Webdiary - Founded and Inspired by Margo Kingston

There is no knowing the time table towards an ice-free Earth, the current “experiment” by Homo sapiens being unique in the history of the planet. The atmosphere is not waiting for human decision. 

While we in the West can hold our nose when we read about these terrible troubles in the rest of the world, the reality is that our oil dependence means we help contribute to this ugly reality. Our leaders cheerfully extol the virtues of globalisation, but don't like to talk about the money that Saudi Arabia funnels into supporting fundamentalist causes.

Which brings us to a separate issue, yet one with tentative connections to the one mentioned above – the spectacular dumping of the contentious Traveston mega-dam in south east Queensland, which represents a belated day in the sun for the long-maligned Peter Garrett and more eclipse for Labor's cover-girl of such a short time ago, Anna Bligh.

It now seems almost certain that, if it has not occurred already, within the next several years enough warming will be locked into the system to set in train positive feedback processes that will overwhelm any attempts to cut back on carbon emissions. Humans will be powerless to stop the shift to a new climate on Earth, one much less sympathetic to life. (Clive Hamilton)

"The Water Dreamers" is a haunting and thought provoking history of a dry land that refuses to yield to the fevered imagination of its colonisers. With our current water crisis do we continue to dream on, or do we submit to the land and live within it?

It's about time the convenient yes minister-type arrangements for the Murray-Darling catchment allowing state government interference based on cronyism against genuine reform of resources management, were ended, and a governing body capable of making the changes necessary for that protection were incorporated, as promised in 2007.

Stuart pulls his focus back from the dumpster to give a big picture view of the shocking inefficiencies in the way we make and market food. When the veil is lifted on how food is farmed, processed, marketed, sold and often thrown away your jaw will hit the ground.

The unique nature of the "experiment" Homo sapiens is conducting with the atmosphere through the emission of 319 billion tons of carbon by 2007, and the consequent extreme rise in atmospheric CO2 of about 2 ppm/year, two orders of magnitude faster than during the last glacial termination, counsels caution. … The alternative to urgent fast tracked mitigation efforts does not bear contemplation.

With the recent scoping studies for the proposed 5th Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report due out in 2014 suggesting a downplaying of the role of anthropogenic carbon dioxide as a significant driver of (catastrophic) climate change it is time that scientists can speak and publish freely without suffering ad hominem attacks (or threats to funding) and that the media (and blog sites) report their findings honestly and accurately.

Inherent in any attempt at challenging published scientific theories is the need to conduct research, or advance discussions, submitted to the peer-reviewed scientific literature: the core of the scientific process allowing discrimination between credible scientific work and ambit claims. ... Not so the so-called "climate change sceptics" who, rather than follow scientific procedures, mostly publish in politically friendly media channels.

With no intermediate targets defined, no clean energy technology assistance given to developing countries, come 2050, a magic wand will be waved, carbon emissions will be cut by 80 percent, mean temperatures limited below 2 degrees C, and pigs will fly.

Rarely do politicians listen to climate scientists, nor is the atmosphere likely to cooperate with governments trying to obtain a “balance” between fossil fuel corporations, trade unions, environmentalists and the public. Not to decide is to decide.

Observations show that warming of the climate is unequivocal. The global warming observed over the past 50 years is due primarily to human-induced emissions of heat-trapping gases. These emissions come mainly from the burning of fossil fuels (coal, oil, and gas), with important contributions from the clearing of forests, agricultural practices, and other activities. (US Global Change Research Program)

Fresh out of meetings at the Heartland Institute (earlier involved in tobacco promotion) supported by the American Enterprise Institute, which received $1,625,000 from Exxon-Mobil between and 1998 and 2005, Senator Fielding states, "So far I don't think there's been a real debate about the science," and "Let's actually explore that". Unfortunately, the climate is not waiting for Senator Fielding’s “exploration”.

Having endured the sharp climate upheavals of the Pleistocene glacial-interglacial cycles, humans are likely to survive in suitable environments, including clouded tropical mountain regions, high elevation islands and cool high latitudes regions. Hinging on extensive agriculture in temperate climate zones, prone to severe droughts, on cultivation in low river deltas, prone to sea level rise, and on irrigation of mountain snow-fed rivers, the future of civilization under global warming on the scale of several degrees Celsius is less clear.

The implications of climate change for ecosystems are illustrated in the new book Heatstroke: Nature in an Age of Global Warming by Anthony Barnosky, of Yale University. Despite intensified warnings from the Copenhagen climate conference, as a self-fulfilling prophecy the government’s “great moral issue of our time” is being relegated to secondary priority. Given that warnings by scientists have proven mostly correct, as contrasted with watered-down reports percolating upward through bureaucracies, there is little evidence the Rudd government is listening to the recent dire warnings by climate scientists.

The UK's Sustainable Development Commission has released a major new report: 'Prosperity without Growth?: the transition to a sustainable economy' which proposes twelve steps towards a sustainable economy and argues for a redefinition of "prosperity" in line with evidence about what contributes to people’s wellbeing.

In a time of economic downturn when the private sector is reducing its work force, the national government should step up to the plate with infrastructure spending to stimulate the economy and create jobs for the unemployed. We should be building infrastructure to benefit Australia when the boom times return.

It is likely only a combination of deep urgent cuts in carbon emissions, coupled with major investments in fast-tracked development of a wide range of effective geo-engineering methods may be capable of making the difference.

Obama, the EU (and Rudd?) face two issues: first the plethora of extreme weather events around the world, including fatal fires and floods, inherent in accelerating climate change, and second, a massive well-funded disinformation campaign, which has provided governments an excuse to undertake no mitigation measures or over more than 20 years.

As we look for solutions to the global situation it is becoming increasingly clear that the only way forward is a new path. We should listen to those who predicted the collapse nearly forty years ago. We must be willing to change and support those who are showing us some direction.

A far more effective control of the danger of climate change would be to tax all emission materials (oil, coal etc) at the point of supply, start at once, and at a low rate that would not panic the natives.

There is little evidence the “climate change skeptics” worry too much their misunderstanding of climate science may lead to the death of billions and the likely demise of civilization . The legal status of disinformation campaigns aimed at the promotion of substances of proven fatal global consequences, such as ozone-destroying CFCs, or greenhouse gas levels pushed up to near-40% above their natural level, is unclear. The lack of suitable laws to prevent ecocide may yet prove to be the Achilles heel of global civilization.

Kevin Rudd has certainly nailed his colours to the masthead with his article The Global Financial Crisis published in the February 2009 edition of The Monthly. As a plain language account of the dominance of neo-liberalism in Western political economy over the last thirty or so years it is exemplary.

The election will be very close. Anna Bligh may scrape in with the help of Green preferences; the alternative will be disastrous for Queensland. Let us hope that the ALP learns from this election and works out how to manage both the economic crisis and the climate change crisis.

Limiting carbon pollution is the next step in the plan to ... revitalize our economy. But the fossil fuel industry has already signaled that it will spend whatever is necessary to maintain the status quo. To jumpstart our economy, we need bold action from our leaders. (Repower America)

Most of us would agree that there is a limit to the number of people this planet can sustain. It may be 10 billion or 100 billion but there is a limit. The only debate is about the size of the limit and how we prevent the human population from reaching the limit and destroying the planet.

We have an enormous opportunity here in Australia to absorb millions of tonnes of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, store it safely as carbon, and put in back into the soil and increase the productivity and the health of our own landscape. A win-win. A win for jobs, a win for the environment, a win for agriculture. (Greg Hunt)