WIND FARMS BLOW ILL WIND FOR LOCAL COMMUNITIES
The North American experience of the establishment of wind farms has been challenging for local communities, energy consumers and those waiting for reductions in CO2 emissions. Power bills have risen, quality of life for local communities has fallen – all without any real reduction in emissions. This video from Canada tells a compelling story.
THE GREAT RENEWABLE ENERGY RORT
Kathy Russell from the Australian Landscape Guardians writes a compelling article on the need for a rigorous analysis of the alleged benefits of more wind farms.
Government has accepted, without due diligence, proposals put forward by vested interests that disadvantage the people with higher energy costs and little or no benefit for the environment.
The moral high ground taken by those in government and those initially in favour of turbines is that they are doing their bit for the environment – the data shows otherwise.
Why is anyone of sound mind supporting Renewable Energy Targets?
Article at Quadrant Online
RENEWABLE ENERGY – WHAT IT WILL REALLY COST
With the deferment of the Australian emissions trading scheme until at least 2013 renewable energy companies and advocates for a greater mandating of renewable energy use in Australia are ramping up their efforts to commit Australia to a changed energy mix.
This appears at face value to be a plausible policy path, if one were committed to the concept of reducing reliance on fossil fuels, until the economics and practicalities are subjected to scrutiny.
The proposal to mandate an increasing amount of Australian energy use to renewables is poor policy on the same scale as the failed emissions trading scheme and deserves the same scrutiny.
The following link is a paper prepared last month that examines the question in the American context; it is very comparable to the Australian discussion and experience. This link is to the U.S Energy Information Administration data referred to in the paper.
Only because it happens so infrequently, this link to a journalist’s mea culpa on wind farms is included. The original story relates to a big wind farm proposal for Massachusetts for which the stated cost of implementation tripled during the investigation process and wind energy costs blew out to four times the cost of conventional electricity.
AEF SUPPORTS VEGETATION LAW OVERHAUL
6 May 2010
The Australian Environment Foundation today backed the Senate Inquiry into Native Vegetation Laws recommendation to establish a “balance between maximising agricultural production and best practice conservation.” See media release
SCIENCE ON SOLID GROUND WITH GM FOOD
The Chief Scientist of Food Standards of Australia and New Zealand (FSANZ), Dr Paul Brent responds to criticisms of the regulatory approval process for GM food on ABC Bush Telegraph April 28th.
“It’s getting to the point where those people who object to GM foods have failed miserably to show any credible data that GM foods are unsafe”. Listen to the interview
Greenies use 'wilder nullius' to get their way in Cape York
Richie Ahmat, chairman of the Cape York Land Council
The Australian April 19, 2010
THE confrontation between the Aboriginal traditional owners of Cape York Peninsula and The Wilderness Society in relation to Queensland's Wild River laws is fundamental. If it is not resolved fairly and soon, it will be the beginning of a long war that our people will never abandon until justice is restored. (more)
Abbott's bill would reverse the injustice of Wild Rivers laws
Noel Pearson, 3 April 2010
THE Senate's legal and constitutional affairs committee this week started its inquiry into Tony Abbott's private member's bill, which seeks to override the Queensland government's Wild Rivers Act 2005. (More in The Australian.
We need a new paradigm for national parks
Max Rheese, 25 March 2010
The ever increasing expansion of the national parks estate across the country continues to provide fertile ground for conflict between users of public land, rural communities, environment groups and governments. (more)
ABC Beat Up
March 15, 2010
The ABC’s Australian Story episode entitled “Something in the Water”, which attacks Tasmania's plantation forestry and aquaculture industries, is biased and misleading according to forester Mark Poynter. See his article at On Line Opinion.
Dump Emissions Trading Scheme Now
09, February 2010
“The declining credibility of the UN’s science on climate should send a signal to the Rudd government that it’s time to fundamentally reconsider its approach to climate policy” said Alex Stuart, chairman of the Australian Environment Foundation. See AEF media release.
Lord Monckton tour begins
28 January 2010
Over 1200 people hear Christopher Monckton in Sydney as he begins his whistle stop tour of Australia. His main message to the audience was that the temperature rise in the 20th century was not unusual and that major cuts in CO2 emissions would have devastating costs. See the Australian Climate Science Coalition report.
See AEF media release, 27 January 2009.
Tour details
Environmentalists have crossed the Rubicon
Max Rheese
21 December 2009
Environmental advocacy in Australia is increasingly producing perverse environmental outcomes that are changing the way we live, largely as a result of political decisions for electoral gain. (more)
AEF 2009 Conference
Our Canberra Conference on October 20 was a great success and featured speakers on climate change, bush fires and population.
Account of the Conference
Conference Papers
Youtube presentations:
When are we going to wake up?
by Walter Starck
November 23, 2009
Six degrees and rising: I’ll call your 2 degrees and raise it to 6
The past few months has been a frustrating time for the climate change industry. Earlier in the year they were on a roll and it looked like a global treaty agreement at Copenhagen in December was a done deal. The heady scent of unprecedented power and money was palpable. Everyone on the bandwagon, activists, bureaucrats, researchers and entrepreneurs, were in high anticipation. But, as Copenhagen approached, unwelcome reality began to intrude on the dream. (more at Quadrant.)
W.A Liberal Addresses Conference on Climate
The opening address to the AEF Conference by West Australia Liberal Dr Dennis Jensen received coverage on ABC online. See Liberal MP rubbishes human link to climate change.
Also see our media release on the conference.
MUZZLED AUSTRALIANS GAIN A VOICE ON ETS
Sign on to the ListenToUs online petition The petition opposes the federal government’s “Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme” and will eventually be presented to Parliament by Dr Dennis Jensen, MHR for Tangney. See the AEF media release. Also see Dr Jensen's media release.
As well as signing the petition you can subscribe at the site to the ListenToUs campaign newsletter and also make a foundation investment in the campaign through PayPal.
We have so far raised over $20,000. Our target for the campaign against the Emission’s Trading Scheme is $30,000.
Here is another voice coming out against ETS. Read the transcript of Barnaby Joyce on ABC Lateline 24 February 2009. (He is the head of the Nationals in the Senate.)
Save the Environment, Stop the Emissions Trading Scheme
Dear Friends and Colleagues,
Request for Financial Support to Stop the Emissions Trading Scheme
At our recent conference and AGM in Canberra, members decided that the best thing we could do as an organisation for the environment over the next year would be to oppose the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS).
You might well ask why an environment group would oppose such a scheme. Well, for three reasons:
1. An ETS will not change the global temperature;
2. It will force many clean and green Australian industries overseas; and
3. It will make Australians poor, but it is richer, not poorer nations, that are generally better able to protect their natural environment.
Last week the Minister for Climate Change and Water, Penny Wong, said that the Australian government would take the global economic slowdown into account with its plans for carbon trading, but said there was no reason to push back start dates.
I wish she would also take some of the science into consideration!
Indeed the proposed trading scheme represents a major intervention in to the Australian economy with absolutely no chance of changing global temperatures let alone preventing the feared ‘climate crisis’.
It is bad economics, it is bad science and the associated policies are bad for the environment.
On July 14 this year, just before Minister Wong released The Government’s Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme Green Paper, she stood with the Prime Minister Kevin Rudd on the banks of the Hume Dam and suggested that by embracing Emissions Trading, Australians could somehow make it rain in the Murray Darling Basin. (Interview)
Ridiculous statements continue to be made by politicians and lobbyists in the media and attempts to correct them are mostly just ignored. For example, on Monday, Dr Dennis Jensen MP was denied the opportunity to table information in federal parliament showing that many of the current problems facing the Murray Darling Basin are the result of low runoff as a consequence of changed land management practices (including more plantations in the top of catchments), catchment-wide drainage management plans (place in the 1980s and 1990s to lower water tables) and more efficient water use (resulting in less leakage). He explained that it was wrong to blame climate change because there had been no long term decline in rainfall in the Basin, yet the data which shows this was not permitted to be provided to our elected representatives.
Also on Monday, but in the Senate, Ron Boswell spoke against a proposed tax deduction for establishing carbon sinks. The Senator asked the question “If we put 40 million hectares of land into new forestry, where on earth do we put those millions of kangaroos that we’re supposed to farm according to [Professor Ross] Garnaut?” More seriously, if 40 million hectares goes under plantation forestry as proposed by the federal government to fight climate change and offset emissions, there will be even less water for our rivers and streams.
There are a lot of politicians and journalists, as well as ordinary Australians who know that much of what is currently being proposed in the name of stopping climate change is absurd, but there is no organised campaign putting the alternative perspective.
An AEF member, Professor Bob Carter, recently commented to me, “One of the things that I find most troublesome is the degree to which the public airwaves and print channels are filled by people propagating ritualistic, often irrational, emotional views. To what degree this is caused by systematic activity by Green groups or their acolytes, I can't judge, but the result is the same regardless of what the balance of genuine: zealot contributors might be. It is that public opinion still appears to be utterly captivated by AGW dogma. This, of course, is the same perception that all MPs still have, for the Greens make very sure that every communication channel that they can command delivers the alarmist message to MPs.”
The internet is increasingly recognised as an important medium for networking and campaigning. It is a medium for getting an alternative message to a large audience. A dedicated and custom built campaigning website can make it easy for an online community to quickly find their local media and local member and send them a message – as well as encouraging their friends, colleagues and family to send a message.
The AEF needs to build and run a dedicated campaigning website that will initially be used to campaign against the ETS.
If you can make a financial contribution, please go to our website and donate through the PayPal facility using your credit card. Alternatively send a cheque to the Australian Environment Foundation, PO Box 274, Deakin West, ACT 2600.
If you need more information contact Max Rheese (info@aefweb.info, tel. 03 5762 6883)
Make a Donation, Save the Environment, Stop the Emissions Trading Scheme!
Kind regards,
Jennifer Marohasy
Australian Environment Foundation
RIVER RED GUM FOREST INVESTIGATION
The Rivers & Red Gum Environment Alliance launched its alternative plan to the Victorian Environmental Assessment Council [VEAC] proposals for the River Red Gum Forests of the Murray River at the Victorian Parliament on Thursday July 31st 2008.
The AEF is one of the 25 organisations that make up the Alliance and contributed to the compilation of the report.
The major recommendation of the Alliance Conservation & Community Plan is the creation of 104,700 hectares of Ramsar Reserves to allow for multiple use management of the forests and a higher level of biodiversity conservation. Read more on the launch and the Alliance plan here
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Organic food loses the high-ground
An article by AEF member David Leyonhjelm published in the Business Spectator 3 June 2010
LISTEN TO US CAMPAIGN SUCCESS
AEF’s first campaign on our ListenToUs website, to oppose the proposed Emissions Trading Scheme, has achieved a significant milestone in the deferral of the legislation until 2013.
The recognition that this legislation did not have the support of the people no doubt was the reality that led to this historic backdown. This is all the more significant given that AEF was almost alone in its opposition to this poor policy in early 2009 when big business, trade unions, many politicians, media and trade associations supported the legislation in some format.
In the end poor policy – for all the rhetoric – is still poor policy and should be condemned.
Thank You to all who supported the campaign to this point.
Reefgate on the Barrier Reef
29 March 2010
Marine scientist Walter Starck disputes the case made by the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority for reducing no fishing areas on the Reef. See Quadrant Online.
Do-gooders hop on kangaroo-cull bandwagon
Barry Cohen (former Labor Federal minister and former AEF Chairman), March 20, 2010
The British 440,000 Joeys campaign is a long-distance exercise in hypocrisy and ignorance. See article in The Australian.
Don Burke receives Australia Day Honor
Former AEF Chairman, Don Burke was awarded an OAM in the Australia Day Honors List. The award was given for services to conservation, the environment and the media.
The board and members of AEF warmly congratulate our fellow member and hard working chairman on this recognition of his services to the community.
Less than Half Support an ETS
See AEF media release
Listen to Max Rhees interviewed on 2GB
Aboriginal people in Cape York threatened by "Wild Rivers"
See Noel Pearson's article in the The Australian 16 January 2010
In The Australian January 30, NT Aboriginal leader Galarrwuy Yunupingu gives his support to the traditional owners of Cape York and tells how the people of northeast Arnhem Land are successfully harnessing their forestry resources despite the opposition of the green movement.
What does the Temperature Record Show?
There has been a 10 degree variation over the last six millions years and it was two to three degrees warmer three and a half to six million years ago.
Professor Bob Carter discusses the past and present temperature record in this YouTube extract from the talk he has been giving Australia-wide.
Part of the same presentation also appeared on a Four Corners program screened on November 9th.
Scientists 'crying wolf' over coral
A senior marine researcher, Professor Peter Ridd, has accused Australian scientists of "crying wolf" over the threat of climate change to the Great Barrier Reef, exposing deep division about its vulnerability. See Scientists 'crying wolf' over coral and How blue is your reef? in The Australian 19 December 2009.
SENATE HAS VOTED IN THE NATIONAL INTEREST
December 2, 2009
The Australian Environment Foundation applauds the senate vote against the legislation to introduce a flawed emissions trading scheme that will have no measurable benefit to the environment.
“This costly scheme is nothing more than a tax on energy that will make Australians poorer” said Alex Stuart, chairman of the AEF.
See AEF Media Release
News Update
Logging disputes at the mercy of public opinion
October 7, 2009
Disputes over logging are often hijacked by sentiment instead of facts, says Mark Poynter from the Institute of Foresters of Australia. See Age article.
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Green Black Alliance Fractures in Sunshine State
September 17, 2009
Cape York Aboriginal Communities have decided to take on legal advice on Anna Bligh's Wild Rivers legislation. Aboriginal elders fear the legislation, to be enacted at the bidding of the Wilderness Society, will prevent Aboriginal communities from utilising their traditional lands.
See Wiki lawyers take on rivers battle.
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Whistle stop tour on Climate and ETS
Thursday 13 August 2009
Acting AEF chairman, Alex Stuart and several members attended a presentation in Sydney last night at which about 50 people were present along with SBS. The presentation was given by Professor Bob Carter and Dr Jay Lehr, science director of the Heartland Institute in the U.S.
Bob Carter, Jay Lehr and Max Rheese have done a whistle stop tour of Melbourne, Perth, Sydney and Brisbane over the last week to talk to as many audiences as possible ahead of the senate vote today and bring media attention to the issue of the ETS and how the government is dealing with climate change.
Bob Carter did a side trip to Canberra yesterday to brief parliamentarians at the invitation of Senator Steve Fielding. (See press report.)
The tour, run by the Australian Climate Science Coalition, has received quite good coverage from ABC Lateline, ABC radio, Sky News, Brisbane Courier Mail.
Real heat generated by vested interests by Dr Lehr was published in the Brisbane Courier Mail.
The defeat of the ETS legislation in the senate today has given the forces of reason 3 more months to encourage debate on the issue - so the more support for the online petition at ListenToUs the better.
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Forester and AEF member Mark Poynter in On Line Opinion reports on how scientists with close connections to the Wilderness Society have coordinated their research with a campaign to remove the timber industry from Australian forests.
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At talks presented in Bendigo, Shepparton and Albury, AEF member Professor Bob Carter gets the message across that Australia has nothing to gain but a lot to lose from the Emissions Trading Scheme. See regional press reports here and here.
AEF speaks out on global warming in The Australian
An advertisement was placed in The Australian on Tuesday June 9th to draw attention to the ListenToUs campaign opposed to the introduction of an Emissions Tradinng Scheme.
Do yourself, the economy and the enivironment a favour, go to www.listentous.org.au to sign the petition or send an e-postcard to Senators in your state.
The background theme for the advertisement were all the ridiculous claims attributed to global warming listed at John Brignell's Numberwatch website.
THE Great Barrier Reef (GBR) is in excellent shape
Farming and other human activity are not killing the reef, according to James Cook University's reef scientist, and AEF board member, Professor Peter Ridd. Read the interview in the North Queensland Register.
Senator Fielding now a climate realist
See AEF media release
Stop the Emissions Trading Scheme!
Send your Senators an eCard
The ETS bill is in the House of Representatives and will shortly go to the Senate.
It would be difficult to justify an emissions trading scheme (ETS) that imposed large costs for purely symbolic benefit during a period of prosperity - it is absurd to consider as much during a financial crisis.
Send the Senators in your state a Listen To Us eCard to let them know how you feel. There are three cards with the following captions:
- This faulty carbon trading scheme will cost, and won't pay.
- Bad policy and bad science do NOT cancel out.
- Don't waste dollars! Spend them on renewable energy research.
An Inconvenient Truth for forest protestors - No Old Growth Logs used here
Calton Frame from Gunns defends their proposed pulp mill in an ABC Online Opinion piece (May 21st 2009)
Fossil Fuels Fail To Explain Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide Levels
(AEF media release 14 April 2009)
The Australian Environment Foundation today welcomed new research by Australian physicist, Dr Tom Quirk, suggesting natural environmental forces, more than just fossil fuel emissions, could be contributing to the elevated levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide [CO2].
“Most CO2 from fossil fuels is emitted in the northern hemisphere and it takes at least six months to spread to the southern hemisphere, which means that concentrations in the northern hemisphere should go up before they do in the southern hemisphere. In fact, they go up simultaneously, which suggests that manmade CO2 emissions are not the only contributor to the rise in global CO2 and there must be some other source. More
Australian Bushfire Management: a case study in wisdom versus folly
In his recent speech, Chairman of The Bushfire Front and AEF member, Roger Underwood makes clear what is wrong with our approach to bush fires - environmentalists and emergency services have the ear of government and this has lead to a serious neglect of preventive measures such as fuel reduction.
NEWS UPDATES
Lessons not yet learned: a bushfire tragedy
Apart from the terrible human and animal suffering from the continuing bushfire crisis in Victoria, the tragedy of this event is the failure of public land managers to heed lessons already learned from past holocausts. More
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An unsustainable future - Dr Tom Quirk
"Policy for reducing carbon dioxide emissions now appears to be double-barrelled with a target for renewable sources for electricity generation with government subsidies and a carbon tax in the form of an emissions trading scheme. Neither approach appears to be realistic, possible or even plausible." Read the rest of the article at On Line Opinion.
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The Victorian Government's plans for the Murray River forests increase fire risks says AEF Executive Director Max Rheese. See The Australian (13-2-2009).
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"Bushfire management: where to from here" On Line Opinion article by Roger Underwood (AEF member)
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Australia Lacks Capacity to Meet Carbon Reduction Targets. AEF media release
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Declaring four new national parks in northern Victoria is not the way to protect the Murray and its associated red gum forests according to Mark Poynter, a member of the Institute of Foresters of Australia and the AEF. See his article in the The Age of January 2: As red gum forests turn green.
Max Rheese makes a similar point in a letter in The Australian of January 4.
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GetUp’s global warming television ads are dishonest and inaccurate See AEF Media Release.
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This editorial in The Australian on Dec 17th 2008 highlights how badly the Fourth Estate have let the Australian public down “….naive, prone to hyperbole on environmental issues, ideologically blinkered and lacking logic and analysis skills”
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Friends of the Reef not worried about global warming
"THE Greens reckon the Great Barrier Reef is a casualty of Labor's lower-than-expected emissions reduction target, but for those who work among the corals, forecasts aren't so bleak." The Australian Dec 17th 2008.
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Professor Bob Carter on YouTube: Science & social context of climate change
(From our 2008 Conference)
ECHUCA RALLY OPPOSES VEAC’S RED GUM PROPOSALS
A Public Land Rights Rally was held in Echuca on October 5th 2008 to protest against the Victorian Environmental Assessment Council proposals for the red gum forests of the Murray River.
2000 marchers, a number of them AEF members, blocked the traffic in High Street Echuca and brought the town to a standstill. Local people and visitors alike clapped and cheered as the march led by dozens of Barmah cattlemen on their horses proceeded to the local park to hear speakers denounce the proposals that if implemented will see selective timber harvesting, controlled grazing and campfires in the holiday period all banned from new parks.
Nearby state forests at Nyah are already declining in health, even though grazing has been excluded for only six years. Parasitic native cherry, Exocarpus strictus is sweeping through the forest and forming dense stands, affecting the vigour of the red gums.
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