Image: Malcolm Turnbull, Greg Hunt, Ewen Jones travelling to Magnetic Island. Photo: Greg Hunt/twitter. Article first published using storify at nofibs.com.au
A promise by the Prime Minister to divert $1 billion in Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC) funding to improve reef catchment water quality and reduce greenhouse gas emissions has been soundly criticised as legally problematic, inefficient and far below the funding scientists say is required to Save the Reef.
This video, published on 2nd June 2016 from the Climate Council, articulates the climate change threat facing the reef, with statements from tourism operators, marine scientists and climate scientists.
A UNESCO report identifies World Heritage sites at risk from climate change, but there is no mention of Australian sites in the report. The Australian Government requested that all mentions be deleted, and this was complied with by UNESCO. This censorship of science should raise many questions.
This article was originally published at nofibs.com.au
Results from the third Direct Action Emissions Reduction Fund (ERF) auction for emissions reduction was announced with 50.5 million worth of offsets at $10.23 each. So 67 per cent of the $2.55 billion budget has been spent to achieve less than 7 per cent of the emissions reduction goal by 2030.
This effort amounts to less than 3 per cent of what is required for Australia's fair share in global emissions reduction for staying under the 2 degrees C limit as enshrined in the Paris Agreement. Environment Minister Greg Hunt signed the Paris agreement in New York on 22nd April 2016. Australia also agreed with aspiring to meet the 1.5 degrees target, so even more effort is required from Australian climate policy.
But the Liberal National Party Government main policy instrument for reducing emissions is the Emissions Reduction Fund, which is clearly inadequate. Even our 2030 climate target of 26-28 per cent reduction by 2030 is ranked as inadequate.
A Record 176 nations signed the Paris Agreement at a UN ceremony in New York, Australia among them. But Australia was also snubbed by not being invited to a meeting of the Coalition of High Ambition the night before. It seems our last minute belated membership that Foreign Minister Julie Bishop was so happy to highlight and share with me last December in response to one of my tweets, hasn't brought any ongoing diplomatic benefit.
I am sure our support for coal, abysmally low targets and ineffective emission reduction policies that track for a 4 degree world have something to do with it. I tweeted my shame to Julie Bishop in Paris during COP21, she replied to me that there was no need for my shame, that she had accepted a late invitation to join the Coalition of High Ambition.
Funny but I still feel ashamed. Australia is signing on but is still not showing signs of walking the talk on climate action.
This article was originally published at nofibs.com.au
In a late night conference call on Wednesday night 20 April 2016 between Federal Environment Minister Greg Hunt, Queensland State Environment minister Steven Miles and Environment ministers from other states it was agreed that what is currently happening on the Great Barrier Reef is alarming and is an issue of concern not just to Queenslanders but to all Australians.
Ministers all agreed that strong and urgent action was needed on climate change.
Attenborough first visited and documented the reef 60 years ago. Part one of the three part series contains an allegorical story from the Cairns area about sea level rise from the aboriginal dreamtime.
The Great Barrier Reef, geologically speaking, is a relatively recent phenomena. Sea levels were 70 to 90 metres lower during the Ice Age period with a narrow and steep shoreline where the east coast of Australia fell sharply to deeper waters. Sea levels started to rise at the end of the last ice age about 14,000 years ago.
Australia's Quarterly Update of Australia's National Greenhouse Gas Inventory to June 2015 was published on Christmas Eve. You can usually tell something is trying to be hidden when it is being released late on a Friday to avoid public and media scrutiny. Doubly so if published on Christmas Eve.
I find it hard to believe that some diligent public servant worked hard to get it completed and published on Christmas eve. Almost certainly, it would have gone through Environment Minister Greg Hunt's desk in recent weeks.
According to the report, total Annual emissions for 2014-15 are estimated to be 537.0 Mt CO2-e, which is an 0.8% increase in emissions when compared with the previous year (excluding land use change emissions). If you include emissions from land use clearing and deforrestation, then our emissions increased by 1.3 per cent.
It seems that Australia has flexibility in negotiating for a global climate agreement in Paris. Minister Hunt even expressed that there is some room for Australia to lift it's targets, after a review, through purchase of carbon credits. But it appears there is no extra funding to the Green Climate Fund on the table.
Australia as a mid-level power carries some influence at sensitive negotiations such as the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) annual summit, called the Conference of Parties or simply COP. This year in Paris is the 21st year of negotiations, hence COP21.
Tom Arup in The Age has a good summary of the Australian political negotiating position on climate, writing that Australia's "team now has a negotiating mandate approved by cabinet. It is understood to be flexible and allows Australia to sign up to a strong agreement, including one with lofty language about the long-term ambition of the agreement."
It seems Ministers from 62 nations were won over by Australian Environment Minister Greg Hunt's charm at Precop with applause being delivered to speeches from Ministers from both Australia and Canada. (see my article on the Paris Precop ministerial meeting)
Australia is being seen as back on side diplomatically on the climate issue, especially after Hunt was a important broker in a deal phasing down HFC emissions in the Montreal Protocol update last week.
A high level informal Ministerial pre-summit climate conference is currently under way in Paris to try and close some of the differences in negotiating positions to set up momentum for the Paris Climate Conference. The outstanding highlight has been the return of Canada to the serious climate discussion table, although it is still very early to see how strong Canada's climate policy and negotiating position will be.
The French Government is putting a lot of diplomatic effort into the UN climate conference (COP21), due to start on Monday November 30 with an initial leaders summit with more than 100 Heads of State attending.
On Friday the #Ministerforcoal hashtag was trending in Melbourne and then in Australia on Twitter. Activists had decided to inject some honesty into his ministerial position by rebranding him from Minister for the Environment to Minister for Coal.
Fifty or so activists attended his electorate office for the seat of Flinders in Hastings. While one group locked together inside, another group climbed onto the roof and unfurled bannerssaying "Minister for Coal".
The protesters were highlighting Greg Hunt's approval for the second time of the Adani Carmichael coal mine in Queensland's Galilee basin. With coal prices being in the doldrums and most Australian and international banks refusing to finance the project, it is looking very much like a stranded asset.
Melbourne's climate Guardian Angels have descended on top of Environment Minister Greg Hunt's electoral office in Hastings in a rooftop protest at the re-approval of the Adani Carmichael coal mine in Queensland's Galilee basin.
Update: after a full day and evening on top of the roof, the Climate Angels have now safely descended. No arrests.
The original Minister's approval for the Carmichael Coal mine had to be set aside when challenged by the Mackay Conservation Group that the Minister had ignored and not taken into account two threatened species.
The Minister, Greg Hunt, has subsequently drawn up an approval notice with conditions and sent a media release on Carmichael Coal Mine and Rail Infrastructure project on 15October, 2015. These conditions include establishing offset habitat and $1 million of funding for research programs to improve conservation of threatened species in the Galilee Basin over 10 years.
Leadbeater's Possum, also known as Victoria's fairy possum, is one of those species fighting for survival against the odds and against the juggernaut that is human industrial society.
Finally last month, on the recommendation of the Threatened Species Scientific Committee, Leadbeater's Possum (Gymnobelideus leadbeateri) was upgraded to being listed as critically endangered under the EPBC Act. The announcement was made by Federal Environment Minister Greg Hunt on April 22, 2015.
"The challenges facing this iconic species are significant. It has undergone very severe population declines in recent decades with numbers having decreased by more than 80 per cent since the mid 1980s." said Hunt. "That is why we will be working closely with the Victorian Government to find a solution which will help save the possum for future generations."
Victorian Environment Minister Lisa Neville told the Age on May 3, 2015 (Minister flags new national park within this term to save the possum) that a Great Forest National Park could become a reality during the current Government's term "Yes, I think so. I'm hoping that's the case, but I also think that will come with a commitment and a plan around the protection of jobs and workers and their families."
But with Vic Forests continuing to log old growth forest coupes in the Central Highlands, the question becomes one of will a new National Park come too late to save Leadbeater's possum species, and it's associated forest ecosystem, from extinction?
Leadbeater's possum species lives in the upper canopy of mountain ash forests in the Central Highlands of Victoria, and needs a mature forest with plenty of old trees for nesting holes, and younger regrowth trees for food. The species has an estimated 1500 individuals alive. There has been up to 80 per cent decline of the species population since the 1980s.
The Central Highlands forests of Victoria are some of the world's most carbon dense in terms of carbon sequestration, and yet this is seldom included when assessing their economic value for forestry and logging exploitation. Logging of mountain ash forests also increases bushfire risk and the risk of megafires, and creates the potential for a landscape trap that could change the ecosystem permanently.
As a result of the Black Saturday bushfires in February 2009 around 43-45 per cent of the Leadbeater's possum population was decimated due to the loss of much of the old growth mountain ash forest. To conserve habitat remaining old growth forest should have been reserved, instead the rate of logging of these forests has continued apace. A study by Burns et al (2014) (Full PDF) concluded there is a 92% chance the Leadbeater’s ecosystem in the Victoria central highlands will collapse within 50 years.
"Our overall ranking of risk of collapse for the ecosystem was Critically Endangered. We are confident that this risk category is appropriate because all 39 scenarios modelled indicated a ≥92% chance of ecosystem collapse by 2067. Our findings highlight the important need for timely policy reform to facilitate improved management of the mountain ash ecosystem in Victoria. In particular, there needs to be greater protection of remaining areas of unburned forest, and restoration activities in parts of the forest estate. Implementation of these strategies will require a significant reduction in logging pressure on the mountain ash ecosystem." concluded the study.
Leadbeater's possum is not a very big creature, weighing in at about 150 grams, but it's small size makes it very photogenic and appealing when one is captured or displayed at Healsville sanctuary, run by Zoos Victoria. In the wild they are seldom seen as they are mostly nocturnal creatures foraging during the night with their big eyes, and resting in their nests in tree hollows during the day.
The possum flits from tree to tree like a fairy in the canopy at night, using its prehensile tail to carry twigs back to its nest. This creature has already come back from extinction once. For more than half the twentieth century traces of the creature were not seen in Gippsland where the last traces where previously found, and it was feared the species was already extinct. Then, in March 1961 it was re-discovered living in the Central Highlands by Eric Wilkinson, a junior officer in the Victorian Museum.
In 1968 it was made one of the faunal emblems of Victoria. You would think that being a symbol of Victoria would hold your species in good stead to have your habitat and ecosystem preserved. But, succeeding state government's have only paid the merest lip service to taking the necessary conservation steps to protect this species by protecting it's ecosystem. Logging the old growth forests has continued under the control of government body VicForests under both Liberal and Labor governments. Logging contracts and employment, including to make Reflex paper, have trumped conservation action at every turn, it seems.
In 2013 two distinguished environmental scientists accused the Victorian Government of forestry policies knowingly designed to drive Leadbeater's Possum to extinction. There was a concerted campaign by conservationists in the 2014 state election for the creation of a Great Forest National Park covering much of the Central Highlands. But the Labor policy when released was non-committal stating the need for discussions between all stakeholders. Labor support for a new national park was dropped seemingly at the behest of the powerful Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU) due to concerns over employment loss, according to the Age report.
A new National Park would add 355,000 hectares to existing national parks and reserves stretching from Kinglake across the Yarra Ranges to Mt Baw Baw and north up to Lake Eildon, and protect forests around the tourism hubs of Healesville and Warburton. In 2014 over 30 national and state environmental organisations endorsed a statement for creation of a new national park, along with international conservation luminaries Sir David Attenborough and Jane Goodall.
Professor David Lindenmayer is the acknowledged world expert in the montane forests of Central Victoria, the ecosystem of Leadbeater's possum. Shortly after the species was listed as critically endangered he wrote an article at the Conversation where he clearly states what needs to be done to save the ecoystem and species.
"The answer is that the processes that threaten the persistence of the species must be removed. This is basic conservation science. In the case of Leadbeater’s Possum, the key process threatening the species is industrial clearfelling." wrote Professor Lindenmayer.
Meanwhile, the logging and burning continues, although the Mt St Leonard Rusty coupe was given a last minute reprieve at the end of April by Environment Minister Lisa Neville:
Nannas sitting opposite #Rusty protesting the logging of Toolangi forest home of Leadbeater's possum. pic.twitter.com/BegGg871DE
The Australian Climate change Authority has released its final assessment on what Australia's climate emissions reduction target should be. They say that the global conditions have clearly been met for Australia increasing emissions reduction from 5 per cent on 2000 levels to 19 per cent on 2000 levels by 2020.
In 2009 the Australian Government under Prime Minister Kevin Rudd gave an unconditional guarantee of a 5 per cent target to the Copenhagen UN Climate Change conference. This was part of a range of 5 to 25 per cent with specific conditions attached for increasing the target past 5 per cent. Australia's formal target needs to be advised by 30 April 2014, although governments can strengthen their targets at any time. This target and the conditional range had bipartisan support: Both Labor and the Liberal and National Parties supported this international undertaking.
Bernie Fraser, the chair of the Climate Change Authority, said during the press conference:
"The five percent minimum isn't credible in terms of the task that has to be done and the time frame to stick to the 2020 target of a minimum of 5 per cent would, within the framework of the present global budget, Australia's share of that global budget, would impose a virtually impossible task of catching up, making up that lost ground and getting to the end result in the time available.
The Whitehaven coal mine at Maule's Creek near Boggabri in north Western NSW involves the destruction of a substantial part of the Leard Forest. One of the requirements for approval was the provision of environmental offsets to balance 'like for like' against the destruction of high biodiversity habitat. But the latest environmental report by Dr John Hunter advises the offsets for critically endangered ecological communities are "vastly overstated".
This shows that the approval under the EPBC Act by former Environment Minister Tony Burke and the continued support given by current Environment minister Greg Hunt are a travesty and likely a dereliction of duty of care for the environment, threatened species and biodiversity.
Let's get this straight. Australian politicians are allowing some of the richest Australian billionaires combined with Chinese and Indian power corporations to destroy the Great Barrier Reef, one of the natural wonders of the world and a World Heritage site. Political approval of mining the guts out of the coal rich Galilee basin in Central Queensland destroys sensitive ecosystems like the Bimblebox Nature Reserve containing threatened species, and is forecast to substantially lower the water table impacting rural communities and agricultural productivity with possible repercussions on flow in the Great Artesian basin aquifer.
This coal will be exported through Queensland ports, but substantial dredging is required with the dredge spoil to be dumped in the marine park waters damaging the reef. The increase in ship movements will also imperil the reef. The increased CO2 emissions when the coal is burnt will also cause ocean acidification and climate change both of which are, you guessed it....damaging the coral reef systems and the Great Barrier Reef.
Australia had the dubious priveledge of earning the first Fossil of the Day award at the United Nations climate talks in Warsaw, Poland. Civil society organisations confer the awards each day of the climate talks, and have been doing so since 1999.
The new Federal Government lead by Prime Minister Tony Abbott has in a few short weeks dismantled the Climate Change Department, closed the independent scientific panel the Climate Commission and set about undoing Australia's carbon pricing through preparing legislation to repeal the operation of the Climate Change Authority and the Clean Energy Finance Corporation.
But the award wasn't for all this political attack on climate change action at home in Australia. It was conferred because Australia will not be putting forward any new finance commitments at the Warsaw negotiations, beyond the Fast Start Finance commitments made by the former Labor Government.
Tony Abbott has confirmed that the Australian government would be making no further commitments of funding to the Green Climate Fund, setup by the UNFCCC climate talks to fund climate mitigation and adaptation programs in third world and developing countries. It was hoped that $100bn a year in public and private financing would be channeled to developing countries by 2020. The previous Labor government deposited $500,000 last year to help get the new fund established, as well as committing almost $600m to a "fast-start" fund.
A spokeperson for Foreign Minister Julie Bishop told the Guardian: "The Green Climate Fund is currently in the design phase and Australia will consider its longer term involvement in the fund once its design has been further progressed."
