Enviroment
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Environment: Invasive animals and plants are the main killers of our native ones
Invasive species, including pet cats, have been and remain the major cause of extinctions in Australia. ‘Net zero emissions’ sounds good but is it just a greenwashing delaying tactic? Continue reading »
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Environment: Natural resources, renewable energy, opportunities and vision will create the African Century
A plan for Africans to take control of Africa and make it prosperous, fair and low carbon. Price of solar panels falling again. Protection for Macquarie Island’s wildlife. Continue reading »
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Environment: Two years left for a decent chance of keeping warming under 1.5ºC
Scientists establish annual dashboard of indicators of climate change to guide policymakers. Bushfires fatal for humans and invertebrates. Commercial sponsors sought for November’s COP meeting in Dubai. Continue reading »
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Environment: Do CO2 emissions influence your life expectancy?
Military activities generate uncounted but large amounts of greenhouse gas. Ocean temperatures hit all-time peak in April. Victoria to end logging of native forests. And, do your personal CO2 emissions influence your life expectancy? Continue reading »
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The federal budget: what planet does Labour live on?
It’s astonishing now that the analytical dust has settled on the budget that out of 57 leading Australian economists, most have given it top marks. What planet we may ask do they – and the Labour Government – live on? Not one critically endangered by climate change and a catastrophic decline in biodiversity which collectively Continue reading »
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We love you gas, we do. Oh gas, we love you
Sycophantic ministers cosy up to the gas industry. Electricity from renewables will soon match increasing demand for electricity. Will sodium replace lithium in batteries? Continue reading »
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Environment: Developing a better relationship with Nature
Jurisdictions are increasingly introducing Rights of Nature provisions into their legal systems. International shipping needs to steer a better course to zero emissions. Rewilding Britain one stream at a time. Continue reading »
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There’s still time to avoid climate catastrophe
If we fail to reach the goal of reducing emissions by 50 percent by 2030, it won’t be for lack of options. Continue reading »
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Environment: the real meaning of CCS: capitalism, corporations and subsidies
Carbon Capture and Storage, nothing but an inadequate fig leaf for obscene government endorsed corporate practices. Direct Air Capture may play a useful climate role in a few decades. Banks still lending trillions to fossil fuel companies. Continue reading »
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Environment: How good are we at capturing carbon?
Effective carbon capture is needed to stay under 2oC but need does not guarantee supply. A national park in Wales is regenerating culturally and ecologically. Helping you to know your cirrocumulus from your altostratus. Continue reading »
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Environment: climate change colonialism
Wealthy developed countries worsen the climate and debt crises of poor countries and trample on the rights of their Indigenous peoples. Continue reading »
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Labor’s conflicted climate change policies
There is something but not much to celebrate over the safeguard compromise. It may well ensure we reduce our emissions by 43%. But the Labor government’s continued permissive attitude to new fossil fuel projects is in blatant disregard of the IPCC’s pathway to a 1.5C limit on global warming. Continue reading »
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Environment: Climate change, chickens or cats: choose our poison
Climate change is causing more flash floods in dry areas and increasing methane emissions from wetlands. Cats continue to destroy Australian wildlife. Chicken and salmon farming pollute their local environments. Continue reading »
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Environment: Rapidly closing window of opportunity to achieve a safe, sustainable future
New IPCC report documents a threatening climate-present and a bleak climate-future. Alcoa failing to rehabilitate the lands it has destroyed once mining stops. Shortage of integrity not gas behind our gas problems. Continue reading »
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Environment: Trees good. Plastics bad. Why don’t governments turn it around?
Trees are good for the climate and human health. Plastics are bad for the environment and bird health. Where are the good governments when you need them? Continue reading »
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Environment: Labor safeguards our fossil fuel climate wreckers
Australia’s Safeguard Mechanism gets a government greenwash while international efforts to control Scope 3 emissions increase. Pygmy chameleons and eagle-owls are fighting for survival in different ways. Please stop eating shark and Tassie farmed salmon. Continue reading »
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Environment: does bad news about the environment create doom loops?
We are losing trees and insects at alarming rates and Australia’s land and sea temperatures continue to rise. But does too much bad news create ‘Doom Loops’? Continue reading »
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Environment: humans must care for our travelling companions: earth’s animals, plants and ecosystems
Indigenous owned forests in the Amazon absorb carbon; non-Indigenous forests produce carbon. Chicken and pig factories are bad for the animals and bad for the climate. Continue reading »
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Sunblock for Planet Earth
How best to reduce greenhouse gas emissions: stop burning coal, eat less meat or block out the sun? The first and second look preferable to the third to me. Continue reading »
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Environment: Young people unimpressed by boomers’ environmental and social neglect
All countries are failing to look after their environments and their people. Long haul flights will continue to generate most CO2. The world’s youth are not happy. Continue reading »
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Population, growth and the environment: a response to Michael Keating
Michael Keating’s response to the P&I article series on growth – GDP and population – is very welcome as it provides a condensed summary of what has befuddled Australian political economy in recent decades. Continue reading »
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Environment: Life scientists endorse civil disobedience
Australia’s oceans, Greenland’s Ice Sheet and Antarctica’s sea ice are all feeling the heat. One million species are on the edge of extinction. No wonder life scientists are taking to the streets. Continue reading »
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Efforts to combat climate change and biodiversity loss are inseparable as new mass extinction looms
Recently, I had a catch-up conversation on climate change and November’s UN climate change conference (COP27) in Sharm el-Sheikh with one of Hong Kong’s most conscientious students of the subject. Continue reading »
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Environment: It’s a wonderful world …
… as Louis Armstrong famously croaked. Well, perhaps: The temperature’s going up. The rich are getting richer. Wetlands are disappearing. Gas is officially green. Continue reading »
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Environment: Guterres: ‘the ecosystem meltdown is cold, hard scientific fact’
Tell it like it is, António: ‘climate disaster, death sentence, insanity, inconsistent with human survival’. Thank goodness for chocolate and birds. Continue reading »
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Devastation and blindness in our High Country
One can only hope that the day is not too far away when “I was only doing my job” will be no more a defence against climate crimes than it is against war crimes. Continue reading »
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Protecting nature: art of the impossible?
In recent months governments around the world, including ours, have been striving to reach agreement on “protecting nature”. The UN summit held in Montreal aimed at reaching a global deal to secure the protection of 30 per cent of the planet by 2030. Continue reading »
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What’s not to like about nuclear fusion?
Recently the mass media have bombarded us with hype about a ‘breakthrough’ in controlled nuclear fusion. Continue reading »
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Environment: melodrama and tragedy worthy of the great storytellers
Hard times lie ahead. Are the Great Expectations of renewable energy, ocean-based removal of CO2 and protein from microbes justified? Continue reading »
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Environment: No reasonable prospect of keeping 1.5 alive
Not one of over 1200 computer simulations provides a reasonable chance of global warming being under 1.5oC in 2100. Climate protester jailed for 15 months in NSW. Continue reading »