The big decision Australia faces — We could try to stop all arsonists, lightning, wind, droughts and cool the entire world, or we could reduce the fuel. Which will it be?
In Australia, the situation is comi-tragic. As potential record-breaking heatwave heads eastwards across the country our fire-fighters are reduced to emergency backburning— an act of sheer desperation on the verge of panic in these conditions. The fires they light in the hope of stopping firestorms are causing firestorms — with flames 70 meters high — even burning down one of the RFS captains homes. This is fuel reduction six months too late. One twelve year old drove a car to escape a fire. 2,000 firefighters are battling 108 blazes. A coal mine and a power station are in the path in NSW. The Mount Piper Power Station generates about 10 per cent of NSW’s electricity and is 3km from a fire front. At the coal mine unprocessed coal lies on the surface. How much fun can you have?
Temperatures of 44C (111f) and 46C (114f) are forecast for the outskirts of Sydney on Friday and Saturday.
The East Coast is a cauldron of fuel, millions of hectares of dense match-sticks waiting-to-go. Meanwhile Greens are complaining about the smoke haze and pollution that their policies created and chanting about “climate change” with all the indulgent self righteousness and scientific reasoning of injured four-year-old fortune-tellers.
The grown-ups see things differently. Roger Underwood is a former General Manager of CALM in WA (Dept of Conservation and Land Management), a regional and district manager, a research manager and bushfire specialist. Roger Underwood has 60 years experience in Australian bushfire management. He is one of the leading experts behind Bushfirefront, and this graph (below) that I keep showing. For 18 years they’ve been warning “reduce fuel”, “reduce fuel”, “reduce fuel”.
As he says: Fire need three things — oxygen, fuel and a spark. The only thing we can control is the fuel.
The big decision Australia faces — We could try to stop all arsonists, lightning, wind, droughts and cool the entire world, or we can reduce the fuel. Which will it be? The intellectual giants running the national conversation are still not sure which way to go.
In Western Australia after the major fires of 1961 a massive and dedicated fuel reduction program stopped wildfires for twenty years. Then as the prescribed burn area fell, the wildfire emergencies returned. Its obvious, unarguable, and agrees with everything else we know. It’s still to complicated for the ABC.
A one degree temperature rise does not create a firestorm
The difference between 39C and 40C is not the difference between normal and catastrophic fires.
Modern witchdoctors wave their windmill-totems and want us to stop fires with solar panels and batteries — so possibly in one hundred years we might get shorter droughts, slower winds, less lightning, and temperatures that might be a meaningless 1 degree cooler (in their wildest dreams and with no possible numerical justification even through their own broken, failing models and as assessed by their favourite mass foreign committee of 26,000 experts).
Even if we sacrificed our economy and way of life and somehow achieved what they wanted the nation would be a powder-keg for the next hundred years, and then after they “succeeded” it would still be a powder keg.
Watch this space… pray for people, koalas and forests. Trainwreck in action in Australia…
— Jo
______________________________________________________
Climate change versus bushfires: killer flaws in an unhelpful and dangerous argument
by Roger Underwood
A group of former “fire chiefs” are blaming the current bushfires across Australia on climate change, and demanding that Prime Minister Morrison takes urgent action to fix the climate. This, they claim, will fix the bushfire threat.
This position is not just unhelpful, it is dangerous. Even if we could change the climate (cooler summers, saturating winter rains, light breezes, no more droughts), it would not influence the current weather patterns or stop the fierce bushfire coming up the driveway this afternoon. Even if we knew exactly how to change the climate, anything we do in Australia will have to be replicated globally (especially in China and India) to make any difference, and even if these climate-changing measures were applied globally tomorrow, the desired new climate might not cut in for many years.
The “climate-change-is-causing-bushfires” position has two killer flaws.
- First, it takes no account of fuels; and second
- It prescribes no practical actions that will help with the immediate bushfire threat.
Ignoring fuel is an error of astonishing magnitude and seriously undermines the credibility of the “fire chiefs”. It is almost as if they never studied elementary bushfire science. In Bushfire 101 we learned about The Fire Triangle. This illustrates a fundamental reality: a bushfire (in fact any fire) can only occur if three things are co-present: oxygen (in the air), fuel (to burn) and heat (a source of ignition to get the fire started).
If any one of the three is missing the result is no fire.
Unfortunately, nothing can be done to remove the air and the oxygen it contains. Unhappily, nothing can be done to stop bushfires starting. They will either be lit by Mother Nature in the form of lightning strikes, or will be started by humans, either deliberately or accidentally.
But bushfire fuel can be removed, or at least the quantity of fuel around a house or in the bush can be reduced to a point where a fire will burn at a relatively low intensity , allowing firefighters to deal with it relatively comfortably.
On the other hand, if fuel is allowed to build up, as happens in long-unburned eucalypt bushland, the eventual fire will be of high intensity. If a crown fire results, generating a downwind ember storm, the fire will be impossible to control and highly damaging, no matter how many thousands of firefighters and water bombers you throw at it.
Blaming climate change for the current spate of bushfires ignores the fact that these bushfires have proven almost impossible to control once they got going. This is because they are burning in heavy fuels dried out by drought. Ignoring fuel is the ultimate cop-out. It absolves the authorities of any responsibility for the incubation of this fire epidemic, and especially it absolves the former “fire chiefs” for not doing their job over the years, allowing dangerous levels of fuel to accumulate in the nation’s bushlands.
But what of the solutions proposed by the “fire chiefs”? I have yet to see any, other than the usual suggestions to curtail CO2 emissions, shut down coal-fired power stations, no coal mines, switch to electric cars, use trains instead of aircraft, and so on. But what will these measures actually achieve? There is no agreement. And when will their impact on the climate become significant? There is no agreement on this either, other than vague statements about 2030 or 2040.
As far as I can see the “fire chiefs” have offered nothing of any practical or immediate value in terms of bushfire management.
However, I am in full agreement with the “fire chiefs” over one thing: something does need to be done to fix the bushfire crisis in Australia. A good start would be for governments and bureaucrats to acknowledge the three great truths about bushfire occurrence and severity in this country:
- Australia is naturally bushfire-prone. This is because of our hot, dry summers, periodic droughts, flammable vegetation and abundant sources of ignition.
- Bushfires cannot be prevented; but bushfire severity and bushfire damage can be minimised if an effective management approach is adopted.
- The effective approach is well-understood and field-tested: (i) you must harden-up rural and semi-rural communities to increase their resilience in the expectation of fire; (ii) you must reduce the fuels in the bush; and (iii) you need to have in place an efficient fire fighting force. It won’t work with only one of the three, you must have them all, properly integrated.
One of the biggest problems with the current situation is that the nation as a whole does not understand or agree upon these key points. There is a confusion about priorities. Thus we see “fire chiefs” focusing on climate change, environmentalists focus on protecting biodiversity, the fire services focus on firefighting, the aviation industry (supported by the media) is pushing for more and bigger water bombers. Meanwhile politicians are scrambling to please everyone … but pleasing nobody. The leadership vacuum is devastating, and nothing will change for the better until this vacuum is filled.
But while I agree with “the fire chiefs” that something needs to be done, I deplore their focus on climate change as the solution. Because it ignores the influence of fuel on bushfire severity, it is a flawed argument; and because they prescribe nothing of practical or immediate benefit, they offer nothing of value. If the government was to adopt their position, ignoring the need to make communities more resilient and ignoring bushland fuel build-up, the result would only be a worsening of the current bushfire crisis.
I conclude that what we are seeing from the “fire chiefs” is a political exercise, based on a different agenda, the ‘take-action-on-climate-change’ agenda rather than the ‘fix-the-bushfire-crisis-now’ agenda. The bushfire situation is being used as a vehicle for their political agenda. Until the “fire chiefs” start advocating a practical approach to remediating the immediate bushfire threat, they must be regarded simply as climate activists, and therefore as a distraction in the business of stopping bushfire damage. There is nothing wrong with being a climate activist, per se, but advocating policies that distract the authorities from dealing with the immediate bushfire threat can only be described as unhelpful and, indeed, irresponsible.
Roger Underwood has 60 years experience in Australian bushfire management
I do hope to see the “fire chiefs” included in the round-up when the trials for the biggest scam in history are conducted.
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Peter listening to Mullins is like listening to any of the Greens !
350
Its really simple…when it all dies down..the class action legal cases against those responsible, will begin.
I hope those responsible are listening. And no dougt it wont be just the expendable greeenie foot soldier councils, but it will target right up the food chain.
It wil be a firestorm of a different type, but come it will.
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Given ignorance is no excuse especially for those in high positions the round-up must include all political leaders, government and opposition who keep on insisting we must reduce our emissions regardless of the amount stipulated. It must also include business leaders, of which there are many. Once found guilty they should be fined millions and put in prison for life, just like Bernie Madoff who conducted a much smaller scam compared to the CAGW one. Sorry PM Morrison but that includes you.
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Greta would have put them up against a wall.
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I do wish you were right Steve. But all I’ve seen so far is “ignorance is celebrated”.
If ever a class action is put forward, I definitely want to be part of that. But to be honest, I can’t see that ever happening. They run rough-shod over us without the slightest care in the world.
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I wish I could give this 20 stars Jo !
Each one of them is earned by you & Roger !
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That’s OK I’m not looking for a popular vote. I just want justice. I’m sick and tired of the crap that’s being hounded by so many in all facets of our life as though Australia is the sole nation responsible for causing climate change and that we must move away from fossil fuels completely while other countries are allowed to build in total hundreds of new coal fired power stations. In my book it’s an act of terrorism as well a scam so it deserves a double does of punishment for those guilty of perpetration these agendas and claiming reducing our CO2 emissions is a good thing.
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You are thoroughly delusional.
The atmospheric greenhouse effect is an uncontroversial scientific reality that we’ve known about for 200 years.
The increase of atmospheric CO2 from its long-term level of 280ppm up to 415ppm (so far) is something that was predicted and studied since over a century ago.
Since 1973, the current trajectory of global warming has been accurately modelled by people using a sensitivity value of 3 degrees for a doubling of CO2.
Global warming is happening, it was known it would happen, and the vast majority of people have no problem accepting this reality.
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Ohhhh Dear
Another believer Nut Bag on the blog !
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Screaming Nutbag says it all!
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The total global rise in T due at the end of this century, due to CO2 rise, is estimated to be 1.4 deg C, the majority of which has already occurred. i.e. the rate of T rise slows as it begins peak (which is what is happening).
And the T rise that occurred already is remarkable in that it remains within the range of natural-variability, that was observed prior to 1950’s, before significant rise in anthropogenic CO2 had even occurred.
And the antropogenic component is only 4% of the annual total CO2 contribution to warming anyway!
A fairly disappointing sort of alleged human-induced ‘Climate-Crisis’. I hope I can remain awake for it (or that I will even notice that it has ‘occurred’).
And as we all know, heat increases before CO2 rises, so how can that be in a greenhouse-theory, as an “EXPLANATION FOR EVERYTHING™“, actually can explain or substantiate nothing at all?
Does CO2 has its own time-machine then?
Have a look at video presentation, from 11 mins in:
Christopher Monckton Talks Climate Change During COP25 in Madrid
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZhcnRe3qd8
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Hijacking the top of the thread with the usual recycled simplistic baits to make people angry? Poor form. Yawn.
For lurkers: Since satellites began the rate of warming is only 0.13C per decade. That’s less than the rate the world was warming in 1870. And it falls totally below the best possible case scenario of the IPCC in 1990. They aimed for a barn door and still had a complete fail. The only reason models “appear” to be right is when the data gets vandalized.
Even if the models got the trend right, it would be pure accident. No hot spot. No ability to predict rainfall, El Ninos, bbq summers, droughts, floods, or the Southern Hemisphere. They bollocks up with Antarctica. Where was that polar amplification? Didn’t predict the pause, can’t tell us the cause.
But thanks SN for the chance to remind onlookers how pathetic your case is, and how skeptics don’t need to run chicken from debate.
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I don’t know much about this stuff, but I’m confused.
Isn’t there actually 2 sources of warming to consider here?
1) There was warming occuring from the end of the Little Ice Age or whatever.
This was, presumably still is, due to natural forces, whatever they are and presumably are still acting.
2) There is a warming of some sort due to increased CO2 (as a greenhouse gas).
The warming here would be dependent on the extent to which CO2 concentration is active ie the
sensitivity range of the atmosphere to that CO2. I had read that the CO2 response is concentration
limited, sort of like a dose-response curve of a drug where beyond a certain concentration there is
almost zero further response (except, for some drugs you increase the chances of side effects). I
had thought this could explain the ‘pause’ at the time until the El Ninio took effect.
Sorry if this is nursery grade science, but there you are. I also wonder about the use of statistics in
the climate debate where the null hypothesis is really ignored. A range of possibilities used to
derive percentage chances of an event happening seem to ignore the prime question as being probable or
just due to chance.
50
Doc, In the only reliable temperature data (uncorrupted by the GAW agenda)
There has been no warming in the last 40 years except for 2 El Nino events
CO2 cannot and does not effect El Nino events, because the fictitious “back-radiation” from CO2 is so weak that it can only penetrate a tiny fraction of a mm into the water surface.
100
If I might just add. I don’t see that if there are two separate sources of warming as above,
I don’t follow why it can be claimed that all current global warming must be totally, or even
partially due to increasing carbon dioxide concentration when one doesn’t even know what the
sensitivity of the atmosphere to CO2 is, or what are the greenhouse limits of CO2, if any. Moreso,
it would seem we haven’t the fullest knowledge of just what the natural forces are or do.
Furthermore, this seems to be the nub of the argument about the cause of Anthropogenic Global Warming.
One can forget bushfires, floods and famines as being of any consequence to the argument that must be settled.
The effects of global warming are spurious to the core argument; they would occur from warming due to any cause
unless the factors causing warming also affected other points of ‘Climate’.
It is really hysterical to carry on about the effects of a changing climate, to destroy one’s energy and
economic systems before the cause is actually truelly defined rather than opined. It is deceptive to
argue that acting now is cheaper than waiting into the future until the matter is scientifically defined,
especially when one is already killing one’s economy as Australia is doing. Lomborg has a point even if
he is a true believer. Adaptation has always suited nations well.
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Thanks AndG55. I sort of knew that but had to cover all bases just to put
my problem as I don’t live this stuff enough to reliably recall what I last read.
My problem is, what happened to the factors already warming the planet since the LIA
that CO2 had to be the source of the warming until around 1998 (remembering that in the ’70’s the
temp was dropping and we were all going to starve to death).
80
I’m not sure that having satellite readings demonstrating no change in global temperatures for
40 years actually helps or hinders the argument. We have seen in this blog recently a graph put up
that is said to show a steady background increase in global mean temperature since the LIA. The idea
was to show [CO2]atm had no discernible effect on the background rise which presumably is due to
‘natural’ forces working on the earth. A steady temperature from satellites has to then ask one what
has happened to those forces’? Have they reduced and the earth is beginning to cool as the solar argument
goes? Are there other forces working between the earth and its atmosphere that create a separate slowly warming
environment that creates that rising temperature graph which isn’t showing on satellite measurements? Is it
just a time lag effect with heat energy taking longer to dissipate than the satellites pick up.
Again, I’m no climate scientist. Just an interested person in the arguments.But as such, the arguments have to
obey the logic that a lay person has to apply to work out what is going on. There is a dichotomy here between
a land based, measured warming and steady state satellite measurements.
00
I note that you must have been brought up on the Null Hypotheses and student t test.
Global warming AKA climate change looks like a problem in internal medicine.
The planet does not vary by more than + or – 8 C degrees whatever happens any way.
So there has to be some sort of thermostat and feedback and damper on the global average temperature.
They use quaint terms like ‘forcings’ and ‘feedback’and average out inputs and out puts as an estimate, when the weather events are at the level of a thunderstorm, too small to measure.
So intuitively[only, this then is not science, just hypotheses], its unlikely that one trace gas controls it all.
The planet has been cooling in a sinusoidal wave form from the Eemian warming to the Roman warming to the medieval warming to now.
Each time civilization prospered.However we are in an ice age and over this time the planet has been cooling.
So the Null Hypotheses is
There is no difference between the natural warming change in temperature from the LIA to the present than what would have occurred with the CO2 increase we have made.
Now the Global Climate Modelers put in CO2 as the driver of the temperature rise. The predicted rise in temperature has been shown mathematically to be a linear extrapolation of the CO2.
increase.
So their assumption always gets the answer they want.
The models do not reliably ‘predict’ the future temperature.They, when compared to reality, fail.
When the next model curve appears, note that the hind cast has been altered to fit the recorded temperatures. Thats like solving the second part of a mathematical problem after you have been given the answer to the first part.It shows they do not understand the first part.
However the geologists, especially those retired, say that the temperature rise post LIA is natural as the planet recovers from the cooling event, just as it did before in Roman and Eemian times.
A lot turns on the estimated ‘forcing’ of a doubling of CO2.
This ‘measure’ seems dubious, because the influence of CO2, by definition, must decline as it absorbs and is saturated in the bands it radiates.
A process of diminishing returns.
I note your comment about drug effects.
A medicine analogy would be the saturation of Hemoglobin, once saturated you can double the CO2 but it won’t carry any more.
Just because I don’t understand the quantum of the forcings of ‘Climate Change’ does not lead me to believe that climate modelers understand either.
As Jo points out, their estimates of CO2 sensitivity are so wide,barn door analogy,that their models can ‘forecast’ anything.
And if you look at the spaghetti traces of the models they do, in fact, forecast anything.
My attitude is to adapt.Most of the countries by population of the world are doing this.
20
Well said Jo, S N the ame says it all . . .
GeoffW
40
Your name tag says it all. No further comment is necessary.
50
Leave Scromo alone. It’s possible he has feelings somewhere.
20
“is an uncontroversial scientific reality”
And yet you are totally incapable of providing ANY empirical evidence of warming by increased atmospheric CO2
Your belief system is based on pure fantasy.
73
“the current trajectory of global warming has been accurately modelled”
No, it has not been modelled accurately.
In fact the models have been proven to be highly inaccurate and not worth a tinker’s curse..
114
Screaming Nutbag is as Screaming Nutbag does.
50
The UN’s First Assessment Report clearly states that the density of any particular gas in the atmosphere is not a critical factor determining atmospheric temperature. It is basic physics that most folk are unsure of. If it was a factor we’d have seen warming during the Ice Ages when CO2 was 10X to-day’s level.
50
Apparently, Tim Flannery is the activist winding up the Fire Chiefs – see comment in ‘The Australian’:
“Climate activist Tim Flannery is the force behind a band of former state fire and emergency chiefs accusing Scott Morrison of abandoning bushfires across the nation and demanding an immediate end …”
It’s a good diversion to blame ‘Climate Change’ when their failure to carry out Hazard Reduction burns in the winter has resulted in the intensity of the current bushfires
80
Just listening to ABC radio you would be forgiven for thinking that bushfires are caused by climate change “only” and we’ve never ever had one before , just once I want an interviewer to do their job and homework not just parrot alarmism .
540
Yeah. Just heard the 22:00 RN news bulletin and was greatly let down by being told that a group of distinguished fire chiefs was demanding action on climate. What moron in the ABC newsroom elevates a piece of trivial dogma to the head of the bulletin? I say again, shut down this farcical organ; the travesty has gone on too long.
390
NB: very TIC (Tongue In Cheek)
It’s obvious:
1. There’s too much oxygen in the air
2. There’s not enough Carbon Dioxide — it’s not a flammable gas and in the right conditions (so far only available on Mars and Venus) can quickly smother fires.
So those fire chiefs who are claiming “Klimate Change is the cause” should be asked to “surrender their oxygen for the good of the nation” and to actively aid in preventing it from burning.
See how many idiots agree.
260
Isn’t carbon dioxide used as the fire suppressing agent in some fire extinguishers? If so, it’s obvious that to control bush fires we need more atmospheric CO2, not less.
201
Nitrogen is the most significant fire depressant in the atmosphere. Fire burns with such intensity in oxygen rich atmosphere that even steel is a fuel source.
This recent fire/explosion in an air separation unit in China is a good example of an oxygen rich fire:
https://www.gasworld.com/asu-explosion-in-china/2017556.article
Flame temperature in an oxygen rich atmosphere is about twice that of the same fuel burnt in air. An oxyacetylene flame burns as high as 3500C.
The fire suppressing aspect of CO2, CO and other products of combustion contribute to forrest fire behaviour.
70
to Reed Coray @ 2.1.1.1
Yes it is.
Back in my days at secondary school, all the labs in most of NZ’s secondary schools were out-fitted with quite large CO2 Fire Extinguishers. It’s my guess they still are.
60
And what do these ‘fire-chiefs’ want to do? Pour H2O on the fires, which is an explosive mixture of hydrogen and oxygen! What’s up with that? 😛
60
On television news last evening I could not believe the deceptive commentary regarding the Prime Minister daring to go on holidays while bushfires are burning.
No mention of the bushfire season being underway, or excessive fuel loads that have been allowed to build up for years. The presenter also failed to acknowledge that fire fighting services including volunteers is a state government responsibility, the federal government provides some funding but state governments manage fire services.
There was even a comparison drawn between a Victoria State Government employee and former Police Commissioner who was out at lunch during major fires in that state and the PM going on a family holiday during the Christmas break. No indication that the PM does not control and manage fire fighting.
Of course the climate emergency beat up was what the deceptive news story was all about, and of course the Australian Government is under fire from the COP zealots and deceivers for not doing enough to combat their hoax.
232
I haven’t seen a bush fire yet which has needed a Prime Minister, nor even Ministers of the Crown in any shape or form, to carry out it’s destruction. They’re like volcanoes — Whakaari White Island didn’t need Jacinda to do its thing either. So why should he be excoriated?
I think it’s because he isn’t there to offer comfort and meaningless words to the affected masses.
“It’s a disaster! PMs are necessary to show they care! They’re there to offer meaningless words about doing something, anything.”
That’s why Jacinda attended Whakaari a week ago, she wasn’t necessary but Whakaari was probably poised and waiting for her to step ashore, which she wisely forebore doing.
90
Both Whakari island and the current NSW bushfires are similar in one regard, failures in risk management and mitigation (letting people onto an active volcano and failure at fuel load reduction burns). I hope those actually responsible are held accountable.
80
… in particular, one which is as unpredictable as that one is. Yes: it has a reputation for being unpredictable.
Just because it didn’t erupt the week before … for about a year or two … is meaningless. It’s often super heated steam and if it’s not that, it’s lava bombs and both of those include free toxic gas in large quantities and ash when it feels like it. Fresh ash shreds the lungs of animals if the steam hasn’t cooked them.
It’s NZ’s most active volcano, and its risk factor has been at medium for most of this year, which is way higher than low. I’ve sailed around it on an NZ navy frigate which stayed well out to sea, because Whakaari only knows what it’s going to throw at you from its arsenal and it never tells you in advance.
Unfortunately we can’t do fuel reduction burns with volcanoes, they do what they want to do when they want to do it.
I won’t set foot on it: I’m not that stupid.
Which way do you want to die this week?
00
That is a fantastic sad face she wears, must have taken hours of mirror study to perfect.
70
Australia needs a Max-Headroom version of Scott Morrison to provide comfort during isolated local fire micro-disasters.
30
OR,
We could rip the self immolating vegetation out of the ground and replace it with something that is less likely to erupt into flame at the merest thought of heat. You know, behave like INTELLIGENT humans and modify the environment, like we have done for all our existence.
171
Concrete!
All the greens could be rounded up, given paint brushes and green paint and put to useful work! 🙂
90
Casuarinas.
Should be a criminal offence to plant eucalypts.
210
Nutbag, in your fantasy world, native eucalyptus were illegally hand-planted across the continent by humans? And you’d like to rip them all out, and hand plant Casuarinas, in their place? To set things to right?
Here’s the existing natural-range of native Casuarina trees.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casuarina#/media/File:Casuarina_distribution.svg
If this was such a great idea, why hasn’t nature done this already? Or did naughty humans pull them up and replace them with native eucalypt varieties? Given Europeans never did that, I presume you’re blaming aboriginals for this crime?
Again, I ask, is that you, Sarah?
110
And it should be a criminal offence to close down mental hospitals and put the patients onto the streets.
71
“And it should be a criminal offence to close down mental hospitals and put the patients onto the streets.”
Or let them near a computer,
lest they post under names like Screaming Nutcase, and prove their mental deficiency to the whole world.
51
‘Should be a criminal offence to plant eucalypts.’
That would be unproductive, its a natural resource to be farmed.
‘China began its Eucalyptus oil production in 1958. Since the 1970’s oil production in China has been developing rapidly, now providing 1,000 tonnes/yr or 40 percent of the international essential oil market. In the eucalypt forests of China, oil production is very attractive since it can represent 20 percent of the total income obtained from the trees.
‘By further processing the Eucalyptus oil, citronellol, menthol, thymol and roseol are obtained which are used widely in the pharmaceutical industry for the manufacture of throat lozenges, candy for cough relief, oil balms, cooling ointments for burns, cold ointments, etc. They also are used in compositions for tooth paste, perfume, toilet soap and prickly heat powder, as well as for flotation of metals, industrial solvents, insecticides and fungicides as additives in small amounts.’
fao.org
50
A little further reading.
‘For all the masses of eucalypts that Yu Qiao has seen growing in China, nothing prepared her for how the trees’ bark peeled and branches slouched in the wild. In the scruffy, mixed eucalyptus stands she visited in the forests of the Otway Ranges, not a single gum reminded this Chinese academic of home. “They looked insane,” she says. “They looked like broccoli.”
‘In China, to stick with the vegetable references, eucalypts are as thin as beanpoles. Ramrod straight, there is not an unruly, end-weighted branch in sight.’
The Age / August 2019
40
That’s what happens when you get the full benefit of the re-education camp.
Ask the Uigher.
10
Don’t worry about them, they’ll be fully westernised in no time once they get a thirst for alcohol.
Back on topic, I propose we reduce the size of national parks, harvest gum trees and corner the world market.
In the short term we should reinvigorate the green army, particularly with gap students and an influx of young migrant guest workers. The principle aim is to reduce fuel loads around habitable areas.
Not back burning, the scheme will be labour intensive to develop mulch to sell locally or exported.
20
Around habitable areas, eliminate gums and replace them with retardant natives.
https://www.ozbreed.com.au/download/fire_retardant_plants.pdf
00
As long as we have a gutless government in Canberra nothing will change. Morrison and co are afraid to confront the ABC and the green left alarmists who are all over the media with ‘climate change’. We should have been burning off 6 months ago. It’s too late now to fix for this summer and so the people in the bush will just have to cop it till we get some rain or until there’s nothing left to burn.
GeoffW
300
Definitely off-thread but there is a kinda link, ABC/BBC and it IS the season to be jolly pantomime time… and there is some witty phraseology and… h/t Rhoda @ https://chiefio.wordpress.com/2019/12/08/w-o-o-d-7-december-2019/#comment-121291
40
Here it is. ) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GE6mx6wyKmU
110
thoroughly enjoyed it 🙂
thanks
40
It’s brilliant, laughted my head off. Thanks Beth 🙂
40
Laughed…sigh, fumble fingers. Perhaps I should just have left it.
10
Or lefted it….no, on reflection…too sinister 😉
20
And in the end, he was quite good. Thanks Beth, really enjoyed that.
10
Annie, Sophocles, Graeme, Christmas cheer! 🙂
10
and to you! 🙂
10
Morrison is just as guilty as the Greens. Forcing a reduction of our CO2 emissions by a smaller amount than that proposed by the Greens is of no consequent. So the LNP and the ALP+Greens are on a unity ticket for the CAGW scam. Time to take our gloves off and call the whole thing for what it really is – a scam of historical proportions, and an act of terrorism to boot.
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With due regard for the politicians ignoring the Australian Constitution I would call them traitors, but apparently they removed that crime from the books some time ago?
50
That won’t protect them when the things go really crazy. I suspect however many politicians will escape to another country when the walls come tumbling down and public unrest rises.
10
The pants wetting on the MSM about two hot days coming this week in Victoria is almost humorous, the fifth column has been an essential tool for the climate message to become part of the public psyche’.
210
And no mention that Melbourne is currently running at 2.2 degrees C below the long term average. Weatherzone also shows that the highest December temperature recorded in Melbourne was 43.7 way back in 1876. Now removed from the BOM data.
https://www.weatherzone.com.au/vic/melbourne/melbourne
270
Meanwhile the real Greta sat on a train floor for a photo opportunity while travelling across Germany on a renewable energy powered train and the train operator was not happy, they had provided Greta and her media manipulators with first class seats.
170
…another sad obsessive parroting ridiculous attacks on an autistic child.
321
She’ almost 17. Not the 10 or 12 year-old-looking ‘child’ who was presented to us originally. She has become a snarling scold with little of life’s experience or much schooling to justify it. But, of course, she is an instant ‘expert’ on matters of science and politics.
211
At the May 2019 federal elections your GetUp colleagues hired teenage students from a Sydney Western Suburbs school for want to be actors and models. They were given GetUp shirts or alternatively a GetUp “independent” candidates brand and appeared as concerned about climate change young people.
Greta is also a hired actor, stage managed, written lines rehearsed, minders travelling with her.
When anybody is placed on a stage under the spotlights and in front of the cameras the organisers plan to project an image to impress the audience with and believe the messages spoken and acted out. So when the public works that out and turns against the messenger the public cannot be blamed for getting angry about the attempt to fool us.
70
Moderation #5.2.1.2 ?
10
That’s just it Screaming Scro.
The question is, did she jump into this, or was she pushed.
60
Screaming Nutbag — another sad obsessive frothing at the mouth …
23
Screamin Nutbag; Great satire.
00
It turns out that Greta bought and paid for first class reserve seating. So sitting on the train floor was just a stunt. That’s why the railway company are so upset about her tweet. She had a seat.
111
“Greta bought and paid for first class reserve seating”
No, it was bought for her.
30
Good luck with your “climate change is a hoax” nonsense following this year’s fire season.
The few people who once took you seriously are going to think twice about it now.
425
Nothing scientific to sayScreaming Nutbag ?
just wild ‘ad hominem’ accusations !
I guess that sums up your own ability
To understand what’s being said here.
142
Screaming; if you change your mind with the season, then your opinion isn’t worth much is it.
40
Funny, nuts don’t rise to the top.
40
Come on Screaming Scrote, these fires are the end result of many decades of “redirection” of government funds previously taken up by foolish people who were managing know historical threats from fire.
I’m not sure where that money has gone but am sure it’s being used wisely.
DKK
70
I doubt it, you are just projecting your own biases.
People who have lived in Australia for any time expect bushfires in summer , it isnt a big surprise.
By winter, outside NSW , it will be oh yeah theu had some big fires in NSW a while ago didnt they. Just as it was for us in VIC.
People in NSW will be looking for practical action, not posturing. They arent so stupid they believe installing a few more windmills and solar panels will stop bushfires.
60
People have now realised that the real problem is the anti-environment agenda of locking up National Parks and State Forest, and then neglecting them, allowing a huge build up of fuel load.
The current drought has nothing to do with atmospheric CO2
There has been no warming over Australia this century
It is caused by anomalously cool waters above and below Australia
The cycle of blustery winds and hot/cold is caused by the low solar energy allowing a wavy jet stream.
But none of these facts will be allowed to get passed your total lack of education and your utter and complete AGW brain-hosing, will it.
82
Yep.
And there’s been very little over the globe in 162 years according to the IPCC:
“The total increase between the average of the 1850–1900 period and the 2003–2012 period is 0.78 [0.72 to 0.85] °C, based on the single longest dataset available (see Figure SPM.1). {2.4}”
https://www.ipcc.ch/site/assets/uploads/2018/02/WG1AR5_SPM_FINAL.pdf
0.78 C°
🙂
11
And I look forward to your explanation about the warming seen on Mars, Triton and Pluto (for a start)** over the last 20 odd years.
Difficult to see how human released CO2 on Earth could cause that.
**WARNING. Don’t contradict NASA, The Guardian or Popular Science, or The Washington Times.
40
Of course SC is fully capable of explaining the mechanism …
-how 1 ° C in increased temperature suddenly creates bush fires.
So c’mon SC: explain it, just:
Don’t mention the burning areas being dried out because of drought since last summer …
Don’t mention the thunder storms and lightning strikes …
Don’t mention the arsonists and fire bugs … we know all these things.
Tell us the climate mechanism …
or is SC just another empty-headed foaming at the mouth idiot?
20
“or is SC just another empty-headed foaming at the mouth idiot”
Most definitely.
Proven so with every post he makes.
Rabid ranting,
Never any science.
20
… s/he/it makes that rather obvious. (SHeIt)
Another Space Cadet (SC), like Mickey and Fitzroy. A few more like them and we’ll have a platoon of them!
Sheesh: a platoon of scientific vacuums shrieking propaganda …
00
Nutbag, this is the bicentennial drought predicted by many astro-physics types and long range forecasters. In NSW temperatures are frequently high due to the lack of cloud cover. It has very little to do with the absorption/emission spectra of CO2.
51
Let’s not forget that their proposed solution is still far more absurd than their claimed cause.
181
it’s such a cop-out to call for climate action to stop the bushfires!
read all:
16 Dec: ClimateChangeNews: How Cop25 turned its back on climate action
The final text released after a marathon talks harked back to a deal made in Paris that placed no requirement on most countries to raise their targets until 2025.
By Karl Mathiesen
https://climatechangenews.com/2019/12/16/madrid-talks-turned-back-climate-action/
80
And the biggest permitted to continue increasing emissions by more than Australia’s annual emissions every year and continue after 2025.
20
Maybe we can sue China for damages from their CO2 fire attack on Australia?
And sue the UN for just letting them do it?
20
or maybe just get on with dealing with our own problems
00
That was in need of a /s
00
Thank you Madrid for the free piss and Nosh up.
10
16 Dec: Carbon Pulse: EU’s wood-fired power should face carbon price under tougher rules -report
The EU should toughen rules that exempt wood-burning power plants from the EU ETS, or else it will put at risk global climate targets due to emissions resulting from dozens of new facilities, a report found on Monday…
12 Dec: EASAC (European Academies’ Science Advisory Council): Leading Scientists Warn: Wood Pellets Threat to Climate – “No Silver Pellet”
Press release
Burning forest biomass for electricity and heat is touted as a smart way for Europe to reach its climate targets. But especially wood pellets release more carbon than coal per unit of electricity generated, a series of reports by the European Academies’ Science Advisory Council (EASAC) shows.
“Wood pellets are no silver bullet for providing electricity and heat without causing climate change. Even if the EU and many national policies incentivise their use at large scale,” says Prof. Lars Walloe, EASAC’s Environment Programme Chair.
‘Listen to science’ is the famous battle cry of the Fridays For Future movement. And as COP25 in Madrid has entered its second week, it becomes clearer with every day: Both the stocktaking of climate change and the search for technological solutions to prevent a further increase of the global temperature are becoming more desperate. Now, the European National Academies of Science warn of the serious mismatches between science and policy on forest bioenergy.
Despite much scientific warning, UN carbon accounting rules turn a blind eye toward the climate impact of cutting trees to burn them. In line with UN rules, the EU’s Renewable Energy Directive revised in 2018 and the EU’s Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) rate carbon emissions from all biomass use as zero. “This gives a misleading impression to energy consumers and policy makers, and these loopholes must quickly be closed,” adds Michael Norton.
The large renewable energy subsidies made available in some EU member states have led to a huge increase in forest biomass use – including the replacement of coal in large power stations with imports, for example from the US, Canada and other European countries. The process of harvesting forests to produce wood pellets has been industrialised to a scale of many millions of tons per year and transported over thousands of kilometres…
https://easac.eu/press-releases/details/leading-scientists-warn-wood-pellets-threat-to-climate-no-silver-pellet/
100
Burning wood to provide electricity on an industrial scale is certified lunacy.
60
In 1985 I went to a wedding in Wollongong. Stayed in Sydney for a week. temperatures in the low to mid 40s were reported.
A hailstorm ruined a car yard some place with marble sized hail. And lightning killed someone in Melbourne.
What a crisis! It just never ends! How Dare you, look what you’ve done!
160
read all the transcript. it pretends to be about need for back-burning, but it’s more an opportunity for Lapsley (Emergency Leaders for Climate Action) to dominate the conversation, & suggest the bushfires are unprecedented. not a mention of how the fuel load built up, etc:
AUDIO: 4m45s: 17 Dec: ABC PM: Former fire chief says re-think over backburning urgently needed
By Julia Holman on PM
TRANSCRIPT
JULIA HOLMAN: Professor Ross Bradstock is the director of the Centre for Environmental Risk Management of Bushfires at the University of Wollongong.
ROSS BRADSTOCK: A backburn literally is burning back against the wind, and it is part of suppression and containment operations…
JULIA HOLMAN: He believes backburning is a fire-fighting tool that should be used.
ROSS BRADSTOCK: Probably should, but it’s a high-risk strategy at the moment because landscapes are so critically dry.
JULIA HOLMAN: But one former fire chief is worried by the backburning strategies deployed by crews, who were tasked with defending property and lives.
CRAIG LAPSLEY: That is concerning, and I’ve got no doubt at all that it would be a major concern to those who have put the backburn in, because it would be done with the best intentions to control the fire, and however, it’s resulted in the fire spreading even further…
JULIA HOLMAN: Craig Lapsley is Victoria’s former emergency management and fire services commissioner. He says serious questions need to be asked about whether backburning is appropriate.
CRAIG LAPSLEY: You know, there’s a lot of fire out there, and you’ve got to ask that question, whether the right techniques is to put the fire back into the environment to control it.
The conditions are so, so dry — that means there is no moisture in the soils, there’s no moisture in the fuels and the fire behaviour is different…
JULIA HOLMAN: Craig Lapsley, who’s heading to Sydney for a meeting of former fire chiefs tomorrow, organised by the Climate Council, says that this season’s length and ferocity is unprecedented.
CRAIG LAPSLEY: We’re seeing longer, hotter periods. We’re seeing more intense fires in more locations, and the one that’s really hit this year, it’s all happening at once across multiple states…
https://www.abc.net.au/radio/programs/pm/former-fire-chief-says-re-think-over-backburning-urgently-needed/11804526
50
wrong date for ABC PM program. should be 16 December.
20
Watching an un-named “news” program, they had some musical band members on…banging on about climate and hotter blah blah …this and that
I doubt they had ever read a science journal in thier lives…..
90
heading to Sydney on his own dime no doubt, training it in from the airport no doubt, eating vegan meals at the local Budget Ibis no doubt
00
Off topic – Gary Orsum does another classic music video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wp66t7UgaK4
Enjoy 😀
10
Funny…from my Christian perspective, I have Israel Folau’s words ringing in my ears about the current fires being punishment for Australia allowing SSM….and while cognitively I know the fires are from a build up of fuel, the Christian in me is starting to wonder whether hes actually right and God has allowed t fuel build up as He knows the future.
Folau walked away with a pile of cash and an apology, when most people wrote him off.He was victorious.
Interestingly, I recall saying to my wife that if God is protecting Folau, anyone who attacks him will be “burnt” by a fire that couldnt be put out, because God Himself had lit it, as a form of minor judgement upon society.
Now are we seeing a major judgement, where the country is actually being burnt?
When viewed through the eyes of faith, knowing Gods character, I would have to say it indeed is possible.
Interesting times….
68
FYI…my opening word “Funny” wasn’t to convey a humorous tone/intent, rather I think a better word would have been “Interesting”….
20
My view of him is different. He doesn’t seem to know the detail behind what he said and is hiding behind the cross.
61
It has never been easy being a Christian. Far from it.
The audience at the Colosseum barracking for the lions is still alive and well, particularly in the left wings of Western Countries.
80
Its a bit hard to know. The reality is that these days, as toorightmate says, the message from the Gospel will always be unpopular.
I think all Folau has done is , as it turns out, is pulled the covers back on society and exposed whats there.
51
Yes. Him.
Problem is that I don’t see his behaviour as Christian.
Bashing others with the bible isn’t a good look and I don’t think he’s given any thought to the damage he may have done to religion.
KK
00
Keith..
Just curious, but how do you figure you are qualified to tell us what is “Christian”?
By definition, a Christian is one who follows the teaching of Christ and the Apostles… who all taught quite emphatically that Hell was a reality and that judgement awaited unrepentant sinners.
Warning people that their behaviour will have consequences isn’t exactly “bashing” them, any more than warning drunks that if they drive they will get caught by the breatho’s or kill themselves.
The idea that Christianity is about freedom from consequences is simply wrong.We can disagree on the style with which that message is conveyed, but the message itself is non-negotiable. If we don’t earn people, their “blood is on our hands”.
Regards….. Peter.
00
Steve, you don’t have to be a practicing or even non-practicing Christian to be appalled with the things we see being ‘normalized’ within our society.
30
There is a view that unless you are a Christian (whatever that means from time to time) you have no moral framework to operate with in the world. Apparently we have no intelligence and need men in robes to give us that. Anyway, way of topic I guess.
10
‘I would have to say it indeed is possible.’
Anything is possible, but some things are highly unlikely.
Many years ago a young firefighter at Lithgow lost his life when the wind changed. Without going into detail, the anecdotal story is that he was badly burned yet still alive when they finally reached him, and he said to his mate, “I’m dying again, John”.
As you may appreciate, these few words have been a burden on me for many years.
60
OriginalSteve I have had the exact same thoughts. I take the view we are meant to be taking care of the planet and so mishandling it will be returned with disasters by design. We have mishandled the land by not conducting appropriate mitigating programs to avoid major bush fires. We are continuing the mishandling by trying to stop some of the fires when in fact we should let them continue to run their natural course. We should focus on avoiding deaths. Let the fires burn as they will do a good job of reducing the chance of a real fire-storm in the future.
50
One should ask what is the more plausible cause of raging bush fires – God’s wrath because communities are supporting homosexuality or anthropogenic climate change.
The vast majority of people in Australia will say it is Climate Change. They simply do not accept that they are both religious beliefs. The church of Climatology has been highly deceptive in how they have presented their belief to the broad community; aided by government funded media.
22
Sounds like one of those polls were they dont give you any sensible answers in the multiple choice.
10
OriginalSteve.
From my perspective, it’s pretty obvious that bad things happen to good people.
The doctrine of a fallen world accounts for it.
Job spends a fair bit of time arguing – both personally and by example – that bad things happen to good people and that bad people sometimes live lives that look like they are “blessed”. In John 9 Jesus implies that a man’s disability was not caused either by his own sin (he was born with it) or the sin of his parents.
Then there is the example of the Apostles themselves. All of them came to sticky ends…. Are we to claim that as a nation, we are more righteous?
So, no, I don’t believe that we can make that case?
(I had to go through all of this when I was suffering from depression and wanting to know to what extent it was my fault)
What we CAN say is the world is place where as a general rule, consequences matter.
We are instructed, frequently, to be wise….. And wisdom is the skill of making GOOD DECISIONS.
When it comes to fire and forest management, we have behaved as though we can make stupid decisions without having to suffer the consequences.
We have been foolish, and there is no free lunch. Someone always pays.
00
You australian hipsters are really hitting the fan ! Such gigantic bushfires without any significant production of carbon and zero CO2 in the UN and EU bookkeeping-system .
Congratulations , well-done . The world is looking in awe at you . Fantastic new statistics , runaway global warming without adding one iota to your carbon imprint . The chinese will become more and more jealous , you are outperforming them in the amounts of smoke and mirrors and your contribution to global warming is intense and spot on . Quite a difference with Peking where the cold of winter rules their society . The only problem you are facing is the surplus of oxygen in your air leading to these hasardous situations . Is there not one scientistin Australia who is capable to blame oxygen for this mess ? Upon considering this am I already too much ahead of my time like the visionary Don Quichotte in Spain fighting windmills a couple of ages ago ? Here in europe nowadays the newest trend in the leftist blame-game is nitrogen . Carbondioxide is yesterdays gimmick . Nitrogen and its chemicals based upon a mayor nitrogen content are the new forbidden fruit hampering our children and grandchildren to reach utopia and Paradise . Just like with you now today our farmers are paying the brunt here , whilst the nomenclatura in the towns are only paying tribute to their latest superstition .
140
Not one of those clowns understands that 78.5% of air is nitrogen, they pretend farming releases too much nitrous-oxide, and (tropospheric) nitrous-oxide destroys (troposphere) ozone.
And anything that destroys ozone = “Bad”™.
But they neglect to mention (or don’t realize) that humans also create a lot of ozone, in the same agricultural industrial processes.
That also don’t understand that ozone is highly toxic to plants and animals, so if nitrous oxide (i.e. laughing gas) were to destroy tropospheric ozone, that would actually be a good thing.
So nitrogen = Bad™, occurs when ignorant uneducated greenie arts-school dropouts pretend to have a clue about the atmosphere, or chemistry.
50
Eco-loons have been whining about nitrous oxide being 298 times ghg effect of CO2, except NO2 is only ~0.00003% of the atmosphere. So contributes a couple of 100th of a degree C, at most. They claim this ~0.00003% has increased by 15%, since 1750, i.e. at the bottom of the little ice age level (when agriculture and providing food was so much less successful). They must have had awesome instrumentation back in 1750 to resolve NO2 concentration with that level of precision.
But of course they didn’t. It’s just another deeply ignorant and backward greenie propaganda attack farce agenda in the media being pushed by dishonest morons.
50
havent seen stream of consciousness writing for some time
00
Their plan is succeeding magnificently. The overburden of fuel grantees fire storms. The fire storms grantees that every living thing AND their habitats will be burned. The land and the economy will be devastated. The goal is to destroy for the sake of destruction. Not by their words but by their actions and carefully calculated inaction. Yet they still get voted into office and are granted unlimited power to do evil. Eventually, they will destroy enough so that even they will have nothing to eat or steal. THIS is what they really want!
I weep for what could have been a second American renaissance. It still can be but things have to change and it is NOT your CO2 footprint. It is the holding to reason, reality, and logic combined holding those who are guilty of such evil accountable for their words, actions, inaction, and, especially, the destructive consequences. If you willfully and repeatedly choose a policy and the policy, as implemented, ends up with consequences counter to what you verbally claim, YOU are responsible for the consequences.
50
“Maybe Donald Trump is not so bad, tra la…” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GE6mx6wyKmU
20
We need the authorities to learn from this. Western Australia is far ahead of the other states in the area of hazard reduction. However WA still doesn’t do enough. in jarrah forest we need to get the rotation down to 4-5 years. In karri forest probably down to 6-8 years.
I recall when I first started recreating on the south coast (WA). The cattle leases were just being bought out but the National Parks board continued regular burning. There was no preparation, no edging just throwing in a couple of matches. The fires never got out of control and never threatened anyone. You could walk freely through the coast hills, and kangaroos were abundant, Then came a new management plan, a lightning caused wildfire and a really big suppression operation to contain the fire. Since then the burn rotation has been about 8 to 10 years. With all the preparation, fire fighting appliances and manpower, escapes still occur. A few years after the burn much of the coast hills are almost inpenitrable, and kangaroos rarely seen. Plenty of ticks though. Really sad to see what I consider to be environmental vandalism.
110
There are two major parts to hazard reduction. One is the well know program to reduce fuel on the ground. The other not so well know is when fires do start let them burn. Before this country was populated with humans of any type we surely had bush fires many times yet the bush revives and survives.
50
Given the destructive and stupid policies of the greens, their supporters and associated hangers-on, LGAs, and politicians of all persuasions, the second strategy (let them burn) is the only viable one at present. And, that’s what the RFA is doing. Protecting property where possible but letting the forests burn, burn and burn.
I drove down the Princes’ Highway from Nowra to Moruya the other day. It was finally open after two weeks of closure. The forest was burnt out from just south of Ulladulla to a little north of Batemans Bay. Massive damage. Fuel load still smoldering. Traffic reduced to 80 KPH.The RFA let that one burn. They could do little else. They’re now back-burning well to the west, where the fuel load is massive. The Kings Highway is still closed. Tourists and holiday makers can’t get down the coast without a 200 – 300 kilometre diversion. Businesses are in a bad state as a result, and I suspect we’ll see a lot go belly-up before the year is finished.
80
That’s good to see. The way the MSM tells the story it appeared they were focusing on stopping as many fires as possible. Of course the MSM has a habit of twisting the truth. Let the bush fires burn and just make sure people are safe. Buildings can be rebuilt.
40
Well, the authorities will rarely if ever publicly state that they’re letting the fires burn.
After all, they have been denied staff and policy certainty to undertake the essential cool-burns during the cooler months.
Never let a crisis go to waste. It’s one effective way of beating the ignorant green policies that have generated this state of affairs.
There’s still a lot more to burn, and a lot of summer left. We’ll be seeing more fires and that’s a godsend. Protect the built assets, protect the people, move the livestock or de-stock in potentially vulnerable areas. Let it burn, burn, burn baby until such time as the green imbeciles come to their collective senses and recognize that “Cool Burns are King”.
10
Reality is most fires are let burn because there is no choice, they only get put out when they emerge into low fuel country or it rains. Saving people and assets is doable , putting out large scale fires not so much.
30
Sorry…. But from an RFS point of view, we do not just “Let them burn”.
That is because while a fire is “going” it is likely to end up somewhere that you don’t want it, on a day that you don’t want to fight it.
How many times do I have to point out the Canberra fire of 03. It burnt for a week where is wasn’t causing much damage, then went feral on a bad day. Four funerals and 500 burnt houses later, the conclusion should be obvious.
I hear what you are saying, but the POINT of the reduction is at least partly to make fires controllable before they get too big to handle.
00
From memory, after the fires that destroyed Dwellingup in the early 1960’s, the W.A. Forests Dept (as it was then) was supposed to carry out fuel reduction burns on the entire Jarrah/Karri forest areas on a 7 years rotation. This apparently worked quite well as the incidence of wild fires decreased in the following 20 years. Both fewer and smaller fires resulted. Since then, there has been a generational change in forest management in all States and the experience of the older managers has been replaced by computerised knowledge and models. A pity hands-on experience cannot be down loaded!
40
AUDIO: 6m16s: 17 Dec: ABC PM: Country on high alert as heat wave moves east
By Julia Holman on PM
Temperature records are expected to be set in a number of Australian locations this week as a wave of soaring heat crosses the country from the West…
Ahead of the dire conditions, a group of former fire chiefs is calling for a re-think of how we manage bushfires.
They’re warning these conditions make the fires un-fightable, with worse expected as a result of climate change.
Featured:
Tasha Hill, bartender, Port Augusta
https://www.abc.net.au/radio/programs/pm/country-on-high-alert-as-heat-wave-moves-east/11807570
Related:
17 Dec: ABC: Temperature record could be repeatedly broken as heatwave hits Australia’s south-east, BOM says
By Daniel Keane
The Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) said the blast of scorching weather would likely see December records tumble throughout the south-east, and potentially produce the hottest day on record across the country…
“We’re expecting to see December record-high temperatures over much of inland southern Australia, from the Nullarbor as far east as eastern New South Wales,” Dr Trewin said.
“We may see some places have their highest [overall] temperatures on record, particularly eastern New South Wales and the ACT on Saturday.”…
Brisbane yesterday recorded its hottest December day since 1981, and severe heatwave conditions will continue in parts of Queensland, the Northern Territory and Western Australia.
An extreme heatwave — the highest level on the BOM’s scale — will develop over South Australia and parts of New South Wales and Victoria over the next few days…ETC
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-12-17/heatwave-weather-australia-south-east-states-to-swelter/11804502
20
Yesterday was, amazingly the hottest day on record. Believe it or not it was 40.9.
Where? You may well ask. Everywhere on average or something else entirely. I’m not really sure how such a rubbish claim could be made, yet the ABC have no trouble making it.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-12-18/bom-says-tuesday-was-australia-hottest-day-on-record/11810632
40
every times the BOM says “on record” eyes roll around the country, but if you are in the tribe you just nod and say WOW!
30
meanwhile –
16 Dec: NYT: Snow, Tornadoes and Freezing Rain Are Coming to a Wide Swath of the Country
By Mihir Zaveri
More than 60 million people were under winter weather advisories and warnings, according to the National Weather Service. At least seven people died in crashes on icy roads, the authorities said…
The seven people all died in crashes on slick, icy roads on Sunday in Nebraska and Missouri, the authorities said. But the storm system was expected to cause more chaos as it swept east from Monday afternoon into Tuesday, continuing to bring a variety of severe winter weather to Colorado, the Midwest and up through Boston, said Patrick Burke, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service’s Weather Prediction Center…
The Weather Service said it expected up to seven inches of snow in some parts of the St. Louis area, making travel “extremely difficult, if not impossible.”…
Mr. Burke said freezing rain and a “glaze of ice” would hit southern Pennsylvania, western Maryland and the mountains of West Virginia…
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/16/us/weather-midwest-northeast-snow.html
16 Dec: ScottishSun: SNOW WAY Scotland braced for heavy snowfall overnight as Met Office issues severe weather warning
by Aidan Smith
A yellow warning has been put in place for the north of the country from 4pm through to 9pm tomorrow morning…
We told earlier how Scots are bracing for a ‘nightmare before Christmas’ with horrific -9C storms as bookies slash odds on white Christmas…
Some short term loss of power and other services is also possible…
https://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/news/5074553/scotland-snowfall-met-office-weather/
50
Well, they wanted to be cut off from the rest of the UK.
30
17 Dec: Stockhead: Coal demand still has legs, says the IEA
Australian thermal coal producers and explorers could still have several years of strong demand to look forward to if the International Energy Agency’s (IEA) outlook for the fossil fuel is anything to go by…
In its latest Coal 2019 report, the IEA found that coal maintained its position as the largest source of electricity in the world with a 38 per cent share in 2018 while coal demand increased by 1.1 per cent in the same year.
This is due to strong demand from China, Indian and other Asian economies that more than offset falling demand in Europe and North America.
Coal production rose 3.3 per cent to meet this demand with India, Indonesia and Russia – three of the world’s largest coal producing countries – producing their largest outputs ever…
Even Australia recorded coal export revenues of $US67 billion, making it the country’s top commodity export.
China remains the world’s largest coal producer and consumer due to stronger than expected electricity consumption and infrastructure development over the last couple of years…
The rapid development of Asia’s other giant, India, is also expected to provide support for coal demand…
…India’s coal power generation is expected to increase by 4.6 per cent per year through to 2024.
Pakistan has commissioned over 4 gigawatts (GW) of new coal power plants with similar capacity under construction while Bangladesh is about to commission the first unit of the 10GW it has in the pipeline.
Additionally, coal demand in Southeast Asia is expected to grow by more than 5 per cent per annum through 2024 due to strong economic growth in Vietnam and Indonesia…
MCA chief executive officer Tania Constable told Stockhead that the IEA’s forecast was good news for regional communities, jobs and Australia’s economy.
“If Australia lifts its game so new coal mines are approved more quickly, our nation will be able to maintain its edge as a reliable supplier of top-quality coal to the world – reducing emissions compared to the lesser-quality coal produced by competitors,” she said…
https://stockhead.com.au/resources/coal-demand-still-has-legs-says-the-iea/
so how has the Guardian reported the above?
17 Dec: Guardian: World demand for coal falls despite growth in Asia
Renewables help fossil fuel’s decline in Europe and US but capacity rises in China
by Jillian Ambrose
A report from the International Energy Agency (IEA) found that the world’s appetite for coal declined in 2019 after a two-year resurgence following the steepest ever drop in the use of coal-fired power plants…
But the forecasts could deviate widely, depending on China’s energy policy decisions in its next five-year plan, covering 2021 to 2025. The fossil fuel faces rising public opposition due to concerns over air pollution and the climate crisis. Many governments are now considering stronger climate and environmental policies as renewables and gas become cheaper to use. “If China changes – everything changes,” Sadamori said…
India bucked the trend for rising coal use in Asia this year. The IEA said the fast-growing economy is expected to record its first drop in coal-fired power in the last 45 years…
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/dec/17/world-demand-for-coal-falls-despite-growth-in-asia
60
Off topic:
Video of all the rubbish left by the global warming promoters at the COP25 climate conference in Madrid.
Typical Leftist hypocrites.
https://youtu.be/M6qzjvrVDn8
80
Australian coal exports set to keep rising to satisfy Asia demand
The Australian – 8 hours ago
QLD urged to seize on global coal demand to protect jobs
Courier Mail – 47 minutes ago
17 Dec: Reuters: Global coal demand to remain stable up to 2024: IEA
by Susanna Twidale
“Despite the growth in low-carbon fuels in recent decades, the reality is coal remains a major fuel in global energy markets … ***the world consumes 65% more coal today than in the year 2000,” the report by the Paris-based agency said…
World coal demand is expected to expand at a compound annual growth rate of 0.5%, reaching 5,624 million tonnes of coal equivalent (Mtce) in 2024, the IEA said…
An increase is predicted for India, with demand rising by 4.2% a year to 748 Mtce in 2024 from 585 Mtce in 2018, boosted by a rise in coal-fired power output, the IEA said.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iea-coal/global-coal-demand-to-remain-stable-up-to-2024-iea-idUSKBN1YL005
17 Dec: Bloomberg: Coal Endures as World’s Favorite Fuel for Electricity Generation
Rising demand in China and India is more than offsetting declines in the U.S. and Europe.
By Will Mathis
Power generation from coal rose almost 2% in 2018 to reach an all-time high, remaining the world’s largest source of electricity…
India, with a population of more than 1.3 billion, will see coal generation increase by 4.6% a year through 2024 to help power its growing economy. In Southeast Asia coal demand will grow more than 5% annually. China, which accounts for almost half the world’s consumption, will also have modest growth with usage peaking in 2022…
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-12-17/coal-endures-as-world-s-favorite-fuel-for-electricity-generation
60
Sydney’s driest years were, in order, 1888, 1862, 1968, 1941, 1957, 1980, 1880 and 1936. What does this prove? Nothing much.
Off the coast you might find 1944, 1915, 1902 or 2006 was driest, depending on which town and availability of record. What would that prove? Nothing much.
Brisbane’s driest? In a long record back to 1840 with a few gaps, the driest years were, in order, 1902, 1919, 1957, 1936, 1923, 1993, 1865…you get the picture. Proven? Very little.
The little that is proven is that the simplest and most straightforward facts can be concealed merely by making them inconsistent with a prevailing political fashion. You are allowed to see but allowed not to see. The Pavlovian reward is in not seeing, so millions consent to miss what is plain and obvious to all.
Should we reduce fuel loads since nothing burns if it’s not fuel? That might seem obvious. It has in the past. WA proved it after 1961. But now there is new knowledge for the New Man at Year Zero. There may be old knowledge, there may have been a 1961. But they do not apply in Year Zero for the New Man. So there is no contradiction!
220
Brilliant.
50
” The Pavlovian reward is in not seeing, so millions consent to miss what is plain and obvious to all “.
Hang in there with the group. And everyone hangs together.
KK
30
Sarc on/
Clearly, the concentration of Halon 1301 is below 6% by volume in the brushfire affected areas. As well, far too little CO2 to effectively suppress the fires.
Another irresponsible oversight by the authorities.
Sarc off/
90
(SIC) As he says: Fire need three things – oxygen, fuel and a spark. The only thing we can control is the fuel.(EQ)
And conversely,we can relate this,to the Australian political spectrum.
To get action, one may need to cut off oxygen,to the majority of the Australian political spectrum.
Fuel, that’s tucker time, joking with their mates, endless concessions
To reignite a spark, well this could well do that.
40
Climate activist Tim Flannery is the force behind a band of former state fire and emergency chiefs accusing Scott Morrison of abandoning bushfires across the nation and demanding an immediate end to the burning of fossil fuels. The Australian has confirmed Emergency Leaders for Climate Action — 29 ex-fire chiefs led by former NSW Fire and Rescue commissioner Greg Mullins — is funded by Professor Flannery’s crowd-funded Climate Council as an official “project”.
Source: Brad Norington, News Corp
Fire chiefs’ climate group a pet ‘project’ of activist Tim Flannery
Morning Mail website
110
I’m looking forward to the debate on the ABC between Tim and Roger. Should be a good one. Wonder when it will be taking place . . . . . . .
70
Maybe after Flannery gets burned out up there on the Hawkesbury river ?
With only a boat to escape the flaming fuel load !
40
Was it “climate change” that prompted the NSW Government to add another aircraft to the fleet of fire bombing fixed and rotary wing aircraft before the 2019/20 fire season, or was it advice that lack of land management had reached a crisis point?
The Mayor and volunteer fire fighter at the NSW Mid Coast Council says that the climate emergency in his opinion is the lack of land management emergency.
https://australianaviation.com.au/2019/05/nsw-buys-boeing-737-large-air-tanker-for-firefighting/
50
A highly visible political act to show “concern”.
Back to reality and the firefighters are stuffed after weeks of work that has been made necessary by government arrogance over many decades.
Water bombing may save homes under imminent threat but this situation should never have occurred in the first place.
Green Control freaks have given us red skies.
KK
100
Bring on legal redress I say….
The only other benefit out of a this is that some point, even the dumbest of people will see fuel load as the real issue.
40
I was talking to the range officer out at our gun range recently, he had been up in Port Macquarie for the ladt week fighting fires.
The 18 hour days were tough, and I am concerned about fire fighter safety when people get tired.
60
I’ve little doubt that an OH&S evaluation of NSW volunteer firefighters would require stand-down of most of them.
If that happened because the NSW government was concerned about their welfare, what then.
Would Scomo be obliged to send in armed services personnel?
The failure of government at all levels is appalling and then they abuse the goodwill of Volunteers because they think they can get away with it.
We need to critically examine this massive disaster and roll a few heads; department heads, politicians and media provocateurs who misrepresent the truth.
KK
10
Keith..
You are correct on multiple points.
10
Putting aside the fact that we shouldn’t need the 737 in the first place, I’m more intrigued by the decision of the NSW RFS to send the 737 water bomber to WA. It’s is very neighbourly I’m sure, but with the Gospers Mountain “mega-fire” bearing down on NW Sydney outskirts and the Central Coast, the timing is suspicious.
What devious intent is behind that bizarre timing?
BTW the 737 did 6 bombing runs over my backyard 5 weeks ago, complete with the pretty pink stuff onto a fire up in the bush. Looked very impressive at a couple of hundred feet up. “Elvis” was dumping water from treetop level onto a hot spot (house??).
50
I understand that a DC10 water bomber arrived at Richmond RAAF Base recently so the 737 is not the only large tanker available in NSW, and there are other larger fixed wing aircraft in the fleet;
https://fireaviation.com/tag/australia/
30
Beowulf,
In the blue mountains, In the early 2000’s, I was part of a task force that was protecting a street of properties adjacent to the bush.
During the day, water pressure was low, wind strength was too high and we were too few in number stop the fire or extinguish it.
Dusk was approaching and the wind was dropping to 10 to 12 knots from approx 30-40 knots. The fuel load on ground was high. We were forced to allow the fire to advance but whilst doing so, took the heat out of any flareups. We kept the height of the fire down to waist height/shoulder height. We do this to slow the fire as it burns with less intensity, doesn’t heat the canopy to explosive point and embers are not driven high in the air to travel hundreds of meters behind us. We can compress the chord of the fire to 20 to 30 meters in width, decrease the fires intensity and then when that is done we advance attacking the base of the fire.
Suddenly chopper overhead, “Elvis”, flying along our fire front. The pilots couldn’t see us as the canopy was intact. Next few seconds 10000 litres of water were dropped onto us. They missed the fire chord and slammed us. It is like being dumped on by a 6 foot wave. A very welcome wave in my view. No losses of life or property occurred. The fire along our front was blacked out at approximately 2230hrs.
40
Beowulf..
Major fire assets like the LAT and VLAT are Federally funded assets.
The NSWRFS gets to paint our badge on the sides because we have the biggest Aviation Management section of all the Fire Services. RFS gets to pay the bills and do all the admin required while they are not fighting fires, but they go wherever the perceived need is greatest.
It has to be that way because we can’t afford to have equal assets for every State and we can’t predict a year in advance where the greatest need will be.
Cheers…Peter
10
5.41 am and 14C here this morning according to my phone report, Mid Coast NSW.
40
“A one degree temperature rise does not create a firestorm”
Quite so.
For every 1°C (1.8°F) of warming, the amount of water vapour in the atmosphere increases by about 7 percent.
https://www.climatecommunication.org/climate/heat-trapping-gases/
>> Has anyone ever seen a greenhouse explode in fire because of CO2?
Greenhouse collapses under weight of snow
https://www.tristatehomepage.com/news/greenhouse-collapses-under-weight-of-snow/
40
That first link is a real science free zone.
Frightening.
KK
30
NASA: “”When carbon dioxide increases, more water vapour returns to the atmosphere.”
https://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/co2-temperature.html
If trace CO2 causes more moisture in the atmosphere, why should we expect droughts and bushfires to get worse?
50
Shouldn’t “… amount of water vapour in the atmosphere increases …’ actually read:
“… amount of water vapour that can be held in the atmosphere increases …”?
When there’s no water to evaporate, all that happens with any increase in temperature is that the relative humidity decreases. i.e. the air becomes drier.
Cheers
Dave B
10
As the planet is constantly rotating
And here are global winds patterns
Redistributing the air around the planet
Water vapour in the atmosphere
Is also redistributed.
However at warmer temperatures the air
Does not become ‘saturated’ so easily.
20
I wonder why WordPress will not let me reply to you David ?.
10
G’day Bill,
Don’t know the answer to that. ??
Cheers
Dave B
20
The ONLY argument is that a man made 50% increase in CO2 produces very slight warming, a warming not noticeable by human beings.
Mankind has not changed and cannot chang CO2 levels. And there is no connection between CO2 and temperature, as proven by the last 20 years.
Bush Fires are not caused by +1C. They are caused by the bush, which is why they are bush fires.
The amount of bush is limited by water and CO2 and sunshine. So there should be 50% more fuel. Not just in Australia, but around the planet. Everyone now admits that.
So there should be 50% more backburning. The graph shows backburning just dropped below 5% of historic levels. Why? And shouldn’t it be up 50% to cope with extra CO2?
Self proclaimed and utterly unqualified climate expert Tim Flannery is blaming the climate. Calling such perpetually wrong and incompetent people as Flannery scientists is the tragedy. It gives them unearned credibility and that allows them to do massive damage. He knows nothing of science. And like his Climate COmmissioners, nothing of meteorology.
As with medical doctors and engineers it should be illegal but smug faux scientist Flannery is smirking on the front of the Australian again. Single handedly our Chief Climate Commissioner nearly destroyed Brisbane with three Sydney harbours crashing down the valley of the Brisbane river but they blamed the engineers when they should have blamed Flannery and the Greens.
This is true of the bushfires. Flannery and his friends are the entire problem. Incredibly dangerous earthworks dam Wivenhoe was not emptied as requried by law at above 100% let alone 190%. Only the emergency plugs saved Brisbane. And backburning had effectively stopped. Flannery is blaming Climate Change. Again.
150
This comment is so real, logical and scientific that it would immediately be rejected by;
The UNIPCCC.
All politicians intending to get re-elected.
Greepiece.
All Pier Reviewers.
The Algorithm.
MalEx444.
Renewable energy collector manufacturers like China and Germany.
Other less visible Troughers.
And the list grows daily.
KK
70
“Mankind has not changed and cannot change CO2 levels“. You devalue your entire comment by starting off with a lie. Of course burning coal, fossilised vegetation laid down over millions of years in a very short period in geological terms is adding carbon dioxide in excess of the natural cycle. Just how much effect this has on temperature is arguable but the cumulative increase in CO2 partial pressure is all down to mankind. Secondly backburning is a fire fighting practice. What you mean are hazard reduction burns which reduce the fuel load during benign conditions. Flannery is a essentially a fanatic that has a record of spouting opinion without any foundation in either science or logic. It does your side of the discussion no good if you do the same thing.
21
Brian, yes, fossil fuel burning may be another source of CO2 in the system, but that does not mean it is the source of the increase of Atmospheric CO2 .
Anthropogenic CO2 is so small in comparison to the natural sources and sinks that the unknown natural variation, in those natural sources far outweigh the Anthropogenic volumes.
However, the scientific analysis suggests that Anthropogenic CO2 component In the atmosphere is <20ppm of the current 410ppm total.
71
Just shows your lack of education Brian.
If human activity stopped tomorrow, within 3 or 4 years all excess “human origin CO2” would be gone.
Even then variations in CO2 levels above natural habitat on a 24 hour cycle show amazing variations which make any discussion of the human input look ridiculous.
The earth breathes.
The oceans breathe.
They keep in touch.
KK
81
Sorry Keith, but I have a MSc and take some offense at your insinuation that I am uneducated. With respect to the comments above you need to understand that the Earth has a natural cycle which includes the balanced of atmospheric CO2. As with any natural balance it fluctuates to a small degree, but human requirements for energy have increased the CO2 partial pressure. Every year we add some 30 gigatons of CO2 to the natural annual CO2 cycle of some 750 gigatons. Only 3.8%, pretty small really until you understand that only some 40% of this additional CO2 can be absorbed by carbon sinks. The rest stays in the atmosphere and the buildup is cumulative.
13
Brian,
What do we do as humankind on this planet to become totally carbon neutral?
Due to respiration, 7 billion humans create 7 million tons of Co2 per day.
How do we offset that?
If humankind is alive on this planet, we will always add Co2 to the atmosphere/environment.
In your opinion, what should we do to stop the cumulative buildup of Co2 caused by humankind?
30
Hypocrite.
That’s a porky of the first order.
You’re telling us that the carbon sinks can pick man-made CO2 from ocean outgassing?
Delusional greeny claptrap.
Get yourself educated Brian – then come back.
50
“Sorry Keith, but I have a MSc”.
Sorry Brian but I don’t believe you have an MSc from a reputable Australian taxpayer funded university.
You are uneducated.
KK
21
Sorry Brian, but if you really have an MSc, you need to start using it,
… and not just believe what you are told by the greenie machine.
Human emissions of CO2 pa are about 3% of the total pa world emissions.
The sinks increase, so nearly all that CO2 is absorbed back into the natural carbon cycle very quickly.
Henry’s law and the huge increase in outgassing CO2 from cold areas warming up a tiny amount after a period of anomalously low temperature (the LIA), easily accounts for highly beneficial build up of atmospheric CO2.
50
Sigh. The extreme elements of the global warming/climate change debate do themselves a great disservice by making absurd claims and shutting debate down by attacking the man screaming “climate denier”. However the other side of the argument is also guilty of the most absurd claims and pseudoscience as evidenced by some of the comments on this blog. For example, Skeptical Sam seemingly unable to understand that a carbon sink couldn’t care less about the origin of a CO2 molecule but if more is produced than can be absorbed the atmospheric partial pressure will increase. Given the clear and unambiguous evidence I find it almost inconceivable that some here can deny that the CO2 levels are increasing. The human contribution over nature (nature including the contribution of fauna inhalation/exhalation including humans William X) is actually some 3.8% nowdays, but the increase over the capacity of the carbon sinks is cumulative CO2 is a trace greenhouse gas and a pretty inefficient one, but compared to other efficient greenhouse gasses there is a heck of a lot of it.
As far as Kalm Keith is concerned he and PF have a lot in common. Neither apparently capable of reasoned argument or logic but equally quick to insult.
00
Brian, like most green extremists who visit this site you too have a comprehension problem.
re-read what I wrote. Compare it to what you wrote.
You were trying to tell us that only 40% of man-made CO2 will be absorbed by the carbon sinks.
That, my good green pseudo-scientist is a nonsense.
As you (and I) say, the sinks don’t discriminate – unlike the green extremists. And, they are not limited in their ability to take up CO2. Yes, a warming ocean will outgass. Yes, the pp will increase as that outgassing occurs, and that outgassing puts the man-made quantum of CO2 into the shade. But it doesn’t end there.
Other sinks respond. Vegetation for example increase in mass due to the additional CO2 in the atmosphere.
Here read this. It’ll give you a hint:
https://climate.nasa.gov/news/2436/co2-is-making-earth-greenerfor-now/
I reitereate. Your assertion that “only some 40% of this additional CO2 can be absorbed by carbon sinks. The rest stays in the atmosphere” is a nonsense.
00
All perfectly good logic. An hypothesis contingent utterly on the idea that CO2 accumulates in the atmosphere or as the IPCC have written, for a half life of 80 years. But is this correct?
Firstly, you can measure it which shows this is not true. Fossil fuel CO2 vanishes very quickly from the biosphere. So where does it go and why?
The fact agreed by all is that 98% of free CO2 is in the world’s oceans. At an average depth of 3.4km and covering 75% of the earth, the oceans outweigh the atmosphere by 340:1. (1 atmosphere of pressure per 10 metres). The reason the figure is so large is that CO2 is highly soluble and highly compressible as we know from beer, soda, lemonade, champagne. At pressures of 340 atmosphere, it is a liquid at ocean temperatures.
There is also rapid gas exchange with the oceans, a fact we know because fish breathe oxygen and output CO2 and humans are ultimately from the ocean too, utterly dependant on water and salt. Our 400m2 of wet lung allowed our ancestors to leave the water. I have read there are still more species of fish than all other life on earth except insects. More the point, there is rapid equilibrium exchange as you would expect of all gases obeying Henry’s Law. Of course some argue that CO2 does not obey Henry’s law, but that’s another point. Henry’s law says the amount of CO2 in the air, the partial pressure is directly proportional to temperature, so we have a very simple explanation for CO2 rising with rising sea surface temperature rather than man generated CO2.
So the key is equilibrium and the second key is turbulence which dramatically enhances equilibrium, turbulence you do not see in the laboratory. Wind on the water, waves. A stagnant river or lake or meander quickly becomes anaerobic and the fish die. The same in a fish tank, which is why we bubble oxygen in.
Everything fits together. Rapid equilibrium exchange, Henry’s law and our observations of the rate of decay of C14 from the biosphere.
To counter all this perfectly simple physical science, the IPCC argue that either the half life is 80 years or in some reports, CO2 stays for thousands of years. They say that liquid CO2 is trapped with deep ocean currents and does not surface for thousands of years. The only thing wrong with this is that it is not true, another unsubstantiated random hypothesis contradicted by the facts. Geologists looking for hydrocarbons know all about CO2 venting from the deep ocean floor. Also we know the C14 is vanishing quickly back to equilibrium levels of the last 50,000 years.
So Brian, what you have been told is plausible. However it is all demonstrably wrong, contradicted by simple evidence. And then you get the scare of ‘ocean acidification’ when all the oceans are alkali and CO2 leaves warmer water by Henry’s law. Beer left to get warm does not get fizzier. And to take ocean water, a massively buffered alkali solution to acidic is impossible, without melting the white cliffs of dover and the great barrier reef and the vast continents of limestone and coral.
The IPCC collectively are making it up and what you have written is a good summary of what they are saying. A good scientist must however be a skeptic above all. Measurements, theory, equilibrium and physical chemistry show that it is not true at best, outright lying at worst.
20
And Brian, if you love mathematics, I can recommend Dr. Weiss’ Fourier analysis of temperature patterns over the last 2500 years. It is riveting great science ignoring the vagaries of the weather and climate in a chaotic system and looking for frquencies. His fit is excellent and a complete explanation of all gross temperature patterns and points to one driving force, the sun. As Monty Python says, the source of all our power.
20
Brian, it is not a lie. It is what I know to be true. I can prove it by radio carbon dating of the air. It’s simple science.
Also despite the millions of years of deposition of coal, oil and gas, it is a tiny fraction of what was around at the time and even now. Carbon is one of the 92 basic elements. Oxides exist of everything and CO2 is only one of them. However it does not just exist in plant form and 98% of all free CO2 is dissolved in the oceans.
There is a lot more, but I would appreciate it if you countered statements with facts, not generalizations and accusations.
70
By radio carbon dating I assume that you are talking about isotope differentiation? The key is the 33C/12C ratios. The 13C/12C ratio for fossil fuels is much lower that the atmospheric ratio and research show that the ratio in vegetation and coral reefs (reflecting the atmospheric ratio at the time) began to progressively reduce from some 150 years ago. The isotopic ratios clearly demonstrate that the extra CO2 in the atmosphere comes from fossil fuels. The increase is real, not a generalization or accusation although the affect on the Earth’s temperature is certainly arguable.
11
The real science from 1956 was the discovery by Dr.Suess that C14 has been constant for 50,000 years. And it decays with a half life of 5740 years. Fossil fuel therefore has no C14 at all but the CO2 in the bisophere has C14. It is used for radio carbon dating. You can date nothing with C12/C13 ratios.
The C12(99%) vs C13 (1%)is not great science. It is a late invention looking for differential takeup of CO2 molecules of CO2 weighing 44 against 45 amu. There can be very slight differences but to generalize them to the entire ecosystem is unjustified. This has been called the Suess effect. It is not.
So fossil fuel lacks a radioactive tracer. Normally only one atom in a trillion, it is easily detected. It cannot be chemically destroyed. And there is too much of it in the air for the air to be 1/3 fossil fuel.
In fact the great discovery of Dr. Suess and others is that the total amount of fossil fuel CO2 in the air more than half way through the 20th century was only 2.1%. It meant that fossil fuel CO2 was vanishing into the oceans. There is nowhere else.
We also know from the atom bomb blasts in 1965 that the C14 exchange rate with the 98% of CO2 in the ocean has a half life of 12 years. That fully explains why there is so little CO2 without C14.
I could write pages on this. No, C12/C13 is a furphy, an inaccurate and debatable late invention. It is certainly not the Suess effect. And it is not an absolute measure of fossil fuel but an inferred measure which is promoted to hide the real science discovered long before man made CO2 levels were invented.
Perhaps you can find: G.J.Ferguson. Processing of the Royal Society of London. Series A. Vol 243. No. 1235 (Feb 11, 1958), pp. 561-574? Roughly it says “As fossil fuel CO2 has no C14, what could have been C14 dilution of 13% was in fact only 2.03%+/-0.15%.”
80
Or to put is more simply, radio carbon dating is used by archeologists world wide to date carbon in once living things because all living things are made from carbon and ultimately from carbon dioxide.
So why not date the air itself? The answer shows that there is almost no fossil fuel in the air.
That is why the IPCC, who accept the exchange with the oceans, state that the rate of exchange has a half life of 80 years. It is their standard. They are not telling the truth. If you want lies, start with the people who make their living from man made global warming.
90
Brian, I found the article from the Royal Society. I wonder if they read their own literature?
90
“Record Heat In Australia”
https://realclimatescience.com/2019/12/record-heat-in-australia/
30
Just a Natural Grid Capacity Stress Test.
Surely the wind will blow, the sun will shine, and all will work as previously advertised.
If not, AU might well discover practical and personally relevant knowledge about Capacity Factor, Economic Dispatch, Frequency and Voltage control (aka Ancillary Services).
This is going to be an interesting 90 day period.
90
I noticed this warning:
https://www.smh.com.au/business/the-economy/victorians-face-nervous-wait-as-heatwave-strains-power-grid-20191217-p53knp.html
Which is reality?
1. We aren’t reducing our CO2 emissions enough and more needs to be done.
2. We shouldn’t have closed down some of our coal fired power stations.
Of course it’s 2. but our political masters at all levels are operating in the mode it’s 1. Go figure.
80
On P45 of AEMC’s final report on resilience…AEMC spells out the almost unfathomable complexity of their 100% weather-dependent electricity system…with its proliferation of rooftop solar…that they’re forcing on Australia.
Australia will be alone in the world in having to face a future without energy security…since all comparable countries…all of our trade partners and competitors … will continue forever to have multiple baseload options…. while it’s intended that we’ll have none.
https://www.aemc.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/aemc_-_sa_black_system_review_-_final_report.pdf
Eg….
‘The implications of declining levels of power system resilience are more load shedding and an increased risk of system collapse, following non credible contingencies and HILP events. Historically, such events may have been survived with limited, or no load shedding.’
‘ Historically, the power system’s response to a disturbance event was determined by the physical dynamics of rotating, electro-magnetically coupled synchronous generators and loads.
‘
….the reduction in system security resilience from historic levels has increased the chance of significant load shedding and cascading failure’
30
Bring on the climate Nuremberg Trials….
20
This time next year, the climate change believers will be blaming some disaster on the climate change we haven’t done enough to stop, but least 3,000,000 hectares of NSW will be probably be safe from bushfires.
50
From The Australian
“Climate activist Tim Flannery is the force behind a band of former state fire and emergency chiefs accusing Scott Morrison of abandoning bushfires across the nation and demanding an immediate end to the burning of fossil fuels.
The Australian has confirmed Emergency Leaders for Climate Action — 29 ex-fire chiefs led by former NSW Fire and Rescue commissioner Greg Mullins — is funded by Professor Flannery’s crowd-funded Climate Council as an official “project”.
Mr Mullins was joined by five other former state and territory fire chiefs on Tuesday in pledging to convene a national summit of industry experts early next year to find a long-term solution to bushfires savaging Australia’s east and west coasts.”
https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/tim-flannery-climate-group-funding-exfire-chiefs-going-it-alone/news-story/fd55e5bd69cc54288e071d07808438c9
80
Flannery is a bitter man, intent on revenge for the disbandment of his government funded Climate authority.
He is also an Ar5e h0le who has been substantially embarrased by a sucsession of failed predictions !
Some folk just dont know when to quit !
81
That pretty much sums up the attitude of the left. Sore losers who will not stop from wrecking the place to try and force their opinions onto everyone else. The harder they try the worse it will be for them in the end.
50
Yeah, Flannery was parked with the hood up and the jumper leads connected waiting for Labor to restart his career –how he must loathe Bill Shorten.
70
Funny that the ABC hasn’t mentioned the twenty-nine fire chiefs were enlisted by the Climate Council. Thank you GrahamP.
40
Here is the harsh reality – fire chiefs are not scientists. They manage fires and manpower.
Flimflam is an activist – so we have the blind leading the scientifically unqualified.
Can anyone else see how this onbthe surface looks impressive but in reality is like a toilet pan made of tissue paper….
Sheer lunacy….
40
Original Steve: fire chiefs may not be emplyed as scientists, but don’t underestimate their knowledge.
A friend (now retired) was for many years in charge of his shift at a major chemical plant. He needed to know the details of what various chemical reactions took place all over the site, the way the reaction vessels all interconnected, the health and safety aspects of everything on the site as well as ensuring the safety of all site workers and the firemen and more. Perhaps any firemen reading this might like to enlighten us further.
I’d take the practical knowledge of a fire officer such as he over the computer modelling and predictions of many a so-called ‘climate scientist’ any day. As in all professions, scientists can be good or incompetent – they don’t belong on a pedestal.
10
“..and demanding an immediate end to the burning of fossil fuels.”
Idiots.
How are front line diesel fire trucks going to be used then? Pedaled by the crew Fred Flintstone style?
And what will firefighters eat, since our food is produced by diesel powered farm equipment, and delivered to the parasitic green filled cites by diesel powered trucks?
00
Jo, Backburning, except in very windy conditions, is the best (only?) way to stop a fire. Fight fire with fire. But you have to do it well in advance of the fire, like kilometres, so that the firebreak is very wide by the time the fire arrives. Let the fire burn itself out. Unfortunately with very dense regrowth with lots of fuel lots of embers go flying. Cane farmers managed cane fires for years. Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LKwBMm9xUo
142
I wonder who it was gave you a red thumb Ken ?
A clown troll ?
Or maybe just a mistake !
61
G’day Ken,
Great video, but somewhat different from a running fire in eucalypt forest. Flat ground v steep, no wind v strong westerlies, night time ignition v middle of the day, completely surrounding fire line v chasing an expanding fire line, 2-3 metres of fuel height v 20-30. And the fire ran towards the centre of the fire v running uphill and/or before the wind.
In spite of that I agree there’s no alternative once a fire becomes “unstoppable”, which brings me back to fuel load and bad management of NPs etc.
Cheers
Dave B
40
The problem we can address is represented by the 68 people charged or cautioned by police with lighting fires! That is just NSW and on the front page of the Australian buried. Under the picture of ‘activist opportunist Flannery.
68 people. And Flannery tells us bushfires are Climate Change?
Imagine a real government ran advertising telling fire bugs they will go to jail. Radio and television. That might be 68 fires which never happened.
And activist Flannery might try fighting a fire like Tony Abbott instead of asking for more public handouts for his retirement.
150
And CO2 is up 50%. That’s 50% more bush. Shouldn’t we be addressing the problem instead of demanding our Prime Minister sign more documents?
80
But the climate tourists are angry that Australia was a COP out country.
30
Whilst I haven’t closely followed the current December temperatures for NSW there is no doubt been cooler temperatures over the last few months in Victoria. Whilst they hysterically describe the fires as unprecedented they don’t describe the temperatures as unprecedented although they do use forecasting to predict catastrophic weather or heat wave conditions ( even if it’s only 1 or 2 days of over average temperatures.If climate change were the culprit the solution would be to lower the temperature but it’s clear that it’s nothing to do with the temperature. These fires have burnt for months even through the record coldest summer day occurred on Dec the 2nd. The behaviour and length of these fires and the difficulty in firefighters getting on top of them without unusual weather circumstances is proof that the real issue is forest management not climate change. The only thing that is unprecedented is the build up of fuel over the last 10 years plus.
Even some of the more fatal fires in the past in Victoria and elsewhere when fire management was more in vogue didn’t remain as an issue for months on end.
40
OT but no totally-
I think the ABC have finally reached peak stupidity , can’t remember them ramping up the BS to this level and its sick ,twisted even immoral and possibly bordering on child abuse .
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-12-18/climate-change-and-how-to-talk-to-kids-about-it/11686900
50
The Australian Brainwashing Corporation
Hard at work wasting my money
On utter bloody nonsense !
Not my ABC
Corrupted by ideological Greenist zealots !
40
Lenin advocated use of schools as indoctrination centres…
“Aunty” now wears a red scarf and advocates propagation of lies over any form of truth it seems.
A great series on Netflix is “The Americans” – it follows two soviet agents inserted into America to cause trouble. Strikes me as very plausible, but what comes through is that soviet agents may be trained from childhood onwards and also how absolute the brainwashing is. Now fast forward to Aunty appearing to brainwash not just children but parents too.
This is straight out of the Soviet playbook.
20
I would also recommend the reading of Phil Cheney’s 2004 oration. https://www.bushfirefront.org.au/…/hi…/canberra-day-oration/
Phil is Australia’s pre-eminent bushfire researcher. I have had the pleasure of working with and discussing bushfire fighting with Phil over many years.
From my many years of bushfire fighting, and forest and land management I totally agree with Phil’s oration. The current argument about Climate Change detracts from finding practical solutions in a fire prone environment.
80
‘Page not found’ is all I can get and the search box was dead. Tried a couple of other suggestions but can’t find the oration you mention Paul.
30
https://ipa.org.au/wp-content/uploads/archive/Cheney_2004-Bushfires.pdf might be what you seek Annie.
30
Thanks Serp. Downloaded for later reading.
00
It’s intesting when the BOM gives explanations, this time for the huge mass of superheated air moving from Western Australia. They say the Indian Dipole caused it.
What they did not say was CO2. Or Climate Change. Other explanations for the weather changes, say warmer water around the Barrier Reef include such things as El Nino and La Nina and the Pacific Decadal Oscillation. The Egyptians have plotted the 11 year cycle in rains for the last 1600 years. We see the same. Nothing to do with CO2.
Now none of these are predicted or predictable by ‘Climate models’. Because we do not understand them. So the real explanation for the bushfires are three. Oscillations in ocean temperature, 50% more fuel to burn, no back burning at all compared to what is needed and firebugs.
We can do a great deal about two of these and we are doing nothing. The advice in the Australian however varies from more power to ex-fire chiefs (I note Ex Victoria police commissioner Christine Nixon is missing, possibly at lunch) and more cash for Flannery’s Climate Council and nuclear power.
Only these things matter.
Backburning.
Removing ground litter with animals including Goats, horses, cattle, sheep(Dorpers) and people.
Clearing around houses and farms you do not want to burn
And a massive campaign, even rage against people who light fires for fun.
This will all come out at the inevitable Royal Commission where lawyers will decide what should be done and will not be done next time.
Or a tax on black evil carbon, eliminating carbon from the cycle of life and banning CO2 and CH4 and organic chemistry. Pass a law. No carbon.
Or we could replace our trees with trees which don’t burn, build dams, back burn in winter and lock up firebugs. But then no one gets the cash.
160
I would add..
.. clear felling of forrests along side major highways , power lines, and critical infrastructure,…to prevent damage and closure fron fallen /burning trees.
This will enable safe , quick access for RFS and emergency services, as well as secure escape routes for key population areas..
RFS spend a lot of time and resource, clearing roads during and after major fires.
May even be an effective fire break !
71
Agreed. And dams and spillways on every watercourse in the country, the aim being to keep them filled. Like the 26 on the Murray river all built before 1939 but which kept the Murray full of water in the millenium drought where in the Federation drought everything ran dry. If you want a fire break, there is nothing like water.
And we need underground shelters and safe places, as in the US for Tornadoes. I read of one firestorm survivor who crept under a concrete half pipe cover and survived as the firestorm raced over his head. And a Footscray footballer Gary Dempsey who sheltered under his car. The people who died tried to outrun the fire.
Shelter from radiation and cool air. Others like famous newsreader Bryan Naylor were just incinerated instantly while running down the road. You cannot outrun a firestorm. And above ground tanks are just steamers.
Why is no one talking about this? Why is climatebagger Flim Flannery on the front page of the Australian seeking money? He knows nothing about bushfires and climate. His field is ancient dead wombats and kangaroos, not meteorology or bushfires.
90
“A coal mine and a power station are in the path in NSW.”
But, but … the green ‘science says more rain …
“GREENS leader Bob Brown says the coal mining industry should foot the bill for the Queensland floods because it helped cause them.”
https://www.news.com.au/breaking-news/coal-miners-to-blame-for-queensland-floods-says-australian-greens-leader-bob-brown/news-story/cbfe12042fa9c4149ea3c10524f57344
It’s worse than we first thought.
90
If it was a flood, Flannery would be on the front of the Australian demanding more funding for his Climate Council.
The only good which comes from this seizure of the avoidable tragedies of Australian bushfires by the Climate baggers is that. No one believes a word of it. Bushfires are not the climate. Droughts and flooding rains are the climate and we have done nothing about either for fifty years, thanks to climatebaggers like Flannery.
110
Off topic, but prepare for new reports of catastrophic heat with southern Australia facing temperatures over 40 degrees today.
And the foolishness of the AEMO wholesale electricity pricing system is on display, with lack of reserve forecasts for Vic this afternoon. Spot wholesale prices are forecast to jump from $70/MWhr during the day to over $10,000/MWhr from 4-7 pm.
80
In SA 40C plus is not unusual in summer, from my personal travelling experiences.
50
Agreed. I remember one summer in 1974 where we were in Adelaide for three days and like Colorado in Summer, 40C day and hotter at night. Not a breath of air. Stifling. The beach at Glenelg was like a swimming pool, flat without waves and a thin film of coppertone on the water and getting in the hot water was near pointless.
Our taxi driver turned up in speedos, which seemed reasonable. And the whole street slept on the front lawns at night because the stone houses were so hot, it was cooler outside. It was amazing to see people standing up on their lawns in the morning. Perth the same year for six weeks had 37C every single day but at least they had the Fremantle Doctor/Docker but Adelaide for a week was hell, except no one was complaining because we didn’t have Climate Change then. The weather was not our fault.
As Monty Python in the Yorkshiremen said, you tell kids that today and they do not believe you.
10
A couple of choices
1. Increase funding for NPWS, RFS for fuel load reduction during cooler months,(funding could come from cuts to ABC budget), while removing green tape that stops this being done sensibly by farmers and other rural landowners. Mandate such fuel reduction.
2. Yell and scream about a tiny but natural 1ºC rise in temperature in 100+ years, and put on a carbon tax to be sent to the UN as virtue signalling.
Which do you think would be more effective for reduction of intensity of future bushfires ?
110
survived for tens of millennia of climate change, but…
17 Dec: Guardian: Indigenous investigations: Too hot for humans? First Nations people fear becoming Australia’s first climate refugees
Aboriginal people in Alice Springs say global heating threatens their survival
The town had 55 days above 40C in the year to July 2019
Central Australian outstations are running out of water
Poor quality housing in town camps cannot be cooled effectively
Indigenous leaders fear extreme heat will cause influx of internal refugees
by Lorena Allam and Nick Evershed with photographs by Mike Bowers
But Douglas knows that from now on it will only get hotter.
Last summer was the hottest on record, and the driest in 27 years in central Australia. Five per cent of the town’s street trees died. A heat monitoring study showed that on some unshaded streets the surface temperature was between 61C and 68C.
“We can’t keep going on the way we’re going,” says Douglas, who is manager of policy and research at the Central Land Council.
“Central Australian Aboriginal people are very resilient. They have evolved to cope with the harsh and variable desert climate, but there are limits.
“Without action to stop climate change, people will be forced to leave their country and leave behind much of what makes them Aboriginal. Climate change is a clear and present threat to the survival of our people and their culture.”…READ ON
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/dec/18/too-hot-for-humans-first-nations-people-fear-becoming-australias-first-climate-refugees
20
Eh? I hope they haven’t succumbed to Western Wimpishness.
00
Another interesting take on it . . . . . .
https://tottnews.com/2019/12/05/australian-bushfires-conspiracy/
20
Hi Jo, I draw your attention to the deliberate lies being put about by the BoM. The ABC reports today that Victoria may have its hottest day EVER if Mildura gets to 47 degrees. Mildura’s hottest day, and Victoria’s, was 50.7C on 7 January 1906. My grandmother was an 8 year old in Mildura at the time.
It also says that Alice Springs’s record temperature is currently 45.6C. That is the Airport record. The real record is the Post Office on 24 December 1891 at 47.5C.
Further, “In Darwin, we had a December maximum temperature record of 37.1C on December 9 — the previous record was 37C in 1976”. Darwin’s record at the Post Office was 40.4C on 17 October 1892, and the December record was 38.8C on 14 December 1886. The 1976 record was the airport.
All of this is from the BoM site.
130
Good stuff.
Just one observation from a mid east coast resident.
The Darwin temperatures seem to be very moderate?
KK
60
Yes, they are heavily moderated, like all tropical temperatures. There is no winter or summer in Singapore. The only possible change in temperature is in the mid latitudes. The Arctic -25C to 0C hardly matters. And Antarctica -50C to -25C. Darwin is 32,32,32,31,32,33,32,… and 37 only rarely, like Victoria.
Incidentally, it is not clear from the purveyors of Climate Change if the Southern Hemisphere has ‘Global Warming’ at all. The presumption that North of the equator and South are identical is not reasonable. The Southern Hemisphere is much colder and has very little land. Antarctica, the size of South Emerica is covered in 3.5km of ice.
And then most CO2 is generated North of the Equator, not in the bottom third of the planet which has only 2% of the world’s population.
The very idea of a Global Temperature change causing ‘Climate Change’ is very odd. Where?
80
Consider Melbourne’s temperatures..
23 Monday
24 Tuesday
39 late change
23 Thursday
41 late change
25 Friday
20 Saturday
Two hot half days. That’s just hot air blowing over the state, not Climate Change. Victoria has been much colder in the last decade than in the decades before. But with low rainfall, the state is quickly tinder dry. That’s the Australia bush in summer, not Climate Change.
Do not send money to climatebagger Tim Flannery.
110
Tom Foolery.
30
Yes, I seem to have overlooked the fact that Darwin is only about 12° off the equator and going to be a bit like Hawaii that’s moderated by wind and ocean.
KK
30
disgraceful:
AUDIO: 10m6s: 18 Dec: ABC Breakfast: Calls for national heatwave education campaign as temperatures soar
Australian National University public health expert Dr Liz Hanna is calling for a national education campaign to help us manage heat stress.
Guest: Dr Liz Hanna, public health expert, Australian National University
https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/breakfast/calls-for-national-heatwave-education-campaign-as-temperatures-s/11808868
less time for Canavan:
AUDIO: 8m54s: 18 Dec: ABC Breakfast: ‘Demand for Australian coal will continue to grow’: Matt Canavan
New forecasts suggest that Australia’s coal sector has a strong future.
According to the latest report by the International Energy Agency, global demand for the fossil fuel will remain steady for at least the next five years, driven by “vigorous” growth in coal-powered generation in India and South-East Asia.
The outlook is already sparking renewed calls for investment in new coal mines here at home to meet the demand.
Guest: Matt Canavan, Federal Resources Minister
https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/breakfast/demand-for-australian-coal-will-continue-to-grow:-matt-canavan/11808844
60
I don’t hear them doing the same with “cold stress” which happens to kill roughly as many if not more people. The solution is simple in either case; cheaper electricity so people can afford to use their air conditioners and heaters.
70
What about national education to help prevent firebugs? The penalties are very severe, but who knows that? Does a child with a packet of matches realise the seriousness? We Australians teach everyone to swim, but teach no one about the dangers of firebugs. Prevention is far, far better than jail.
70
Off topic but on Johnson and the BBC and common sense, something sorely needed to deal with bushfires.
Two great quotes from Alison Pearson in the Telegraph
On the very biased BBC reporting “Why should I pay a tax for this biased rubbish?” fumed one Tory viewer, speaking for the frustrated millions.
and this great line
” I mean, the normal “we”. The Normals who live outside the metropolitan bubble and who haven’t succumbed to the deadly virtue-signalling virus which destroys that part of the brain where common sense and humour reside.”
100
Allison Pearson writes very good articles (paywalled probably). We subscribe to the UK Telegraph. Subscription worth it for Allison, Charles Moore, Matt, the pocket cartoonist, and Bob and Blower for the larger cartoons.
40
I also subscribe. Very good and often clever writing and many points of view. Which is so refreshing. It’s great to read both sides of an argument, not to be told what to think. And it gives a larger world view, even a British view of America which is interesting.
60
True. I didn’t list all the others we like. There are other writers that have me shouting at the screen!
We also subscribe to The Australian and the Aussie Speccie (paper copy). What with reading Jo, WUWT, Paul Homewood, Roger Tallbloke, etc. etc. it’s a miracle I get anything else done!
Very hazy here today; can’t see the nearby hills….just like a couple of weeks ago, or whenever it was. It’s now 37C at 1348.
30
Mustn’t forget Pointman, Michael Smith News, Catallaxy Files.
Can’t contribute financially to most….Jo has to be the priority. Time for Jo’s Christmas chocolates everybody!
50
A bit off topic here. But NZ is currently putting C02 sensors in State houses.
In order to monitor “overcrowding”. Been trialed in Lower Hutt.
Nothing to see here, its only a sensor that monitors ones output of a gas they like to tax.
20
heard part of this article being read out on ABC’s Nightlife’s “Tomorrows papers today” or whatever with Philip Clark, including the “power costs, water COSTS” part.
typical reflexive ABC response from Clark, sounding concerned(closely paraphrasing): yes, it seems water is a problem everywhere:
Central District Football Club seeks 50 per cent rate rebate
The Advertiser – 16 Dec 2019
The club has written to the council asking for its rate rebate of 30 per cent to be increased to 50 per cent… “An increase in power costs, water COST on the oval and a continual decline in … “This is starting to impact on the club’s ability to fund junior development in our area.”…
30
Its for the kids.
20
More brainwashing from the Greenist
Australian Brainwashing Corporation :
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-12-18/marine-heatwave-kills-fish-as-australia-faces-record-temperature/11808268
And of course they fail to mention that warm seas off the coast of WA
Mean more evaporation
And higher rainfalls over the land..
The IOD is slowly reversing !
40
Sweating fish……?
Impressive….Australian Mean Temp chart…more nonsense….showing a distinct hockey stick shape.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-12-18/marine-heatwave-kills-fish-as-australia-faces-record-temperature/11808268
“As heatwave bakes Australia on land, an unprecedented marine heatwave causes fish kills in the ocean
“Mainland Australia is bracing for a heatwave so intense it could reset the history books, but it is not just the land that is sweltering.
“Western Australia’s coastline is in the midst of the most widespread marine heatwave it has experienced since reliable satellite monitoring began in 1993.
The warm waters are believed to have contributed to a number of fish kills in the past month.
“”Particularly in the last two weeks or so the ocean temperatures have been increasing — they’re about two degrees warmer than what is normal for December,” University of Western Australia coastal oceanography Professor Charitha Pattiaratchi said.
“Fish kills linked to changing environment
“A combination of high temperatures and low tide is believed to have contributed to the deaths of tiny crabs in Karratha mudflats, wild oysters at the mouth of the Fortescue River on the Pilbara Coast and krill at Town Beach in Exmouth in the state’s north-west in recent weeks.
“Heatwave of unprecedented size
“The scale of the marine heatwave gripping the WA coastline was unprecedented, according to Professor Pattiaratchi.
“”We haven’t actually had one before that extends all the way from the Kimberley to South Australia,” he said.
“But it was far too early to compare its intensity to the extreme marine heatwave of 2011, which had devastating ecological consequences.
“We are not 100 per cent sure whether this is only a short-term thing — for heatwaves to become extreme they have to last longer,” Professor Pattiaratchi said.
“The temperatures the ocean off the west coast is currently experiencing are not as high as the 2011 heatwave, which occurred in February when temperatures are historically much warmer.
“”It’s warm compared to a normal December but it is not as warm as what we’ve had previously in other months,” Professor Pattiaratchi said.
30
ABC are ramping up the ideology at the moment , https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2019-12-18/abares-climate-change-slashes-1-billion-farm-incomes-20-years/11809500
Cherry picking much one thinks , also no mention of the water fiasco that prefers to flush water out to sea rather than be used for irrigation.
40
I love to see the ALP ramp it up as much as they can in all aspects of climate change and related topics. It will spell the end of them sooner rather than later as they make fools of themselves even more so. I say to them make my day and give it your best shot (in foot).
20
I have a question: I assume that the areas burnt this year will be fire proof next year. Assuming there is no human activity to reduce fuel loads in subsequent years. How long will it take for serious and dangerous quantities of fuel to build up again?
50
About 20 years for maximum fuel load according to this for WA forests.
https://www.dpaw.wa.gov.au/management/fire/fire-and-the-environment/51-fuel-loads-and-fire-intensity
30
But 5-8 yrs for dangerous fuel loads to accumulate.
50
David would be closer but it all depends on fuel loading and what dies off and gets totally burnt in the original fire .
Maybe PeterW would have the knowledge here but I’ve seen regrowth 3 years after a fire at two metres and so thick you can’t hardly walk through it .
10
Hi Robert,
I recently mentioned the coastal fire here about six years ago. I walked through it last week and there were two main things that stood out.
The South facing hillside had mature trees from which the clogging undergrowth had been burnt out. Regrowth was well spaced small trees no more than a metre and a half tall. After six year, still O.K.. The trees that remained didn’t do so well. Most were still charred.
On the promontory nearer the ocean the mixed waste high scrub had totally regrown and was impenetrable.
Still enough lantana and bitou bush to warrant pointing a finger at those responsible maintaining the area.
It was a long overdue burn with serious consequences for many of the mature trees.
More regular controlled clearance burns would be more beneficial to animals and green growth.
KK
30
Yes KK I agree totally, the area where I was referring to is in north east Victoriastan and has a massive pine plantation at one end and reservoirs for Benalla’s water supply nearby as well so in the past not a lot of effort in reduction burns but they are now doing it again .
20
finally!
17 Dec: The Hill: Judge blasts FBI over misleading info for surveillance of Trump campaign adviser
By John Kruzel
The secretive federal court that approved the surveillance of former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page on Tuesday accused FBI agents of creating a misleading impression about their basis for requesting a warrant and ordered the bureau to overhaul its process.
In a blistering order, a judge on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) accused the bureau of providing false information and withholding materials that would have undercut its four surveillance applications.
“The FBI’s handling of the Carter Page applications, as portrayed in the OIG report, was antithetical to the heightened duty of candor described above,” Rosemary Collyer, presiding judge with the FISC, wrote in the order (LINK) released by the court.
The judge gave the FBI until Jan. 10 to provide the court a sworn statement detailing how it plans to overhaul its approach to future surveillance applications…READ ON
https://thehill.com/policy/national-security/474964-surveillance-court-accuses-fbi-agents-of-giving-misleading-basis-for
indictments coming?
50
BUT!
“Nuclear – Devin Nunes Questions FISC Judge Lack of Candor – Again Calls For Dismantling of FISA Court…”
“Today, hours after Judge Collyer released her order, Devin Nunes responded to the review of the FISC by stating, accurately, Judge Collyer doth protest too much.”
https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2019/12/17/nuclear-devin-nunes-questions-fisc-judge-lack-of-candor-again-calls-for-dismantling-of-fisa-court/
20
Another Ian –
I was being sarcastic, of course. the FISA Judge/s should have dealt with this at least 8 months ago.
50
Yes, and the penalties of lying to a judge in a matter of national security matter should be severe, not just a request to promise to do better next time. Privacy is protected by the constitution. To break this and spy on anyone is illegal. For a government agency to do this with court approval destroys the idea that a court can control illegal and improper invasion of privacy. They failed. What was done makes Watergate seem like a picnic and all this with court approval.
30
Are any “greens” helping to fight the fires?
I didn’t think so.
70
Greens are becoming carbon.
30
What? Throw their lattes on the fire?
30
Past bushfires
A chronology of major bushfires in Victoria from 2013 back to 1851 [Wrong link removed – Jo]
Fire has been present on the Australian continent for millions of years and has been significant in shaping much of the landscape. Many fires were started by lightning.
Aboriginal people used fire for many thousands of years to ‘care for country’. The fires were a tool that encouraged the growth and extent of grasslands to enhance hunting, reduced levels of fuel, and kept vegetation from becoming dense and hard to walk through.
Because there are few comprehensive records of bushfires in the early stages of European settlement, or beforehand, the following chronology includes only those bushfires that have occurred since 1851.
Maps are available for some past fires.
60
Old Ozzie, your first link refers to the formation of a right wing militia in Virginia??????
What were you trying to link to?
30
At least some “warmist scientists” accept that not all the warming is due to CO2..
https://edition.cnn.com/2019/12/17/us/ohio-exxon-mobil-methane-leak-satellite-climate-change/index.html
31
It’s 4:15 on Wednesday afternoon and I am sitting here in my house in Blackheath in the Blue Mountains looking out of the window at the swirling smoke around the 100+ pine trees we have around our 3/4 acre property. I have just checked the Sentinel Hotspot web site and the fire across the Grose Valley has just spotted down from the plateau above, where it has been raging for days, and is now down to the Grose River. Once across that, which will just be a matter of time, it will head up to Mt Victoria and, possibly, up Rodriguez Pass to Evans Lookout and up the road to where we sit above the Golf Course. Time to get our evacuation kit together as we may not have much more that 24-48 hours, if the wind comes in from the north.
I cycled down to Evans Lookout two days ago and was aghast at the accumulations of fallen trees and branches, dead scrub and grasses that have accumulated right next to the car park. We have had no hazard burning up here since the last major fire about 8 years ago, and it shows. Here we go gain!
60
Peter, I think until people start taking lazy greenist councils to court over lack of action regarding fire mitigation and suing them so hard thier eyes water, little will change.
50
And the Blue Mountains CC is as Green as the Emerald Isle. We would have had a Liberal elected at the last election if it had been first past the post, but, NO, the Green votes got labor home!
50
Good luck !
Take Care Peter !
By the way Pine trees are pretty flammable.
Consider replacing them with fire retardant species.
00
The Greens have been working on establishing a front group to represent the medical profession for several years now.The group, Doctors for the Environment, initially recruited in naive student doctors and allied health students The man behind it was a failed Greens candidate from Gippsland in Victoria.(I can’t remember his name for the moment). The purpose of the group (my interpretation) was to use the reputation of the medical profession to grab headlines and impress the public and politicians and to push particular Greens agendas such as climate change, abortion and curtailment of population growth.Most reasonable doctors will have nothing to do with it but the leftist media use it to ramp up any climate change issues.It would be interesting to do a write up of its membership and objectives and get this published so that the public has better information as to its mission. I first discovered it when in a GP’s waiting room and there was a new poster opposite the clients seating area which was basically making women feel guilty for having children and overpopulating the world. I was so angry that I saw the administrator who agreed it was totally inappropriate and took it down.She said it had been sent to the clinic by Doctors for the Environment and no one had really thought about its impact on clients and what the message was suggesting!
60
Here is the Doctors for Environment website and if you go into its media releases you will see it ramping up the fabricated connection between bush fires and climate change.https://www.smh.com.au/national/horrified-doctors-call-for-direct-action-on-bushfire-health-threat-20191212-p53jbd.html
50
First do no harm?
20
I just heard Matt Harris from Frontier Economics stating nuclear power stations are not suitable here because they are sources of base load power and thus are not compatible with intermittent renewables. We’ve reached a new level of stupid in this country when someone can make such a comment in public.
40
There is no doubt that fuel loads are a key causative agent in these fires.
Removal of cattle from the national parks has facilitated the buildup of fuel over decades. A lifetime friend, grazier and volunteer rural fire fighter of 40 years knows this from on ground experience.
Grazing has been phased out of national parks and reserves since the early 1900’s on the basis of threatened and endangered species. Man is now the threatened and endangered species!
70
early 1990s?
30
18 Dec: Reuters: Disappointment for clean energy firms at U.S. spending bill
by Nichola Groom
Clean energy producers voiced dismay on Tuesday at a U.S. spending bill, saying it fell far short of what wind companies and solar developers had hoped for.
Under the bill, which passed the U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday, wind companies will get just one more year to land a big subsidy, while solar developers lost out in their bid to extend another key tax credit…
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-budget-renewables/disappointment-for-clean-energy-firms-at-u-s-spending-bill-idUSKBN1YL1XU
10
17 Dec: Nature: Not slashing emissions? See you in court
A pioneer in sustainable innovation explains why she has spent the past decade fighting the first lawsuit to force a government to act on global heating.
by Marjan Minnesma
(Marjan Minnesma is co-founder and director of the Urgenda Foundation in Amsterdam, which this year received an honorary doctorate as an institute from the University Saint-Louis in Brussels. She lectures at many universities and is a board member of the energy co-operative OM | new energy in Amsterdam, the Netherlands)
I live in a nation where more than one-quarter of the land is already below sea level. For much of the past decade, I’ve been on a journey for climate justice. With 886 of my fellow Dutch citizens, the Urgenda Foundation that I co-founded brought the first lawsuit aiming to find a national government guilty of failing to safeguard its people from the ravages of climate change. We have won repeatedly, at several levels of the court.
I write this as we await the final ruling in the Supreme Court of the Netherlands in The Hague on 20 December — a fitting end to a watershed year for civil action on global heating (this article will be updated with the outcome). The case has inspired other national lawsuits that — along with those against corporations and investors — are creating a burgeoning toolkit of environmental jurisprudence…
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-03841-5
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unbelievable:
13 Dec: NYT: Democracy Grief Is Real
Seeing what Trump is doing to America, many find it hard to fight off despair.
by Michelle Goldberg
The despair felt by climate scientists and environmentalists watching helplessly as something precious and irreplaceable is destroyed is sometimes described as “climate grief.” Those who pay close attention to the ecological calamity that civilization is inflicting upon itself frequently describe feelings of rage, anxiety and bottomless loss, all of which are amplified by the right’s willful denial. The young activist Greta Thunberg, Time magazine’s 2019 Person of the Year, has described falling into a deep depression after grasping the ramifications of climate change and the utter refusal of people in power to rise to the occasion: “If burning fossil fuels was so bad that it threatened our very existence, how could we just continue like before?”
Lately, I think I’m experiencing democracy grief. For anyone who was, like me, born after the civil rights movement finally made democracy in America real, liberal democracy has always been part of the climate, as easy to take for granted as clean air or the changing of the seasons. When I contemplate the sort of illiberal oligarchy that would await my children should Donald Trump win another term, the scale of the loss feels so vast that I can barely process it…
After Trump’s election, a number of historians and political scientists rushed out with books explaining, as one title put it, “How Democracies Die.” In the years since, it’s breathtaking how much is dead already. Though the president will almost certainly be impeached for extorting Ukraine to aid his re-election, he is equally certain to be acquitted in the Senate, a tacit confirmation that he is, indeed, above the law. His attorney general is a shameless partisan enforcer. Professional civil servants are purged, replaced by apparatchiks…
The entire Trump presidency has been marked, for many of us who are part of the plurality that despises it, by anxiety and anger. But lately I’ve noticed, and not just in myself, a demoralizing degree of fear, even depression. You can see it online, in the self-protective cynicism of liberals announcing on Twitter that Trump is going to win re-election…
I reached out to a number of therapists, who said they’re seeing this politically induced misery in their patients…
Kimberly Grocher, a psychotherapist who works in both New York and South Florida, and whose clients are primarily women of color, told me that during her sessions, the political situation “is always in the room. It’s always in the room.” Trump, she said, has made bigotry more open and acceptable, something her patients feel in their daily lives. “When you’re dealing with people of color’s mental health, systemic racism is a big part of that,” she said…
Democracy grief isn’t like regular grief. Acceptance isn’t how you move on from it. Acceptance is itself a kind of death.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/13/opinion/sunday/trump-democracy.html?fbclid=IwAR0_gKapC7Ynl0JrSk5IAnhozW87fJsuepLkiOZl9ZwxxpVRnpfqBoPgZ1c
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Right now South Australia is getting around 10% of its power needs from unreliables and Victoriastan around 7% , aren’t Victoriastan supposed to be closing down more coal fired generators soon ? .
AEMO must have been doing some stellar juggling to keep the power on today .
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PICS/VIDEOS: 17 Dec: Conde Nast Traveller: -20°C! It’s time to head up to the mountains for the season’s first snow
From Shimla to Spiti, it’s all white and fluffy
Winter is here! And with it is the soft, fluffy snow that’s turning north India into a white wonderland. Over the past week, the upper reaches of Ladakh, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand have been getting a steady amount of snowfall. Temperatures in Spiti Valley are currently a bone-chilling -20°C. Shimla is only slightly warmer with temperatures between -1 and 6°C. In Uttarakhand, Nainital got its first spell of snow this winter last week, while Binsar too is now nicely wrapped in a blanket of white. If the snow, a fireplace and a book are your idea of a vacation, it’s time to pack your bags. Need more inspiration? Here we go…PICS VIDEOS
https://www.cntraveller.in/story/20c-spiti-nainital-shimla-temperature-its-time-to-head-up-to-the-mountains-for-the-season-first-snow/
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today on ABC RN PM:
Heatwave: Australia’s hottest day on record
by Rhett Burnie on ABC PM
WA, South Australia, Victoria and Tasmania are all in the grip of blistering conditions that’ve already produced the nations hottest day on record, with numerous other records tumbling and hundreds hospitalised.
Unprecedented marine heatwave hits WA coast
by Ruby Jones on ABC PM
Marine heatwaves are believed to be behind fish kills in recent months, and scientists in West Australia are now on high alert for coral bleaching, with another marine heatwave declared there
Will climate change make parts of Australia unliveable?
by Oliver Gordon on ABC PM
What are the implications, if the mercury is going to keep hitting new highs, for those who already live in the scorching and sparse landscapes or Australia’s interior?
https://www.abc.net.au/radio/programs/pm/
ABC Sydney radio was being broadcast in Brisbane early afternoon today, going overboard about heatwave, with the help of a BoM guy. then the ABC guy says it’s 24C in Sydney.
it wasn’t much warmer at my place, south of Brisbane.
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remembered the BoM spokesman was Dan Narramore.
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Currently on 2GB ,9pm , jane Marwick interviewing David Packham OA , a distinguished bush fire expert.
Very informative basicly ,it is proven physically impossible to extinguish these major fires.
Scientificly proven that the best fire fighting methods can only control fires up to 3-4 MW per mtr, whilst these current fires are of the oerder 30+ MWper mtr. !!
Yhey have to burn out unless we get heavy rain.
Much debunking of the AGW wailing ..
Lots of other detail also.
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I agree with David Packham.
A bushfire when small is easily extinguished.
see 25.2.2
A bushfire that has high ground litter, fuel loading, will increase in size rapidly. It will preheat the bush in front of it, cause moisture loss in the flora, and cause eucalypts to release oil as a vapour around their canopies. If a low humidity wind is present then you have the basic ingredients for a perfect firestorm.
When a bushfire becomes large enough, it creates its own microcosm. Hot air rises fast, drawing in new oxygen rich air. This amplifies the intensity of the fire. Much like a blacksmith uses a bellows in his forge.
When the eucalyptus oil vapour eventually ignites, and there is a wind driving it, then you will be confronted with a self propagating monster that you cannot control.
Once the canopy is alight, embers will be blowing up to 1 km ahead of the bushfires path, igniting that bush in multiple areas and preheating it. This again causes eucalyptus oil to be emitted as a vapour ready to explode. Invariably it does, and permits the chain reaction to continue.
You cannot control that, or stand in front of that, without seriously risking your life.
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18 Dec: BBC: Australia heatwave: Nation endures hottest day on record
Australia has experienced its hottest day on record with the national average temperature reaching a high of 40.9C (105.6F).
The Bureau of Meteorology (Bom) said “extensive” heat on Tuesday exceeded the previous record of 40.3C set on 7 January 2013.
Taking the average of maximum temperatures across the country is the most accurate measure of a heatwave…
Officials predict that 2019, on the temperatures recorded so far, will be among the four warmest years on record. Bom says it’s expecting national mean temperatures to be at least 1.3C above the long-term average of 27.5C.
That heat has helped create the conditions for natural disasters like bushfires, droughts and floods – which have always happened in Australia – to be more frequent and more severe.
“Australia’s climate is increasingly influenced by global warning and natural variability takes place on top of this background trend,” says Bom…
According to the measurements for 2019 so far, the year has been Australia’s driest in over a century…
Australia’s conservative government has been criticised both at home and internationally for what’s seen as an inadequate climate record…
Heatwaves are Australia’s deadliest natural disaster and have killed thousands more people than bushfires or floods…
Bom and fire authorities have warned that the record temperatures have made the fires more volatile and harder to fight…
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-50817963
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It’s interesting that a place called Oak Valley in western South Australia is forecast to reach 49C tomorrow, as reported in the media. However there is no weather station there, so no way of knowing if the BOM will be correct! The nearest stations are Nullarbor and Forrest, hundreds of Km away. The old weather station Cook on the railway is the closest at around 100 km away. Of course the argument will be academic if somewhere like Roseworthy cracks 50C!
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Ian I’m pleased that the recently arrived
Non native fruit bats are dying like flies here in SA
hurrahhh !
Qld and NSW can have them !
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full of it…
18 Dec: Guardian: Natural disasters and extreme weather: Australia’s fossil fuel industry should pay climate disaster levy, thinktank says
Plan for biggest fossil fuel producers to pay $1 per tonne of carbon pollution estimated to raise at least $1.5bn a year
by Amy Remeikis
Australia’s fossil fuel industry would stump up for a national climate disaster fund levy to help cover the costs of escalating natural disasters, under a new thinktank proposal.
The Australia Institute has released a plan to have some of the nation’s biggest polluters pay a $1 levy per tonne of carbon pollution from fossil fuel production, which it estimates would raise at least $1.5bn per year.
Putting the nation back together again after flood, storm or fire is an increasingly costly exercise, as climate change exacerbates the strength and duration of events, draining local, state and federal coffers…
Ogge said polling undertaken by the institute, as part of its Climate of the Nation report, found 62% of Australians supported the introduction of a fossil fuel levy…
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/dec/18/australias-fossil-fuel-industry-should-pay-climate-disaster-levy-thinktank-says
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18 Dec: Daily Mail: Greta Thunberg is named one of the top ten most influential people in science in 2019 for ‘channelling the rage of a generation’
•Nature publishes a list of the ten most influential people in science every year
•The prestigious journal says Greta Thunberg channelled a generation’s rage
•The list isn’t about ‘the best scientists but people who make an impact in science
•The list includes a neuroscience who brought dead pig brains back to life
By Ryan Morrison
The prestigious British science journal, which celebrated its 150th anniversary this year, says the Swedish campaigner ‘channelled the rage of a generation’.
She had outshone scientists who couldn’t ‘galvanise global attention’ the way she did and many are cheering her along, according to Nature (LINK)…
The journal has also published a list of ‘key people’ to watch in the world of science in 2020 including the United Nations Secretary-general António Guterres.
‘The Portuguese diplomat has pushed for aggressive action on global warming, and that advocacy could prove crucial as nations meet in 2020 to update their pledges under the 2015 Paris climate agreement’, the journal writes…
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-7801793/Greta-Thunberg-named-Nature-ten-influential-people-science-2019.html
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16 Dec: Newsbusters: How Dare You! The Movie: Greta Thunberg Getting Hulu Documentary In 2020
by Gabriel Hays
Deadline detailed who was behind the project, stating that B-Reel Films’ Cecilia Nessen and Frederik Heinig are the film’s producers and Nathan Grossman is directing.
The production crew working on the film has been with Greta ever since her first ever “School Strike for Climate” in her home country and throughout all her subsequent world travels…
Deadline then went through all her accomplishments to justify why we, the oversaturated consumer, need yet more elitist BS shoved down our throats. The site wrote, “Thunberg has been getting messages of support from Michelle Obama and has been embraced by Hollywood, with celebrities such as Arnold Schwarzenegger, Leonardo DiCaprio and Woody Harrelson among her army of fans.” Though, earth to Deadline, the Hollywood and Michelle O endorsements aren’t selling the case…
Overblown media productions intent on canonizing unsavory political figures will supposedly have a banner year in 2020. B-Reel Film’s Greta will be joining Hulu’s other 2020 documentary (four-part series) on an irksome lefty who won’t go away, Hillary (Clinton, naturallyl)…
https://www.newsbusters.org/blogs/culture/gabriel-hays/2019/12/16/how-dare-you-movie-greta-thunberg-getting-hulu-documentary
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the CAGW mob just doubles down:
16 Dec: NY Mag: Intelligencer: U.N. Climate Talks Collapsed in Madrid. What’s the Way Forward?
By David Wallace-Wells
You could see the failure of the United Nations’ COP25 climate conference, which just concluded in Madrid, coming from months away — if not years or decades.
It was, of course, the 25th COP, and judging by the only metric that matters — carbon emissions, which continue to rise — the conference followed 24 consecutive failures. Emissions set a new record in 2018, and are poised to set another again in 2019. Just three years since the signing of the Paris accords, no major industrial nation on Earth is on track to honor the commitments it made in Paris…
Those in Madrid without much sense of climate urgency might have looked to Australia — by some accounts responsible for “cheating” and “thwarting” progress at the conference last week. This week, the country is poised for a record-setting heat wave, with temperatures above 40 degrees Celsius (or 104 Fahrenheit) all across the country, prompting a “code red” warning for vulnerable citizens. The heat wave follows a month of horrifying brushfires there, which have burned through more than 7 million acres. In Sydney, ferry service had to be suspended because the boats couldn’t navigate in the smoke. All across the city, fire alarms inside office buildings went off, the smoke so dense the sensors concluded the buildings themselves had to be smoldering. And millions took in toxic air with each breath…
By accidents of geography and colonialism, Australia is unusually positioned as a climate-change case study, the one exception to the cruel rule of global warming and global inequality: that the poorest countries will suffer most in our hot new world…
Australia is not today uninhabitable, but it can look that way from a distance — and indeed, up close, to each of those 4 or 5 million people exposed to that toxic air. And yet, most of them, probably, will continue to live there, as the city and the country adapts to punishing fire seasons, even as they become more punishing…
Are there any other ways, beyond the U.N. model, to organize or incentive that kind of global cooperation? I’ve heard from a number of economists, in the last few months, who would like to see the establishment of something like a WTO for climate — an independent organization, capable of not just rewarding participation but also punishish bad behavior by nations…
http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/12/cop25-ended-in-failure-whats-the-way-forward.html
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This type of thinking has to stop.
The CO2 Control Knob is being twisted harder by our masters but strangely the money supply is beginning to get Less.
Perhaps people have become very distrustful of democracy that allows whole nations to be enslaved at the stroke of a pen.
The pall of smoke that has been visible from our city and which now often covers it reminds us that overcontrol by absent Know It Alls doesn’t work.
The Pall of smoke, now months old, should be a reminder that those responsible have not been punished.
Instead of suffering a week of mild discomfort from small controlled burns each year many have now been in the continuous heavy pall for two months.
KK
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Not even close to being the hottest day. See Tony Heller’s excellent discussion: https://youtu.be/rxJTZvRl13Q
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I grew up on a farm in what is now Zambia, then it was Northern Rhodesia. Every 2 years my Dad and I would go out at the end of the dry season and set fire to sections of the surrounding bush. Our farm was on the banks of the Kafue River, so in the evening the wind flowed down the course of the river. We set the fires to burn towards the fire-breaks we had prepared. We never lost a crop of maize or our pasture land to fires. The fuel load in the bush was insufficient to cause any fire problems.
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Quote from Jo:
That allegation should be accompanied by a quote and reference to Greens Party policy that supports it.
I already looked for it a month ago and found their policies to be a very mixed bag.
This is from Greens policy in 2008:
Their recent rhetorical trick has been to claim truthfully that they have always supported fuel reduction burns while craftily omitting the conditionality of that support. Protection of towns and key assets is the only definite case where they advocate prescribed burns unambiguously, while everywhere else their preferred ecological goal is a state of old-growth. No matter what you think of their policies, the Greens have not held any political power to get their policies enacted which is why they cannot be blamed for the current state. The parties which have had the political power to make change (Labor and Liberal) are in the hot seat in more ways than one. But the root of the problem goes way back and is far wider than the Greens party.
We may understand the original and current purpose of national parks as primarily conserving nature. It is therefore no surprise that conservation is what they do and that means no interference, especially not to light fires. That just seems really obvious. You don’t build museums with the goal of setting fire to them. What else were parks created for if not conservation, not only for people’s enjoyment but for the thriving of various critters as a value in itself?
But we have seen recently the inevitable end result of a conservation-only role for State forests and National Parks.
I’m tempted to make an analogy with the Brisbane 2011 floods at this point, where people built a tool (dam/burns) for disaster mitigation (flood/inferno) and due to believing environmental hysteria (unending drought/species delicacy) they refused to use that tool even when expert advice and data (recent rainfall/burn history) indicated what would happen without action. (All analogies have their limits and I’m sure someone will chime in with why this analogy doesn’t work.)
On that basis we might say that in NSW the NPWS has just had its “Wivenhoe Moment”. Just as Wivenhoe dam had two purposes which went out of balance by focusing on storing water and so did poorly at flood mitigation, so the National Parks should achieve a better balance between conserving nature and conserving the public’s health and property.
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I had to laugh at the “fire chiefs” standing around in suits in the direct Australian summer sun posing for publicity shots for the media. Would not have been my choice of attire if I wanted people to believe how dangerously hot it was now in Australia. As my late mother would have said “no sense, no brains”.
Speaking of brains, what of the people we pay to study climate from a scientific point of view? Why do the likes of Andy Pitt stay silent while hysterical MDs and former “fire chiefs” drag his science through the mud of gross exaggeration and “hyperbole”? Do they think it will be good for business i.e. ensure the continuation of research grants for the rest of their academic lifetimes?
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Does not take Einstein to work out the correlation between areas burnt for fire prevention verses how much damage will happen if not done so .
This is not extrapolated to be causation , yet the climate change scaremongers can do so with CO2 .
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https://www.2gb.com/podcast/scientist-david-packham-on-whats-really-causing-the-bushfires/
David Packham deals with the claim that the current fires are “unprecedented”.
Current peak intensity estimated at 30MW/m of fire front.
Peak intensity observed in the Back Saturday fires in Vic, 2009. … 60-70MW/m.
Also of interest is his comment on the infamous former fire-bureaucrats who are claiming that this is “climate change”.
They know that the maximum controllable fire intensity – by any direct method, including aircraft – is around 3-4MW/m…… Yet during their tenure they campaigned for more resources instead of funding the means to reduce fire intensity.
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It is amazing that no one seems to be using fire to fight the fires. In 1974 I had a fire that had jumped a road and was raging directly towards my house through the bush. I lit up the bush on the edge of the cleared area around the house. It burned against the wind slowly so as soon as established I lit up another line of fire a few meters upwind and then did it again several times as the main fire advanced quite rapidly. The lines of fire each quickly burned into the one downwind and went out so when the main fire arrived there was no fuel over quite a wide area and so it went out.
The house is still there 45 years later.
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