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Climate of creative disobedience
“If you disobey a police directive, there is a risk you will be arrested and charged with trespass,” I explained gently to countless groups of people as they lined the front of Parliament House yesterday. Around two and half thousand people of all ages and from all over Australia gathered to encircle federal Parliament on…
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It’s your Climate Summit: join the live info session
When Kevin Rudd announced the 5% carbon emissions target in December, climate action groups organised creative protests with lightening speed. In Adelaide, they pelted ‘5% Kevin’ with shoes (a la the George Bush shoe pelt of 15 December). In Melbourne, activists sandbagged Martin Ferguson’s office against climate impacts. In Newcastle, they occupied the local member’s…
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Looking forward to 2009
It’s been a lovely summer. I was camping for a couple of days near the beach at Meroo National Park on the NSW south coast. Long afternoon sleeps under shady eucalpyts… morning swims in the crystal clear ocean… slow cooked damper on the campfire. It was a great rest after a hectic year. The turbulance…
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An open letter to Kevin Rudd on climate
Today Greenpeace released this joint statement, together with over 50 Australian environmental organisations. Any day now the Federal Cabinet will be making a decision about the target for cutting greenhouse emissions over the next decade. It’s a crucial moment. We’ll find out what the target is on the 15th – when we will know if…
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The energy revolution will not be centralised!
This week has seen yet another round of protestations from the big end of town about how difficult it will be to cut greenhouse emissions, and how they are going to have to move offshore if a decent emissions trading scheme is introduced. Meanwhile, another renewable energy manufacturer has just announced that they are actually…
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Herald-Sun breaks the silence on new Limits to Growth report
Congratulations to Melbourne’s Herald-Sun for breaking a thirty-year taboo on the dreaded ‘Limits to Growth’ hypothesis today, in an article by Peter Jean. Limits to Growth is the theory that since the Earth is finite, an endlessly growing global economy will eventually run out of planet to get resources from, dump pollution into, grow food…
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Garnaut, climate change and the need for 2020 vision
It is reassuring to hear a respected economist such as Professor Garnaut emphasise the importance of committing to 2020 targets and his warning that as climate change is proceeding faster than predicted, more urgent action is needed. Having been such a devoted laggard on the issue, Australia now has the opportunity to show international leadership…
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Climate whistleblower speaks out: Guy Pearse speaking tour
Australia’s climate change response: Guy Pearse speaking tour Greenpeace is excited to announce a series of climate change forums with Guy Pearse, the Liberal insider turned whistleblower on climate change. Guy Pearse joined the Liberal party in 1989 and spent the past 18 years studying environment policy and working in the political ‘dark arts’. He’s…
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Students take direct action against coal
As I write, 20 student activists are peacefully blockading the Newcastle coal loader to highlight the insanity of expanding the world’s biggest coal port at a time when we need urgent cuts in greenhouse emissions (see coverage on abc and SMH). Yesterday, activists shut down power generation at the Loy Yang power station in Gippsland’s…
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And another renewable energy company bites the dust
The Howard’s government’s persistent failure to support renewable energy claimed another victim today with the world’s largest wind turbine manufacturer Vestas announcing it was shutting its Portland factory in Victoria. Unless the Howard government or the ALP intervenes by increasing Australia’s pathetic 2% renewable energy target 136 workers at the factory will lose their jobs,…