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In 2004, the forestry company Gunns began proceedings against 20 individuals, including Senator Bob Brown and several Wilderness Society staff members, claiming these e nvironmentalists had caused the company a loss of reputation, jobs and profit. The claim was for $6.3 million. This corporate response to community concern is known as a SLAPP suit (Strategic Litigation Against Public Participation).
From The Australian
A THREE-kilometre thick cloud of brown soot and other pollutants hanging over Asia is darkening cities, killing thousands and damaging crops but may be holding off the worst effects of global warming, the UN says.
The vast plume of contamination from factories, fires, cars and deforestation contains some particles that reflect sunlight away from the earth, cutting its ability to heat the earth.
“One of the impacts of this atmospheric brown cloud has been to mask the true nature of global warming on our planet,” United Nations Environment Programme head Achim Steiner said at the launch in Beijing of a new report on the phenomenon.
A BITTERSWEET dump of rain in southern NSW has arrived just a bit too late to offer a reprieve for thirsty winter crops, despite delivering some of the best falls in at least 12 months.
Albury received 40 millimetres, Henty 41mm, Holbrook 33mm, Tumut 34mm, and further west Swan Hill recorded 19mm, Jerilderie 29mm, and Narrandera 20mm.
Farmers and agronomists say the rain arrived too late to prevent crop failures and low yields in many areas, with many farmers already finished stripping canola and barley and starting on wheat this week.
FERTILISER is an expensive input that many farmers wish they could avoid, and CSIRO studies indicate some graziers might have good reason to do so.
CSIRO has suggested fertilisers play a role in reducing the growth of native pasture species and contribute to the loss of drought-tolerant perennial native grasses.
This comes as a spin-off from the boost in production that fertiliser applications promote in improved pasture species.
The International Energy Agency has called for a revolution in the management of energy on a global scale.
Here is the press release from the global organisation, released on November 13, 2008
“We cannot let the financial and economic crisis delay the policy action that is urgently needed to ensure secure energy supplies and to curtail rising emissions of greenhouse gases. We must usher in a global energy revolution by improving energy efficiency and increasing the deployment of low-carbon energy,” said Nobuo Tanaka, Executive Director of the International Energy Agency (IEA) today in London at the launch of the World Energy Outlook (WEO) 2008 – the latest edition of the annual IEA flagship publication. The WEO-2008 provides invaluable analysis to help policy makers around the world assess and address the challenges posed by worsening oil supply prospects, higher energy prices and rising emissions of greenhouse gases.
On November 9th the Chinese government approved a US $586 billion stimulus plan focused on large-scale investment in low-income housing, water, rural infrastructure and electricity in China. Though the primary purpose of this initiative is to spur economic growth at a time when exports are falling, as the Chinese stock market is in the doldrums and GDP growth is flagging, a secondary effect of this stimulus plan may be increased investment in renewable energy and energy efficiency in China.
This effort would include accelerating efforts to achieve the goal of reducing China’s energy consumption per unit of GDP by a cumulative 20% by 2010. One very promising approach for China to build energy conservation into its infrastructure is the construction of a “smart grid.”