Climate change defines Christine Milne’s fine legacy in Parliament
Given our climate politics, who can blame Christine Milne for retiring?, Guardian 7 May 15 Tim Hollo
After 25 years of campaigning, Milne’s retirement from parliament is an indictment of how little progress Australia has made on climate change. egardless of the surprise of the press gallery, anyone paying attention realised Christine Milne would have been thinking deeply about her future. With her first grandchild on the way, the planet’s future would also have been brought into a stark new light.
Milne can be confident that she steered the Greens through a hugely difficult period, bringing a new strategic focus to campaigning and beautifully mentoring a new crop of advocates. But it is climate change which keeps her awake at night, and she has had to consider where she could most effectively focus her efforts in the critical years ahead.
Who can blame her for concluding that Australian parliamentary politics is a poor place right now from which to work for radical climate change action?
Milne’s deep knowledge of (and passion for) climate science and policy is legendary in and around parliament. Less well known is her record on climate change over the last quarter century.
In 1990, while a member of the Tasmanian Parliament, she was appointed alongside Joan Kirner and Rupert Hamer to Australia’s first Greenhouse Council. She moved to the international arena in 1998 and was elected to the Global Council of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature in 2000. She was elected its vice president in 2004, the same year she was elected to the Senate.
From all of these positions, Milne worked to build awareness and acknowledgement of climate change. More deeply, she challenged us to grapple with its deep ramifications for our economies, our politics and our lives.
From all of these positions, Milne worked to build awareness and acknowledgement of climate change. More deeply, she challenged us to grapple with its deep ramifications for our economies, our politics and our lives……………..
Milne’s role in bringing depth to the climate change debate through that period was vital to the tremendous election result for the Greens in 2010. She capitalised on that by proposing the Multi Party Climate Change Committee as a condition of supporting the Gillard government, insisting on experts sitting on the committee, and shepherding through it the best possible result that could have been achieved. She also used the process to increase the understanding of climate change in the community.
While we have, of course, lost the carbon price, the Climate Change Authority and the Clean Energy Finance Corporation remain – and both are Milne’s hard-won achievements. More importantly, the idea that we cannot be serious about climate change without phasing out coal remains and is growing ever stronger. No future government will be able to get away with what Tony Abbott has done, and that is in no small part thanks to Milne’s efforts…….http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/may/07/given-our-climate-politics-who-can-blame-christine-milne-for-retiring
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……………
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.
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
This week’s Nuclear Notes, from Mia Pepper
Mia Pepper , Beyond Nuclear 30 April 15 Last week the Federal Government gave conditional approval to the Kintyre uranium mine proposal on the edge of Karlamilyi National park. You can still send a message to the minister even though he’s made the decision here online action supporting Parnngurr’s. You can read the minister conditions here – which basically says they need to resubmit everything before they can start mining – reaffirming our frustration that everything we looked at through public review was a draft and could change as it goes through the DMP assessment. An article about this in the NW Telegraph is attached.
Also this week we saw the Mineral Council of Australia push for the Government to reconsider nuclear power as they also celebrated the $4 million gift to Climate denialist Bjorn Lomborg (*sigh). The South Australian Royal Commission has released papers for comment please have a look and make comment – if anyone is keen we’d love volunteer help to look through a make comment on behalf of CCWA, ANAWA or WANFA. Can pick your choice of org. We have computers, internet, photocopiers and phones to assist you in doing this.
Last week the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty Conference was opened in NYC – some strong statements have been made about the humanitarian cost of war and nuclear weapons, and calls to ban nuclear weapons. Unfortunately Australia is not one of those countries. Can see statements from Austria and
Mexico. Reaching Critical Will have put together this great little briefing book on the NPT, for a short read on background and demands for this conference. Yesterday there was a great action against US warships in Fremantle with Dr Death, the doomsday clock, Baloney Abbott and the CWA *concerned womyn anarchists – thanks to all involve for a very fun, engaging and peaceful protest.
The World Uranium Symposium in Quebec has now been and gone – check out the very inspiring declaration from the Symposium.
And remember to tune in to Understorey – and the Radioactive Show this week for all the latest nuclear and peace news.
Western Australia ready to gamble with the radioactive uranium industry
The uranium lobby is one of the nation’s most powerful.
The State Labor Opposition carries on that it supports a uranium ban however this is hogwash. It was former Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s Government, helped along by Gary Gray and Martin Ferguson, who talked up uranium mining no less than Bob Hawke did, and who negotiated with India. State Labor despite its promises at its annual conferences will never reinstate the ban on uranium.
Western Australia ready to dice with uranium & radiation, The Stringer by Gerry Georgatos April 26th, 2015 “…….Yesterday, the Federal Government ‘green 
light’ welcomed in a uranium mine in the Pilbara. There are now four uranium projects in advanced development stages. The Government will sell the underwriting of revenue and jobs but it is their mining chums who will get rich not the Australian nation – but the burden of any radiation leaks will be borne by the Australian people.
Mining companies are investing huge fortunes in research, exploration and development projects for the mining of uranium. Nuclear energy is not just touted but will be the energy fuel of the future. Previous and incumbent Australian Governments have signed off uranium export deals and not just with India.
Western Australia has four uranium mining projects in the advanced stages leading to their establishment – Kintyre, Mulga Rock, Wiluna and Yeelirrie.
For now, they are mostly by the communities – Homelands – of First Peoples. The communities are being told that jobs will be waiting for them at the uranium sites. The uranium sites are being sold as world’s best practice – Continue reading
Minerals Council wants to overturn Australia’s environmental laws- in the cause of the nuclear chain
I recently reported on the plan outlined by pro nuclear propagandist Oscar Archer to bring the entire
nuclear fuel chain to Australia.
In Archer’s glossy spiel on how great it would be – he just barely touched on the fact that Australian federal and state environmental laws will have to be overturned.
Now the Minerals Council comes out spruiking for this overturning of laws as the first step in the toxic chain of events to bring the toxic nuclear chain to Australia
Review emissions target, nuclear ban: Minerals Council The Minerals Council of Australia has called for a review of the ban on nuclear power and warned that Australia’s post-2020 emission-reduction target cannot be properly formulated without extensive economic modelling… (registered readers only)
New Matilda’s Guide to Greg Hunt’s Climate Nonsense
A Simple Guide To Understanding Greg Hunt’s ‘Nonsense’ Carbon Con, New Matilda 26 Apr 15 More than a decade in, Australia still doesn’t have a credible carbon abatement policy. Thom Mitchell explains.
Environment Minister Greg Hunt is doing a stellar job of muddying the rising, warming waters which threaten to submerge the government’s “inadequate” climate policies, but experts say his claims are “quite outrageously misleading”.
After half a decade of rhetoric the government’s Emissions Reduction Fund (ERF), the centre-piece of its ‘Direct Action’ climate policy, has faced its first real test. Continue reading
Australia’s role in the global nuclear industry crisis – – theme for May 2015
The global nuclear industry may pretend otherwise, but it is in crisis. The commercial nuclear industry is an economic disaster. The first and greatest nuclear nation, USA, has learned this. So has France. Britain now undergoes this painful realisation.
As these “old” nuclear countries realise the collapse of their nuclear industry, they turn to marketing nuclear technology overseas, in a desperate effort to make the industry viable. This gets complicated, because the desire for nuclear weapons is a strong motive for buyers – India, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia? – countries that really do not need nuclear power, but like the option of nuclear weapons..
Within the nuclear industry there’s been a division between the interests of the big “conventional” uranium fired nuclear reactors, and the supporters of small nuclear reactors and thorium fuelled reactors.
Here’s where Australia comes in. Somewhat culturally isolated, Australia is a sitting duck for a clumsy plan to put all these technologies together, and for the global nuclear salesmen to present a united face, and try to sell the whole lot to Australia.
These nuclear marketers (Canada’s Lavalin, France’s AREVA, USA’s Westinghouse, GE Hitachi) are desperate for Australia to accept this scheme. Afflicted at home by public anxiety about radioactive trash, they really do need to be able to tell their citizens – “Don’t worry – Australia will take the trash – we can keep on making it.”
Abbott’s funding of Bjorn Lomborg – a travesty of climate science and economics
Lomborg’s influence over key ministers in the Abbott government is quite well-known. He is seen to be at the centre of much of federal cabinet’s climate groupthink………
The real travesty of funding Lomborg’s newest franchise is that it comes from the same government that defunded the Climate Commission. This was composed of Australia’s best climate scientists, economists and energy experts, with an operating cost of A$1.5 million per year. This, more than even the most horrendous of storms, really exposes the parlous state of the Abbott government’s desertion of future generations
As such, one has to have some sympathy for Lomborg, who is a strange kind of “climate change refugee”. In 2012, the Danish government pulled all funding from his centre. Since, he has only set up shop in countries that have strong climate change-denying lobbies – both in the private sector and within mainstream media. He has enjoyed this in the US.
Lomborg operates by attaching himself to these centres as an adjunct professor, which will be his title at UWA, rather than a staff member. This offers the freedom to command remuneration well above a professorial salary – such as the US$775,000 he was paid in 2012 by the CCC and the US$200,484 paid for his work in 2013……… Continue reading
Australian tax-payers funding shonky climate economics with $4m Bjørn Lomborg centre
So is this “methodology” the Abbott Government has spent $4million on any good?……
while cost-benefit analysis can be useful, it doesn’t work when you apply it to climate change policy.
How do you price, for example, the loss of a Pacific island nation and what that would mean for the cultures that have thrived there? What’s the price losing multiple species of flora and fauna or the Great Barrier Reef Jotzo adds:
Climate change is exceptional because it has all of these dimensions that go beyond the practical capability of cost benefit analysis.
Australian taxpayers funding climate contrarian’s methods with $4m Bjørn Lomborg centre Graham Readfearn, Guardian 23 Apr 15 Lomborg’s think tank methods underplay the impact of climate change and have ‘no academic credibility’ says leading climate economist. Danish political scientist and climate change contrarian Bjørn Lomborg says the poorest countries in the world need coal and climate change just isn’t as big a problem as some people make out.
Australia’s Prime Minister Tony Abbott says “coal is good for humanity” and there are more pressing problems in the world than climate change, which he once described as “crap” but now says he accepts.
So it’s not surprising then that the latter should furnish the former with $4 million of taxpayer funds to start an Australian arm of Lomborg’s Copenhagen Consensus Centre (CCC) at the University of Western Australia’s business school.
The CCC has consistently said that targets to cut greenhouse gas emissions are too expensive and money should be spent elsewhere
After a couple of weeks of doubt and confusion over the origins and the funding of the centre, latest reports suggest that the idea came from the Prime Minister’s office.
A spokesperson for the Prime Minister told Fairfax media it was “the government’s decision to bring the Lomborg consensus methodology to Australia”.
More on this “methodology” and some pretty fundamental problems with it in a bit.
Students at UWA are gathering names on a petition and campaigning in protest, saying Lomborg’s appointment as an adjunct (unpaid) professor there damages the university’s reputation and is an embarrassment. The University’s Student Guild claimed that “students, staff and alumni” were outraged. Continue reading
Bjorn Lomborg’s climate contrarianism: where his money comes from
many of the earlier donors to Lomborg’s US think tank have been linked to the
conservative side of politics, some with links to the billionaire Koch brothers.
There’s nothing “smart” about spending $4 million of taxpayer cash on a highly questionable methodology that by design downgrades climate change.
Australian taxpayers funding climate contrarian’s methods with $4m Bjørn Lomborg centre Graham Readfearn, Guardian 23 Apr 15 Lomborg’s funding“………Exactly how and where Bjorn Lomborg’s think tank has gathered its cash over the years has been a tough story to get the bottom of.
When the Danish Government’s funding of the CCC ran out in 2012, Lomborg had already registered the US arm of the think tank four years earlier.
Since 2008, the US tax records of the Copenhagen Consensus Center show it has gathered about $5million in income, more than half of which had come in 2012 and 2013 (the most recent years for which records are available).
Lomborg himself was paid $975,000 via the think tank in those two years.
Yet much of the think tank’s income is not disclosed Continue reading
International nuclear lobby pleased with Abbott’s gift to climate contrarian Lomborg
Nuclear lobby backs Abbott’s $4m gift to climate contrarian Lomborg, Independent Australia Giles Parkinson 23 April 2015, When push comes to shove to act on global warming, Big Mining will wheel in nuclear as a ploy to stall the take up of renewables. Is pro-nuclear Bjorn Lomborg’s thinktank in WA just a cynical move by Abbott to kill the clean energy industry? RenewEconomy’s Giles Parkinson runs the ruler over the nuclear option. THE PRO-NUCLEAR lobby has welcomed the decision by the Abbott government to award $4 million to Bjorn Lomborg, a climate “contrarian” who favours nuclear energy and opposes deployment of renewable energy.
Michael Schellenberger, president of the US-based Breakthrough Institute, a pro-nuclear think tank, tweeted over the weekend that the Australian government’s granting of funds to Lomborg was no different to the German government’s funding of an environmental think tank that favours renewable energy.
The difference may be that the Energiewende, or energy transition, is official bipartisan government policy in Germany. But Australia does not – at least officially, although its actions suggest otherwise – embrace climate obstructionism and nuclear technology. And it has defunded independent climate analysis such as that from the Climate Commission.
The tweet from the Breakthrough Institute might be unremarkable, but for that institution’s recent alliance with the pro-nuclear lobby in Australia, and the joint release of an “EcoModernist Manifesto” last week that says present day renewables are incapable of providing zero carbon energy, and that nuclear fission is the only technology capable of meeting most, if not all, the energy demands of a modern economy.
This, it would appear, seems to concur with the not-so-subtle secret agenda of Australian Coalition government policy. Continue reading
Bjorn Lomborg’s climate views have no credibility in the scientific community
“UWA was approached by the federal government” [ to host Bjorn Borg’s Centre, with govt funding]
In an email to supporters of the Climate Council on Friday, former Australian of the Year Tim Flannery said it was “extraordinary” that the government had abolished the Climate Commission “which was composed of Australia’s best climate scientists, economists and energy experts” on the basis of lack of funding only to find the money to “import a politically-motivated think tank to work in the same space.”
“Mr Lomborg’s views have no credibility in the scientific community,” Professor Flannery wrote.
Bjorn Lomborg centre: leaked documents cast doubt on Abbott government claims, The Age April 23, 2015 Lisa Cox, Matthew Knott It was the Abbott government’s original idea for the University of Western Australia to host a think tank created by the “sceptical environmentalist” Bjorn Lomborg, according to leaked talking points.
The government will provide $4 million over four years to bring Dr Lomborg’s Copenhagen Consensus Centre methodology to Australia at a new centre within the University of Western Australia (UWA) business school. 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 