Climate action network meetings
6pm, alternate Wednesdays (15/8, 29/8, etc)
School of Arts Building, level 2, 166 Ann St Brisbane
An opportunity for climate action groups to get together, network, share resources and ideas and plan joint activities.
Next meeting is the 29th August.
For further details, contact James 0431 150 928
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Climate Action Network Meetings
Rally Calls For Climate Change
From Brisbane Times
Scott Casey
More than 1000 people braved the rain in Brisbane today to join politicians and community campaigners in the annual Walk Against Warming rally.
The march was a loud and colourful affair with African drums rumbling along the length of the protest and chants decrying nuclear power and fossil fuels echoing through the city.
Leading the march was Greens Leader Bob Brown and Democrats Queensland Senator Andrew Bartlett, Brisbane City Council's Cr Helen Abrahams along with a host of candidates for the next election from the Greens and Democrats.
The turnout was down on predictions of 5000 people with organisers blaming the weather, while commenting that rain usually is associated with the Walk Against Warming.
"It's a walk that people listen to and it's a walk that gets that message across about more climate action."
The walk aims to increase public awareness of climate change and to encourage people to place pressure on government to undertake more action on a range of climate change related initiatives.
Read More......
Monday, August 27, 2007
Walk Against Warming 2007
This was the third annual Walk Against Warming, although today was the unofficial Brisbane (Queensland, Australia) event. The official WAW 2007, which will be held in all major Australian centers is 2 weeks before the Federal Election. This hasn't been called yet so the date has not yet been determined.
There was approximately 3000 people participating in the walk. Most of them made it to the River Stage to listen to speakers and entertainment though didn't seem to stick around till the end.
It was a good day. The guest speakers included:
- Bob Brown - Greens Senator
- Andrew Bartlett - Democrats Senator
- Don Henry - Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF) Executive Director
- Claire Moore - Federal Labor Senator
- Helen Abrahams - Brisbane City Council (Labor)
As expected, the Liberal / National parties (the Coalition) didn't turn up as they know they would have been heckled over the lies they'd have to tell to cover up that they don't have any policies to address climate change in any realistic way.
See the photos on National Enquirer's Flickr site. Read More......
Gorillas slaughtered
July 27, 2007
From UNESCO
This is not directly about climate change but about the same attitudes that have gone into causing climate change. This is a story about the slaughter of the a dwindling population of Mountain Gorillas. Seven have been killed this year. This is about pure human selfishness
From New Scientist:
The animals were not killed for their meat. Conservationists describe the killings as "executions - bullets to the head". One theory is that the gorillas are victims of a conflict between those locals who see them as the basis for a tourist trade, and others who want them gone so they can use the forests to fuel a booming trade in charcoal.
Sound familiar?
Read the first article.
Read the second article.
Read More......
Friday, August 24, 2007
Media Lens: On corporate journalism on Heathrow's Climate Camp
August 23, 2007
From Media Lens
This is a Media Lens discussion of the Heathrow Climate Camp and Corporate Media. The Heathrow Climate Camp is a group of concerned people camped outside Heathrow to raise awareness of the damage that the expansion of the airport (and corresponding significant increase in aircraft) will cause to the people in surrounding suburbs and to the atmosphere through emissions.
The mainstream media is attacking this as an exclusive club who just cause people to turn away from this message. The Media Lens article attacks mainstream media for their double standards and support of corporations who do this and more including encouraging and causing damage to our planet.
The corporation is one of the most totalitarian organisations imaginable: control is strictly top-down with zero public input and minimal staff input flowing back up the chain of command. As the Canadian lawyer Joel Bakan has noted, the corporate motivation is essentially “psychopathic”: all concerns, values, motivations are subordinated to the bottom line of maximised profits as a matter of legal obligation. That’s what you are part of.
As for being taken seriously, your diatribe against the climate camp tells its own story. When has a corporate journalist ever railed in this manner against the restrictions imposed by the US/UK military in Iraq, against the control freaks of New Labour, against the taboo on discussing their advertisers‘ products and services?
Your piece is a good example of how respect is reserved for the powerful, while the powerless are considered fair game to be patronised and in effect told off with impunity. It’s all part of the great myth of balanced professional journalism. It turns out that ‘balanced’ is that which does not offend powerful interests. You are very much part of the corporate media problem, John. The sooner we all wake up to this, the better.
...
Read the article.
Read More......
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
130 jobs lost at wind turbine factory - Federal Govt to blame
August 22, 2007
From News.com.au
"The reason why Vestas has been unable to continue its operations in Portland is very squarely and directly as a result of the federal government's refusal to extend its renewable energy scheme to allow the industry to expand," he said on the ABC.
MORE than 130 manufacturing jobs will be lost in southwestern Victoria with a wind turbine blade factory set to close.
Vestas Wind Energy will close its Portland blade factory by the end of the year, saying it is not profitable enough.
"Vestas is regrettably compelled to close down its blade factory in Portland, Australia, effective from the year end," the Danish-based company's website said.
"The factory is not of a sufficient size to ensure satisfactory profitability, and the market outlook for Australia makes it impossible to expand the facility."
Opposition spokesman for regional development Denis Napthine said the factory closure was a bitter blow for the 136 workers and made a mockery of the state Government's promise of wind-energy jobs for country Victoria.
"It's absolutely imperative that the Brumby Government gets off its backside, gets down to Portland, talks to Vestas about keeping the factory open and keeping those jobs in Portland," he said on ABC radio.
"If they need assistance to grow the factory, to make it more efficient, the Government should assist."
Victorian Industry Minister Theo Theophanous has blamed the Commonwealth for failing to invest in renewable energy.
"The reason why Vestas has been unable to continue its operations in Portland is very squarely and directly as a result of the federal government's refusal to extend its renewable energy scheme to allow the industry to expand," he said on the ABC.
AWU state secretary Cesar Melhem also took aim at the Federal Government, citing its lack of vision and support for renewable energy.
"(Prime Minister) John Howard likes to say he is a good friend of the worker, but his Government fails time and time again to actually support the retention of good Aussie jobs," Mr Melhem said.
"Australians would much prefer to have their governments investing in local industries that provide good jobs and products, rather than having jobs sent offshore and poor quality goods imported."
Read the article.
Read More......
Tuesday, August 21, 2007
Bob Brown's Brilliance
On the recent "scandle" where the Australian Labor Party leader, Kevin Rudd (and likely next Prime Minister), got drunk in New York and went to a strip club, Bob Brown, the Australian Green's leader said:
"Four years ago Kevin Rudd got drunk and took himself into a strip club," Senator Brown said.
"Four years ago John Howard, sober, took Australia into the Iraq war.
See News article.
Read More......
Saturday, August 18, 2007
The Big Switch
The Big Switch
Turn your thoughts into action with The Big Switch.
The Queensland Conservation Council, along with Australia's other peak non-government environmental organisations, supports the Big Switch.
Our Big Switch team is available to speak with community groups in the Brisbane electorates of Brisbane, Bonner, Bowman, Moreton and Griffith.
We can provide support including print materials and help you communicate with candidates and the media.
We will be actively involved in coordinating the Walk Against Warming (two weeks before the election) and other community events in these five electorates. And we're actively recruiting to our campaign team.
Monday, August 13, 2007
Walk Against Warming
Walk Against Warming
12.30pm, Saturday August 25th
Meet at Queens Park (cnr George and Elizabeth Sts). Procession to Riverstage, Botanic Gardens
Walk Against Warming brings together Australians for a community day of action on climate change. It’s been held annually since 2005 when 20,000 people walked in 17 locations nationwide. This quintupled last year with almost 100,000 people taking to the streets in 28 locations across Australia!
This year, this momentum will continue. We’re hoping Brisbane citizens turn out to send a clear message to our political leaders – that the community wants bolder and more effective government action on climate change… and we want it now!
The national Walk Against Warming will be held 2 weeks before the election. Brisbane is having its own Walk Against Warming on Saturday August 25th from 12.30pm at Queens Park. From there, we’ll walk to Riverstage at the Botanic Gardens for entertainment and speakers. We’re inviting people to bring a picnic and message on an umbrella or windmill and stay to hear more about this important issue and learn what you you can do to make a difference.
You can get more information and/or volunteer to help on the day by emailing Dom at info@qccqld.org.au or phoning 07 3221 0188.
Saturday, August 04, 2007
Discussion: Deforestation and Climate Change
This post comes from a recent email discussion with friends and family about Gunns - Old Growth Forest destroyers and ExxonMobil - the climate change deniers and denier funder.
It started when I forwarded a Wilderness Society email asking us to support the discontinuation of land clearing. Michael my brother in law replied and I replied back. Michael seemed to think that the fans at Live Earth who left all their rubbish were far more destructive than Gunns or ExxonMobil. These companies are two of the biggest offenders in environmental damage and this post is a hope that people will see them for what they are and make moves to bring them down. Gunns rule Tasmania (Australia) and all the people and businesses on that island. They are destroying everything and the politicians are letting them.
Michael Linke wrote:
Ahh Brooke....are you going to have kids? Are your friends, colleagues etc etc, so where are all these extra people going to live, get jobs, wear clothes etc etc. consumerism is here to stay because populations will continue to grow.
The worlds pop will be 9 BILLION by 2020. That’s 9 Billion poos a day! 9 Billion pairs of underpants, 9 Billion people who need to eat, it has to come from somewhere.
The only real solution is ZPG, which the catholic church opposes, so where does the real problem lie!!! Ahh an interesting debate at Christmas time I should think!
We cant continue to blame the “conglomerates”, they are simply meeting demand. A kid today has no idea where a carrot comes from, so he wont grow it, he will buy it!
I agree we all need to do something to reduce our footprint, but that is all we can really do, the blame game needs to stop and we as individuals need to change our lives, and not add to it.
Did you see the rubbish let after the live earth concerts, land fill, human garbage, not the Microsoft's and exxon’s, not the Gunns’, but people like you and me, zero respect, zero real understanding of the issue. That who we need to change.
M
Hi Michael,
Thankyou for this opportunity to talk about two of the destructive companies in the world. This is also an opportunity to provide you with perspective.
I'm casting this discussion a bit wider to include the receivers of the original email. It is important not to be defeated which is what you are sounding. Or perhaps you don't see this as your problem but mine and the group of environmentalists I share the same views with. These viewpoints are not from someone, for example who wants independence for their nation - a big and important topic affecting many people but not everyone. This topic of the environmental damage being caused is everyone's problem and we collectively have to do everything we can to stop it.
You say:
The worlds pop will be 9 BILLION by 2020. That’s 9 Billion poos a day! 9 Billion pairs of underpants, 9 Billion people who need to eat, it has to come from somewhere.
...
Did you see the rubbish let after the live earth concerts, land fill, human garbage, not the Microsoft's and exxon’s, not the Gunns’, but people like you and me, zero respect, zero real understanding of the issue. That who we need to change.
The planet *can* support 9 billion + people but not at the current rates of environmental destruction, and yes the attitudes shown are pretty terrible (it happens at every large public gathering). So yes, it is important to change people's attitudes and that can come from both angles - with the companies changing the way they operate to help set a good example, and from the grass roots up. But in comparing the attendees at Live Earth and the two companies mentioned, please consider the following.
Imagine a hillside of Old Growth forest supporting a rich and varied web of life. Trees that have been there for 400 years or more, native animals everywhere, a diverse range of other trees, plants, lichens, moses ... Now see that completely decimated - loggers move in with large equipment and rip out most of the Old Growth trees. Once that is gone the hillside is burnt to the ground to clean up the leftovers, destroying any homes the animals that lived there may have been able to find. Then a monoculture plantation goes down, row after row. 8020 poison is spread by helicopter or light plane to kill any wildlife that comes into the area to feed on the new seedlings. This is what is done in Tasmania at 40 football fields a day (*). Gunns and the "Public" (Govt) Tasmanian Forestry Industry are responsible for this.
(*) - In an email discussion with Michael on 15/2/2006 I provided him with evidence of "40 football fields a day" since he didn't believe it. This came from a direct quote from John Gay (MD of Gunns). That article is now no longer available (how surprising!). I could trawl through their company reports though I'll leave this an exercise for you.
See the following:
http://www.sprol.com/?s=pulping+tasmania
http://www.wilderness.org.au/campaigns/corporate/gunns/whatisgunn/
http://forestrytasmania.com/ - sounds of the forest dying
http://www.wilderness.org.au/campaigns/forests/tasmania/taxpayers_prop/ - taxpayers prop up old growth logging (IT DOESN'T EVEN MAKE ANY MONEY!)
http://www.wilderness.org.au/campaigns/forests/ - TWS Forests campaign
http://www.discover-tasmania.com/financial_review.html - has the following quotes which should make you feel pretty sick:
I didn't mean to kill all of them. But that's what I was doing. We had been feeding the animals, mostly wallabies, wombats and possums, the good carrots for two weeks. Then, on the third week, the boss covered the carrots in 1080 and told us to make sure everything was dead when we finished. Everything was dead, all right."
...
It is the only state that has made its corporatised forestry department, Forestry Tasmania, exempt from the Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act, the Threatened Species Act, the Freedom of Information Act, and the state's own Resource Management and Planning System. And, bizarrely, Tasmania is the only state that sets out to poison its native animals.
Deforestation relates heavily to climate change, the biggest threat to our modern civilisation.
http://asia.news.yahoo.com/070323/kyodo/d8o23ef80.html - cost in greenhouse gases of deforestation in indonesia
http://news.mongabay.com/2005/1210-fao.html - deforestation causes 25% of greenhouse gases (GHG)
http://www.nationalgeographic.com/eye/deforestation/effect.html - National Geographic - 80% of earth's forests have been destroyed
http://www.umich.edu/~gs265/society/deforestation.htm - why trees matter
We've put man on the moon, we can get around the need for the causes of deforestation. It just takes political will, which will be led by the people. The companies responsible have to stop immediately. We will all die if this doesn't change. This is not independance for a nation, this is what keeps us alive.
Now onto ExxonMobil, one company most people who have any knowledge about what they have done would like to put in a vat of boiling oil. One of the biggest reasons why the world has not so readily accepted the climate change science is due to the denial that went along with the science. Denial that presented junk science to try to debunk the true science of climate change (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science to understand the difference). Most, if not all denial, was funded by ExxonMobil. Each day that our greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are not reduced below the sustainable level has made it that much harder to reach the target. We should have been making changes 10 years ago when the Kyoto protocol was drawn up. It is companies such as ExxonMobil and governments such as the Bush and Howard governments (I'll send information out on this soon) that may have changed life in the future more than it ever would have had to have been. Specifically looking at Exxon-Mobil:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2006/sep/19/ethicalliving.g2 - The denial industry
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2006/sep/20/oilandpetrol.business - Royal Society tells Exxon: stop funding climate change denial
http://www.ucsusa.org/assets/documents/global_warming/exxon_report.pdf - Union Of Concerned Scientists report on the ExxonMobil tactics in its denial
Gunns and ExxonMobil are only two companies on this planet that should be made to cease and decist. Read around and you'll learn of many others.
To round off your list, you mentioned Microsoft. Despite their bad and possibly society damaging behaviours that we are all accustomed to hearing about, they are nowhere near on my radar compared to the practices of such companies as the ones described above.
People may want to be happy and may think I'm a bit of a downer. No doubt true though we have to face the facts and someone has to say it. Everyone has to do everything they can to change the trends that are driving the world. Things you can do:
- Reduce the amount of fossil fuels you use - drive less (catch public transport, ride a bike or just walk) and reduce your energy consumption. Don't buy it if you don't need it, and turn it off if you don't need it on.
- Reduce the amount of paper you use. Use recycled paper if you have to. See the http://www.summitrecycling.org/html/prere.html (precycling) message.
- The number one thing is to vote for a political party who are dealing with the
environmental problems realistically. The coalition government has to date not only denied global warming but has sought to undermine any efforts world wide to make changes. I will send more information about this out soon. They do not understand the problems we face. They haven't even set a true policy - they have not provided targets that we need to meet. They won't do this "until after the federal election". Basically they want to continue doing nothing. Infact, Howard is teaming up with Bush to try to continue to deny the problem and keep doing business as usual. War was not enough for Howard (Bonsai - Little Bush). If you need to see Australia take action about climate change then do not vote for the coalition. This election issue is bigger than industrial relations, interest rates or issues that have been important in the past. No party is so wrong on these things. But the coalitions attitude to the environmental problems which faces us IS WRONG.
All feedback and comments welcome.
Cheers,
Brooke
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