Category: General news

Managing director of Ebono Institute and major sponsor of The Generator, Geoff Ebbs, is running against Kevin Rudd in the seat of Griffith at the next Federal election. By the expression on their faces in this candid shot it looks like a pretty dull campaign. Read on

Is there any real chance of averting climate change

admin /29 November, 2009

Is there any real chance of averting the climate crisis?

Nasa’s James Hansen was the first to point out the perils of climate change to the US Congress. Here, he begins a heated debate with experts from around the world, from China to the threatened Maldives, and argues that our leaders must be shaken out of their complacency. But will they show enough courage at next week’s Copenhagen summit to take the first steps to saving the planet?

Absolutely. It is possible – if we give politicians a cold, hard slap in the face. The fraudulence of the Copenhagen approach – “goals” for emission reductions, “offsets” that render ironclad goals almost meaningless, the ineffectual “cap-and-trade” mechanism – must be exposed. We must rebel against such politics as usual.

Climate change: Gulf stream collapse could be like a disaster movie.

admin /29 November, 2009

Climate change: Gulf stream collapse could be like a disaster movie

Scientists predict an ice age could be provoked in a matter of months

 

The next Ice Age could take only weeks to engulf Britain. Scientists say the last great disruption to the Gulf Stream 12,800 years ago took only a couple of months to trigger a massive plunge in temperatures across Europe.

“It was as if Europe had been shifted 20 degrees north and Ireland moved to Svalbard,” said Bill Patterson of Saskatchewan University.

Rudd’s scheme unfair but effective

admin /28 November, 2009

Rudd’s scheme unfair but effective

November 28, 2009

This will come as a surprise to many Liberal politicians, but there are still people who want to see effective action against climate change – and whose main worry is that the deal Kevin Rudd did with Malcolm Turnbull earlier in this tumultuous week made his scheme worse rather than better.

They’re right. Even so, the revised version of the carbon pollution reduction scheme is better than it seems. It will change behaviour, reduce emissions and move us towards a low-carbon economy.

To see why that’s true, you need a deeper grasp of economics than most people possess. You also need to be able to distinguish between what’s fair and what’s effective. Rudd’s scheme bombs out on fairness, but not on effectiveness.

It’s Polluters Payday in Parliament House today

admin /24 November, 2009

Dear friends,
It’s polluters’ payday in Parliament House today.
Kevin Rudd has once again bent over backwards to give the polluters and the climate sceptics what they asked for, pinching another $5.8 billion out of taxpayers’ pockets on the way through.
Now is a critical moment to stand up and be counted, to say “not in my name”, to call Kevin Rudd out for his climate hypocrisy.
We need floods of letters to editors today and we need people to turn out to snap protests tomorrow to make the clear point that Australians will not accept an emissions trading scheme that locks in failure.
If we keep fighting this, we can still drive real action in the years to come!
Yours in hope,
Bob and Christine

Why Can’t We All Just Agree?

admin /20 November, 2009

countdown to copenhagen

20 Nov 2009

Why Can’t We All Just Agree?

By Gerry Simpson

As far as climate change is concerned, it remains unclear whether international law will be part of the solution or part of the problem, writes Professor Gerry Simpson

The slow roasting of the planet, in effect, combines two problems: a scientific-environmental problem and a political-legal one. Interestingly, the environmental consequences of man-made greenhouse gas emissions are the subject of both widespread agreement and scientific uncertainty. There is now a consensus (give or take the occasional corporate-funded oddity) that the planet is warming, that burning fossil fuels are a large part of the problem, and that warming will cause us to enter a period in history marked by regular environmental catastrophe.

The Copenhagen negotiations will tell us a great deal about the possible role of international law, based on the will of self-interested sovereigns, in global survival.

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