Viv Forbes sums it up brilliantly. — Jo
Politicians again show “Real Genius”.
A British observer [in 1975 or so] noted “Any fool can bugger up Britain but it takes real genius to bugger up Australia.”
Australian politicians are again showing real genius.
Now, we have incredible tri-partisan plans to cover the continent with a spider-web of transmission lines connecting wind/solar “farms” sending piddling amounts of intermittent power to distant consumers and to expensive battery and hydro backups – all funded by electricity consumers, tax-assisted speculators and foreign debt.
We are the world’s biggest coal exporter but have not built a big coal-fired power station for 11 years. We have massive deposits of uranium but 100% of this energy is either exported, or sterilised by the Giant Rainbow Serpent, or blocked by the Green-anti’s.
Australia suffers recurrent droughts but has not built a major water supply dam for about 40 years. And when the floods do come, desperate farmers watch as years of rain water rush past to irrigate distant oceans.
Once, Australia was a world leader in exploration and drilling – it is now a world leader in legalism, red tape and environmental obstructionism.
Once, Canberra and the states encouraged oil and gas exploration with geological mapping and research – now they restrict land access and limit exports.
Once, Australia was a world leader in refining metals and petroleum – now our expensive unreliable electricity and green tape are driving these industries and their jobs overseas.
Once, Australia’s CSIRO was respected for research that supported industry and for doing useful things like controlling rabbits and prickly pear and developing better crops and pastures. Now CSIRO panders to global warming hysteria and promotes the fairy story that carbon taxes and emissions targets can change the world’s climate.
Once, young Australians excelled in maths, science and engineering. Now, they are brain-washed in gender studies, green energy non-science and environmental activism.
Once, the opening of a railway or the discovery of oil, coal, nickel or uranium made headlines. Today’s Aussies harass explorers and developers, and queue at the release of the latest IPad.
As Australia’s first people discovered, if today’s Australians lack the will or the knowledge to use our great natural resources, more energetic people will take them off us.
Viv Forbes
h/t Ian B, David E, Dennis, C.J.O. Thanks.
“We are the world’s biggest coal exporter but have not built
a big coal-fired power station for 11 years. We have massive
deposits of uranium but 100% of this energy is either exported,
or sterilised by the Giant Rainbow Serpent, or blocked by the
Green-anti’s.
Once, Australia was a world leader in exploration and drilling –
it is now a world leader in legalism, red tape and environmental obstructionism.”
Part of the ol’-Globul-Governance-Agenda-21-Sus(s)tainable
-(Un)Development-Trick.
420
Australia is in a competition with Canada to see which can be the most stupid nation on earth.
571
England is not far behind. BREXIT and windmills.
170
At least they have nuclear power stations and they plan to build many more. So they are much smarter than us here in Australia where we have the largest reserve of uranium yet we have not even one nuclear power stations and it appears we will never have one, unless of course China takes over. Then we’ll probably have dozens of them build in no time given the vast amounts of suitable land area for storing the waste.
200
If we can crack the problem with thorium reactors we can power our nation without the entire industry around enriching fuel
140
LFTR is “cracked.” https://www.terrestrialenergy.com/
It’s not on-line yet because of certification. They expect certification to be completed in 2019. After that, reactors will be coming on line in 4 years …
Check out the costs: https://www.terrestrialenergy.com/technology/competitive/
60
I liked this quote from the web site :
“There is no credible path to climate stabilization that does not include a substantial role for nuclear power… A major expansion of nuclear power is essential to avoid dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system this century… We’ve done the math and we can’t power the world without nuclear energy.”
Open letter COP 21: Ken Caldeira, Kerry Emanuel, James Hansen, Tom Wigley”
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Yeah, I remain sceptical. All I’ve read indicates there are still issues with the efficient and consistent maintenance of self-sustaining fission with thorium reactors.
20
Be realistic. We would be the last nation on the planet to use that technology. In any case I still believe we should just build coal fired power stations like pretty much everyone else is doing.
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No, PeterS, you won’t be the last nation on earth to use that technology, you might be the second to last, though. NZ will be dragging the chain even harder … ooh, can’t go nuclear, too dangerous, think of all the earthquakes! Pphhshaw! As Anthony Watts puts it: The Stupid: it burns!
I see NSW winter crops have suffered badly and are predicted to be down by 46% on last year. Food prices will climb.
An interesting event in the US: about a week ago, [Sept 7 ?] the FBI (complete with a Black Hawk Helicopter) raided and shut down the Solar Observatory in New Mexico: “closed indefinitely.”
Propaganda control? What did somebody not want to hear? What did the observatory discover? What does the “Swamp” not want let out? It’s near Roswell [about 130miles away], yes, that Roswell, so maybe an alien managed to escape and was trying to call home … there was supposedly some interest in radio aerials 🙂
It’s also about 70miles from White Sands missile testing site so maybe someone tried aiming the Sun somewhere they shouldn’t have. A cover story will appear sometime soon.
How credible we’ll probably never know.
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-09-11/national-solar-observatory-mysteriously-closed-geomagnetic-storm-looms gives a little extra. Look at those sunspots! Maybe someone pressed the Carrington Event Alarm Button. I know the Kp Index kicked right up around then. But no auroras were visible from Auckland: 10/10 cloud cover as is seemingly always the case when something interesting happens in the skies … Darn.
There’s more on the crops and cold on Adapt 2030: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mzpJnYHBCxM
Interesting times! 🙂
70
As for the Solar Observatory shutdown: apparently the telescope uses a huge quantity of mercury—which is liquid at room temperature—as a float bearing. Gallons of it. If there had been a mercury spill, that might explain the shutdown of a nearby post office too.
Maybe someone tried to post a very heavy parcel which sloshed 🙂
50
Well at least Australia is not so stupid as Britain and the EU to con themselves into believing that burning wood is renewable and reduces CO2 – AHHHH YET!! 🙁 🙁
https://www.thegwpf.com/europes-renewable-energy-strategy-will-destroy-forests-and-boost-co2-emissions-scientists-warn/
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You’ve hit the critical point.
It’s not about the CO2: hence the current flight of fancy that says diesel, gas and Extremely Dirty Batteries are a better idea than coal.
The oily contaminated off gases from Wood, make coal combustion look like Snow White.
And it’s not about the money: taxpayers have heaps of that.
It’s about Control.
Think Woolworths and Coles and the Plastic Bag shambles that is still stressing out shoppers and employees.
Control, dominate and destroy.
KK
90
@ Kinky Keith: The trouble now with some Societies: It is run by and encouraged by a pseudo parallel-running society of those who Hunger for Compliance. This is an issue becoming more and more prominent: Police, some judges and Media mouths calling for Zero Tolerance in various issues ( Oh! – BBC not tolerating discourse on Climate change, etc. as of recent news) Have these folk had problems in the way they were brought up or “educated” ? We are sleep-walking into the Medieval Dark Ages. With freedom comes responsibility and Power is being abused by those “in power”. What’s in a word? ‘Yes’ as the vote slogan instead of’No’ so it’s “yes” for independence but “no” for Brexit….. n’est pas ?
Control Dominate & Destroy …….. If you don’t bend, we’ll break you – is that not from those Cannibalistic individuals with a desire to Control, or consume? Yield or be consumed… ie it’s this Hunger for Compliance thing again
30
What’s the problem with Thorium reactors?
10
peter @ #1.1.1.1.4 asks:
They aren’t making them … yet. But it is Really Soon Now.
There is:
Flibe Energy (Alabama USA)
Moltex Energy (London, England)
TerraPower (Washington USA)
Terrestrial Energy (Canada)
ThorCon Power (Florida USA)
Transatomic Power Corporation (Massachusetts USA)
and China.
Production of reactors is expected to start by 2020 (Thorcon Power)
Terrestrial Energy is finishing its certification with the Canadian Atomic Energy Commission—expected 2019. They expect to take about 4 years after that to get a site up and running.
Terrapower is chaired by Bill Gates and seems to be working in with the Chinese
Transatomic Power are aiming to have a prototype running by 2020.
Flibe is aiming Big —250MW and up but no timetable so far.
So that’s the problem with LFTR or thorium reactors. They’re about three years +/- 1 year away.
41
In a nutshell, Thorium reactors do not produce fissile materials for nuclear bomb making which made them worthless in government eyes.
20
Peter C @ # 1.1.1.1.2 said:
Correct.
Back in the 1950s, that was the main reason the US govt supported the pressure water-cooled breeder reactors. There is now a lot of private sector interest in the MSR (Molten Salt Reactor) technology because the reactors should end up being so much cheaper to both construct (no huge containment pressure-vessel required) and run than the submarine-design breeder reactors in use now.
And they are a lot safer. No fuel re-procession required, no fuel storage while awaiting reprocessing required. The reactors self regulate-temperature wise—temp rises, liquid fuel expands, reaction slows down, fuel cools and contracts, reaction picks up again, therefore no Chernobyl danger (meltdown and explosion).
20
Thanks to Sophocles and others. You people, as usual, are very good with technical answers to questions. If I put the same question to letters on MSM the response from resident idiots would have been that nuclear reactors poison the environment, produce fissionable material and anyway renewables are the future. 🙂
20
They have to build more. When the wind did not blow for 10 days straight, they had to import nuclear power from France. So much for a National grid.
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Koff choke splutter ! Crumbs in the eyboad … . w8a meenit.
Aye England, eh? you wonder why some SCots want independence??? !! I for one don’t, but want Brexit URGENTLY.
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I thought Scotland as seceded years ago and voted against Brexit and for continuing domination by France and Germany and Brussels. There seem to be many more windmills in Scotland per capita than anywhere else. A bit like South Australia. The Green thinking is that no one seems to live in pristine wilderness, so a great place to put a blot on the landscape.
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No. They just have a number of politicians as gullible and spendthrift as Dopey Dan.
81
Brexit is sensible mate. The EU is seriously centralist, Statist and Green. And is on its last legs anyway even without British money, as its two flagship policies – the Eurocurrency and the Schengen open borders agreement – fall apart due to the tensions of monetary without fiscal union and terrorism respectively. Good riddance.
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Hear hear Anton!
30
Canada ahead on points just now
“Oh My – Canadian Foreign Minister Left NAFTA Negotiations To Attend “President Trump is a Tyrant” Conference…”
https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2018/09/11/oh-my-canadian-foreign-minister-left-nafta-negotiations-to-attend-president-trump-is-a-tyrant-conference/
“Chrystia Freeland Virtue-Signaling as Leverage for Preferential U.S-Canada Trade Outcome…”
https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2018/09/12/chrystia-freeland-virtue-signaling-as-leverage-for-preferential-u-s-canada-trade-outcome/
(SNIPPED) CTS
20
“Trudeau’s Legislative Record, As Impressive As His Socks”
http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/index.php/2018/09/09/trudeaus-legislative-record-as-impressive-as-his-socks/
30
We’ll be beyond the help of God if Scott Morrison gets to competing at that level (IMO)
30
Both obviously outclassed!
“Washington Post: President Trump is “Complicit” in Creating Hurricane Florence…”
https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2018/09/12/washington-post-president-trump-is-complicit-in-creating-hurricane-florence/
31
I’ll presume that The Washington Post gets the full red thumb?
10
Even more power of Trump!
“It WAS a CAT 6. WaPo said PT was causing it. So PT decided to downgrade it to a CAT 2 and MAGA. It is anticipated to continue to weaken. But the rain will be very bad.”
A comment at CTH
20
We’ll beat them hands down, we have far more geniuses who are far better educated in idiocy & also have hearing problems!
20
I think we can take ’em.
50
The odds probably just went your way
“Send in the clowns. Scott Morrison’s “well done team” QT video.”
http://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2018/09/send-in-the-clowns-scott-morrisons-well-done-team-qt-video.html
10
Its too depressing
180
The government might be working on a strategy, they have already separated environment from energy.
120
El GORDO – I dream too – but I have yet to be convinced.
170
I can very well understand where you are coming from. Just be a little more patient. If they come up with virtually nothing over the next month or so then we won’t be in a dream – we will be in a nightmare when Shorten eventually becomes PM.
110
Its not looking good, the new Environment Minister Melissa Price is offside.
“I am not a climate change denier. I am actually of the view that if we constantly talk about emissions and not talk about the environment more broadly we are missing half of the subject matter.”
50
Melissa Price WASTE OF SPACE!
60
Says she won’t touch the Water Act or open up feral ridden national parks to help graziers out in this dry time. Melissa is green.
80
“Then there is hope.
But hope is not a strategy” E.M. Smith
20
If we look back over the years one can’t avoid coming to the conclusion Australia has been trying its best to commit economic suicide. We will excel at it when Shorten becomes PM unless Morrison pulls his finger out and acts.
360
Very much the same could be said about the UK. The greenblob is determined to stop any fracking and any further nuclear power, whilst trying to cover the countryside (and the shoreline) with useless and unreliable renewables that have to be massively subsidised.
250
Meanwhile, in Delusion Island ( both of them ) it seems the green blob has been hard at work owning the NZ govt out right…..maybe NZ has better fools than Oz? A green PM handy with a selfie stick, a govt does not make….
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-09-13/new-zealand-climate-change-zero-emissions-jacinda-ardern/10207334
“But as Australia adjusts to another prime minister undone by climate change, New Zealand has just released its comprehensive roadmap for transition to a low emissions economy.”
Its worth noting that NZ makes about $1.1 billion from mining, in Australia had export earnings of $174 billion and between 2003 to 2014 started $400 billion worth of projects.
https://www.minister.industry.gov.au/ministers/frydenberg/speeches/mining-and-australian-economy-australian-governments-priorities-mining
Just a minor difference.
NZ has “100% natural” vs Australia is “whatever works”…he he
Interestingly, a mate who is also Christian, has noted while living in NZ recently, he noticed an increase in deceidely un-Christian activity in society generally. Its probably no surprise, as the green paganism rises, so will associated stuff…..this is one aspect that never seems to get much attention, but will bite society in the rear end pretty hard IMHO.
81
The New Zealand government and administrative apparatus of State, the bureaucracy, health service, police, municipal councils and academia are unquestionably a conglomerate of UN sycophants and Rainbow Cult adherents reliant on the abolition of free speech and the right to chose to listen. Antifa are the favoured rent-a-mob. Membership of this wide Leftist “elite” requires the unquestioning or silent adherence to the eco-Marxist credo, political correctness and cultural Marxism.
The populous of the country are on the other hand altogether something else. Usually practical, mildly to seriously impoverished, frequently dependent on State largesse, used to making do with no.8 wire, bemused by the required drench of Maori language week, entertained by “multiculturalism in a bicultural country” and impoverished by power prices, despite being “zero carbon” 60% hydro power generation built and paid for by the people, and finally, preferring to be generally left alone to meander along their lives but afraid to articulate at the end of a pitch-fork their demand for small governance and taxation
Trouble is, they’re not particularly noisey or intolerant. Those times are running down. The time to pick a side and fight is upon us all. Time to wake up New Zealand and consider a healthier more sustainable, rational alternative.
40
While complacent apathetic Australians didn’t think too hard about politics, after all politics has nothing to with them, a revolution was taking place in line with the UN nation new world order agendas but here to take control of governments federal, state and local government.
Evidence was provided by journalist Max Walsh who wrote in The Bulletin Magazine in 2006 about a “corporate-style takeover” by the union movement of the ALP. Of course the ALP has always been the political voice of unionism but now and for a coupled of decades Union Labor has been managed and controlled, union trained executives placed in safe Labor seats and sitting members pushed aside. Walsh wrote that the primary objective was to control this nation. Look at the rise in union business ventures and related wealth creation, and Labor governments facilitating this which was taken advantage of by private sector banks, finance, superannuation and even renewable energy investors.
On the opposite side was the Liberal Party being targeted for takeover by an ambitious and very wealthy Labor leaning lawyer and merchant banker (evidence @ stopturnbull.com) who had made it clear that he wants to get rid of the National Party and conservative Liberals and join forces with Labor to create a single governing all powerful party with no real opposition in parliaments. That ambitious person was a former employee of Goldman Sachs.
And Viv sums up where Australia is today, “buggered up” and losing sovereignty quickly.
Globalists and fellow travellers have us almost in their bag.
271
“Former”?
100
Don’t the unions already run the Labor party ?
131
The unions and Labor don’t work together, they are one and the same.
171
The penny dropped last night too on CO2.
For all the scare that +0.5C in an average is an end of world scenario, the really big change which has everyone excited is a 50% increase in CO2. According to California Governor Brown, this means world famine through ‘climate change’. What is does mean is a 50% increase in vegetation. Just in time for a booming world. In fact if we could wind the 50% back somehow, there would be world famine.
So why is it that everything Greens like Brown or Flannery or Gore say is in direct conflict with reality?
Whether or not there is man made Climate Change anywhere, the only change in 100 years is the 50% increase in CO2. Temperatures have not increased 50%. Where on earth is the problem with more food? Show me a place where people have had to move because of man made ‘Climate Change’?
They have had 30 years. It’s over. Not a single prediction of disaster has happened. No more 10 years to end of the world. The Profiteers of Doom need to get off the stage and retire. With the indisputable benefit of 30 years of hindsight, nothing they said was true.
521
If there is a reason that people have had to move, it is not lack of food. It is overpopulation from too much food and better health and the enormous attraction of successful Christian democracies. Even the Latinos in the US want the wall built. They voted for Trump and partied in Miami when he wond. People left to get away from a rolling disaster and want to be prosperous and safe Americans in a country with a rule of law, not Central America and Venezuela and Cuba.
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Multiculturalism, sorry that’s the old slogan, I mean diversity is good, isn’t it.
100
sorry: sarc
60
Multiculturalism was meant to be an accommodation and respect for other cultures when it started. Now it has been taken to be the creation of ghettos and different rules for different people, like Sharia courts in the UK. That was never the idea but an excuse for an attack on the British Christian culture which is at the core of a very successful system called democracy. People who want Communism or its clone Socialism are determined to bring down democracy as their mortal enemy. The current attacks on our history, our British and Christian institutions and rules is just part of it. For example the huge story about gay marriage changed nothing. Real gays did not want it or need it, but it was another Christian pillar kicked away and that was the whole point.
The tennis debacle was about an all black women’s match at the same prize money as the men, but all we hear is that it highlighted racism and sexism. Arthur Ashe would have been amazed. Martin Luther King as well. The black women are now being paid as much as the white men for a two set final, so they get the huge concession for being women but the money for providing one of the shortest exhibitions in history and the worst in sportsmanship. No one pointed out that Serena only played up when she was at the point of losing.
330
“Multiculturalism” was nothing less than a Rainbow Cult euphemism for cultural Marxism, where no culture is deemed to possesse a greater intrinsic value than any other, which is of course unbridled and patent nonsense, and no different from their propaganda trinity of division, inequity and exclusion
140
An attack on reason. One theory is as good as anuther, regardless of evidence.
70
diversity + left + socialism = chaos + crash + burn
60
TdeF
WWF = Waiting for the Wheels to Fall off
Bodaceous amounts of might, may, could, perhap etc.
Very short on “did”
100
Another Ian, that’s exactly where we are; waiting for the Wheels to Fall off. I am still holding out for the possibility of a hung parliament at the next federal election provided the voters are not completely brain dead – if they are brain dead then be prepared for PM Shorten to take us over the cliff.
80
Life will go on, even after we enter the surreal world of belt and road under Bill and Penny.
Socialism with Australian characteristics.
30
Yes life will go on but the quality of life will deteriorate drastically. Socialism is a cancer on society.
70
Admittedly it has history, but if you go back to the ‘Diggers’ in mid 17th century England ….
10
“So why is it that everything Greens like Brown or Flannery or Gore say is in direct conflict with reality?” Agenda 21 (now Agenda 2030?). Either its world Govt. Destroy hydrocarbon fuels and supply, destroy any good source of cheap energy for developing countries – keep them in the stone age. (and us eventually).
140
Well, the New Age anti-Christian Occultists who appear to run the UN and world govts, big business and the Left, advocate a 95% reduction in global population.
This is why fossil fuels are being kyboshed – so the Elite who are in the preserved 5% once 95% of the population kills itself in WW3 , will have 500+ years of fossils fuels ……all to themselves. Its all in thier books and writings if peopke did the research….
80
We’ll actually it’s 1% for every 2ppm, so 50% = 200 ppm which reflects a 100% increase.
30
The incoming solar minimum is going to hit our global crops hard. The higher levels of CO2 will help some but shorter and colder growing seasons (summer) with earlier frosts and snows at planting time and again at harvest time, will hit hard. We will have to change quickly to seed adapted to these new conditions.
The last two NH winters have wiped out much of the food reserves. A third bad winter in a row will hurt.
Now it’s cooling, drought will figure. Cooler temperatures will mean less evaporation from the seas and consequently less precipitation. Times are not looking so good. (Drought in warming times is only for the desert areas like California.)
Go to Youtube and check David DuByne’s Adapt 2030 videos.
Lack of food is a very good reason for peoples to move. It, along with earthquakes is what brought the Bronze Age in the Mediterranean to an end around 1177BC. (that and probably a shortage of Copper—Cyprus may have run out of easily mined ore.)
131
sophocles:
Why do you think that the Chinese are so keen to buy up agricultural land in Australia (and elsewhere). They DO NOT believe in Global Warming and have records of what happened last time there was global cooling (foreign domination and a nasty civil war with 30 million dead). When the wet belt around the equator shrinks and the roaring forties move north, then southern Australia will produce more. In the last half of the nineteenth Century South Australia’s wheat farming expanded north almost to Lake Eyre – it was short-lived as the Federation Drought wiped out a lot of northern towns. Willochra has 30,000 people and a Bishop in the 1880’s. When I saw it in the early 1960’s no-one lived there.
101
I suspect most Australians missed the news from the Copenhagen Conference that the delegation from China spoke about 3,600 years of their civilisation and that there had been three much warmer than present day periods, each delivered greater prosperity to China from higher crop yields.
120
To: Graeme No.3 @ # 6.5.1
who said:
I don’t need to think about it; I’ve been watching that for over a decade so far. They’ve been buying up mineral resources in Afghanistan as well but I don’t think that’s for tractors. Interestingly, a lot of the `mineral resources’ seem to be in agriculturally productive areas. They don’t make any fuss or noise about it. They just go ahead and do it. They own swathes of highly arable land across central and south Africa as well. They own large farms in NZ.
Sensibly, they have spread these investments wide, I think to avoid any untoward notice, but also to ensure year-round production. Not at all silly.
60
Apparently mother England still owns most of Australia’s agricultural land and our US cousin is the next on the list, followed by the Netherlands, Singapore and then China. They are 2016 numbers and I read recently that China has made a push on since then.
40
“Sensibly, they have spread these investments wide”
Isn’t that what Cargill and co have been doing for years?
10
Farmland and Countryside is an emotive issue:
1. WHO sells / sold off the land / house ? Is the seller duty-bound to sell to fellow country residents?
2. People talk about “THEIR” Country – what do they mean by ‘country’ ? Is the “Country” really the City with all its workings of Admin. and Factories & Service Industries, OR the Land / hinterland where Food is produced – the fuel for the folk to run on, and a place for exploiting?
30
Wind farms are not in cities, lets start with them.
‘A class-action lawsuit is being planned against a council, the state government and a wind farm operator after a damning report.’
Oz
10
North Atlantic cooling is a signpost along the way, a genuine tipping point.
https://rclutz.wordpress.com/2018/09/11/n-atlantic-cooling-in-2018/
10
Dennis brought up Unions. Peta Credlin on Sky interviewed Menzies Research Centre’s John Slater last nite (no point trying to find full video online), so here’s the full report:
Sept 2018: MENZIES RESEARCH CENTRE: LATEST REPORT: UNIONS INC
WEALTHY UNIONS LOSE TOUCH WITH WORKERS
Union membership has declined from a peak of 65% of the workforce more than 50 years ago to 14.55% of today’s workers and yet they have never been richer…
A policy briefing prepared by John Slater, Research Director, Menzies Research Centre
LINK TO 60-PAGE REPORT BY CLICKING ON “CLICK THE COVER TO READ THE FULL REPORT”.
https://www.menziesrc.org/
80
sorry, 48-page report.
50
Hi Pat, and most unionists in Australia today are public service employees.
151
That’s the only way the unions continue to survive, and apparently, thrive.
Queensland Labor Premier Palachook has rampantly blown out the numbers of public servants in that state. She wasn’t being benevolent, she was instructed to.
Victoria’s Marxist premier, Daniel Andrews, cancelled the East-West Freeway because the CFMEU weren’t getting a slice of the action. It cost Victorians one billion dollars not to have a road built. Andrews had no choice. His benefactors, the CFMEU, instructed him to or else.
Labor and the unions are in a symbiotic relationship that can only mean disaster for Australia if Shorten’s Labor win at the next election.
101
A public servant would tell you that he or she pays taxes too.
That is true but an explanation is required, the tax revenue is not new money. Public service employees and politicians are paid from taxes paid by the private sector and therefore what they pay is not new money, just them returning some of what they are paid to treasury.
It’s like the immigration intake, unless the migrants are self supporting in businesses or in jobs that are available they become welfare dependent, refugees are even given priority for housing in public housing funded by taxpayers.
People paid from the public purse spend the money and that is economic stimulus but is a false GDP input like a person out of work using savings or a loan to live on and saying it is income.
90
Agree Dennis,
I believe the purpose of public servants is only to “circulate” money..
I get really sick of people assuming the Govn has ” money”…!
00
I am a little concerned about the idea we can restrict fresh water running into the sea especially in the north of Australia , often this water mixes with salt water in shallow estuaries and provides a habitat for young fish and prawns and other animals , if we take to much fresh water we may cause these places to become more saline and that could impact on many fish that rely on a fresh/salt ratio to breed. I think a better way to go would be to have desalination plants around the coast powered by nuclear. they could be positioned to best help farmers and remote communities.
55
Good point, but cost?
Also I would suspect that water that could be trapped in dams might be a very small percentage of potential runoff.
Maybe NSW could sell its desal to WA and NT.
81
I think Perth is ok for desal plants KK, but thanks for the offer. Ours are working nicely and most probably use newer technology. Best thing we ever did, our water quality has markedly improved.
10
Stephen they could build a pipe from the Ord River system to the Murray Darling Basin and drought would become a thing of the past. The government has already put a lot of money into infrastructure, to conserve water, which could easily be tapped.
The crocodiles are out of control and should be culled.
61
The problem is sometimes droughts happen outside the Murray Darling basin like at the moment Gippsland is affected, as far as cost goes they threw fifty billion away on a phone system that will be out of date before its run out, and Dan Andrews wasted a billion plus on a road he didn’t build.
141
Yeah, its been dry in East Gippsland, but a desalination plant attached to a nuclear power plant wouldn’t pass due diligence.
I blame the blocking high system for perpetuating the droughty conditions.
80
All the floods of recent times in Gippsland was wasted water to the sea , plenty of sites for dams but no political will .
91
el gordo
Have a look at Brasil and big dams and droughts. They have quite a few. Have a look at Sobradinho on Google Earth.
Even small ones – often the road embankments have the drain pipes at the top, not the bottom as we do.
But was pointed out that big dams cost a lot and usually the water has been used for other purposes before the drought arrives.
So beware the “theoretically sound but practically imperfect” – and be prepared to have a bloody good review of the theory as well.
20
There is already a lot of work happening, albeit on a small scale.
https://www.pipeliner.com.au/2016/03/16/pipelines-watering-a-sun-burnt-country/
20
We have a nuclear powered desalination plant already – its called the Sun…
60
I have read that the Ord system dumps a few Sydney Harbours of fresh water a day. I doubt we could ever touch the huge output.
Then ultimately its a question, us or the fish. You can certainly rely on short lifespan animals to adapt much faster than we can. It is also not clear whether saltier water would be a bad thing.
So things might change but since we started feeding ourselves with agriculture, we have altered landscapes all over the world. England and Europe look nothing like they did 2,000 years ago. Nor do the rivers. Or we could hunt kangaroos with spears and live entirely on a meat diet.
The people against change have no faith in the world to adapt to our existence. It’s a bit like a GP friend who said the surgeons have no faith in the body’s ability to heal itself, until after surgery.
101
The Ord River system and Lake Argyle is impressive, I have been there a few times in recent years and have a friend who used to fly agricultural aircraft for crop dusting until he misjudged and ripped the tail off while turning under a power line.
60
Presumably lucky he was close to the ground and flying slowly, but that’s also why it happened. Flying under bridges and powerlines is part of natural selection.
40
The grand plan to create a new irrigation farming area about the size of Western Europe involves dams on a number of rivers to harvest part of wet season rainfall, as done with the Ord River in WA for the Ord Irrigation Area.
In Northern Australia wet season rainfall can be huge.
50
“a better way to go would be to have desalination plants around the coast powered by nuclear.”
Many of us here are nuclear enthusiast’s and love the clean green image of thorium and uranium. And especially like that processing uranium and thorium produces no pollution.
Why not recycle and re-use the fresh clean water in the tailings dams that is used to process uranium?? Wasted resource *sigh….
When tailings dams are factored in, Australia is building dams at fever pace. These dams are engineered to last for ever and should be utilized rather than leaving these open air pools of nuclear goodness to go to waste..
11
That water is neither fresh nor clean, I worked at ERA, the only water that is released from the mine is cleaned retention pond water.
50
Pond water?
Sounds like frogs would love it. Frogs love pond water.
Fascinating.
20
An aquatic wonderland in our own back yard.
20
yup… A.T.M.
23
( sighing ) …. yes, and in today’s BBC news headlines – Brexit related and Farming (about no confidence in P.M. & Farming Subsidies – Green related): I think the title cold be applied to great Britain too. Just listening to the Media splattering the nonsense around. My 20 years of good education wasted.. OR – were we taught rubbish? – blame the Parent / Grandparent generation for guiding us into this situation. Guiding us – ‘cos we were not encouraged to debate and disagree. Now we are educating the 5yr-olds who are telling the rest what to do…. 20 yrs on they are 25 now… and look what they say and demand!
Free thought, Free Spirit and freedom to EXPERIMENT is being snuffed out in so many disciplines. There is now no longer a place for you if you do not have the Hunger for Compliance.
60
Who says you have to comply?
The mark of a man us whether he stands up to a bully….
90
In a civilised world and democratised society running on populist ideals, a DECENT MAN has to look out for his family, first, Company and Staff: Standing up to the State Bully is, alas, not always an option ….. Society is heading for the Medieval Dark Ages. Comply or else…..
10
For the avoidance of doubt, the main bugger factor in the specific sense is Australia being suckered into following the UN line on climate change, thus the mess of energy prices from compliance with the RET, the renewable energy target.
In the general sense, the blame goes squarely on those impressionable citizens and especially politicians who fail to realise the dangers of globalism and its expression in Agenda 21 etc. We need an invigoration of proud Aussie sovereignty and nationalism, not megabucks of our taxes going places like Green Climate Fund and Clinton Foundation – without taxpayers event being asked. Geoff
150
That’s what I said above and beyond. DO NOT fall for the
UN cli-sci game, it’s a suckers’ game.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5YuBRwAo0Y
100
So how many ace of spades must we see before people call it a sucker’s game? The count so far is 3; Rudd, Gillard and Turnbull. Will Morrison be #4 and Shorten #5?
40
Nice to see the US ‘un-sign’ itself from the ICC, nothing less than a patent transnational grab of transcending national sovereignty. I see Australia, New Zealand and the UK among many others are signed up, and ratified members, fittingly coloured in green here.
120
Thanks LD for the link – I listened to it all the way through – a great speech and well presented. How encouraging to listen to someone who puts nationalism first, before the demands of the globalists – oh! That we had a Trump and. Bolton here to tell the UN where to go. I don’t think Morrison has the ticker to do it, despite all the hype about the NEG and the Paris target.
70
Agreed, but at least he’s middle ground. Small steps maybe, but thanks to Dutton and Morrison, we’ve dodged a bullet re Turnbull’s intended legislation of our adherence to the Paris Agreement.
80
Re Turnbull
“Turnbull needs a stake in the heart – metaphorically speaking”
http://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2018/09/turnbull-needs-a-stake-in-the-heart-metaphorically-speaking.html
40
What! No comment in moderation as is #1.1.2
Maybe WordPress doesn’t like Conservative Tree House – which uses WP
20
It would be interesting to draw up a list of all donations, payments of dues to all support organizations outside of Australia.
KK
20
Re NEG, Paris, immigration etc
“Australia’s Suicide Vests”
Borrowed from
“DELINGPOLE: Boris’s Brexit ‘Suicide Vest’ Metaphor Was Perfect”
https://www.breitbart.com/london/2018/09/09/theresa-mays-brexit-policy-is-like-a-suicide-vest-says-boris/
More at
https://www.breitbart.com/london/2018/09/09/boris-mays-brexit-plan-wraps-suicide-vest-around-constitution-detonator-brussels/
50
Australia should have paper mills value adding billions to the economy with thousands of jobs.
With sustainable logging and minimal environmental impact, like the Scandinavian countries.
Instead the greens force companies like Gunns into liquidation and we export our woodchips to Asia.
161
The Labor Greens in Tasmania converted sustainable logging State Forests into UN National Parks which badly damaged the timber industry there including paper mills.
Without extreme greenism and globalisation Australia would today be a far wealthier nation.
80
can’t be bothered checking all the links to see if any are to the actual report – too boring:
12 Sept: CarbonBrief: Daisy Dunne: UK could become ‘carbon neutral by 2050’ using negative emissions
The UK could cut its emissions to “net-zero” within the next three decades by stepping up investment into technologies that can remove CO2 from the atmosphere, a report finds.
However, such methods, which are known collectively as “negative emissions technologies” (NETs), would only be effective if paired with drastic efforts to cut the UK’s current rate of emissions, the findings suggest.
The report, published jointly by the Royal Society and the Royal Academy of Engineering, evaluates how the UK could capitalise on a range of proposed techniques from “natural climate solutions”, such as planting forests, to more experimental methods, including capturing CO2 directly from the air.
The findings show that the UK “must act quickly” to ramp up “research and investigation” into a suite of NETs, the report’s chair told Carbon Brief at a press briefing in London…
However, for some industries, such as aviation and agriculture, it will be almost impossible to cut emissions down to zero, says Prof Corinne Le Quéré, a report author and director of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research at the University of East Anglia.
In the video below, she explains why the use of NETs could be necessary to counteract the “emissions we don’t know how to bring down to zero”…
The 133-page report assesses the potential carbon storage of a wide range of proposed NETs, as well as their potential co-benefits and risks…
To reach the scenario outlined in the report, the UK will need to “act quickly” to boost investments in negative emissions research, says Prof Gideon Henderson, chair of the report working group from the University of Oxford…
In addition, the government will need to introduce more incentives for techniques such as afforestation and enhancing soil carbon stocks.
On Tuesday (11 September), Conservative MP Simon Clarke handed in a letter to the government – backed by 132 MPs and 51 peers – calling for the UK to adopt a net-zero emissions target before 2050…
https://www.carbonbrief.org/uk-could-become-carbon-neutral-by-2050-using-negative-emissions
30
The mind boggles. How are they going to stop “international” and Atlantic Ocean atmospheric CO2 from crossing their border?
70
pat:
can’t be bothered reading it, but take it is from Climate Deniers who think that if only we cut the level of CO2 down to what it was in, say, 1995 then the Climate would somehow be the same thereafter. Yes, the real Climate Deniers re on the Left.
100
Its totally insane. CO2 is absorbed into cold water. Now that there is a grand solar minimum approaching (geophysical FACT), colder seas will absorb more CO2.
All the CO2 schemes are a scam, totally fraudulent and who pays? We do.
They are all nuts, human CO2 emission is around 4% anyway. It doesnt matter if we had 97% CO2 atmosphere (hard to breath) but it wouldnt make any difference to the surface temperature.
70
Uk…powered by USSR gas…carbon neutral…yeah right…ROFL….
30
I have been saying and writing similar views for years. It is said that conquerors become like their conquered. Instead of exploiting resources the attitude now is to be ‘caretakers of the land”.
All the possibilities that are said to be impossible now is a 180’ turnaround in attitude.
Tell the Ord River doubters to go there and say to the wealthy farmer/exporters that it does not work.
Tell the Snowy Mts Scheme workers that you cannot divert water inland for farming.
Tell the CO2 emitters in the major nations that we are the ones saving the planet.
Let us learn the indigenous myths and ones made up by new art degree graduates that all we need do is sit around singing/dancing and all will be well. A big silver bird in the sky will fly overhead now and then dumping needed supplies to us for free.
Bah!
60
12 Sept: Guardian: Urgent greenhouse gas removal plan could see UK hit ‘net zero’ target – report
Tree-planting, restoring wetlands and use of chemicals to remove CO2 from air needed, as well as cutting new emissions, say scientists
by Fiona Harvey
In a joint report on greenhouse gas removal, the Royal Society and the Royal Academy of Engineering found that increasing the amount of forested land in the UK to 5% of land area could play a major role as trees act as a carbon sink. At the same time, farmers could be encouraged through incentives or subsidies to use their land to store carbon through better farming methods.
Construction companies should also be given incentives to use wood, which is a natural store of carbon, and cement can be manufactured with waste carbon dioxide to offset the emissions from its production…
However, while these measures together would account for about a quarter of the carbon reductions needed, technology to remove carbon from the air would also be required, the scientists said…
Using bioenergy, such as wood, plants and waste, while capturing the resulting carbon dioxide is technically possible and should be pursued, the scientists urged. But they said other methods, such as direct air capture, would also be needed…
Richard Black, director of the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit, called the report “crucially important” for the UK’s low-carbon future. “It shows the UK can take its carbon emissions down to net zero by around mid-century and can do so affordably,” he said. “If anything, it has over-estimated the amount of negative emissions the UK will need, and yet still concludes that we can deliver.”
He pointed ahead to a major report coming from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change next month, which is expected to find that the world must achieve net zero emissions by 2050 to meet the Paris agreement targets…
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/sep/12/urgent-greenhouse-gas-removal-plan-could-see-uk-hit-net-zero-target-report
11 Sept: Daily Caller: Jerry Brown’s Plan For ‘Negative’ CO2 Emissions Is Based On ‘Science Fiction’
by Michael Bastasch
What Brown ordered is not just reducing emissions, but instead implied sucking more greenhouse gas out of the air than human activities in his state put up — and not just for electricity. Brown’s order applies to the entire economy, including transportation and agriculture.
So what does negative emissions mean in practice?…
University of Colorado professor Roger Pielke, Jr. recently published a paper on the problems with the UN’s use of BECCS to sell the Paris climate accord.
“Carbon dioxide removal at massive scale is science fiction — like a light saber, incredible but not real,” Pielke wrote…READ ALL
http://dailycaller.com/2018/09/11/jerry-brown-carbon-dioxide-emissions/
30
FUTILITY ISLAND
How many times do we need to remind them?
The THEORETICAL cost-benefits of abandoning Australia
40
Latus Dextro:
Don’t despare, I’m sure the Chinese will buy it (and make a better fist of running it). Our population will have to become Climate Refugees. Where to go? I suggest all those fearful of Global Warming/Climate Change etc. should be resettled on Macquarrie and Heard Islands (to avoid polluting Antarctica). I don’t know if the other 20 million of us would fit onto Christmas, Howe and Norfolk islands but I suppose we might if only at low tide.
40
despair….why does spell check only work when you don’t need it?
60
We are but human,
spell check ain’t that.
Place no faith in it
nor in bureaucracy.
Trust Nature, evolutionary
-trial and error and
rational criticism.
H/t Socrates ‘n Feynman
50
You can fool voters
You can certainly fool politicians
But you can’t fool an ecosystem
50
I think we should gradually abandon the capital cities to the immigrants and build new cities in the arid regions, connected by bullet trains.
These new cities would initially be populated with baby boomers and service industries.
30
Why not go the whole hog and build the B Arc but include politicians and merchant bankers?
30
Van Dieman’s Land for those incorrigibles.
Mass transit rail is only for the mainlanders, Tasmania will remain cut off.
‘The new longer Fuxing bullet train ran on the Beijing-Shanghai line for the first time on Sunday. With a designed speed of 350 kilometers per hour, the new train measures more than 400 meters in length and has 16 carriages, twice as many as current ones. It can carry nearly 1,200 passengers.’
China Daily
10
Well said, Viv.
51
Agree with John of Cloverdale: Well said Viv. As a retired exploration geologist from both mineral as well oil and gas exploration spheres, I can vouch that red tape, green tape and black tape are heaped upon productive explorers and developers. The net effect is to tie up valuable experienced personnel in non-issues. Fortunately there are people still out there making discoveries such the Dorado oil field in the Bedout Basin off-shore from Port Hedland or the recent long copper/gold-bearing borehole at the Khamsin Prospect in the Gawler Craton of South Australia. I would venture to say that the work on finding and developing gas and oil reserves in the Beetaloo Basin of the Northern Territory will do more for the social and economic development indigenous Australians than the current government programs because that is what will deliver meaningful work to that region.But watch what the Greenies will do to try and stifle worthwhile development there!
151
Such a difference betwixt
yr front-line-invention,
(James Watt,)’entrepreneur-ivists
‘n yr paper-shufflin’-regulation
-connstrainin’ bureaucrat-ists.
Oh UN! Oh EU! Oh George Soros!
20
“Once, young Australians excelled in maths, science and engineering. Now, they are brain-washed in gender studies, green energy non-science and environmental activism.”
More Agenda 21…
161
Yes I saw the writing on the wall back when I started my career as a scientist at CSIRO almost 40 years ago. Even back then I saw it becoming politicised with true scientific research was on the downhill run. It was one reason why I left and decided to join the real world.
130
Peter S
That period also about covers the rise, peak and crash of rangeland science
50
Yeah but the millenial driven “sharing caring econony” ( pardon me while i barf….) works as long as someone some where is paying hard currency in tax.
Socialism fails when the tree huggers and hipsters run out of other peoples money….
Will the adults in the room stand up please? Play time us over, kiddies….
70
And therefore more social workers.
30
Clearly long boat trips purify coal and long transmission lines improve wind-power.
For this reason I suggest floating our coal around the world a couple of times and bringing it back to port for use here. As it goes, the ship can lay a transmission line for wind-power, which should be dynamite after it’s wound around the globe a couple of times.
Either that, or we kick the kids out of the kitchen find some adults to run things. There are still some adults left. I think.
Adults? Adults? Helloooooo? Are you there?
120
But! BUt! BUT!
Power in those wires will flummox the magnetic poles (/s)
40
I’ll be buggered.
It’s worse than we first thought …
Cave features suggest stable sea levels during last interglacial period
Sept. 10 (UPI) — New research suggests sea levels were surprisingly stable during the last interglacial period, between 127,000 and 116,000 years ago.
The interglacial period was the last time Earth was as warm as it is now. It was also the last time sea levels were as high as they are now.
https://www.upi.com/Science_News/2018/09/10/Cave-features-suggest-stable-sea-levels-during-last-interglacial-period/1341536601363/
81
Mark M:
Take that with a pinch of salt. Most figures are for a higher temperature in the Eemian interglacial than the present as per the ice cores (more like 2.5℃ above present). I mean the presence of lions, elephants, giraffes and hippos in the Thames Valley (as revealed by fossils) sort of indicates some more warmth there than at present (esp. for hippos). Rhodes Fairbridge thought that the melting ice sheets ( not the Arctic floating ice) raised the sea levels by about 6 metres and illustrated it with tidal erosion photos. Others have concurred.
50
“I Spent the Summer Reading About Socialism—and It’s Even More Disturbing than I Thought”
https://townhall.com/columnists/justinhaskins/2018/09/10/i-spent-the-summer-reading-about-socialismand-its-even-more-disturbing-than-i-thought-n2517355
50
Good read, thanks for that.
30
what a load of ???
12 Sept: ABC: Google searches reveal where people are most concerned about climate change
The Conversation By Carla Archibald and Nathalie Butt
(Carla Archibald is a PhD candidate in Conservation Science at The University of Queensland; Nathalie Butt is postdoctoral fellow at The University of Queensland. This article originally appeared in The Conversation)
According to Google Trends, in 2017 Australians were keen to know about tennis, Sophie Monk, fidget spinners and bitcoin.
But besides these arguably trivial queries, our Google searches also revealed our concerns about extreme weather events such as Cyclone Debbie, Hurricane Irma, and the Bali volcano.
Our research, published in the journal Climatic Change (LINK), suggests that Google search histories can be used as a “barometer of social awareness” to measure communities’ awareness of climate change, and their ability to adapt to it.
We found that Fiji, the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu share the highest levels of climate change awareness, according to their Google searches — as might be expected of island nations where climate change is a pressing reality.
Australia is close behind, with a high level of public knowledge about climate change, despite the current lack of political action…
So finding a way to rapidly gauge public awareness of climate change could help deliver funding and resources to areas that not only need it the most, but are also willing to take the action required.
In our research, we used Google search histories to measure the climate change awareness in different communities, and to show how awareness maps (like the one below) can help better target funding and resources…
Amid the political impasse in much of the world, big data can help reveal how society feels about environmental issues at a grassroots level.
This approach also provides an opportunity to link with other big data projects, such as Google’s new Environmental Insights Explorer and Data Set Search…
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-09-12/google-searches-where-people-most-concerned-about-climate-change/10235948
40
links to 8-page report:
12 Sept: UK Independent: This is how UN scientists are preparing for the end of capitalism
As the era of cheap energy comes to an end, capitalist thinking is struggling to solve the huge problems facing humanity. So how do we respond?
by Nafeez Ahmed
Capitalism as we know it is over. So suggests a new report commissioned by a group of scientists appointed by the UN secretary general. The main reason? We’re transitioning rapidly to a radically different global economy, due to our increasingly unsustainable exploitation of the planet’s environmental resources and the shift to less efficient energy sources.
Climate change and species extinctions are accelerating even as societies are experiencing rising inequality, unemployment, slow economic growth, rising debt levels, and impotent governments…
These crises are part of the same fundamental transition. The new era is characterised by inefficient fossil fuel production and escalating costs of climate change. Conventional capitalist economic thinking can no longer explain, predict or solve the workings of the global economy in this new age…
Those are the implications of a new background paper prepared by a team of Finnish biophysicists who were asked to provide research that would feed into the drafting of the UN Global Sustainable Development Report (GSDR), which will be released in 2019…
A copy of the paper, available on the website (LINK) of the BIOS Research Unit in Finland, was sent to me by lead author Dr Paavo Järvensivu, a ‘biophysical economist’ – a rare, but emerging breed of economist exploring the role of energy and materials in fuelling economic activity…
The UN’s GSDR is being drafted by an independent group of scientists (IGS) appointed by the UN Secretary general. The IGS is supported by a range of UN agencies including the UN Secretariat, the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, the UN Environment Programme, the UN Development Programme, the UN Conference on Trade and Development and the World Bank.
The paper, co-authored by Dr Järvensivu with the rest of the BIOS team, was commissioned by the UN’s IGS specifically to feed into the chapter on ‘Transformation: the Economy’. Invited background documents are used as the basis of the GSDR, but what ends up in the final report will not be known until it is released next year…
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/long_reads/capitalism-un-scientists-preparing-end-fossil-fuels-warning-demise-a8523856.html
30
pat:
When I was young and naive Prof Ehrlich toured and addressed the University about the coming calamities; among them the oil running out shortly, followed by the failure of agriculture so that cannibals would be roaming the mid-west of the USA by 1975 because the World could not support a population of 2½ billion. I forget the rest but as they haven’t happened either it doesn’t seem to matter.
Now 50 years later not one of his predictions has come true. It seems that humans are inventive types who get around ‘problems’.
60
Graeme No.3 –
sadly reality doesn’t matter when there’s trillions of dollars at stake:
12 Sept: Reuters: British pension schemes to disclose climate change strategy
by Simon Jessop
British pension trustees will be required to show scheme members how they account for a range of financially material risks such as those related to climate change when investing, under new rules announced on Tuesday.
The rules, which come into force on Oct. 1, 2019, will force trustees of defined contribution schemes to produce a statement of investment principles that shows how they will consider environmental, social, governance and other similar risks in their investments, the Department for Work and Pensions said.
Schemes will also have to prepare a separate statement on how they plan to take members’ views on the principles into account, and, beginning a year later, show how they acted on the principles.
Pressure group ShareAction said the new rules would give “a new level of protection” to the millions of people automatically enrolled into company pensions in recent years and give them a chance to say which ethical investment issues matter to them.
“This is a major development, for which we have long fought, and we commend the government on this action to protect UK pension savers,” Catherine Howarth, Chief Executive at ShareAction, said.
“Working people in the UK deserve 21st century risk management of their retirement assets and investment strategies that anticipate the impacts on portfolios of issues like climate change.”
https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-britain-pensions-esg/british-pension-schemes-to-disclose-climate-change-strategy-idUKKCN1LR1U9
20
10 Sept: e360 Yale: Analysis: Paris Conundrum: How to Know How Much Carbon Is Being Emitted?
By Fred Pearce
As climate negotiators consider rules for verifying commitments under the Paris Agreement, they will have to confront a difficult truth: There currently is no reliably accurate way to measure total global emissions or how much CO2 is coming from individual nations…
And that is distinctly alarming, given the contradiction between reports that anthropogenic emissions have stopped rising and atmospheric measurements showing that annual increases in CO2 levels have reached record levels…READ ON
https://e360.yale.edu/features/paris-conundrum-how-to-know-how-much-carbon-is-being-emitted
12 Sept: Buzzfeed: Three-Quarters Of Australians Are Now Worried About Climate Change
More Australians are turning towards renewables and believe climate change needs to be addressed
by Elfy Scott
A report (LINK – THE AUSTRALIA INSTITUTE) released this week by the progressive think tank Australia Institute has found 76% of Australians are now concerned about climate change, a 7% increase from polling conducted in 2017.
The polling took place in June of this year and surveyed over 1,700 Australians aged 18 and above.
The survey recorded participants’ agreement with statements such as “Ignoring climate change is simply not an answer, as it increases the risk of the situation getting worse” and “I trust the science that suggests the climate is changing due to human activities”.
The belief in climate change has increased steadily over the past six years, with only 64% of Australians believing that it was occurring in 2012.
Now only 11% of Australians believe that climate change isn’t real (with another 13% reporting that they’re unsure).
The most pressing climate change concerns for most Australians are droughts, floods affecting crop production, food supply, destruction of the Great Barrier Reef and bushfires.
The majority of Australians also now believe in transitioning away from coal-based energy within the next two decades towards solar power (67%).
Emeritus professor Warren Yates, a solar power researcher from the University of Technology Sydney, agrees that the public is becoming increasingly aware that the predictions of climate scientists are now coming true.
Yates told BuzzFeed News he believes that Australians are starting to notice an increasing and more intense pattern of bushfires, storms and droughts, and are becoming more savvy about where Australia’s energy policy needs to go.
“Scott Morrison is really painting himself into a terrible corner, he’s going around saying he’s going to be the prime minister who helps the farmers with the drought, but obviously everyone in Australia knows that the best way to long-term protect farmers is to take action on climate change,” said Yates…
https://www.buzzfeed.com/elfyscott/three-quarters-of-australians-are-now-worried-about-climate
30
It Takes Clive Palmer to explain the simple economics of Coal power and Electricity Prices.
Clive Palmer says he wants to build a new coal fired power station in Queensland, which will bring electricity prices down and bring properity to Queensland.
Kochy (David Koch) does not seem to understand what he is saying!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NP4URtH6tNg
50
Peter C
Methinks that borrowing the thoughts of Trump do not make you a Trump
30
As demonstrated long ago Clive Palmer is an actor and fake story teller, new Titanic for example.
His latest campaign for trying to gain seats in parliament and claiming to be on consumer voter’s side on electricity supply and pricing is more deceptive advertising, Palmer United Party voted against abolition of the RET when the Abbott Government tried to achieve that goal. He was also reported dining with and holding meetings with Al Gore when he was in Australia.
The lovely Clive owns the Coolum Resort on the QLD Sunshine Coast and a few years ago locked the owners of holiday share dwellings out claiming they were in arrears on levies. One owner, a barrister and real estate specialist, represented the owners and Palmer was exposed and forced to back down. Apparently he wanted to redevelop the resort land, and had even turned the grounds into a dinosaur statue park and the hotel into a depressing place to stay.
Radio 2GB’s Ray Hadley is campaigning almost daily against PUP advertising on 2GB Radio and others on the basis that if Palmer has millions of dollars to spend on election campaigning he should use it to pay the now former employees at his bankrupt nickel plant in Townsville.
70
I think that you are both expressing your general view of Clive Palmer ( which I agree with), rather than criticising his argument in this case.
20
Peter C
Called “queering the pitch” IIRC
20
“Queering the Pitch!”
🙂
10
let’s demonise rice:
11 Sept: UK Independent: Rice farming up to twice as bad for climate change as previously thought, study reveals
Levels of overlooked greenhouse gas are up to 45 times higher in fields that are only flooded intermittently
by Josh Gabbatiss
Scientists at the US-based advocacy group the Environmental Defense Fund suggest the short-term warming impact of these additional gases in the atmosphere could be equivalent to 1,200 coal power plants…
These results, obtained by working with farms in southern India, were published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (LINK)…
“We now know nitrous oxide emissions from rice farming can be large and impactful,” said Richie Ahuja, a co-author of this study.
By considering each farm individually and taking into account their methane, nitrous oxide and water use, the scientists suggest that specific strategies can be used that can minimise emissions of climate harming gases…
https://www.independent.co.uk/environment/rice-farming-climate-change-global-warming-india-nitrous-oxide-methane-a8531401.html
10 Sept: Gizmodo: These Scientists Formed A Fortnite Squad To Teach Players About Climate Change
by Brian Kahn
Amid the 125 million Fortnite players, you’ll find rich and famous folks like Lil Yachty, Drake, and David Price (just not at Fenway). But there’s a new squad in town that’s about more than talking shit and selling albums. Scientists are braving the dangerously popular game to talk about climate change.
It’s a seemingly unlikely avenue for climate communication, but by taking the science out of lecture halls and into the most popular game on the planet and Twitch, the researchers hope to make climate change more accessible.
The seed for this idea was planted on Twitter in mid-July, when climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe mused that traffic for her son’s Fortnite videos on YouTube crushed her climate talk videos’ traffic. This is impressive (or depressing, depending on how view it) when you consider Hayhoe is a leading climate science communicator ***with a devoted following…
But it got MIT graduate student Henri Drake thinking: Why not gather a group of climate scientists to play Fortnite and talk climate shop? He pitched the idea on Twitter and told Earther he got about 20 climate scientists and science communicators interested. And thus a squad was born…
“I had played a few times but my kids would describe my play as trash,” Andrew Dessler, a climate researcher at Texas A&M, told Earther.
Dessler and his two sons joined Drake for the squad’s inaugural win a few weeks back. In the video of their victory, Dessler and Drake ***talk about the midterm elections and what they could mean for climate policy while collecting guns and building supplies…
“Surprisingly, all of the scientists have been pretty solid players,” Drake said, giving Dessler a shoutout as the “#1 dad fortnite player.” He said the journalists and communicators who’ve joined the squad could use some help.
***I am one of those journalists…
With a little polish, Drake could be the climate version of Ninja, the king of Fortnite streaming. He probably also needs to get some better compatriots than yours truly so that his games are actually fun to watch.
And hey, that could be you. If you’re interested, there’s a form to signup. You can also drop the Climate Fortnite Squad a line on Twitter, catch them on Twitch, or add Drake on Fortnite. He’s ClimateScientist, a handle that should be easy enough to remember.
https://www.gizmodo.com.au/2018/09/these-scientists-formed-a-fortnite-squad-to-teach-players-about-climate-change/
***the Gizmodo writer, Brian Kahn’s LinkedIn: Lecturer, Columbia University, 2013 – present; Climate Central Inc 2013 – 2017.
Brian Kahn articles at Scientific American
https://www.scientificamerican.com/author/brian-kahn/
20
That would be ‘UN-scientists’.
40
comment in moderation re: UK Independent: Rice farming up to twice as bad for climate change as previously thought, study reveals
10 Sept: Guardian: No more BBC platform for climate change deniers? It’d be about time
by ***Richard Black
The BBC seems to be moving away from feeling obliged to give equal weight to the views of the likes of Lord Lawson
Back in 2007, a report for the BBC Trust, then the corporation’s regulator, concluded that the old bipolar world of “the climate change debate” had gone. The working model had to change, as the title put it, From Seesaw to Wagon Wheel : “the weight of evidence no longer justifies equal space being given to the opponents of the consensus. But these dissenters (or even sceptics) will still be heard, as they should.” Four years later, the Trust’s review of accuracy and impartiality in science coverage , commissioned from geneticist Professor Steve Jones, reached very similar conclusions.
Both reports were accepted by BBC managers. Both contain much that is common sense. And then there are the editorial guidelines, which are very clear that the guiding principle is “due impartiality”, rather than equal weight.
So how have we reached a situation in which the BBC has to apologise for not challenging incorrect statements made by Lord Lawson on the Today programme, where an entire Radio 4 feature, What’s the Point of the Met Office?, turns into a polemic about “dodgy” climate science, and where Radio Cambridgeshire finds it appropriate to stage a traditional seesaw-style debate between “warmist” and “sceptic”?…
After the Jones Review it set up seminars on science coverage; but it failed to make them mandatory, and scrapped them after a year. Staff come and staff go; it seems extremely unlikely that Sarah Sands, editor of Today, had read either the Jones Review or From Seesaw to Wagon Wheel when she decided to call Nigel Lawson for “that” interview…
I recently argued (LINK) for the seminars’ reinstatement and for making them mandatory…
Mercifully the stream of claims that “the lights will go out” as Britain adopts more and more renewable energy appears to have stopped. But which of the BBC’s correspondents knows that energy bills have gone down over the past decade?. Not those who last year covered the government-commissioned Helm Review of energy prices, which led to Radio 4 claiming that “bills have doubled over the past decade”.
Where is coverage, also, of the existential risk posed to oil companies – and therefore our ***pension funds – by the tumbling prices of renewable energy and electric cars? This is now standard fare for the FT, Economist, Telegraph, Reuters, Bloomberg … But the BBC has yet to catch on that a transformation of the entire global energy system is a big story.
The other major factor behind the BBC’s occasional troubles on climate change is lobbying. The newspaper commentariat is amply stocked with columnists who routinely lambast the corporation for bias; and the weight of rhetoric has had an impact…READ ON
Richard Black is director of the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit, and a former BBC science and environment correspondent.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/sep/10/bbc-climate-change-deniers
10
here we go again:
10 Sept: Bloomberg: Yellen Touts Carbon Tax as ‘Textbook Solution’ to Climate Change
By Jennifer A Dlouhy
Former Fed chair joins prominent conservatives behind plan
Tax would cut more emissions than Obama-era regulations
Former Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen says a tax on carbon dioxide emissions would do more to combat climate change than a slew of federal environmental regulations being undone by the Trump administration.
Yellen joins former Walmart Inc. Chairman Rob Walton, former Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers and former Secretary of State George Shultz in delivering a pitch for the carbon tax-and-dividend plan, released Monday (LINK) along with an analysis of its potential emissions reductions.
“From the standpoint of an economist, the most efficient way to tackle climate change is to tax emissions — to create a disincentive to emit carbon dioxide,” Yellen said in an interview before the report’s release. “It’s the right solution to a problem, and it’s collected in a way that is practical and feasible.”
The proposal has the backing of a broad coalition of prominent conservatives, economists and corporations that have united as the Climate Leadership Council and developed a multiyear strategy for advancing the initiative on Capitol Hill. Corporate supporters, which have a roughly $2.4 trillion market cap, include Exxon Mobil Corp. and three other oil giants as well as the largest U.S. automaker, General Motors Co.; utility, Exelon Corp., and telecommunications firm, AT&T Inc…
The proposed tax aims to increase the cost of energy derived from oil, natural gas and coal, thereby discouraging the use of those fossil fuels and encouraging the free market to develop low-carbon power alternatives…
Under the Climate Leadership Council’s blueprint, every ton of carbon dioxide would be hit with a tax, potentially starting at $40 per ton and rising over time, with revenue redistributed to households in the form of quarterly dividend checks…
“It’s been so difficult to make any progress on this issue,” said Yellen, now a distinguished fellow at the Brookings Institution…
“It is compensating in a completely appropriate and targeted way for the externality that is associated with any emissions of carbon dioxide,” Yellen said. “And that’s why almost all economists love it. You’d be hard pressed to find an economist who would not be supportive of a carbon tax because it is exactly the textbook solution to the problem of climate change.”
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-09-10/yellen-touts-carbon-tax-as-textbook-solution-to-climate-change
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Pat
Another one
“Trans-partisan Plan #1: Addressing Man-Made Global Warming With A Plan That Could Be Supported By Both Democrats and Republicans”
https://www.coyoteblog.com/coyote_blog/2018/09/trans-partisan-plan-1-addressing-man-made-global-warming-with-a-plan-that-could-be-supported-by-both-democrats-and-republicans.html
20
So Republicans have their own trough-swillers and useful drongos? Don’t need no help from Dems?
Know the feeling. Here in Australia you couldn’t swing a small cat in a room full of “conservatives” without hitting numerous warmies engaged in “climate leadership”. I think they like the idea of boosting oil and gas at the expense of coal and nukes (while pretending to disapprove of all four)…or they’re just taking orders from from past and future employers at Deutsche, G-S etc.
(No animals were harmed in the making of this comment.)
50
Would that yr harmed a few white elephants…
er, is that a racist comment?
30
To make amends we should remove any statues of Lachlan Macquarie or Sir Henry Parkes and replace them with statues of white elephants. Certainly, that would be a better symbol for NSW. Maybe a white elephant wearing Laurie Brereton’s hard hat holding a monorail in its trunk? Or carrying Malcolm on its back while blowing the Snowy River back uphill with a mighty blast of its trunk?
40
Maybe a kind of Trevi or Travesti Fountain, horse-power
replaced by white elephants.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trevi_Fountain#/media/File:Trevi_Fountain,_Rome,_Italia.jpg
30
Dark forces have taken control,
Of Australia, with the sinister goal,
To degrade human life,
Through forced energy strife,
With a manic aversion to coal.
130
Brilliant, Ruairi! 🙂
20
pro-nuclear Shellenberger. lengthy, plus links to analysis:
11 Sept: Forbes: Had They Bet On Nuclear, Not Renewables, Germany & California Would Already Have 100% Clean Power
by Michael Shellenberger (President, Environmental Progress)
Had California and Germany invested $680 billion into new nuclear power plants instead of renewables like solar and wind farms, the two would already be generating 100% or more of their electricity from clean (low-emissions) energy sources, according to a new analysis by Environmental Progress (LINK).
The analysis comes the day before California plays host to a “Global Climate Action Summit,” which makes no mention of nuclear, despite it being the largest source of clean energy in the U.S. and Europe…
Here are the two main findings from EP’s analysis:
•Had Germany spent $580 billion on nuclear instead of renewables, it would have had enough energy to both replace all fossil fuels and biomass in its electricity sector and replace all of the petroleum it uses for cars and light trucks.
•Had California spent an estimated $100 billion on nuclear instead of on wind and solar, it would have had enough energy to replace all fossil fuels in its in-state electricity mix.
The finding that Germany could have entirely decarbonized its transportation sector with nuclear is a significant one. That’s because decarbonizing transportation is considered a major challenge by most climate policy experts.
Electricity consumed by electric cars will grow 300-fold between 2016 and 2040, analysts predict. That electricity must come from clean energy sources, not fossil fuels, for the transition to electric cars to mitigate climate change.
As a result of their renewables-only policies, California and Germany are climate laggards compared to nuclear-heavy places like France, whose electricity is 12 times less carbon intensive than Germany’s, and 4 times less carbon intensive than California’s…
Carbon emissions rose 3.2% in California between 2011 and 2015, even as they declined 3.7% in the average over the remaining 49 states…READ ON
https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2018/09/11/had-they-bet-on-nuclear-not-renewables-germany-california-would-already-have-100-clean-power/#3f1848ace0d4
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12 Sept: ClimateChangeNews: Climate action is written in the stars
As business and civic leaders meet in California, they should look to the heavens for inspiration, writes New Zealand climate change minister James Shaw
by James Shaw
(James Shaw is co-leader of the Green Party and climate change minister of New Zealand)
At this time of year, stargazers in the southern hemisphere can see a constellation that marks a time of remembrance, celebration and renewal. It’s called Pleiades – known as the Seven Sisters, or Matariki to New Zealanders. It has a similar name (and significance) in other Pacific cultures, from the early Polynesian word mataliki, meaning minute, small…
Soon, Matariki will be visible in US skies. The celebration and renewal it signifies is an apt symbol for the states, regions, cities, companies, investors and citizens who will soon gather in San Francisco for the Global Climate Action Summit. The summit will celebrate their extraordinary achievements, and reinvigorate the transformational change that is taking place in the US and around the world…
http://www.climatechangenews.com/2018/09/12/climate-action-written-stars/
12 Sept: Sacramento Bee: Here’s another big concern about climate change: It’s ruining childhoods
By Gina McCarthy And Kelsey Wirth
(Gina McCarthy is a former administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency; Kelsey Wirth is co-founder of Mothers Out Front, a climate change nonprofit based in Boston)
Climate change has been impossible to ignore this summer. Extreme heat waves and droughts sparked fires around the world and cloaked California in hazardous smoke.
While less visible than orange skies and wildfire evacuations, our dependence on carbon-rich fuels is changing how our children are growing up. About 5.4 million Californians, primarily in low-income communities, live within a mile of an oil or gas well and breathe polluted air. Some children report near daily nosebleeds, dizziness and nausea. Poor air quality and extreme heat make outdoor play hazardous.
As mothers, we are calling on leaders gathering this week for the Global Climate Action Summit in San Francisco to help us achieve a healthy environment today and a livable climate tomorrow for all children…
https://www.sacbee.com/opinion/op-ed/soapbox/article218164260.html
12 Sept: Fortune: Climate Change Is Everyone’s Problem. Women Are Ready to Solve It
By Anne Finucaneand Anne Hidalgo
(Anne Hidalgo is the mayor of Paris and the chair of C40 Cities, an alliance of cities devoted to addressing climate change. Anne Finucane is the vice chairman of Bank of America)
Imagine a world with affordable, clean energy, sustainable cities and communities, and decent work and economic growth for all. That is the world the United Nations imagined when it defined the 17 Global Goals for Sustainable Development with “the desire to create a future where there is no poverty, the planet is protected, and all the people enjoy peace and prosperity.”…
Women, who control $11.2 trillion of today’s investable assets, are having a profound impact on how businesses view their role in the world, encouraging them not just to grow, but to do so responsibly. In a recent survey, 65% of women versus 42% of men say that companies’ treatment of the environment, their employees and their communities are important factors in making investment decisions…
That’s one reason why Bank of America is committed to deploying $125 billion in capital toward low carbon and sustainable business by 2025. As part of these efforts, we pioneered the green bond market, helping, among others, cities around the world strengthen their infrastructure by unlocking private capital to support energy efficiency and other green projects. We are also working with other financial partners as part of our Catalytic Finance Initiative—to help decrease investment risk and deliver $10 billion in capital to high-impact clean energy projects…
The Women4Climate initiative is a critical project because women, particularly in less developed countries, are more vulnerable to climate change disasters…
http://fortune.com/2018/09/12/climate-change-sustainability-women-leaders/
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“The celebration and renewal it signifies is an apt symbol for the states, regions, cities, companies, investors and citizens who will soon gather in San Francisco for the Global Climate Action Summit. The summit will celebrate their extraordinary achievements, and reinvigorate the transformational change that is taking place in the US and around the world…”
Aside from the bloat and sheer creepiness of the language, is anyone else getting nauseated by the constant boosting of paganism? It’s just cheesy, invented ritual for silly whitefellas, I know…but I’ve had enough paganism.
So what is it with the creepy mock-paganism, you creepy globalist merkins? What’s your creepy point?
40
Well, I’ve just learned a new word, Mosomoso! A very good use of it too!
20
You voted for this. You voted for all of it. Don’t blame the pols. Blame the Australian voters.
31
As I often state we get the government we deserve. Don’t blame the politicians, blame the voters who put them their in the first place. So at the federal election either we re-elect the LNP provided they have their act together (so far it’s not looking good) or we vote 1 for a minor party to block both major parties forming a majority rule. It’s that simple – and it’s easy because our democratic voting system allows for it very well. The last thing we want is Shorten to become our next PM. If he does it proves to me at least voters are brain dead and deserve the crash and burn.
60
While ever the people are continually lied to they cannot and will not make informed decisions. If the media changed their tune, the pollies would have to fall into line and the people would be in a position to make decisions based on facts rather than fairy tales. Without an effusive, complicit media, the likes of Turnbull would never have got a foothold, let alone ruled a party; the Greens would be a non-entities; Labor would be much saner in its energy policies. The self-reinforcing crony cycle of media-politicians-media must be broken before any progress can be made. Your average politician does not have the clout to stand up to the media behemoth. It starts and ends with the corrupt media.
As to the simplistic propositions that “You voted for this. You voted for all of it. Don’t blame the pols. Blame the Australian voters” and “we get the government we deserve” — BS I say. We all get stuck with the government that some of us deserve and which the media push upon us with their biased dogma.
40
‘BS I say.’
I second the motion, we are under the boot of a a cultural Marxist dictatorship and simply don’t know how to think.
Its not much different for an indigenous resident of Shanghai, if you get my drift.
20
The voters mostly are unaware of the globalism ramifications and generally are manipulated by the politicians. When did you last hear about new world order, Agenda 21/30 and a whole lot more not mentioned attacks on the sovereignty of our nation and other nations?
How many are aware that the ALP is now Union Labor Inc., fully controlled by the union movement with union trained executives now in safe Labor seats replacing the MPs who held them? How many are aware that the Liberal Party of today has been hijacked by the self named Black Hand faction with HQ controlled by them? Or that the plan has been for years to get rid of the Coalition National Party and conservative Liberals then merge into a single party with no real opposition to govern without challenge?
Tony Abbott is often referred to as “right wing” but he is a real Menzies Australian Liberal conservative and they traditionally have occupied the middle ground with centre-right and centre-left, “a broad church” former PM Howard described them. The Black Hand faction is more Labor than Australian Liberal-National.
71
Bob the electorate at large is not all that interested in politics and only vote because its compulsory. Under Turnbull the Australian Westminster system became a cultural Marxist consortium backed by the MSM, its not my fault because I voted informally.
From a literary perspective its like being in a Kafka nightmare, but still has its funny side.
40
Yes most voters don’t give a damn about politics. So they get the government they deserve and they have no cause to complain when things turn bad, such as high power prices.
40
The electorate is not fully informed, so how can they make a rational decision on anything?
If Cameron and Dean interviewed the new Environment Minister, can you suggest three talking points?
30
The electorate if well and truly informed via various means more so than ever. The issue is the information goes over the heads of most people as they are not interested or couldn’t give a damn to try and sort truth from fiction. You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink. Our system is far from perfect but if people bothered to make informed decisions when voting then we would have better governments.
30
People have diverse lives and are out of touch, a lot of them are new immigrants and the two majors are always pretty close.
Questions to Melissa:
Do you believe carbon dioxide causes global warming, even though the observational evidence disproves the theory?
Are you against building new dams across the country?
Will you amend the Water Act, to help out the struggling agriculturists until the next La Nina?
40
People who have busy lives also are out of touch with politics. So I say again they have no one to blame but themselves if they keep voting for a party that fails to deliver or worse still goes out of their way to destroy a nation, such as Turnbull tried to do and if left to continue would have accomplished that, deliberate or otherwise.
20
“busy lives also are out of touch with politics” eh? Indeed this is the case – Make everyone comply – adds an unnecessary burden and you have less free time to look up and see what’s going on in the Political Beer garden whilst you are out in the Fields.
Rather, we should be turning the phrase on its head : Politicians are out of touch with the living busy ( people) …
So isn’t it time to do something about those Politico-elites who yearn for “Hunger for Compliance” from the rest of society ?
10
An informed society, not just an opinionated one, is the backbone of a good democracy.
The MSM needs to tell the people that CO2 doesn’t cause global warming, then the politicians would fall in behind.
10
We already have a well informed society in particular the West societies. The problem is most people refuse to listen, read, think and decide with the exception of the US. It worked in the US with Trump so there is no reason why it can’t work here as well, especially since the MSM campaign against Trump was and still is much worse there than the equivalent here against our conservatives.
20
What little faith I had in Cory has completely evaporated, he is discussing millennial shopping habits.
10
The Nats are making their move, with WIN/Sky as support.
‘The Nationals are threatening to run against the Liberal Party in the NSW Senate race at the next federal election amid concerns they will lose an upper house seat, exposing growing turmoil within the Coalition.’
Oz
10
el gordo, I presume you are not referring to blind faith as most people do have that in our leaders. I have no faith in any of them blind or otherwise but I do have some hope in Morrison and Taylor. Of course there is an expiry date and it’s not that far away.
10
I listened to Josh Frydenberg interviewed on 2GB today and it was very disappointing to hear his views of the Paris Agreement, which are no different to Morrison’s view, surprise surprise. It is now clear he and the rest of the LNP have lost the plot on Paris and renewable targets – they still believe in them. He then goes on to say they might look at supporting alternative energy sources, which could be gas, coal or something else. What a load of crap. If that’s all they can come up with to reduce power prices then they are gone. The only way to reduce power prices is to scrap the renewables subsidies pronto. It’s all well and good if they want to throw billions towards supporting new coal fired power stations but that won’t reduce power prices in the short term, and at best introduce some competition years down the track AFTER power prices have risen some more. When asked about Liddell all I heard was mumbo jumbo. BTW where is Taylor, the new energy minister? OK, I’ll give him some more time to explain his new policy on energy. It better be good or else he will turn out to be yet another fake Liberal, in which case I hope the LNP crashes and burns at the next election, along with ALP+Greens. Time for a new political landscape.
50
Sounds ominous.
10
It need not be and it’s very simple to block Shorten becoming our next PM but alas I see very little hope. The LNP have not just one but a few golden opportunities to convince voters the LNP is a real alternative to the ALP+Greens polices on a number of fronts, the three main ones being energy, agriculture and immigration. We should by now have the cheapest energy in the word, be the biggest supplier of food for the world and have a more sedate population growth rate living in the lap of luxury reaping the benefits from the other two, something this nation used to be so fortunate to have a very long time ago. Instead we have an LNP split in two fuelled by Turnbull who is yet again white-anting Dutton to cause the party to lose his seat and help Shorten become PM sooner rather than later. I suspect Morrison impossible task to keep the party from eating itself alive. There is still time to rectify the situation but he has a Herculean task. Time will tell if he can do it.
40
First eliminate the RET.
30
He might be forced to do just that if he loses majority rule before the next election or at the next election if it ends up being a hung parliament, and relies on the support of a minor party or two. If the next election ends up being a reflection of the current despair by voters for both major parties and the people prefer lower energy prices and lower immigration then it should be an easy win for the LNP if the people favour minor parties that agree with those sentiments rather than parties that do not. At least that’s the case of voters are by and large sensible (LQTM). I suspect the next federal election will be very revealing.
10
If bugger means the same thing in Australia that it meant many years ago when I was a young teenager growing up then you certainly don’t want Australia buggered up.
It’s a really offensive term here and I’m truly sorry that your problems have to be described in that way. But no body ever said a politician had any smarts of the kind that keeps the governed out of trouble. And I expect it will be here soon enough.
Paris is only the next move too I’m afraid. If Paris comes completely unraveled something else even worse is sure to come out of the next big mutual back patting and buggering society get together.
71
You got it! Paris is just one stepping stone to the ultimate end, which is some form of world dictatorship from some global organisation, be it the UN or whatever.
50
Sorry about the offensive language. Here it is a common term, no biggie. Said so often in Oz that it doesn’t have the toxic baggage.
Once I couldn’t find a car park and from the back seat Master Two loudly announced “Bugger!”.
60
Years ago the English considered b….y to be offensive; (a common adjective in Australia!). My little brother was sitting in the back seat when something happened that caused him to speak up for my father….’sluddy pool!’…he was a little mixed up. 🙂
30
Jo,
You needn’t apologize. I’ve seen it here before. I was intent on making the point that you definitely don’t want that happening because of what it means.
And I remember that once you let me get away with something equally if not more offensive because it was the only word that could describe what’s happening and the way I felt about it. So we’re more than even on that account. If anything I owe you a few. Keep up the good work and don’t worry about me.
30
Comment from an ex-South African years ago as he adjusted to local useage
“Good word that buggerise”
20
Roy
Perhaps you’d better check the meaning of the phrase “queering the pitch”?
10
Who’d a thunk it? “Wonders” never cease. 🙁
10
Roy, it used to be considered an extremely offensive term in Australia as well, and for the same reason.
50
Some interesting links on the word “bugger”.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bugger
https://sites.google.com/site/oshearobertp/publications/words-americans-should-avoid-saying-to-australasians
20
In my old age I’ve realized that society has become expert at dodging the poison dart by such transparent subterfuges as using F-word, N-word and so on. Everyone knows what you mean, even your prepubescent children have probably hear the words so why not say them? If you’re worried about your children then don’t say the cleaned up version either or explain to your offspring what the word means and how it can be used in a hurtful way and that they should avoid doing that. Tell them that they’re better human beings than to need to use such words and thy’ll soon get the idea.
But a word is just a word, nothing but some noise coming out of someone’s mouth. The meaning and consequences are all in the way it’s used not in the word itself. And perfectly acceptable word here or in Oz can be used in a way that hurts. So who’s fooling who?
Can we not discuss the N-word like adults? I would never call you that but after all, it’s just a word like any other word. We don’t need to throw either cleaned up word around like popcorn popping but there’s real need to talk about them and do it at an appropriate time, with your children if they enter the equation.
Or have I gone off my rocker like the rest of the world?
40
Don’t answer that. I’m sure that by now I’ve gone off my rocker or fallen from my tree and it’s too late to pick up all the pieces. 😉
40
And now I’m certain I’m off my rocker. If I ever learn to type accurately or proofread accurately it will be so big an event you’ll see the lightning all the way to to the southernmost rock in Tasmania.
You would never know it now but I once could copy morse code at 32 words/minute*** on a typewriter for five minutes with no mistakes to pass the test. And a typewriter is a lot harder to use than the typical keyboard.
***That’s faster than anyone can tap it out with a telegraph key and I practiced for several weeks at that speed before I could begin to get it right. And now I can’t string two words together without going back and correcting something. 🙁 Bugger!
70
Och Mannie, I’ve heard all those words before and never questioned what they really meant – not even sure if I do, now. Had to laugh at the Kiddy take on them ( suddy pool, etc )- reminds me of a Local Farmer, raging about something in front of HIS Bairns – Kukin Funt – he spat out. The Boys made it worse by laffeen aboot it. I remember that story from 40 yrs ago and use that phrase now too – told My bairnies that same story.
What gets and ANNOYS me tho’ is the way the english language is being mucked up by foreigners …. in a Town like Alice – German version, .. hoo de **ck is aliss. Who the heck taught them all that stuff, anyway ?
I wouldn’t worry about Typos etc – raises a laff anda smile. Slainth !
20
Wow, my one little old comment generated more commentary than if I had announced that I just shot someone. Amazing! Words do have power and I wish the fools who throw around the wods racist and diversity, not to mention plain old lies like they had a licence to make fools of themselves would tape their mouths shut.
A word is not something to use as a club to hit others over the head with. If you were to really want to hit someone over the head I would think that a baseball bat would be more appropriate.
And no one here would do that. I’m sure of that.
00
I’m not so sure of the mechanics but I see a potential silver lining in Turnbull’s recent treachery to destroy the government by attacking Dutton. If Dutton loses his seat due to another by-election then the government would need to form an alliance with one or more of the minor party members to form a majority government. If the minor support happened to be anti-Paris and anti-renewables then Morrison will have to do what he should have done in the first place and announce the withdrawal from Paris, scrapping of the renewables subsides and targets, and cutting the immigration intake. Then he will be forced to campaign very strongly to defend those positions along with the support of the minor party. Thank you Turnbull! Woohoo! I can dream can’t I?
80
I noticed a parallel between Serena Williams stunt and the victim lobby.
Who won? The other one.
What was her full name? Naomi Osaka
Is she black or white? Black
What nationality? Born in Japan. Haitian father, Leonard “San” François, and a Japanese mother, Tamaki Osaka..
How tall? 1.8 metres (5′ 11″)
Osaka has been described as Japanese, American, Japanese-American, American-Japanese, Haitian-Japanese, and Haitian-American-Japanese. Lived in Florida since she was 3.
She has a story to tell, but we didn’t hear it.
It reminds me of Hillary Clinton’s loss. Every possible tantrum and excuse. Fighting for women’s right. Ridiculous. Hollywood. Notables being angry. Cartoonists vilified for stating the obvious and the irony.
In all this a young woman’s rights were taken away. Her moment of glory as the new US champion.
A Haitian or Japanese champion but not what Hollywood wanted, their fantasy moment.
It was the same with Hillary. Now the papers are still attacking the umpire for dealing with a losing tantrum
and the Australian cartoonist for telling the truth.
In all this a great injustice was done. Hollywood doesn’t care. They want their fairytale and its the same with Hillary. She lost. It was her fault.
120
How much more of a minority can you be? Japanese, Haitian, black, American. So much for someone’s rights.
We are told that rich and famous Serena was a victim of oppression. Remember when celebrities did je suis charlie and then did nothing and instantly forgot about it. The ethics of a dog on a croquet lawn.
80
TdeF
Add Jo’s today thread here
30
TWEET: TicToc by Bloomberg:
“I’m as tough as he is, I’m smarter than he is,” Dimon told CNBC
LINK Bloomberg: Dimon says he could beat Trump in Election because “I’m smarter”
follow-up:
TicToc by Bloomberg:
UPDATE: In an emailed statement, JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon says he regrets his remarks on Trump: “I should not have said it”
8:40 AM – 12 Sep 2018
https://twitter.com/tictoc/status/1039901618060357633
above links to a changed Bloomberg article, which has no mention of CNBC :
13 Sept: Bloomberg: Jamie Dimon Quickly Backtracks on Bragging He Could Beat Trump
By Michelle Davis and Max Abelson
VIDEO: 3mins21secs: 12 Sept: CNBC: Jamie Dimon says he could beat Trump in an election: ‘I’m smarter than he is’
by Hugh Son; With reporting by CNBC’s Dawn Giel and Liz Moyer
J.P. Morgan Chase Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon took a swipe at President Donald Trump, claiming that he could defeat the president in a head-to-head election.
“I think I could beat Trump,” Dimon said Wednesday during an event held at his bank’s Park Avenue headquarters in New York. “Because I’m as tough as he is, I’m smarter than he is. I would be fine. He could punch me all he wants, it wouldn’t work with me. I’d fight right back.”
Shortly after, Dimon addressed the uproar caused by his comments: “I should not have said it. I’m not running for president,” the CEO said about an hour after the original exchange. The off-the-cuff outburst “proves I wouldn’t make a good politician,” Dimon said. “I get frustrated because I want all sides to come together to help solve big problems.”…
SECOND VIDEO: 3mins58secs: (ON THE BACK-TRACKING – BUT ALSO SEEMING EXCITEMENT OVER POSSIBILITY OF DIMON RUNNING!)
Here are Dimon’s full comments:
Question: Why not throw your hat in the ring, Jamie? [laughter]
Dimon: I mean, I’ve said this before Trump was elected. You’re not going to get a wealthy New Yorker elected president. Boy I was dead wrong. And by the way, this wealthy New Yorker [pointing to himself] actually earned his money. It wasn’t a gift from Daddy. And I grew up in a poorer part of Queens than he did, but I am a banker. I am part of the elite. He…I don’t think the American public looks at Trump as part of the elite. They look at him as the upstart who punched the elite in the nose every day. And so I think…I think I could beat Trump. I can’t beat the liberal side of the Democratic party.
Question: You think you can beat Trump?
Dimon: Yeah. I do, yeah. [laughter] Because I’m as tough as he is, I’m smarter than he is. I would be fine. He could punch me all he wants, it wouldn’t work with me. I’d fight right back. But you have these….the Democratic party….they’ve got to get their act together in terms of understanding how society actually works. Because if they just keep on pounding away at business…I watch these ads on TV with all these people …they’re all running and they’re all going to [wags finger] …business where their place is. Well, OK, right that’s going to really work. That’s going to really succeed……Anyway my wife wouldn’t let me, either. She told me she’d love to be first lady. She did not say that, but I do think it’d be a really interesting White House if she were first lady. It would be a little bit…..you compare yourself, remember that show the Nanny with Fran Drescher? [laughter] She says that, not me.
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/09/12/jamie-dimon-says-he-could-beat-trump-in-an-election.html
CNBC mentions the following, as if it had sparked their original Dimon interview:
Financial Times: Jamie Dimon hands over more responsibilities to top lieutenants
‘I’m more like the coach now,’ says Wall Street’s longest-serving chief executive
by Laura Noonan in New York and Patrick Jenkins in London – yesterday
https://www.ft.com/content/7a555e74-b5d1-11e8-bbc3-ccd7de085ffe
funny how MSM loves Dimon, hates Trump.
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should have excerpted the following from the CNBC article:
Last year, Dimon said it was “almost an embarrassment to be an American citizen traveling around the world and listening to the stupid s— we have to deal with in this country.”
Dimon, a lifelong Democrat who was reportedly considered for Treasury secretary under the nascent Trump administration, has said he’s tried to influence the president as a former member of a now-disbanded advisory group of business leaders. Dimon is also chairman of the Washington-based Business Roundtable.
—
lifelong Democrat Dimon!
Wikipedia: Business Roundtable
The Business Roundtable (BRT) is a group of chief executive officers of major U.S. corporations formed to promote pro-business public policy…
The Roundtable was founded in 1972 by John Harper, the head of Alcoa, and Fred J. Borch, CEO of General Electric, who were concerned about growing public hostility toward corporations as evidenced by support for government regulation of the workplace environment and about the power of unions to squeeze corporate profits in an increasingly competitive international market…
Chairman
Jamie Dimon, Chairman & CEO, JPMorgan Chase Inc.
Committee chairs includes:
Rex W. Tillerson, Chairman & CEO, ExxonMobil Corporation
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Roundtable
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… Enough to drive a man to drink.
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I wouldn’t call Turnbull a genius and certainly not Barnaby Joyce who only now admits he’s starting to understand why there was a leadership challenge in the first place now that Turnbull is white-anting the Liberal Party yet again using Dutton as the target. Well Joyce must be a very slow learner or thick as a brick because we all knew Turnbull was white-anting the LNP when Abbott was PM.
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what people who believe the FakeNewsMSM won’t be hearing today:
12 Sept: Youtube: 11mins42secs: Hannity: New “Smoking Gun” Strzok + Page Text Revealed | Dozens Of Documents On The “Leak Strategy”
Sean Hannity, Sara Carter, Gregg Jarrett, Jim Jordan, + Mark Meadows on Hannity on Fox News
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cV2Gu-47PMo
12 Sept: Damning New Strzok Text to Page: “The Times is Angry With Us About the WP Scoop”
By Sara Carter
https://saraacarter.com/damning-new-strzok-text-to-page-the-times-is-angry-with-us-about-the-wp-scoop/
VIDEO 2:43: 12 Sept: Gateway Pundit: Jim Hoft: Report: THIRTEEN Different Deep State FBI Agents Fed Information to ONE LIBERAL REPORTER (VIDEO)
Your Deep State at Work…
Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) the current chairman of the House Freedom Caucus joined Stuart Varney on Wednesday to discuss the latest Strzok-Page text messages released by the DOJ…
12 Sept: VIDEO: Gateway Pundit: Rep. Jim Jordan: Remember Stuart when Michael Horowitz, the Inspector General, did his investigation he talked about the fact that one reporter had 13 different individuals at the FBI who were feeding him information. So, there was certainly a leak strategy going on. The most troubling aspect of all of this is that, remember Devin Nunes memo about what they took to the FISA Court. They cited media reports to buttress the dossier which we know wasn’t valid, wasn’t corroborated, wasn’t credible. But they used media reports to buttress the dossier. They were leaking information to the media that they were then using to buttress the document that they were using to then get the warrant to spy on the Trump campaign…
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2018/09/report-thirteen-different-deep-state-fbi-agents-fed-information-to-one-liberal-reporter-video/
12 Sept: Daily Caller: Lee Smith: OPINION: How Anti-Trump Leakers Moved From Offense To Defense
As Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes reported in their book, “Shattered: Inside Hillary Clinton’s Doomed Campaign”:
“Within 24 hours of her concession speech, [campaign chairman John Podesta and manager Robby Mook] assembled her communications team at the Brooklyn headquarters to engineer the case that the election wasn’t entirely on the up-and-up. … Already, Russian hacking was the centerpiece of the argument.”…
This investigative exposé originally appeared in RealClearInvestigations.com, which is supported by the RealClearFoundation.
https://dailycaller.com/2018/09/12/anti-trump-leakers-offense-defense/
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South Korea announced plans to slap a 0.5 percent to 2 percent ownership tax on property ownership to rein in owners of expensive homes blamed for stoking a speculative housing bubble in the main regions across the nation. Also those renting out properties will face fresh mortgage restrictions, and the government will build 300,000 new homes in the metropolitan Seoul area to boost housing supplies. I wonder if Shorten will do something similar and “bu…. up” our nation?
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Shorten wants to reintroduce DEATH DUTIES!
Labor’s suicide by death taxes
http://morningmail.org/labors-suicide-death-taxes/#comment-81641
no thanks!
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Oh no! A small Swiss company won $31 million in new investment to suck carbon dioxide from thin air that might gain wider acceptance from governments worldwide as a way to slow climate change. Thee goes our crops yields. Millions will die starving if this is taken too seriously.
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8 Sept: ScienceAlert: Elon Musk Warns We’re Living Through The “Dumbest Experiment in Human History”
“The argument for the simulation is quite strong.”
by FIONA MACDONALD
In a 2.5-hour candid interview with comedian Joe Rogan for “The Joe Rogan Experience”, Musk talks about why we’re likely living in a simulation, how flamethrowers are “a terrible idea”, smokes a joint, calls The Boring Company a “hobby”, ***and issues a stark warning against our use of coal and artificial intelligence…
His most serious warning he reserved for our unrelenting burning of fossil fuels.
“We should not do this,” he said, referring to removing fossil fuels from the ground and transferring it into the atmosphere.
“We know that sustainable energy is the end point. So why are we doing this experiment? It’s an insane experiment. It’s the dumbest experiment in human history.”…
https://www.sciencealert.com/elon-musk-says-we-re-probably-living-in-a-simulation-and-warns-agains-our-insane-experiment-with-coal
now watch the great geniuses on carbon/climate etc, if you want a good laugh:
6 Sept: Yutube: 10mins54secs: Joe Rogan – Elon Musk on the Future of Fossil Fuel
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JY1Fymr9lHQ
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Tesla Shocker: Billionaire Elon Musk Smokes Weed Live Internet Stream
https://www.disclose.tv/tesla-shocker-billionaire-elon-musk-smokes-weed-live-internet-stream-345627
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Scott Morrison comes under fire for video saying the drought can be viewed as a ‘necessary evil’ to wipe out the bottom 10 per cent of farmers
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6162027/Scott-Morrison-uploads-video-Twitter-says-Australian-record-drought-necessary-evil.html
What a vile despicable “creature” this scumbag Scott Morrison is!!
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The PM did not say that, the Labor Green allegation relates to what a farmer said and a video of his full commentary was up up on the PM’s website.
And from what I watched the comment was not evil at all, the farmer said that drought forces farmers to assess their stocking situation and quality of animals when selecting what to keep …. my words.
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“Mr Morrison has been criticised widely for publishing the video, which rationalises the drought currently devastating regional NSW as ‘sensationalised’ by the media.
Two farmers go on to say ‘good operators’ will survive the drought, while those that ‘probably shouldn’t be there anyway’ will be wiped out.
The video features comments from feedlot operators Michael MacCue and Sandy Munro in northwest NSW.”
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Scientists To U.N.: To Stop Climate Change, Modern Capitalism Must Die
https://www.disclose.tv/scientists-to-un-to-stop-climate-change-modern-capitalism-must-die-345234
Their true colours revealed………….
RED!
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Red..surrounding a white circle with a black swashtika..
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on yesterday’s new Strzok/Page texts, which Strzok’s lawyer and Dem apologists claimed was a strategy to prevent leaks!
VIDEO: 12 Sept: Conservative Treehouse: sundance: Jim Jordan Discusses The FBI “Media Leak Strategy” Under Director Comey and Deputy Director McCabe…
In essence this “Media Leak Strategy” issue lies at the heart of the controversy behind the redacted “Sources and Methods” the FBI continues to hide.
The “sources and methods” within the FBI investigative material (now classified) reflects intentional leaks by the FBI to media, and journalists writing articles to bolster the investigation which were then cited as supportive material to continue the investigation.
Frustratingly, what no-one seems to mention -during these debates- is how the Inspector General has already outlined the FBI ‘media leak strategy’ when he published his report on FBI conduct. There are two chapters of the IG report dedicated to outlining how grossly negligent FBI officials were collaborating with the media.
(EXCERPTS) We identified numerous FBI employees, at all levels of the organization and with no official reason to be in contact with the media, who were nevertheless in frequent contact with reporters. Attached to this report as Attachments E and F are two link charts that reflect the volume of communications that we identified between FBI employees and media representatives in April/May and October 2016. The OIG did not obtain information reflected in the chart by accessing records relating to any member of the media. We have profound concerns about the volume and extent of unauthorized media contacts by FBI personnel that we have uncovered during our review.
In addition, we identified instances where FBI employees improperly received benefits from reporters, including tickets to sporting events, golfing outings, drinks and meals, and admittance to nonpublic social events. We will separately report on those investigations as they are concluded, consistent with the Inspector General Act, other applicable federal statutes, and OIG policy.
The harm caused by leaks, fear of potential leaks, and a culture of unauthorized media contacts is illustrated in Chapters Ten and Eleven of our report, where we detail the fact that these issues influenced FBI officials who were advising Comey on consequential investigative decisions in October 2016. The FBI updated its media policy in November 2017, restating its strict guidelines concerning media contacts, and identifying who is required to obtain authority before engaging members of the media, and when and where to report media contact. We do not believe the problem is with the FBI’s policy, which we found to be clear and unambiguous. Rather, we concluded that these leaks highlight the need to change what appears to be a cultural attitude among many in the organization. END
(LINK) You can read chapters #10 and #11 and the Full Report here:
https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2018/09/12/jim-jordan-discusses-the-fbi-media-leak-strategy-under-director-comey-and-deputy-director-mccabe/
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Jones and Morrison interview 2
http://morningmail.org/jones-morrison-interview-2/#comment-87456
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OT but the Bald hill windfarm and future windfarms planned in Victoriastan by our glorious leader may now have struck a snag .
Residents who complained about the Baldhill farm have managed to force the local council into getting a second independent report about the complaints and in what may be a world first it seems the report agrees with the residents concerns about health implications or nuisance noise levels .
The solicitor who is acting for the residents has the report which is under a gag order at the moment and I believe it might be the first study that shows the detrimental affects that we hear so much about .
No one in the politburo was willing to comment on this today despite despot Dan announcing yesterday more windfarms were being built in the socialist state .
Apparently there is a lot of interest in this report/study to be made available even from overseas .
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Irish families win court case against wind farm noise « JoNova
http://joannenova.com.au/2016/12/irish-families-win-court-case-against-wind-farm-noise/
http://joannenova.com.au/2016/12/irish-families-win-court-case-against-wind-farm-noise/#comment-1870503
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VIDEO: 1hr3mins: 12 Sept: Breitbart: LEAKED VIDEO: Google Leadership’s Dismayed Reaction to Trump Election
by Allum Bokhari
A video recorded by Google shortly after the 2016 presidential election reveals an atmosphere of panic and dismay amongst the tech giant’s leadership, coupled with a determination to thwart both the Trump agenda and the broader populist movement emerging around the globe…
Sent to Breitbart News by an anonymous source, it features co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, VPs Kent Walker and Eileen Naughton, CFO Ruth Porat, and CEO Sundar Pichai. It can be watched in full above. It can and should be watched in full above in order to get the full context of the meeting and the statements made…
Co-founder Sergey Brin can be heard comparing Trump supporters to fascists and extremists…
https://www.breitbart.com/tech/2018/09/12/leaked-video-google-leaderships-dismayed-reaction-to-trump-election/
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12 Sept: Reuters: Chinese truckers demonstrate over high fuel costs, truck-hailing app Manbang
Chinese truck drivers are demonstrating against higher fuel costs and the dominance of local truck hire platform Manbang which they said is squeezing incomes, a potential headache for the firm backed by SoftBank Group Corp and Alphabet Inc.
Since late last week, demonstrations by truck drivers have been seen in over a dozen locations around China, according to Hong Kong-based China Labour Bulletin, which tracks labour action in mainland China. On social media, photos and videos circulated showing long lines of parked trucks adorned with banners.
The demonstrations come as oil prices hit their highest level since 2014 in recent weeks, scraping $80 per barrel and stoking cost increases for businesses and consumers, especially in large oil-importing nations such as China.
The truck drivers also cited a squeeze on haulage rates due to the dominance of Manbang, formally known as Full Truck Alliance Group. Manbang raised $1.9 billion in April from Japan’s Softbank and Alphabet’s venture capital fund CapitalG.
The firm is often described as China’s “Uber for trucks”, in reference to U.S. ride-hailing firm Uber Technologies Inc . It runs an app that allows companies to connect with truck drivers – often independent contractors – tapping into demand for haulage in one of the world’s busiest markets for goods transport…
Manbang, formed in a merger of haulage platforms Yun Man Man and Huo Che Bang, did not respond to requests for comment. The firm in April said 5.2 million of China’s 7 million freight trucks were members of the Full Truck Alliance Group…
https://www.reuters.com/article/china-trucks-protests/chinese-truckers-demonstrate-over-high-fuel-costs-truck-hailing-app-manbang-idUSL4N1TE379
funny how Reuters failed to mention Alphabet is GOOGLE!
24 Apr: Reuters: Softbank, Google join $1.9 billion investment in China truck-hailing firm
by Pei Li and Adam Jourdan
Japan’s Softbank Group and Alphabet Inc’s venture capital fund CapitalG are among investors pouring $1.9 billion into a truck hailing service platform Manbang, the Chinese company said in a statement on Tuesday.
Manbang, formally known as Full Truck Alliance Group, said the investment was led by SoftBank’s Vision Fund – which counts Apple Inc, Foxconn and Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund among its backers.
Investors also include state-backed private equity firm China Reform Fund and Hong Kong-based investment firm Ward Ferry, said Manbang…
Around 5.2 million out of China’s 7 million trunk line trucks are members of the Full Truck Alliance, Manbang added…
The investment was first reported by the Wall Street Journal, citing sources, who said the fund raising would put the company’s valuation north of $6 billion.
Manbang CEO Wang Gang said in a statement that the firm would use much of the funds “to recruit talent”, which when necessary could include making acquisitions.
“The deal has brought Manbang’s development into a new stage,” Wang said, adding it would help the firm “become the world’s largest platform in terms of transportation capacity.”
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-truck/softbank-google-join-1-9-billion-investment-in-china-truck-hailing-firm-idUSKBN1HV0ON
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Jo should write a blog on this
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how can you expect the average person to grasp what is and isn’t true in the following?
13 Sept: AFR: Coal baron Trevor St Baker fears VRET will drive prices up
by Ben Potter, Mark Ludlow
Power industry maverick Trevor St Baker fears the Victorian Renewable Energy Target’s maiden crop of six new wind and solar farms will put more pressure on Victoria’s power network in the same way extra wind and solar energy did in South Australia.
Mr St Baker, whose company owns the Vales Point coal-fired power station in NSW and wants to extend its life for up to 20 years with proposed federal subsidies, said squeezing out coal- and gas-fired power stations with more renewables would only push up power prices…
“Once Victoria increases its intermittent wind and solar to more than 16 per cent of the state’s annual energy production, the Victoria/SA system will require a very high level of curtailment of wind and solar in both states,” Mr St Baker told The Australian Financial Review.
“This will have implications for the business cases for both existing wind and solar installations, as well as constraining of dispatchable generation, at further increasing off-market costs to electricity consumers.”..
Mr St Baker said the SA experience showed expensive gas-fired dispatchable power was needed to provide stability in a network that relies on intermittent solar and wind.
Tony Wood, energy program director at The Grattan Institute, said the VRET would push electricity prices down at first, but this would put more pressure on fossil fuel generators and “inevitably it pushes them out and prices go up again”.
Other experts believe the Victorian move will lower electricity prices by bringing more low cost power to Victoria, NSW and Tasmania.
Mr Wood said it was predictable that prices would rise when fossil fuel generators were forced out of the market but he didn’t think the sky was going to fall in as a result of the VRET or the Queensland Renewable Energy Target.
He said some of the projects would have been built anyway and “in the absence of anything sensible from the Commonwealth we are maintaining the momentum of large-scale renewables”…
But Brian Morris, Schneider Electric’s head of energy and sustainability in Australia, said the increased renewable energy supply from the VRET tender will push down prices in Victoria, NSW and Tasmania by bringing more low-cost generation into the market.
Mr Morris said the extra supply from six wind and solar projects would push high-priced gas generation and hydro generation into more of a peaking role, but have less effect on Victoria’s low-cost brown coal generators in the short to medium term.
This would increase Victorian exports of power into NSW and Tasmania, reversing the contraction of Victorian exports that occurred after the abrupt closure of the Hazelwood brown coal power station 18 months ago, and bring down prices in both states by displacing higher cost and black coal power…
“Generally more renewables reduces prices. We’d agree with that because it puts more energy into the grid – volumes of energy that is cheaper than the current source,” Mr Morris told The Australian Financial Review.
“We don’t think it displaces coal early. If anything it displaces gas in the first instance [because] in Victoria coal is very cheap compared with gas.” Schneider advises companies on energy deals, such as Bluescope Steel’s huge solar purchase…
Bruce Mountain, director of Victoria University’s Victorian Energy Policy Centre, said if a coal plant withdrawal was not anticipated – like Hazelwood’s – that would have a negative impact on grid prices, but the effect of Hazelwood’s closure was exacerbated by soaring gas prices.
Professor Mountain said a study of countries with high renewables shares in the grid – Denmark, the UK, Germany, Italy and Australia – showed that although they exacerbate shoulder and peak pricing, in every case “as the total capacity from wind and sun has increased wholesale prices have come down in absolute terms in all of those countries and here”.
“I cannot say with absolute certainty that it will bring prices down [because it’s one of many factors] but I can be certain that in the counterfactual, when it was not there prices would be higher,” he said.
Ivan Slavich, chief executive of Energy Action, which helps businesses with their energy purchases, said the VRET announcement did not mention additional network costs that the additional wind and solar supply might necessitate, but “overall I think it’s a good thing”.
“I’m sure there’ll be some requirements for capex to accommodate the additional supply but I think the benefit of having additional supply into the market outweighs the costs,” Mr Slavich said.
https://www.afr.com/news/coal-baron-trevor-st-baker-fears-vret-will-drive-prices-up-20180912-h159y6
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Time to flick switch on renewable energy subsidies: Deloitte
The Australian · 2 hours ago
“As a fuel source renewable energy can now stand on its own,” Deloitte’s energy, resources and industrials national lead Michael Rath said…
13 Sept: TWEET: BusinessReview (The Australian): Subsidies for renewable energy developers should be abolished and politicians should stop clinging on to coal as the default fix for Australia’s under pressure energy grid, consultancy Deloitte says
LINK “Switch off clean energy subsidy”
Subsidies for renewable energy developers should be a abolished and politicians should stop clinging on to coal as the default fix for Australia’s under pressure energy grid, consultancy …
https://twitter.com/aus_business/status/1040167379278290944
13 Sept: AFR: Deloitte: Let go of coal and make way for renewable energy
by Ben Potter
Governments and “coal zealots” need to let go of fossil fuels and embrace renewable energy which is cost competitive with the grid or better and becoming competitive in performance as well, Deloitte energy, resources and industrials partner Michael Rath says.
Launching the Deloitte Global Renewable Energy Trends report, Mr Rath said that although the National Energy Guarantee had collapsed because of carbon emissions targets, renewables could stand on their own two feet thanks to new technologies such as storage, peer-to-peer energy trading and artificial intelligence.
The report says wind and solar photovoltaic power are the cheapest sources of new energy at $US30-$60 ($42-$84) per megawatt hour and $US43-$53/MWh respectively, their intermittency challenges may be overstated and they can be associated with greater grid reliability and resilience even as they push prices lower. Australia has the lowest cost for solar PV and South Australia is the cheapest location for concentrating solar – which stores solar energy – along with China.
The report says “the case for renewables has never been stronger”, demand is inexorably growing and even in countries that are retreating from global carbon reduction commitments such as the US and Australia, cities, communities and corporations are acting in the absence of national leadership.
“They have stepped up to fill the vacuum and demand has continued to grow,” it says.
Mr Rath said the “big concern” in Australia was that subsidies might go back to fossil fuels such as coal and gas. The Morrison government wants to implement a “firm” capacity underwriting mechanism recommended by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission to maintain firm supply and lower prices, but some government members see it as a lifeline for coal generation.
Mr Rath said he understood the need for an orderly transition but “I do think we need to make way for new technology and allow competitive forces to work”. Deloitte sponsors The Australian Financial Review’s National Energy Summit 2018 in Sydney on October 10-11…
Mr Rath said Australia had a choice: It could resist the international trend to renewable energy and be “an outlier”; or it could keep the politics out of it, allow market forces to work and regain the mantle of being “a low-cost energy power”.
“I think people holding onto the past – if you like coal zealots – will eventually have to deal with the facts that renewable energy is here, it’s now at price and performance parity and should be seen as a mainstream energy source. The levelised cost of energy is becoming comparable to conventional and traditional fuel sources, and should now be seen as a reliable grid integration technology.”
The Deloitte report says deployment obstacles and ceilings to wind and solar power are dissolving “as they reach price and performance parity with conventional sources across the world, demonstrate their ability to enhance grids, and become increasingly competitive via new technologies
“Already among the cheapest energy sources globally, solar and wind have much further to go: The enabling trends have not even run their full course yet.”
https://www.afr.com/news/deloitte-let-go-of-coal-and-make-way-for-renewable-energy-20180913-h15c9h
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from AFR –
“Deloitte sponsors The Australian Financial Review’s National Energy Summit 2018 in Sydney on October 10-11”
12 Jun: TheFifthEstate: Willow Aliento: Deloitte hires John O’Brien in sign that cleantech is going mainstream
Australian CleanTech founder John O’Brien has joined Deloitte financial advisory as a partner in the firm’s energy, resources & industrials group, in a sign that the cleantech sector is going mainstream.
While Australian CleanTech will continue to exist and be engaged in industrial development activities, the company’s client work is largely shifting to Deloitte with him…
Deloitte has welcomed Mr O’Brien on board.
“John is a respected leader in his field, helping organisations and governments manage the risks and seize the opportunities from the disruption as we transition to a low carbon economy,” Deloitte energy, resources & industrials national lead Michael Rath said.
“We’re delighted to welcome him to the team and to significantly strengthen our capability in this renewable energy, sustainability and clean technology space advising clients as they navigate the pace and scale of change throughout all areas of their business.”
David McCarthy, Deloitte managing partner financial advisory, said the combination of a changing regulatory environment, investor focus and emerging technologies was “presenting both enormous challenges and opportunities for any company that provides or uses energy.”…
https://www.thefifthestate.com.au/business/investment-deals/deloitte-hires-john-obrien-in-sign-that-cleantech-is-going-mainstream
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13 Sept: news.com.au: Lowest cost for solar panels in Aus: study
Declining costs and advances in technology mean solar and wind are now viewed as solutions to strengthening grid resilience and reliability, a new report says.
by Rebecca Gredley, AAP
Australia has the lowest cost for solar panels in the world, a new study on growing demand for renewable energy has found.
Deloitte’s Global Renewable Energy Trends report released on Thursday says declining costs and advances in technology are driving demand for renewables, with solar and wind reaching price and performance parity on and off the grid…
A report into South Australia’s 2016 statewide blackout found there were issues with some of the states wind farms, which switched off when major transmission lines were brought down by severe weather.
Deloitte’s Michael Rath says the statewide blackout was a combination of an interconnector failure and a freak weather event.
“The subsequent deployment of a large scale solar farm and the installation of the 100MW battery storage facility has enabled South Australia to achieve greater network resilience and grid stabilisation,” he told AAP in a statement…
The study found that Africa has the highest cost for solar panels due to investment costs.
“South Australia, along with China, has the lowest unsubsidised, levelised cost of energy for concentrating solar power,” Mr Rath said.
China, the United States and Germany have reached price parity for certain renewable sources, Deloitte says.
The study says demand is being driven by cities which use renewable technology in infrastructure, the trend of communities using storage and management systems for off-grid flexibility, emerging markets and corporate involvement.
Deloitte notes that two-thirds of Fortune 100 companies have renewable energy targets, a trend it says is growing “very rapidly” in Australia.
Obstacles for more renewables are receding due to reduced costs and technology such as automation and manufacturing techniques which make production more efficient.
https://www.news.com.au/national/breaking-news/lowest-cost-for-solar-panels-in-aus-study/news-story/41a68097833a74eedba2d0eafbed0ac8
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13 Sept: Times of India: India solar power target under cloud as agencies spike bids for 9,000 MW
by Sanjay Dutta
NEW DELHI: Solar power agencies of the central and state governments have scrapped bids for projects aggregating 9,000 MW capacity, which will lead to a flat growth in capacity addition next year and delay the goal of achieving 100 GW ((gigawatt) of solar power capacity by 2022, industry data shows.
The cancelled tenders represent half of the 18,000 MW bid out by these agencies till August. The cancellations coincide with the pace of solar capacity addition dropping 52% to 1,599 MW in the April-June period from 3,344 MW in the January-March period of 2018.
CHART – BREAK-DOWN OF FIGURES
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/business/india-business/india-solar-power-target-under-cloud-as-agencies-spike-bids-for-9000-mw/articleshow/65788144.cms
12 Sept: The Statesman: Why solar energy use has declined in India
by Vaibhavi Dwivedi and Armin Rosencranz
(The writers are, respectively, a final year law student and professor of law at the Jindal Global Law School, Sonipat)
India’s renewable energy capacity till December 2017 was only 62.84 GW, while the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) has also been failing to utilize allocated funds for the past two years. This under-utilization of funds can be seen in the slow research and development of renewable technology as well.
India has recently witnessed a steep decline in its solar market. According to a respected research study conducted this year, there was a downswing of 52 per cent in solar installations around the country in 2017. The imposition of a 25 per cent safeguard duty on solar panel cells imported from China and Malaysia is one of the major reasons behind this recent decline.
This imposition has severally dampened bidders for new solar projects, owing to the rise in prices of solar modules…
Secondly, the new goods and services tax (GST) imposed on the solar module manufacturing industry has resulted in manufacturers paying a higher amount of GST while procuring raw materials. This model has imposed different GST rates on various components of a solar project. While solar modules attract 5 per cent GST, invertors and batteries attract imposition of 18 and 28 per cent GST respectively…
The rise in photovoltaic module prices internationally has also directly impacted solar projects in India. Developers in the country had been modelling their auction bidding strategies on the assumption of declining Chinese module prices. This assumption had not foreseen the rise in Chinese pricing and thus prompted fewer bidders to take up new projects. Additionally, the demand for the imposition of anti-dumping duties by local manufacturers in India ultimately resulted in subdued bidding of solar projects.
Moreover, existing projects have been reported to be under-performing due to breakage of modules and other external factors. The ‘rooftop’ solar programme initiated in the country has not been successful given the high cost of installing solar plants on the roofs of commercial and residential buildings.
Accordingly, India’s target of generating 100 GW of solar power seems like a distant reality. While the rise of duties implies a rise in solar tariffs, benefitting the domestic economy, it will also make solar power less attractive to consumers…
https://www.thestatesman.com/opinion/solar-energy-use-declined-india-1502683631.html
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too depressing:
13 Sept: Canberra Times: Industry calls for NEG resurrection to end ‘cycle of hope and despair’
By Nicole Hasham
Industry is urging Federal Parliament to salvage the National Energy Guarantee as Labor contemplates adopting the contentious policy that triggered the Turnbull government’s implosion.
Business groups and other stakeholders have despaired at the loss of almost a year of intense work and negotiation over the energy plan, which promised to provide investor certainty and consistent market rules after more than a decade of policy upheaval.
Senior Labor sources have confirmed the opposition is seriously considering resurrecting the National Energy Guarantee, subject to discussion with stakeholders, believing it could achieve the bipartisan support needed to broker an enduring ceasefire in Australia’s climate wars…
Business groups are believed to be lobbying Labor to revive the policy, saying it is the best way to quickly address the problems of electricity affordability, reliability and emissions reduction in the electricity sector.
***Former Environment and Energy Minister Josh Frydenberg spearheaded the policy and has expressed disappointment in its demise. Fairfax Media understands he personally rang industry stakeholders involved in consultation to apologise for the outcome.
One recipient told Fairfax Media: “It was to his enduring credit that he did make those calls to people who had been working hard on getting this outcome. He thanked us for all the effort and apologised that he wasn’t able to get it though.”…READ ON
https://www.canberratimes.com.au/politics/federal/industry-calls-for-neg-resurrection-to-end-cycle-of-hope-and-despair-20180913-p503is.html?ref=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_source=rss_feed
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Sky news are reporting that Frordenberg has changed his mind and said we must ditch emission targets in favour of cheaper bills .
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Alan Jones of 2GB Radio knows him very well and has accused him a couple of times of being insincere and prepared to do whatever to get ahead in politics.
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NEG = CARBON dioxide TAX
NO CARBON TAX !!!!!!
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13 Sept: ABC: Gippsland wind farm adversely affecting residents, independent report says
ABC Gippsland By Emma Field
Noise from a wind farm in Victoria’s Gippsland is having an adverse impact on the comfort and wellbeing of residents living at surrounding properties, a new report commissioned by a local council has found.
According to the South Gippsland Shire Council, this could set a new precedent in how planning decisions are made about where wind turbines are built.
The council said the report it commissioned into the Bald Hills Wind Farm at Tarwin Lower found two surrounding properties were experiencing noise levels that were problematic…
Supreme Court orders independent report
It is the latest development in an almost two-year saga involving the wind farm, which has 52 turbines on farmland about 150 kilometres south-east of Melbourne…
An initial investigation by the council found there was no impact from the wind turbines.
But the complainant challenged the decision and the Supreme Court ordered the council to commission an independent report — costing more than $33,000.
The report found “wind farm noise was clearly audible” at two residences with windows and doors shut.
And in one case the noise was so loud at a neighbouring house it “intruded into conversation between investigators and (the couple)”…
Clients entitled to sleep: lawyer…ETC
Councils call for wind farm clarity
Mr Tamlin said the council was trying work out the implications of the report and wanted the Victorian Government to provide clarity on the issue.
He said local councils could effectively be sidelined from the approval process for a wind energy plant, via the relevant planning act, but then have to deal with the fallout if there was a complaint under the Public Health and Wellbeing Act…
“This is something the Victorian Government needs to resolve, ***for the sake of the renewable energy sector and all those involved in the establishment of wind farms.”…READ ON
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-09-13/wind-farm-may-be-causing-health-issues-report-finds/10237568
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This could be the story of the year
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It could be but I suspect it won’t be. I think the story of the year is the realisation by everyone the Liberal Party is being destroyed by leftists headed by Turnbull. The only solution is a split followed by a formation of a coalition or alliance of conservatives from ON and ACP. Failing that the LNP will never ever be free of the cancer of egotistical leftist self-serving career politicians who are clueless as to how to run a nation. The ALP are too smart to allow them in their party. The leftists in the Liberal Party can find other careers as they are a rabble of political party destroyers and have no place in any party.
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Stop These Things (wind farms)……..
https://stopthesethings.com/
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12 Sept: Nasdaq: Why Solar Stocks Are Struggling in 2018
by Travis Hoium, Motley Fool (Disclosure at bottom of article)
Some of the biggest names in the solar business are having a tough year in 2018 as a number of factors pressure the whole industry. At a high level, demand is down, supply is up, and everyone is fighting for sales by lowering solar panel prices — and that means finances are getting worse.
Solar stocks have been on a downward march for most of the year. First Solar (NASDAQ: FSLR) , SunPower Corporation (NASDAQ: SPWR) , JinkoSolar (NYSE: JKS) , and Canadian Solar (NASDAQ: CSIQ) are all down double digits, and there are no clear signs of a turnaround in sight.
CHART…READ ALL
https://www.nasdaq.com/article/why-solar-stocks-are-struggling-in-2018-cm1022098
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That’s terrible. My heart goes out to them.
But before they go, would they please close the door on this sad epoch of human “progress”.
KK
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GOOD!
HOPE THEY ALL GO BROKE!!!
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Taxpayer sting in Victorian energy deal
The Australian-22 hours ago
Victorian taxpayers would be liable for tens of millions of dollars in compensation if a new state government tried to cancel Labor’s major renewable …
Andrews government ‘blind’ to South Australia’s past energy failures
The Australian-5 hours ago
Mr Weatherill had committed state Labor to a 75 per cent renewable energy target by 2025. “South Australia doesn’t want to be overly reliant on a Victorian …
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The COMMUNIST republic of victoria………..
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13 Sept The Federalist: 7 Attorney General Offices Are Running Private Investigations For A Billionaire
This is the second scheme we have found of donors and elected officials using nonprofits as ‘cutouts’ to provide staff, consultant, PR and legal support for climate-activist officeholders.
By Christopher Horner
Privately funded “special assistant attorneys general” (SAAGs) are presently working in at least six jurisdictions, under agreements that they focus on matters of importance to the billionaire donor paying their salary and benefits and regularly report back on their activities.
The donor is Michael Bloomberg, and his interest is “climate change.” This unprecedented arrangement raises questions not just of state law, but constitutional concerns that no legislature could waive, regardless of the benefactor or his wealth. I detail this scheme in a new report for the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), “Law Enforcement for Rent: How Special Interests Fund Climate Policy through State Attorneys General.” (LINK).
This paper, and the appendix with emails and attachments (LINK) obtained under public records laws, detail this mercenary use of law enforcement powers, plainly in reaction to the global warming industry failing to achieve their goals the proper democratic process. Recall that after “cap-and-trade” legislation failed, President Obama’s Environmental Protection Agency responded by claiming it actually had the authority it needed, and pushed regulations instead…
The Supreme Court stayed EPA’s marquee proposed rule in February 2016. By April of that year, AGs had subpoenaed even CEI in the quest to impose a rejected policy agenda through the courts. Disgraced former New York attorney general Eric Schneiderman confessed that this campaign “step[ped] into this breach” left by others’ failure to act. That came in a March 29, 2016 press conference with Al Gore and nearly 20 AGs announcing a whatever-means-necessary campaign to use law enforcement in service of the climate agenda.
After that coalition collapsed under open records productions and subsequent media scrutiny, Bloomberg stepped up to underwrite a new effort to get the band back together…READ ALL
http://thefederalist.com/2018/09/13/7-attorney-general-offices-running-private-investigations-billionaire/
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The next thread is a timely and illuminating article that helps explain the hold on modern “thought” that is exerted by “persuaders” like Googool.
Let’s face it, people just want to belong, and they want that with the smallest effort in thought and action along with the cheapest cost: usually someone else’s tax money.
KK
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ongoing situation:
VIDEO: 13 Sept; WCVB: State police: 70 explosions, fires, gas odor reports linked to gas line pressure issue
LAWRENCE, Mass. —
State police say 70 fires, explosions and reports of gas odors across the Merrimack Valley on Thursday afternoon are connected to a pressure issue in gas lines.
Earlier, residents and workers in Lawrence, Andover and North Andover were urged to evacuate any buildings or homes with Columbia Gas service after the explosions and fires…
https://www.wcvb.com/article/lawrence-massachusetts-multiple-fires-gas-pressurization/23120524
VIDEO: 13 Sept; WCVB: Latest on explosions in Massachusetts: Firefighter among injured
https://www.wcvb.com/article/latest-on-explosions-in-massachusetts-natural-gas-issue-blamed-for-at-least-39-fires/23121957
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For some random reason, comments were closed on the Google article. That was unintended and has been fixed. Sorry!
Comments are open there now…
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Reading this reminded me of a book from some years back, “Tomorrow When the War Began”, where another nation needing resources Australia wasn’t using, invaded with ambitions to use those resources for its own people. Perhaps it was not so farfetched—beyond its teen heroes, of course. If Oz doesn’t use its own resources, and someone else needs them…
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