Category: Archive

Recently released estimates from Federal Treasury reveal a spike in the cost of fringe benefits tax concessions for company cars – costing the taxpayer billions of dollars annually. More alarmingly, the concession rate per vehicle actually increases the more kilometres logged.

These concessions contribute unnecessarily and unacceptably to increased greenhouse gas pollution and urban traffic congestion.

According to the Treasury estimates, in the past five years the concessions have been costing us between $410 and $750 million dollars more per year than was previously thought – an increase of more than 70 per cent for some years.

Treasury predicts that by 2009-10 we will be spending over $2 billion per year subsidising the use of company cars. That’s nearly twice the original estimate.

Other tax estimates have also increased. For the 2008-09 year, the estimated value of aviation fuel tax incentives has increased $70 million to $900 million, and for the same period the value of tax incentives for the production of condensate by petroleum and gas companies has leaped from $250 million to $320 million.

“These tax breaks are economically senseless, reward environmentally destructive behaviour and increase taxes that the rest of us have to pay. There are much better uses for $2 billion than to hand it out to affluent corporate executives as an incentive to buy cars and drive them as much as possible to get the maximum tax benefit,” says ACF’s strategies director Charles Berger.

“Dismantling this fiscally irresponsible, environmentally destructive fringe benefits tax-break for company cars should be tackled by the new Government in its first Budget.

“It is astonishing that even estimates of past tax breaks for polluting activities have increased so dramatically. The revised estimates call into question the reliability and usefulness of public and government information about tax policy.”

From the University of Wollongong  

University of Wollongong scientists have made an exciting discovery that enables processing and fabrication of an abundant form of carbon with extraordinary properties.

Results of the discovery are being released in the prestigious international journal, Nature (Nanotechnology), on Monday January 28 (AEST).

Director of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Electromaterials Science (ACES), Professor Gordon Wallace, said results already indicated that the discovery would lead to advances in energy conversion (new transparent electrodes for solar cells) , energy storage (new electrodes for batteries — especially flexible batteries) and as new electrodes in medical bionics.

The discovery was led by QE2 Fellow in ACES/Intelligent Polymer Research Institute, Dr Dan Li. Other collaborators included recent Fulbright Fellow at the University of Wollongong, Professor Ric Kanar, who hails from UCLA in the United States, and University of Wollongong PhD student, Benjamin Mueller.

The Nature (Nanotechnology) paper is titled, ‘Processable aqueous dispersions of graphene nanosheets’. Graphene — a carbon-based nanomaterial known for its unique electronic, thermal and mechanical properties — can form stable dispersions in water without the need for additional chemical stabilisers. The researchers’ findings will have practical implications for the development of coatings to reduce static build-up on materials.

Graphene is the name given to the individual sheets of carbon, just one atom thick, that stack together to form graphite. Keeping graphene sheets separate from one another is a difficult task because they tend to stick together, forming larger structures that are not particularly useful. However, now the UOW team, using a sequence of chemical reactions, has shown how aqueous dispersions of well-separated graphene sheets can be made from graphite — an abundant and inexpensive starting material.

Rather than relying on either polymer or surfactant stabilisers, their approach maximises the electrostatic charge on the graphene sheets, ensuring that they repel one another instead of clumping together.

Professor Wallace said that this low-cost approach offers the potential for large-scale production of stable graphene colloids that can be processed using well-established solution-based techniques — such as filtration or spraying — to make conductive films.

“In addition to antistatic coatings, these materials are expected to have applications in flexible transparent electronics, high-performance composites and nanomedicine,” he said.

The United Arab Emirates have announced plans for an all-new, zero carbon desert city – seven square kilometres of carless utopia designed to house 50,000 people. The project – dubbed Masdar ("the source") – is being designed by UK architect Lord Foster, and is described as ‘the world’s first sustainable city’. Much of its energy needs will be provided by solar solutions, while careful planning will help protect the inhabitatants from the 50°C summer heat.

Foster senior partner Gerard Evenden said: "It’s extremely ambitious. We were invited to design a zero-carbon city. In this harsh place we needed to look back at history and see how ancient settlements had adapted to their environments."

The city will be aligned north-east to south-west to give the optimum balance of sunlight and shade. Buildings will be limited to five storeys, and packed around narrow streets no more than 3 metres wide and 70 metres long to develop a micro-climate and keep the air moving.

Additional cooling will be provided by wind towers which will harness the desert breeze and flush out hot air.

The whole of Masdar is designed on a three-level concept, one housing a light railway to connect the city with nearby Abu Dhabi, a second reserved for pedestrians, with a third set aside for ‘personalised rapid transport pods’, described by Evenden as ‘little vehicles like driverless personal taxis which run on tracks or magnetic discs in the road’.

He added: "It’s a tried technology. They are in production in Holland, and used to move containers around in Rotterdam port."

On a more practical level, Evenden said: "We will start with a large solar power station which will provide the energy to construct the city. Some 80 per cent of all the roof space will be used to generate solar power, and because we expect technology to improve as we are building it, we hope we will later be able to remove the power plant. We could ‘borrow’ energy from outside, but we are trying to prove it can all be generated in the confines of the site."

While Abu Dhabi is the world’s richest city, with each of its 420,000 inhabitants worth a nominal $17m, they are responsible for more greenhouse gas emissions per capita than any other population in the world, according to the Guardian newspaper.

In an attempt to clean up its act, the UAE is this week expected to announce a $500m deal to manufacture thin-film solar panels, elevating Masdar to a "centre of the global solar energy manufacturing industry".

Jean-Paul Jeanrenaud, head of WWF’s One Planet Living initiative, enthused: "This will be the global capital of the renewable energy revolution. It’s the first oil producing nation to have taken such a significant step towards sustainable living."

However, Tony Juniper, director of Friends of the Earth, cautioned: "The numbers must be put into perspective. They are spending welcome billions of dollars on renewables but trillions are still going into climate-changing oil economies. The future is the Sun and renewables, and there is no time to wait for this revolution."

Sir Paul in NASA concert

NASA will beam The Beatles’ song, "Across the Universe," into deep space Monday in an unprecedented long distance dedication by the U.S. agency.

THE federal Government is committed to a short-term goal to slash greenhouse-gas emissions, despite warnings from a key adviser.

The government has promised to set a short-term target after considering a report from economist Professor Ross Garnaut, who it has asked to examine the economic costs of tackling climate change. Professor Garnaut is due to deliver his report in the second half of this year.

Senator Wong said tackling climate change was a crucial issue for the US, regardless of who becomes the next president.

Australia faces some significant environmental challenges in the coming year. Despite what we know about climate change, our greenhouse emissions are still rising, urban and rural Australians face worsening water shortages and the condition of our inland rivers remains dire.

The Murray from the air

ACF believes Australia’s most pressing environmental problems in 2008 are to:

• Establish a strong, national, science-based 2020 target to reduce Australia’s emissions.

• Play a leadership role internationally, making sure the United Nations’ Bali roadmap helps the world avoid dangerous climate change. Click here for Bali roadmap scorecard

• Bring the Murray-Darling basin back to health through buying water from willing sellers and returning it to the environment.

• Set water use and water recycling targets and introduce water audits for large agricultural, industrial and commercial water users to improve efficiency and cut waste.

• Recognise the value of Australia’s old growth forests – and set a timetable to end the destructive logging of old growth forests.

• Recognise – at Federal, State and Territory levels – the role Indigenous Australians play in conservation, especially in Northern Australia.

• Work with our neighbours in the region – especially Indonesia and Papua New Guinea – to end the destruction of tropical rainforests, the lungs of the Earth, by banning imports of illegally logged timber and supporting an effective, internationally recognised timber certification scheme.

• Put Australia on the path to long term sustainability by establishing a Sustainability Charter, with a goal of sustainability within a generation, so Australia’s economic prosperity is underpinned by environmental health and social cohesion.