny.
“I think this is part of a systematic attack on community groups around the country that engage in advocacy on environmental issues and stand up for clean water, healthy land, and healthy ecosystems.
“And when that doesn’t align with government policy or the industries that government [is] supporting, that’s when government [feels] uncomfortable with that advocacy and [starts] to cut funding.”……..http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-05-27/conservation-council-criticises-funding-withdrawal/6499492
Australians overwhelmingly prefer solar energy – survey results
Survey Says Australians Prefer Solar Power Sputnik News 25 May 15 Australians strongly support the use of renewable energy, according to Ipsos research company’s survey. Some 87 percent of respondents were strongly in favor of solar panels on homes and 78 percent supported large-scale solar energy facilities.MOSCOW (Sputnik) — Solar power is considered the most efficient source of energy by an overwhelming majority of Australians, Ipsos research company stated Monday.
Earlier in May, following months of negotiations, Australia’s current government and the primary opposition party reached an agreement to scale back its Renewable Energy Target (RET) by almost 20 percent by 2020, due to declining power demand.
A recent Ipsos report based on a poll of nearly 1200 people funded by Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) revealed that Australians responding to the poll strongly support the use of renewable energy. Some 87 percent of respondents were strongly in favor of solar panels on homes and 78 percent supported large-scale solar energy facilities.
An overall 72 percent of respondents from across Australia said they supported wind farms and hydro energy, while tidal and geothermal energy was favored by 52 and 45 percent respectively……..
Since coming to power in 2013, Prime Minister Tony Abbott has repealed a tax on carbon emissions and eliminated the post of science minister……… http://sputniknews.com/environment/20150525/1022530489.html#ixzz3bHKV5Rpu
The Bjorn Lomborg recipe for inaction on Climate Change
Bringing Lomborg’s work to Australia seems to have been the personal project of Prime Minister Tony Abbott who found $4 million in a budget that cannot afford to support other scientific work on climate change. Abbott is, of course, famous for dismissing climate science as “crap” and choosing as his chief business adviser a man, Maurice Newman, who believes climate science is being used by the UN to impose authoritarian rule over the world.
The Lomborg Ruse, Clive Hamilton 23 MAY 2015 No one in Australia has more relentlessly attacked environmentalists, climate science, carbon taxes and the aspirations of the United Nations than Murdoch columnist Andrew Bolt.
So what does it mean when Bolt sings the praises of a man who is a declared environmentalist, accepts the body of evidence for climate change, supports a carbon tax and is a strong supporter of the United Nations? Oh, and he’s also a gay vegetarian who’s never out of a trendy black T-shirt.
And what are we to make of it when Bolt, who has complained bitterly that the nation’s universities are stacked with leftists, is now up in arms because a man with admittedly left-leaning politics is sent packing from one of those universities.
I speak of course of Bjorn Lomborg and the University of Western Australia’s reversal of its decision to host his Consensus Centre and so reject the $4 million offered by the Federal Government.
Bolt is not Lomborg’s only unlikely defender. John Roskam of the Institute of Public Affairs writes that the opposition to Lomborg “demonstrates all that’s wrong with Australia’s universities”. The IPA, from the late 1990s the epicentre of the dissemination of climate science denial in Australia, now claims that the man who declares “I believe in global warming” has been “muzzled” and must be heard. (The IPA hosted a Lomborg visit to Australia in 2003, at the prompting of federal industry minister Ian Macfarlane.) Continue reading
Senator Leyonhjelm – Nuclear power is fine: wind power is the danger!
Senator David Leyonhjelm wants government to monitor wind turbine noise, The Age, May 24, 2015 Adam Gartre It seems the only thing colourful crossbench senator David Leyonhjelm hates more than red tape is wind farming.
Despite typically being a fierce opponent of new government regulation, the Liberal Democrat is calling on the government to set up a new regulator to monitor noise levels near wind turbines.
He claims a Senate inquiry he set up has uncovered “credible evidence” that some people are suffering 
health concerns caused by low frequency noise and vibrations known as infrasound.
Australia’s peak medical agency this year concluded there is no direct or consistent evidence that wind farms damage human health, after conducting a year-long study into so-called “wind turbine syndrome”.
Bjorn Lomborg’s USA operation seems to break many USA rules
It is unclear that Lomborg himself is a legitimate charity anywhere, but most of the money seems under his control. One might also wonder where income taxes are paid.
Perhaps with his new $4 million Australia Consensus Center (covered here, here, here) Bjorn Lomborg may pick a better site than a US shipping storefront, since he’ll receive much more taxpayer money, directly, courtesy of the Australian government. That does seem simpler
Bjorn Lomborg’s Copenhagen Consensus Center – Real Charity Or “Foreign Conduit”? DeSmogBlog By John Mashey • Sunday, April 26, 2015 Bjørn Lomborg is founder and president of the Copenhagen Consensus CenterUSA (CCC)), a tax-exempt 501(c)(3) “public charity” whose US physical presence is shown in the image: 262 Middlesex St, Lowell MA. Lomborg and the Copenhagen Consensus Center are known to DeSmog readers for efforts to downplay the importance of addressing climate change, a subset of climate science denialism that has infected the public debate across the English-speaking world.
Despite the name, it has not been based in Copenhagen since 2011. Continue reading
Bjorn Lomborg remains confident about his climate action delaying centre
CCC’s Bjorn Lomborg appears unfazed by criticisms and setbacks, The Age May 23, 2015 – Paul McGeough, Amidst uncertainty over his planned expansion into Australia, sponsored and part-funded by Canberra, Danish climate contrarian Bjorn Lomborg is unapologetic over secret donor funding and his own, at times, large salary as head of the Copenhagen Consensus Centre (CCC).
Defending the donations, Lomborg doubled-back on a position he took late last year when he volunteered, in a Freakonomics talk in the US, “almost all” CCC donors wished to remain anonymous……
Asked if the combination of past trenchant scientific and environmentalist criticism of his “bang-for-your-buck” analysis, which underpinned the outrage at UWA, and of his willingness to accept some anonymous funding risked the credibility of his proposed Australian operation, Lomborg countered: “CCC has been recognised repeatedly as a top global think-tank – it has a strong reputation because of the excellent research that it produces with more than 100 leading economists and seven Nobel laureates.”
Yet Lomborg baulked, when asked about the intellectual hinge in his relationship with Canberra – did the Abbott government enlist him in the Australian discourse because he had always believed humans cause global warming, or because he now spent most of his waking hours articulating arguments against controversial proposals to cut carbon emissions?….
n the 2013 filings, Lomborg’s salary was reveal to be $200, 484, but in the previous year it was more than three times that amount – $US775, 000.That figure caused a rolling of eyes in some scientific and environmental corners. But unabashed, Lomborg told Fairfax Media: “My salary is assessed by a compensation committee. My position is as leader of a globally recognised, top-ranked think-tank and research funder, interacting with hundreds of the world’s top economists, opinion-makers and leaders.”
Hoping to ride out the storm over his appointment, Lomborg said in April: “We want to have this conversation in the developing world, but Imagine having it in Australia too. In a democracy we talk about what can be done in three-year election cycles, but let’s ask what could Australia do in the lifetime of the next generation.”……http://www.theage.com.au/national/cccs-bjorn-lomborg-appears-unfazed-by-criticisms-and-setbacks-20150522-gh6h2g
Environmental powers handed to the States – will mean falling standards
Environmental standards face decline if all approval powers are handed to states, report finds, ABC News, By Jane Ryan, 21 May 15 Environmental standards would drop under a proposed state-based one-stop-shop environmental approval system, a new report has found.
The proposed legislation, which is before the Federal Senate, seeks to streamline environmental approval processes by giving power of approval to state governments and cutting out the Commonwealth.
But a report by the Environmental Defenders Office (EDO) warns against relegating environmental approval powers to state governments, saying the environment will suffer.
EDO principal lawyer Jess Feehely said there were several areas where state legislation did not meet the standards set by Commonwealth protections……..
Ms Feehely said Tasmania would not meet international obligations on environment protection under the proposed legislation change.”There’s a real risk that matters of national environmental significance will receive less protection,” she said. “Matters of national significance include threatened species, so habitat for the Tasmanian devil, and it includes world heritage areas and endangered ecological communities.”
She said there were four main areas where the Tasmanian law fell short of the protection afforded under the Commonwealth Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act. “They don’t apply the precautionary principle, they don’t take account of our international obligations, and they don’t make it easy for people to find access to information about development decisions,” she said.
The report also commended the strong rights for public participation currently provided in many Tasmanian laws.http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-05-22/one-stop-shop-system-would-reduce-environmental-standards-report/6489168
Labor Party firmly supporting price on carbon
Chris Bowen puts carbon tax back in play for Labor, The Age May 20, 2015 Mark Kenny, Gareth Hutchens Shadow treasurer Chris Bowen has ruled out reviving Labor’s unsuccessful and politically corrosive mining tax under a future Shorten Labor government but has committed the ALP to putting a fully formed carbon pricing policy before voters at the next election….
a price on carbon remained central to the ALP’s platform.
“We continue to believe firstly that climate change is real,” he said.
“Secondly, that it’s caused by humankind and thirdly, the best way of dealing with it is a price on carbon. We continue to believe that, and that will be reflected in our detailed policy that we announce and seek a mandate to implement.”
The declaration means the political fight at the next election will in some senses be a carbon copy of the carbon-dominated 2013 race after Prime Minister Tony Abbott managed to abolish Labor’s fixed-price scheme last year……..http://www.theage.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/chris-bowen-puts-carbon-tax-back-in-play-for-labor-20150520-gh5sws.html
Here’s how the states can dodge Canberra’s renewable roadblock
Dylan McConnell & Anne Kallies: Here’s how the states can dodge Canberra’s renewable roadblock Labor and the Coalition government have now agreed to cut the federal renewable energy target (RET) from 41,000 gigawatt hours in 2020, to 33,000 GWh – a reduction of almost 20%. This agreement has been hailed as restoring stability to the industry, after a year plagued with uncertainty and featuring two reviews.
However, this is still a significant cut, particularly as the target is a significant part of Australia’s policy response to climate change.
Meanwhile, Victoria has committed to restoring its own renewable energy target, the VRET, following other states in developing renewable energy policy. However a clause the federal legislation prevents schemes similar to the federal RET.
How can the states get around this and support their industries? https://theconversation.com/heres-how-the-states-can-dodge-canberras-renewable-roadblock-42043
Uranium policy in the Draft ALP Conference Platform
Re: Uranium policy in the Draft ALP Platform for National Conference 2015 http://beyondnuclearinitiative.com/uranium-policy-in-the-draft-alp-conference-platform/
The 2015 Australian Labor Party (ALP) National Conference will be held from July 24/26 in Melbourne. Ahead of Conference the federal ALP has circulated draft policy documents for consultation and comment.
The full draft policy document can be found here with comments accepted from the general public as well as ALP members until Friday 29 May.
The draft uranium policy as presented poses both unreasonable reductions in transparency and unacceptable increases in risk.
The draft policy seeks to remove:
· health, safety and monitoring protections for workers
· public accountability and industry transparency mechanisms
· a long standing veto on the importation and storage of international nuclear waste
The draft policy proposes to facilitate:
· the importation, storage and disposal of international nuclear waste
· all aspects of the nuclear industry except domestic nuclear power (ie- uranium enrichment/fuel fabrication/reprocessing/waste conditioning)
Against the backdrop of the continuing Fukushima crisis, directly fuelled by Australian uranium, it is important that the ALP does not further erode an already deficient policy.
Key national and state environmental groups will be making submissions in response to the above points, but we encourage anyone concerned about this backwards policy step to also contribute via the online comment process.
A little effort from us now might help stop a big set back at the national conference in July.
Some suggested points to include in your submission are listed below- please feel free to adapt and expand on these.
If you would like further information or to discuss the draft policy and response please contact: Dave Sweeney, Australian Conservation Foundation, d.sweeney [at] acfonline.org.au or Natalie Wasley, Beyond Nuclear Initiative, beyondnuclearinitiative [at] gmail.com. Continue reading
Labor, Coalition agree on new renewable energy target
Renewable energy sector welcomes bipartisan RET deal, debate rages over burning of wood waste, ABC Radio 19 May 15 By Peta Donald The renewable energy sector has welcomed a bipartisan deal over the Renewable Energy Target (RET), saying it clears the way for billions of dollars of investment in energy from sources like the wind and the Sun.
The Federal Government and Labor yesterday agreed to lower the RET from 41,000 gigawatt hours to 33,000, to fully exempt trade-exposed industries from the target and to scrap the two-yearly reviews which threatened to derail the deal.
Instead, the Clean Energy Regulator will provide an annual statement to Parliament and the government of the day on progress towards the target, what impact it is having on electricity prices, and whether the scheme is at risk of default.
The Government could bring legislation for the new target to the Parliament as early as next week, which means more than 23 per cent of Australia’s power would come from renewable sources in five years. Continue reading
1 This month
Chernobyl: The Lost Tapes – A good documentary on Chernobyl on SBS available On Demand for the next 3 weeks– https://www.sbs.com.au/ondemand/tv-program/chernobyl-the-lost-tapes/2352741955560
15 April – Zoom –Nuclear Power is Not the Solution
Apr 15, 2026 01:00 AM in Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney
Join the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW) on Tuesday, April 14th for a timely webinar exploring the risks associated with nuclear power and challenging the myth that it offers a simple, safe, carbon-free solution to the climate crisis
21 April Webinar: No Nuclear Weapons in Australia
Start: 2026-04-21 18:00:00 UTC Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney (GMT+10:00)
End: 2026-04-21 19:30:00 UTC Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney (GMT+10:00)
Event Type: Virtual
A virtual link will be communicated before the event.
Host Contact Info: australia@icanw.org
of the week – Australians for War Powers Reform (AWPR)
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity
Antinuclear 