Govt scheme to underwrite gas, hydro and coal power needs investigation – Zali Steggall
Zali Steggall calls for investigation of Coalition plan to underwrite gas, hydro and coal power
Independent MP says scheme lacks transparency and government has no authority to introduce it, Guardian, Adam Morton Environment editor @adamlmorton, Mon 27 Apr 2020 Independent MP Zali Steggall has asked the auditor general to investigate a Morrison government scheme to underwrite gas, hydro and coal power, saying it lacks transparency and citing legal advice that the Coalition had no constitutional or legislative authority to introduce it.
Announced in late 2018 after the government abandoned Malcolm Turnbull’s proposed national energy guarantee, the underwriting new generation investment (Ungi) scheme promises public support for new dispatchable power generation projects to increase competition in the electricity grid. Twelve projects have been shortlisted, including six pumped hydro plants, five gas generators and an upgrade to the Vales Point coal-fired power plant.
Steggall has written to the auditor general, Grant Hehir, asking him to consider investigating the program “as a matter of priority”. Her letter refers to research by The Australia Institute, a progressive thinktank, suggesting the program has no constitutional or legislative standing, no guidelines or criteria to assess projects, and its development and implementation did not follow a clear process.
She said despite these apparent flaws the government had shortlisted projects, started “advanced negotiations” to support gas-fired plants in Victoria and Queensland and entered a memorandum-of-understanding with the New South Wales government to support three projects in the state. ……
Steggall, who entered parliament last year on a climate action platform, said the focus on fossil fuels was questionable and there was little visibility of how and why the projects shortlisted for underwriting had been chosen….
“There’s just no transparency or accountability around this,” Steggall told Guardian Australia. “We’ve seen what happened with sport rorts. We’re talking about commonwealth money at a time when we know the economy has taken a hit due to coronavirus, and I think it should be properly investigated.”……https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2020/apr/27/zali-steggall-calls-for-probe-of-coalition-plan-to-underwrite-gas-hydro-and-coal-power
Australia goes backwards in latest world press freedom index
 Government ‘absolutely committed’ to press freedom as Australia drops in rankings, Brisbane Times, 24 Apr 20 Australia slipped five places to 26th in Reporters Without Borders’ latest world press freedom index, the global watchdog citing Australian Federal Police raids targeting reporters and cost-cutting in the industry as threats to public interest journalism.Attorney-General Christian Porter said the government was committed to protecting press freedom as media organisations and Labor seized on Australia’s slump in the rankings to renew calls for reform.
The drop in rankings comes after a campaign by the “Australia’s Right to Know” coalition of major media organisations, who have urged the Parliament to legislate on a suite of proposals to curb government secrecy. Labor labelled the global result “worrying” and called for action. Mr Porter said the government was “absolutely committed” to a free press and was awaiting the findings of an inquiry by Parliament’s intelligence and security committee…… The media organisations have put forward six key recommendations, including public interest exemptions from national security laws, expanded safeguards for whistleblowers, freedom of information reform, the right to contest search warrants and defamation changes…… Mr Porter said the the committee’s previous plan to report by early this year had been disrupted by the COVID-19 crisis. The reporting deadline had already been delayed multiple times last year, with members citing the complexity of the task and late submissions. Sources familiar with the committee’s deliberations told The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age the plan was now to deliver the findings by the middle of the year. Reporters Without Borders said Australia “used to be the regional model but is now characterised by its threats to the confidentiality of sources and to investigative journalism”. The organisation also noted the concentration of media ownership, the closure of national news agency Australian Associated Press and that the Australian constitution was “completely lacking in guarantees for the right to inform and to be informed”. A spokesman for Australia’s Right to Know said the coalition had long pursued changes and the High Court’s ruling last week on the search warrants executed at the home of News Corp journalist Annika Smethurst “again illustrated the increasing urgency for law reform in this area.” Journalists’ union the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance said the press freedom index result highlighted Australia was going backwards. “Overseas observers are recognising what Australians already know: that press freedom in our country is under sustained assault,” MEAA official Marcus Strom said. Shadow attorney-general Mark Dreyfus and opposition communications spokeswoman Michelle Rowland said in a joint statement the slide down the index “underscores the need for action by the government on law reform to support media diversity, support press freedom and address the concerns of Australia’s Right to Know coalition and civil society organisations”. https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/politics/federal/government-absolutely-committed-to-press-freedom-as-australia-drops-in-rankings-20200423-p54mn6.html |
|
Chernobyl nuclear disaster marks 34 years
, Nearly 8.4M people exposed to radiation, over 400,000 displaced in wake of 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster, AA, Satuk Bugra Kutlugun |26.04.2020 ANKARA
The catastrophic Chernobyl nuclear accident in Ukraine, then part of the Soviet Union, marked its 34th anniversary on Sunday.
On April 26, 1986, a sudden surge of power during a reactor systems test destroyed Unit 4 of the nuclear power station at Chernobyl, some 110 kilometers (68.3 miles) from Ukraine’s capital, Kiev.
“Sunday is International Chernobyl Disaster Remembrance Day. The women, men & children affected by radioactive contamination must never be forgotten,” the UN said on Twitter, designating April 26 the International Chernobyl Disaster Remembrance Day.
31 people were killed in the immediate aftermath of the accident, while millions more were affected.
According to the official numbers, roughly 8.4 million people in the former Soviet territories of Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine got the largest exposure to radiation in the form of a cloud.
Around 155,000-square-kilometer (nearly 60,000-square-mile) area of these three countries were contaminated, and over 400,000 people were displaced.
Later research into the accident showed that the radioactive clouds reached as far as the US and China……..https://www.aa.com.tr/en/europe/chernobyl-nuclear-disaster-marks-34-years/1819033
Eleven of 12 hottest years have occurred since 2000, new climate report warns
Eleven of 12 hottest years have occurred since 2000, new climate report warns, Independent, Isabelle Gerretsen @izzygerretsen 23 Apr 20
Last year was the hottest year on record for Europe after scorching heatwaves led to record-breaking temperatures in February, June and July
Eleven out of the 12 hottest years to date have all occurred since 2000, according to a new report by the European Union’s climate monitoring service.
Last year was the hottest year on record for Europe after scorching heatwaves led to record-breaking temperatures in February, June and July, scientists from the Copernicus Climate Change Service (CS3) said in the annual European State of the Climate report.
“The number of days with high heat stress levels are increasing in both northern and southern Europe,” they said.
An intense heatwave at the end of July led to record melting of Greenland’s ice sheet and all-time records being broken in northern Scandinavia, the Copernicus report noted.
According to recent research, Greenland’s ice sheet and the polar ice caps are melting six times faster than they were in the 1990s. The high melt rate fits with the worst-case scenario outlined by the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which states that sea levels will rise 17cm without sweeping reductions in greenhouse gas emissions…..
Concentrations of CO2 and methane in the atmosphere continue to increase. “It is only possible to find concentrations as high as they were in 2019 by going back millions of years in history,” the Copernicus scientists said.
Professor Martin Siegert, co-director of the Grantham Institute for Climate Change at Imperial College London, told The Independent that the current level of CO2 in the atmosphere is “unnaturally high”.
He said it should be 280 parts per million (ppm) but is currently 415ppm and could reach 1000ppm by the end of the century if CO2 emissions continue to rise at their current rate…… https://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change-global-warming-hottest-years-on-record-a9477796.html
April 26 Energy News — geoharvey
Opinion: ¶ “Australian Government’s $94 Million Crude Oil Purchase Offers A Simple Economics Lesson” • Last week, Australia took advantage of record-low oil prices to buy crude oil it needed to maintain a fuel stockpile. This illustrates the difference between energy that must be stocked, such as oil, and energy that flows naturally, such as […]
When Coalition spends big on oil, it misses a huge green economic opportunity for Australia — RenewEconomy
The Morrison government is ignoring its own advice when pours money into offshore oil reserves, rather than building the foundations of a green economy. The post When Coalition spends big on oil, it misses a huge green economic opportunity for Australia appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Brett Stokes: South Australian law has been repeatedly breached by the deceptive National Radioactive Waste Dump plot
(a) encourage and support South Australian police to enforce the law against illegal
use of public money in a manner prohibited under s13 of Nuclear Waste Storage
Facility (Prohibition) Act 2000.
disgraceful “site selection process”.
I am happy for this submission to be made public.
Censored Previous Submission
Subject – Selection process for a national radioactive waste management facility in South Australia (see on this site Brett Stokes shows how plans for nuclear waste dumping in South Australia have breached S.A. law)
Ngoppon Together Reconciliation Group: Kimba nuclear waste dump opposed by Indigenous, and other South Australians
|
Ngoppon Together Reconciliation Group, Submission No 3 to National Radioactive Waste Management Amendment (Site Specification, Community Fund and Other Measures) Bill 2020 . Ngoppon Together Reconciliation Group write to you in support of the Barngarla people of Eyre Peninsula, who have fought so hard to protect their ancestral home from nuclear waste.
Senator Matt Canaban announced that Kimba, Eyre Peninsula, has been selected for the proposed Nuclear Waste Storage Facility. Why select a site within one of South Australia’s best cropping areas? Grain farming in the Kimba district brings in up to $80 million per annum.. The Federal Government’s promise of a $30 million development package is, with respect, “peanuts”, compared with the long terms risks.
Only inhabitants of a small zone around Kimba were entitled to vote. This excleded the Barngarla people, traditional caretakers of the land and native title holders, and other nearby inhabitants who objected to the proposal. If the 50km radius zone had been applied to Kimba,as it was to Hawker, the vote would have failed. Just 52 Kimba locals cannot speak for 1.7 million South Australians, The majority of South Australians have objected to nuclear proposals for many years.
Medical waste is mainly low level radiation with fast breakdown., but 90% of the waste is intermediate level, and can take up to 10,000 tears to degrade It includes spent nuclear fuel rods, classified as high level waste in France. To complicate matters, it will be stored temporarily in above ground structures until a safe reposirary is designed, approved and built. One hundred trucks will transport the wastes over a 1700 km route over a four year period. As yet there has been no community consultation about the route.
The Federal Government has decided to go ahead with the proposal, despite unanimous opposition from the Barngarla people. The Barngarla Determination Aboriginal Corporation initiated a legal action, protesting their exclusion from the ballot. This failed. The BDAC also asked the Australian Electoral Corporation to change the ballot to a confidential postal vote. This was unsuccessful. The BDAC wrote to the Federal Government, calling for the dump proposal to be abandoned.in the light of their unanimous opposition. They are determined to maintain their fight against the Nuclear Waste Dump..
Honorary Secretary Jacqueline Merckenschlager https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Economics/RadioactiveWaste/Submissions?fbclid=IwAR0v5FeP2_iTZbTmkrFA3HNLS29dko4g2NgxUR7UaiuSUyVDh62bDFOLxwA
|
|
Geraldine Gillen: Napandee nuclear waste dump -illegal, damaging to agriculture’s image, unwanted, unnecessary
Re: Flawed Federal process contrary to Nuclear Safety Committee advice and untenable interim nuclear waste storage compromises Safety & Security and Rights & Interests in SA Geraldine Gillen Submission No. 18 to National Radioactive Waste Management Amendment (Site Specification, Community Fund and Other Measures) Bill 2020 .
I contend that the Construction of a nuclear waste dump in SA at Kimba is currently illegal under SA Law passed by the State Liberal Government in 2000. We also had a Citizen’s Jury which said “NO”.
The Bill is deeply flawed on many fronts and should be rejected. It specifically targets SA for a national nuclear waste “facility” – a repository for low-level waste and an above-ground ‘interim’ (indefinite) store for long-lived intermediate-level waste including nuclear reactor fuel waste. At the same time the Federal Government is making no effort to find an alternative permanent site for this waste.
Why is the Federal Government not using its own land for this purpose? Why has it looked to private land? What is the real motive?
including cancer, cardiovascular disease, emphysema and cataracts – and if it enters the soil can contaminate our food and water.
continues to disempower and dispossess the Barngarla Traditional Owners who are unanimous in their opposition to the proposed nuclear waste facility. I have stood with them and the Kimba community who are opposed to this dump on the steps of SA Parliament House and this year at Kimba. I will continue to do so.
Besides the Barngarla people, many people in the Kimba community were unable to vote. People who originally were told they were neighbours, suddenly were not because a road between their property and another deemed them to be ineligible. People holding property who were just outside the area, did not get a vote. The process of how was eligible for voting needs to be explored by this Committee. Statistic have been misused both by the Government and then by the media.
how we plan and manage our land, resources and social responsibilities in the future.
Now is the time to scrap this Bill. more https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Economics/RadioactiveWaste/Submissions?fbclid=IwAR0v5FeP2_iTZbTmkrFA3HNLS29dko4g2NgxUR7UaiuSUyVDh62bDFOLxwA
Caring for South Australia reject nuclear waste dumping: it will jeopardise South Australian food production
Fossil fuel web leading Australia to a Deadly Recovery — RenewEconomy
It is possible to recover from a deadly crisis through a trajectory that prevents another deadly crisis. We have to fight for that future. The post Fossil fuel web leading Australia to a Deadly Recovery appeared first on RenewEconomy.
via Fossil fuel web leading Australia to a Deadly Recovery — RenewEconomy
Queensland’s Supreme Court bars Aboriginal activists from Queensland’s Adani mine site
|
Queensland’s Supreme Court has barred two Aboriginal traditional owners and their representatives from returning to a ceremonial camp they set up at the controversial Adani mine site. The mining giant won its bid for a court order against Wangan and Jagalingou man Adrian Burragubba and his son Coedy McAvoy, after the court found the men had threatened to continue to enter the Carmichael mine site, despite a temporary injunction against trespassing issued last October. A breach carries a possible prison sentence. Last August the two men set up camp and a ceremonial site on the property after the State Government extinguished native title over the 1,385 hectares of Wangan and Jagalingou land in Queensland’s Galilee Basin. Mr Burragubba has brought numerous court actions against the proposed Adani coal mine and has declared bankruptcy due to costs…….. Mr Burragubba and Mr McAvoy did not have legal representation and did not appear at the hearings, a decision Mr Burragubba said was because “the rules were already set against us”. “This move by Adani simply continues the injustice against us. Adani had already secured its legal entitlements against my rights and interests. But they continue their vindictiveness, and spying on us, because we refuse to concede,” Mr Burragubba said in a statement. He said they had not returned to the ceremonial site since being confronted by Adani’s security last year.
|
|
US Supreme Court Rules Against Trump’s EPA in Clean Water Case — Mining Awareness +
US “Supreme Court Rules Against Trump’s EPA in Clean Water Case By VOA News April 23, 2020 09:24 PM The U.S. Supreme Court ruled against the Trump administration on Thursday, saying industry cannot avoid the Clean Water Act when it pumps wastewater into the ground instead of directly into oceans and rivers. In a 6-3 […]
via US Supreme Court Rules Against Trump’s EPA in Clean Water Case — Mining Awareness +
April 24 Energy News — geoharvey
Science and Technology: ¶ “The Number Of People Affected By Floods Will Double By 2030” • Flooding has already caused more than $1 trillion in losses globally since 1980, and the situation is poised to worsen: New analysis from World Resources Institute’s Aqueduct Floods finds that the number of people affected by floods will double […]
New tsunami estimates for megaquakes off Japan — Fukushima 311 Watchdogs
April 21, 2020 A Japanese government panel says tsunami waves measuring more than 20 meters high could hit northern Japan if a megaquake of magnitude 9 or stronger occurs in one of two deep-sea trenches. The government panel has been studying the possible scale of an earthquake, and tsunami waves it could trigger, in […]
via New tsunami estimates for megaquakes off Japan — Fukushima 311 Watchdogs
1 This month.
PETITION – To: Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and the Australian Labor Government
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/235274195556
19 May – Webinar- Webinar: No Nuclear Weapons in Australia
Start: 2026-05-19 18:00:00 UTC Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney (GMT+10:00)
End: 2026-05-19 19:30:00 UTC Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney (GMT+10:00)
20 May – Webinar – The dangerous world of AUKUS, US, military occupation and suppression of dissent
National Webinar, 20th May, 2026, 6.30pm AEST. Confronting laws restricting/suppressing protest speech and action
Speakers: Former Sen. Rex Patrick, Lawyer Nick Hanna ,Arthur Rorris ,Jorgen Doyle, Sen David Shoebbridge,
Facilitator Kelley Tranter.
of the week – Australians for War Powers Reform (AWPR)
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity
Antinuclear 