All articles
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Forget Watergate, We Now Have Cairns'gate
International climate negotiations just got dirty, even if the final stage hasn’t started. Australia and New Zealand’s corrupt and underhanded means of getting their way inside the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) carries the stench of colonialism. It is no secret that in this fora they continue to use their small contributions to our poor countries…
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Rio Tinto – Do They See The Writing On The Wall?
The fact that multinational miner Rio Tinto is lobbying the federal government (as reported in the Australia, on July 27th, 2009) is striking and curious for a number of reasons. Firstly, as Australia’s number one uranium miner, it should be no surprise that Rio are looking to develop market share in the nuclear energy production…
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Choosing Between Nothing and Worse-than-nothing
Today, 12 environmental organisations representing more than 400,000 Australians launched Plan B, calling for immediate action on climate change in the absence of an effective policy to price greenhouse pollution and cut emissions. Penny Wong once said that the Government’s Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, as a vehicle for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, was “no Ferrari”.…
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Climate Action Dates for Your Diary
Michelle Hunt is one of our new interns working on public engagement. She’s been busy organising a series of public talks on climate change lined up for June and July. I started my internship with Greenpeace six weeks ago wanting to make a real difference by being proactive in the environmental movement. To be honest,…
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Budget Aftermath: Part 2, "A Turning Tide"
It’s a day on from my initial report back on the budget and I’ve been trying to make sure I’m not getting carried away with the size of the renewable energy funding. After years of budgets being handed down that do the square root of not much for real climate solutions, I’m naturally inclined to…
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Budget Aftermath: Part 1, or "Hope!"
I’ve had quite a lot of time to contemplate tonight’s federal budget, having spent four hours in the Treasury lock-up with papers open to pages numbering into the 300s and a confused look on my face shouting: “WHAT? … HUH? … OK, so it’s $100 coming from this department, but only allocated after the first…
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Was climate change a key factor in Darfur?
It’s a question posed by Stephan Faris in his new book Forecast: The Consequences of Climate Change, From the Amazon to the Arctic. Tee Lim, our volunteer Communications Intern, reviews the book. Forecast is a relatively quick and accessible account of the many and varied ways in which climate change is affecting regions and communities,…
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Rudd, Obama And Green Stimulus Package
Kevin and Barack had their first conversation yesterday. As well as discussing the G.F.C. they also discussed closer cooperation on the climate crisis and agreed both countries should work closely together in preparation for the next United Nations meeting on the post-Kyoto framework in Copenhagen later this year. There was no mention of them discussing…
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The Coal Industry’s Christmas Joke
One thing I always associate with Christmas is terrible jokes. It might be that and awful gag has just fallen out of a broken cracker or, after a bit too much brandy, Dad decides to update us on how his comedy act is coming along. But the coal industry have outdone us all this Christmas…