Abbott: 5% CO2 reduction is enough

22 December, 2009 by

Australia's contribution

Enough (possibly) to satisfy a part of the “we must do something” camp, and little enough (just) to satisfy the “we mustn’t wreck our economy” camp:

Australia should target a carbon cut of only five per cent following the international failure to agree on emission limits at the Copenhagen talks, the federal opposition says.

Opposition leader Tony Abbott has written to Prime Minister Kevin Rudd to ask him to conduct new modelling on the impact of a go-it-alone emissions trading scheme in Australia, in the wake of the weak outcome at the Copenhagen summit.

He then wants a national debate on the issue.

“All of the previous modelling, much of which is 15 months out of date anyway, was based on the assumption that other countries would have an emissions trading scheme or something like it,” Mr Abbott told reporters in the NSW Blue Mountains on Tuesday.

“After Copenhagen, we know that this is not the case. New modelling needs to be done to show what the effect of a go-it-alone emissions trading scheme would have on Australian industries and on Australian jobs.”

A 5% cut is nothing more than a gesture, however, as it equates to about seven hundredths of one percent of global emissions… so apart from showing “solidarity” with the rest of the world, it will achieve nothing (even if you believe that CO2 is the only dial on the climate, which, by the way, it isn’t).

Read it here.

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Rudd writes to hunger strike farmer

22 December, 2009 by

Peter Spencer - Day 30

You will recall the awful story of Peter Spencer, currently into his fifth week of hunger strike after the government appropriated his land for use as a carbon sink, in order to help meet Australia’s Kyoto obligations, without any compensation (see here). Jo Nova has a good summary here: Wholesale theft in the name of carbon.

The latest news, however, is that Kevin Rudd has written to Mr Spencer through his Ag minister, Tony Burke, but that it tells him nothing he doesn’t already know:

Peter Spencer is entering his 30th day without food, perched high on a wind tower on his Shannons Flat property, near Cooma in the south-east.

He is arguing that state native vegetation laws have been used by the Federal Government to lock-up land to meet carbon pollution reduction targets.

He has received a letter from the Agriculture Minister, Tony Burke, on behalf of the Prime Minister Kevin Rudd.

It details compensation options and possible land management strategies.

But his supporter Alastair McRobert says he will not open it.

“The Government wanted Peter to come down and talk about measures that were already in place to manage his land,” he said.

“It’ll be returned unopened.” (source)

Is Kevin Rudd really going to stand by and watch this continue to the end?

Email the Prime Minister directly here.

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Copenhagen: more blame and recrimination

22 December, 2009 by

Blame game

I suppose it was inevitable that after the disastrous Copenhagen summit, the key players would start shifting blame around to absolve themselves from any responsibility. Such a joy to behold:

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has accused a handful of countries of holding the UN climate summit to ransom as bitter recriminations swirled over the outcome of the negotiations.

While China’s Premier Wen Jiabao insisted his government had played an “important and constructive” role, Britain said the meeting had lurched into farce and pointed the finger of blame at Beijing.

And the summit host, Danish Prime Minister Lars Loekke Rasmussen, rapped the lower-level negotiators for failing to make headway in nearly two weeks of talks and then leaving their masters with too much to do at the climax.

Brown said lessons must be learned.

“Never again should we face the deadlock that threatened to pull down those talks. Never again should we let a global deal to move towards a greener future be held to ransom by only a handful of countries,” he said.

While Brown refrained from naming countries, his climate change minister Ed Miliband said China had led a group of countries that “hijacked” the negotiations which had at times presented “a farcical picture to the public”.

Copenhagen has certainly provided plenty of entertainment! Long may it continue.

Read it here.

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Rudd's ETS quandary

22 December, 2009 by

A bit like the ETS

Thanks to the weak-as-water outcome from Copenhagen, the ETS is sunk. Kevin Rudd’s desire to arrive at Copenhagen with a trophy has scuppered any possible chance of the two errors in four words “Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme”. Just think about it for a minute. If Rudd had not been so stubborn and vain, and agreed to wait until after Copenhagen to try to pass the ETS, Malcolm Turnbull would still be leader of the Opposition (god help us), and there would have been bipartisan support for it. Rudd may have been able to get it through after Copenhagen with Turnbull onside.

But now? No chance. With Tony Abbott at the helm, the Coalition wouldn’t pass it in a billion years, and the only option for the government is to accede to the wishes of the Greens, who are now arguing for 25% – 40% cuts by 2020:

The federal government should start negotiating with the Australian Greens if it wants parliament to pass its plan to tackle climate change, party leader Bob Brown says.

Despite the Copenhagen summit’s failure to deliver strong cuts to greenhouse gas emissions, Labor maintains it will re-introduce legislation setting up its carbon pollution reduction scheme (CPRS), or emissions trading scheme, to the lower house in February.

…

The Greens want to see Labor’s ETS include a 25 to 40 per cent target, which Senator Brown said would help the government fulfil its international obligation.

“They have to now move to targets that would keep global warming below two degrees, and that is where the Greens have been aiming,” he said. (source)

What international obligation is that, Bob? Remember, Copenhagen resulted in no international obligations – just a wish list, that the US and China have probably already forgotten about. As Terry McCrann says, 40% is really 60% per capita by the time you get to 2020, which would send Australia’s economy back to the Dark Ages, which is what we must assume the Greens want for the Australian people. Because people are very low on the Greens’ list of priorities.

It would be suicidal for Rudd to climb into bed with the Greens on this, so he’ll just have to get used to it: the ETS is sunk.

UPDATE: Not surprisingly, Penny Wong has already ruled out any deal with the Greens:

“The reality is that the Greens have taken a position, in relation to targets, that the Government was not able to negotiate on,” Senator Wong said.

“They indicated they did not wish to have a negotiation unless the Government was prepared to put targets of 25 to 40 per cent on the table. That is not the Government’s policy, that is not the Government’s position.

“We don’t believe that is a responsible way forward.” (source)

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Where's Ruddy?

21 December, 2009 by

Dead ringer

You would have thought that Kevin Rudd, after the “triumph” of Copenhagen, would be bursting to bore the Australian public rigid about the amazing, “historic,” “unprecedented,” [insert fifteen more adjectives here] deal struck and how it’s now full steam ahead for an ETS in February because the rest of the world is committed to doing the same… hang on, that’s not quite right. Unsurprisingly, Kevin has holed up in Kirribilli because his spin-meisters haven’t yet worked out the script. Tony Abbott makes hay:

“You were the one who built Copenhagen up. You were the one who was a friend of the chair. You were the one who was the co-author of the rejected documents. You need to explain yourself.

“Having come back from Copenhagen, instead of explaning the outcome to the Australian people, he is in hiding in Kirribilli House. Now I say to Mr Rudd do the right thing by the Australian people, come out of hiding, don’t closet yourself in Kirribilli House, don’t send out Penny Wong and Kate Lundy and all these other millions to explain the disappointing outcome of Copenhagen – do it yourself.

“I think the public are reacting against the way the government is conducting this debate in these sweeping, moral terms, I mean in the end the debate over how we respond to climate change should be based on fact not faith.

“This is not a theological question, it’s a practical question and I think Mr Rudd risks triggering a very serious backlash from public if he keeps running around like Torquemada – trying to have climate change heretics burnt at the stake.”

Brilliant stuff. More of the same, please.

Read it here (and listen too!)

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Climate madness from Ross Garnaut

21 December, 2009 by

Pontificating…

Ross Garnaut hangs around like a bad smell, pontificating on climate matters when nobody really gives a toss (a bit like Malcolm Turnbull, in fact), and his latest announcement suggests Australia commit to a 25% emissions reduction by 2020:

Professor Ross Garnaut told The Australian Online today that such a goal [2˚C warming] would require Australia to embrace the top end of the [government’s] target.

“Well that’s the 450 parts per million. If the world really was on the path to delivering that that would be a 25 per cent target in Australia by 2020 and 90 per cent by 2050,” he said.

However, he said the Prime Minister would have to wait until he discovered what the world was doing before he committed to such a target.

“I think we’ve got to wait. The wise thing is to wait and talk to others,” he said.

So we have to cut 25% by 2020, but at the same time wait until we see what the world is doing? And even if you can look past that inconsistency, you have to ask, what difference does it make to global emissions if Australia cuts by 5%, or 25% or 100%? Answer: nothing. Anything we do is just a gesture, and a pointless one at that.

And if you can look past that, then you have to ask why they think 450 ppm will guarantee only a 2˚C rise in temperature. The sun didn’t take part at Copenhagen, neither did the oceans, nor the clouds, nor volcanoes, nor cosmic rays, nor the solar system, so I wonder what they all think of this tiny, annoying surface irritant on the planet (i.e. humans) deciding what its climate will be in 2050?

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Rudd to "try again for ETS tax"

21 December, 2009 by

Delusional about climate

At least the Daily Telegraph is calling it an ETS “tax” now!

Kevin Rudd, along with all the other world leaders at Copenhagen, believe they have the power to regulate the earth’s climate. They genuinely believe that it will bow to their superior power, and keep its temperature rise below whatever figure they deem to be the right one.

There is one word for this kind of belief: delusional.

And now Kevin Rudd and Wayne Swan are continuing to press ahead with the ETS for the hopelessly pathetic reason of “business certainty”.

Treasurer Wayne Swan said the controversial emissions trading scheme that would push up the cost of electricity and power was “just as relevant now as it was before Copenhagen and we need to pass the bill for business certainty”. [Well done to the Tele for calling it as it is! – Ed]

The ETS was rejected by the Senate earlier this month and the Government planned to re-introduce the scheme for parliamentary approval in February next year even though other nations were refusing to agree to cut their own carbon emissions.

The Rudd Government said it still remained committed to cutting the nation’s greenhouse gas output by between five and 25 per cent.

It would set a more exact target in February next year when other nations made public the size of any greenhouse reductions they would be perpared to make.

Keep pushing, guys. The more you do, the more the public will see through this nonsense.

Read it here.

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Wikipedia: Don't trust it on climate

21 December, 2009 by

Don't go there

Why? Because over 5000 articles have been tampered with by UK Green Party activist William Connolley so that they all neatly fit in with the IPCC agenda (bit like the temperature records, really):

Connolley took control of all things climate in the most used information source the world has ever known – Wikipedia. Starting in February 2003, just when opposition to the claims of the band members were beginning to gel, Connolley set to work on the Wikipedia site. He rewrote Wikipedia’s articles on global warming, on the greenhouse effect, on the instrumental temperature record, on the urban heat island, on climate models, on global cooling. On Feb. 14, he began to erase the Little Ice Age; on Aug.11, the Medieval Warm Period. In October, he turned his attention to the hockey stick graph. He rewrote articles on the politics of global warming and on the scientists who were skeptical of the band. Richard Lindzen and Fred Singer, two of the world’s most distinguished climate scientists, were among his early targets, followed by others that the band especially hated, such as Willie Soon and Sallie Baliunas of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, authorities on the Medieval Warm Period.

All told, Connolley created or rewrote 5,428 unique Wikipedia articles. His control over Wikipedia was greater still, however, through the role he obtained at Wikipedia as a website administrator, which allowed him to act with virtual impunity. When Connolley didn’t like the subject of a certain article, he removed it — more than 500 articles of various descriptions disappeared at his hand. When he disapproved of the arguments that others were making, he often had them barred — over 2,000 Wikipedia contributors who ran afoul of him found themselves blocked from making further contributions. Acolytes whose writing conformed to Connolley’s global warming views, in contrast, were rewarded with Wikipedia’s blessings. In these ways, Connolley turned Wikipedia into the missionary wing of the global warming movement. (source – h/w WUWT)

WUWT is now reporting that Connolley has been ditched by Wikipedia. However, are you starting to detect a theme here? Anything to do with the alleged “consensus” has to be doctored, tampered with, fiddled or manipulated in order to keep it afloat. Hardly the sign of “settled science”.

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UK Telegraph: Pachauri mired in conflict

21 December, 2009 by

Money from climate scare?

The UK Telegraph  runs an eye-opening piece about IPCC head Rajendra Pachauri’s business dealings, which conflict hugely with his UN role:

No one in the world exercised more influence on the events leading up to the Copenhagen conference on global warming than Dr Rajendra Pachauri, chairman of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and mastermind of its latest report in 2007.

Although Dr Pachauri is often presented as a scientist (he was even once described by the BBC as “the world’s top climate scientist”), as a former railway engineer with a PhD in economics he has no qualifications in climate science at all.

What has also almost entirely escaped attention, however, is how Dr Pachauri has established an astonishing worldwide portfolio of business interests with bodies which have been investing billions of dollars in organisations dependent on the IPCC’s policy recommendations.

These outfits include banks, oil and energy companies and investment funds heavily involved in ‘carbon trading’ and ‘sustainable technologies’, which together make up the fastest-growing commodity market in the world, estimated soon to be worth trillions of dollars a year.

Today, in addition to his role as chairman of the IPCC, Dr Pachauri occupies more than a score of such posts, acting as director or adviser to many of the bodies which play a leading role in what has become known as the international ‘climate industry’.

It is remarkable how only very recently has the staggering scale of Dr Pachauri’s links to so many of these concerns come to light, inevitably raising questions as to how the world’s leading ‘climate official’ can also be personally involved in so many organisations which stand to benefit from the IPCC’s recommendations. (source)

Pachauri has already responded, but typically in the ad hominem style we have come to expect:

“Nothing much of substance has been found in the hacking controversy. So this is another attempt by the climate sceptics to discredit the IPCC. They now want to go after me and hope that it would serve their purpose,” Pachauri told The Indian Express on Sunday evening.

“Frankly, I would not even like to respond to them. Every single payment that I receive goes to my organization (TERI) which is non-profit organization. The extra money that my organization generates goes into the ‘Lighting a Billion Lights’ campaign that TERI has launched. These allegations are nothing but lies,” he said. (source – h/t Tom Nelson)

“Nothing of substance”? So I guess destroying data, refusing FOI requests, manipulating temperature records are all OK with the IPCC, are they? Sure.

We’ll see – there will be more to this story, that’s for certain.

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Post-Copenhagen civil disobedience starts already…

20 December, 2009 by

Smash the State

Let’s hope this isn’t a sign of things to come. The first protest in response to the outcome of Copenhagen:

Environmentalists have chained themselves to a coal train and rail tracks in Newcastle in protest against the outcome of Copenhagen’s climate talks.

The 25 activists marched onto the tracks at the Kooragang coal export terminal about 9am (AEDT) on Sunday, stopping a train and occupying a bridge.

The action, organised by the environmental group Rising Tide, aims to shut down coal exports from Newcastle, the world’s busiest coal terminal.

Spokesman for the group Steve Phillips said the protest is an act of desperation after the UN climate talks in Copenhagen failed to produce a just, effective and legally binding treaty.

“The US, Australia and other wealthy countries wrecked the talks,” Mr Phillips told AAP.

“People are tired of seeing our leaders fail to address to problem of climate change – we want to undertake bold and long-lasting action.”

For some reason, some people, believing themselves to be on a crusade to save the planet, think that democracy just isn’t good enough. Throw away the key.

Read it here.

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