Fixing the gap between Labor’s greenhouse gas goals and their policies — RenewEconomy
Switching to 100% renewables, and focusing on energy efficiency, will play key roles in meeting ambitious greenhouse gas targets. The post Fixing the gap between Labor’s greenhouse gas goals and their policies appeared first on RenewEconomy.
via Fixing the gap between Labor’s greenhouse gas goals and their policies — RenewEconomy
Global emissions from Australian carbon exports dwarf any domestic cuts — RenewEconomy
Global emissions from Australia’s exported carbon are now more than double our total domestic carbon emissions from all sectors. The post Global emissions from Australian carbon exports dwarf any domestic cuts appeared first on RenewEconomy.
via Global emissions from Australian carbon exports dwarf any domestic cuts — RenewEconomy
Wesfarmers dumps coal and turns to electric cars: Australia should follow — RenewEconomy
Just months after selling the last of its thermal coal assets, Wesfarmers – one of Australia’s leading business conglomerates – has made a $776 million play to enter the lithium market and tap into the opportunities of the global switch to electric vehicles. The rest of the country should take note. Last December, Wesfarmers complete……
via Wesfarmers dumps coal and turns to electric cars: Australia should follow — RenewEconomy
International Award for Australian PV Leader — RenewEconomy
Many people would remember the amazing story of Australian citizen, PV scientist and industry heavyweight Dr. Zhengrong Shi, the founder of Suntech Power. The post International Award for Australian PV Leader appeared first on RenewEconomy.
via International Award for Australian PV Leader — RenewEconomy
May 3 Energy News — geoharvey
Opinion: ¶ “Six Signs Of Hope For The Ocean” • It is easy to lose sight of good news amid the barrage of negative stories about the threats facing the ocean. We see everything from growing plastic pollution to dying coral reefs. Increasingly, however, there is a lot to celebrate when you look more closely […]
Federal election candidates for Grey express their views on nuclear waste dump plan
Battle lines drawn in radioactive waste debate, Transcontinental, Amy Green, 1 May 19
Radioactive waste plans have been a topic of contention in Grey for three years so it’s no surprise federal candidates were asked to clarify their views at an election forum at Central Oval on Wednesday.
Battle lines were drawn as current Member for Grey Rowan Ramsey continued with his support to locate a National Radioactive Waste Management Facility at sites in the Flinders Ranges……..
Centre Alliance candidate Andrea Broadfoot rejected plans for the facility to be placed at either of the current proposed sites, a decision welcomed by the Adnyamathanha Traditional Lands Association.
“It is Australia’s responsibility to take care of its own waste,” Ms Broadfoot said.
“We are calling for there to be broad community support … but we haven’t seen a definition of broad community support.
“Barndioota and Kimba are not the places and we need to go back to the drawing board.”
Candidate for Labor Karin Bolton and candidate for United Australia Party Alexander Warren echoed Ms Broadfoot’s sentiments.
Australia’s radioactive waste is currently stored at a purpose-built ‘Interim Waste Store’ at Lucas Heights in new South Wales and has been since 2015.
Nuclear Free Campaigner Dave Sweeney rejected claims by Mr Ramsey that the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency (ARPANSA) will no longer licence this facility unless there are plans to relocate the waste by 2022.
“ARPANSA have licensed this facility through to 2055, it requires periodic updates about the status of the government project, but its license is in no way in doubt and for Rowan Ramsey to suggest, state or imply that it is, is incorrect,” Mr Sweeney said.
“His motivation is his to clarify but that statement is incorrect and where it becomes a problem in the current situation is that it could further the pressure on people over saying yes or no to a national radioactive waste dump.
“The really important thing here from the view of the Australian Conservation Foundation is that nuclear medicine in Australia is secure with or without the proposed government facility.
“To create a situation where the person who is elected to represent the one electorate in Australia that is facing this challenge and this issue is putting out information which is demonstrably incorrect. It’s not helpful.”
The selection process for the National Radioactive Waste Management Facility will continue after the May 18 federal election. https://www.transcontinental.com.au/story/6101887/battle-lines-drawn-in-radioactive-waste-debate/?fbclid=IwAR0Pbmh2mUWat1wuglHeuXjIumwnNGD9Alk-Tz_CciFYlmBprO5LfCHJuEk
The harm done to indigenous people, through uranium mining – and it’s happening again
Uranium mines harm Indigenous people – so why have we approved a new one? https://theconversation.com/uranium-mines-harm-indigenous-people-so-why-have-we-approved-a-new-one-116262 The Conversation, 1 May 19, In the 1970s, when the Ranger mine opened, the Mirarr people felt largely powerless in negotiations between mining companies and the federal government.
Last week, the Tjiwarl experienced similar disempowerment. Yet both communities are recognised by the government as traditional owners.
Unsurprisingly, Australia is yet to sign the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, continuing the persistently toxic legacy of Australia’s nuclear industry.May 1, 2019 Last week the federal government approved the Yeelirrie uraniam mine in Western Australia in the face of vigorous protest from traditional owners.
This Canadian-owned uranium mine is the newest instalment in Australia’s long tradition of ignoring the dignity and welfare of Aboriginal communities in the pursuit of nuclear fuel.
For decades, Australia’s desert regions have experienced uranium prospecting, mining, waste dumping and nuclear weapons testing. Settler-colonial perceptions that these lands were “uninhabited” led to widespread environmental degradation at the hands of the nuclear industry.
As early as 1906, South Australia’s Radium Hill was mined for radium. Amateur prospectors mined haphazardly, damaging Ngadjuri and Wilyakali lands. And an estimated 100,000 tonnes of toxic mine residue(tailings) remain at Radium Hill with the potential to leach radioactive material into the environment.
Uranium mines across Australia have similar legacies, with decades of activism from the Mirarr people against the Ranger and Jabiluka mine sites in Kakadu National Park.
In the 36 years since it began operating, the Ranger mine has produced over 125,000 tonnes of uranium and experienced more than 200 accidents. In 2013, a reported one million litres of contaminated materialspilt into the surrounding environment.
Aboriginal communities remain at a disproportionate risk because large uranium deposits exist in lands deemed sacred and significant, while the testing and dumping of nuclear material is rarely undertaken in areas inhabited by settlers.
The federal government’s ambivalence toward these impacts has most recently culminated in their decision to give Cameco the go-ahead for the Yeelirrle uranium mine, a blow to the traditional owners of Tjiwarl country.
Native title fails to protect traditional owners from the mining industry
The Tjiwarl people have fought the Yeelirrie mine alongside the Conservation Council of WA for more than two years. They now must grapple with the government’s decision to ignore their resistance.
And in 2017, the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) negotiated with the United Nations to create a treaty banning nuclear weapons. The treaty, adopted on July 7, 2017, recognised the disproportionate impact nuclear material has on Indigenous communities around the world. It includes the mining and milling of uranium.
The treaty warns that parties should be:
mindful of the unacceptable suffering of and harm caused to the victims of the use of nuclear weapons (hibakusha), as well as of those affected by the testing of nuclear weapons, [and recognise] the disproportionate impact of nuclear-weapon activities on indigenous peoples.
Nuclear weapons sourced from Aboriginal lands
The toxic legacy of uranium mining is not isolated to the contamination of ecosystems.
Radium Hill provided uranium for weapons for the United Kingdom and United States, including the nuclear weapons tested at Maralinga and Emu Field in the 1950s and 1960s.
These weapons spread radioactive contamination and dispossessed Aboriginal communities in and around the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (APY) lands.
Uranium from the Ranger mine in Northern Territory found its way into the Fukushima Reactor, a reality that plagues the Mirrar people. In 2011, traditional owner Yvonne Margarula expressed her sorrow for those affected by the Fukushima meltdown:
it is likely that the radiation problems at Fukushima are, at least in part, fuelled by uranium derived from our traditional lands. This makes us feel very sad.
These legacies are felt acutely by those who continue to struggle with the lack of protection from native title and other government policies apparently designed to prevent the exploitation of Aboriginal communities by various industries.
In the 1970s, when the Ranger mine opened, the Mirarr people felt largely powerless in negotiations between mining companies and the federal government.
Last week, the Tjiwarl experienced similar disempowerment. Yet both communities are recognised by the government as traditional owners.
Unsurprisingly, Australia is yet to sign the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, continuing the persistently toxic legacy of Australia’s nuclear industry.
British exhibition on nuclear testing glosses over the impact on Aboriginal people
Cold War exhibition tries to airbrush Britain’s dark history of nuclear testing, The Conversation, Researcher, Social History/Tutor in Medical Education, University of Dundee, May 2, 2019 A new exhibition about the Cold War recently opened at the UK National Archives at Kew in south-west London. Protect and Survive: Britain’s Cold War Revealed seeks to tell the story of how the years of high nuclear tensions affected the UK, from spy paranoia to civil defence posters to communications at the heart of government. …..
Files under review
Remembrance, The omissions at the London Cold War exhibition are a reminder about the UK’s low-key approach to its weapons testing history. The story doesn’t only need to be properly told at this exhibition, it needs a permanent public space. Yet no existing museum dedicated to Britain’s wars is interested in giving it house room – not even the records and memorabilia of all the military personnel sent to observe the tests. A number of years ago I was quietly told while walking down a corridor in one major institution not to offer it my own records because “they will end up in the skip”.
The long climate change trend gathering speed
Climate change link to global droughts goes back a century, study finds, https://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/climate-change-link-to-global-droughts-goes-back-a-century-study-finds-20190501-p51j2n.html, by Peter Hannam, May 2, 2019 Humans have contributed to increased global risks of drought for more than a century, scientists say, in findings that also point to “severe” consequences ahead with climate change.
The research by US-based scientists and published in Nature journal on Thursday comes as the latest Bureau of Meteorology data showed the first four months of 2019 were the hottest on record for Australia as drought tightened its grip on the country’s south-east.
The scientists, led by Kate Marvel at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, used so-called drought atlases derived from tree-ring data combined with satellite observations and climate models to identify how soil moisture has changed.
They found drought increased during the first half of the 20th century, eased in the quarter century to 1975 and worsened again. The pause in the trend coincided with increased aerosol pollution.
Models project and observations show a re-emerging greenhouse gas signal towards the end of the 20th century, and this signal is likely to grow stronger in the next several decades,” the paper concluded. “The human consequences of this, particularly drying over large parts of North America and Eurasia, are likely to be severe.”
Paul Durack, a research scientist and an author of the paper, said the study was the first to show global-scale droughts to be impacted by human activities.
“This is potentially bad news for Australia, and similar climate regions such as California,” he said in a statement. “These regions have experienced devastating recent droughts, and if the model projected changes continue, such droughts will become more commonplace into the future.”
Andrew King, climate extremes research fellow at the ARC Centre of Excellence for Climate System Science, said while heat extremes caused by climate change have been clear, “droughts are very complicated”, with natural variability masking the trends, Dr King said.
Hot start to 2019
The Bureau of Meteorology said the first four months of the year were Australia’s hottest on record for maximum, mean and minimum temperatures.
Day-time readings, for instance, beat the previous record set only a year earlier by almost half a degree, coming in at 1.93 degrees above the 1961-90 average.
Regions such as the Murray-Darling Basin were also the hottest on record for mean temperatures, with rainfall this year slightly below half the norm – although rains later this week should help.
Sydney is tracking the hottest on record for daytime temperatures – averaging 27.2 degrees so far in 2019, or 2.4 degrees above average. Rainfall is about a 22 per cent below the norm.
NSW is also enduring its hottest start to any year for mean temperatures. The 2.79-degree anomaly eclipsed the previous record departure of 2.51 degrees from the 1961-90 average set only in 2018, the bureau said. Rainfall is running at 55 per cent below the average for the fourth-driest start to a year.
Most Melbourne sites have also been tracking their hottest starts to any year, while many locations are also having their driest January-April periods, the bureau said.
Traditional owners fight Adani coal project, – fear destruction of their sacred wetlands
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Adani coal mine poses ‘alarming’ risk to sacred wetlands, traditional owners say, ABC News
Key points:
The ABC this week became the first media organisation to visit the remote springs complex — one of the world’s last unspoiled desert oases — which are at the centre of a controversial Morrison Government decision that thrust Adani forward as a federal election issue. The trip to the nationally important wetlands was at the invitation of a determined group of mine opponents within the Wangan and Jagalingou (W&J) people, who have vowed to take their fight all the way to The Hague. The Doongmabulla, which means “the place of many waters”, represents the key hurdles to Adani’s mining ambitions in a project already four years overdue. The miner still has to prove to the Queensland Government it can safeguard the springs, which are also the key cultural concern for traditional mine site owners who could further put the brakes on Adani by taking them to the High Court. Scientists dispute Adani’s mine impact modellingCommonwealth science agencies have raised doubts about Adani’s modelling of the mine’s impact on the springs, saying it could drain its underground water source by four times its legal limit. But Federal Environment Minister Melissa Price approved Adani’s groundwater plans after it agreed to extra monitoring and safeguards and amid pressure from Queensland colleagues to sign off before the election was called. However, concerns raised in a joint report by the CSIRO and Geosciences Australia are being assessed by the Queensland environment department, which said it could not let the mine proceed until Adani provided better evidence about the sources of the springs…….. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-05-01/adani-coal-mine-poses-alarming-risk-to-sacred-wetlands/11058854 |
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Extradition of Julian Assange Threatens Us All
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VIPS: Extradition of Julian Assange Threatens Us All Consortium News, April 30, 2019
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Japan’s nuclear horror relived as people return to Fukushima’s ghost towns — Fukushima 311 Watchdogs
April 29, 2019 More than 200,000 inhabitants within a 20km radius were forced to evacuate, after the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant was damaged by the Japan Tsunami in 2011 Wide streets still lie empty, scavenging boar and monkeys the only signs of life. Only wild animals, and the 6ft weeds, which have rampaged through […]
via Japan’s nuclear horror relived as people return to Fukushima’s ghost towns — Fukushima 311 Watchdogs
Labor pledges funding for renewable jobs, support for Tasmania Battery of the Nation — RenewEconomy
Shorten unveils $75m Renewables Training Package, extends establishment of Renewable Energy Zones to Tasmania, where it makes down-payment on Battery of Nation. The post Labor pledges funding for renewable jobs, support for Tasmania Battery of the Nation appeared first on RenewEconomy.
via Labor pledges funding for renewable jobs, support for Tasmania Battery of the Nation — RenewEconomy
WA’s 130MW Badgingarra wind farm officially opens — RenewEconomy
W.A.’s $315m Badgingarra Wind Farm officially opened. To be co-located with $40m 17.5MW Badgingarra Solar Farm, which is under construction. The post WA’s 130MW Badgingarra wind farm officially opens appeared first on RenewEconomy.
via WA’s 130MW Badgingarra wind farm officially opens — RenewEconomy
The progress of the Stop Adani convoy
The Stop Adani convoy so far – on to Canberra, Echo Net Daily, April 30, 2019 | by Eve Jeffery, On Wednesday April 17, Bob Brown and a few hundred of his closest friends, began a journey from Hobart to the Gallilee Basin in Queensland, to highlight the devastation that will be caused if the Adani Carmichal Mine goes ahead……
We look forward to people joining us. Almost 2000 have inquired about joining the convoy.
The group of beginners left Hobart for Devonport, then Melbourne for a rally on Parliament Lawns.
As the convoy came off the Spirit of Tasmania for the rally in Melbourne, Brown said that from the outset that the convoy, involving hundreds of vehicles and thousands of people, was about the May 18 election being a national referendum on the climate emergency and Adani…….
From Melbourne the growing group visited Albury-Wodonga before a rally in Sydney on April 20.
With flags flying, the cavalcade gave colour and contention to Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s press conference in Parramatta.
The convoy, now 200 cars, including a dozen electric cars, left a rally of nearly 1000 people in Parramatta Park to drive north, passing Morrison’s conference outside Westmead Hospital. Mr Morrison was diverted by cries of ‘Stop Adani’ as the convoy slowly passed.
At the rally an Aboriginal leader from the Adani mine site region in central Queensland, Adrian Burragubba, said he, his father, and grandfather were born at Clermont where the convoy arrives next week. He described the Adani mining company as ‘thieves’…..
Next was the north coast on Easter Sunday with stops in Coffs Harbour and Mullumbimby on the way to Brisbane.
The Bob Brown Foundation were stunned and delighted by the massive crowd in Mullum
‘This is the biggest turn out anywhere in Australia,’ Brown said.
From there it was a trip across the border into Queensland……..
Murdoch newspapers throughout Queensland, including Brisbane’s Courier-Mail, all ran the same article by journalist Renee Viellaris.
Ms Viellaris wrote a very disparaging description of the convoy including that participants were ‘blow-ins’.
‘As ever, I absolutely repudiate offensive comments such as those headlined in today’s Murdoch press,’ said Brown.
‘Offensive comments are taken down by our foundation just as they are taken down off Murdoch media sites………
Brown said that a number of Clermont business owners had expressed regret at the hostility the convoy received the previous day when cars were stoned, and an older women travelling alone, along with young families in cars, were abused and threatened and had flags ripped from their vehicles. Brown praised the Queensland Police for keeping the peace in trying conditions…….
Tensions mounted between opposing ideas in Clermont over the weekend – pro-Adani violence appalled other locals and failed to halt the convoy’s progress.
‘Everyone is concerned for our friend knocked down by the out-of-control horse,’ said Brown.
‘We hope she has a speedy recovery. The incident came after a much-publicised publican friend of Matt Canavan was refused entry to the Wangan and Jangilingou Council’s Karmoo Dreaming celebration which the convoy was enjoying at the Clermont Showground.
‘The horse rider charged between the crowd and the stage where Neil Murray was singing. Children had been dancing in that area.
Both the publican and Minister Canavan have verbally abused the convoy people……..
A witness said a second group of pro-Adani cars at the gate cheered the horse rider as he charged back out after the woman was knocked down in the arena……..
From the Gallile, the convoy will now visit Toowoomba, Armidale, Bathurst and Orange, and drive in Canberra on May 4 for a Rally for Climate on Sunday May 5.
Fo more details, visit the Bob Brown Foundation website. more https://www.echo.net.au/2019/04/stop-adani-convoy-far-canberra/
1 This month.
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Australians deserve the truth
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PETITION – To: Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and the Australian Labor Government
of the week – Australians for War Powers Reform (AWPR)
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