UN climate trackers: monitoring for real action

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Comment by Peter Wignall on June 16, 2010 at 9:51am

You could be very right Caroline, "reality is somewhere in between."
In between the devil and the deep blue sea?
It seems, following the dreadful BP oil spill from the Mexican Gulf, which will eventually follow the "Gulf Stream" to the UK, we are ready to "dispose" of the Planet.
From the West Australian newspaper, 16/06/10:
"Denmark will allow Australia to ship thousands of tonnes of toxic waste to be disposed of since it does not have the technology to carry out the work, officials said."

"Four freighters, carrying 2,500 tonnes of waste each, should carry these toxic chemicals to Nyborg (central Denmark) over the next three years," said Carsten Fich, the head of Kommunekemi, owned by Swedish-based investment fund EQT."

On programs like ABC’s “Catalyst,” we learn that the Oceans are the lifeblood of the whole planet.
Recently watching the immense bravery of two teenage girls sailing “solo” around the globe, we have been shown a glimpse of the dangers.
(I have, in my days as a Merchant Seafarer 1960’s, travelled from New Zealand to Durban, albeit in a freighter. We lost two Lifeboats!)
Of course, these “chemical waste carriers” will have GPS so all is well?
We shall know where they may sink perhaps to throw a wreath.

We do just “have too much.” That is, except TIME to save the Earth.

Comment by Caroline Nute on June 15, 2010 at 10:57am

Thanks so much everybody for all your insightful comments. Peter what you have to say is well-preceived and Dr Chris is right too ,but the reality is surely somewhere in between the two extremes. Both over-population and over-development are evidently responsible for the mess the planet is in, but as Andreas so thoughtfully pointed out, how many of us living in the so called 'educated' developed west have really wanted to open our eyes to the fact that there is 'just too much' of everything? Nobody likes to think of themselves as greedy - but like many baby-boomers I have truly witnessed the growth of a culture of 'waste' that did not exist in the way it does now when I first set foot on this planet. There was no such thing as 'disposible ' - not even paper hankerchiefs! If your wireless (I mean radio receiver) broke, usually your dad or someone else interested - would fix it. TV's were never put out to be collected on the footpath, glass bottles were washed and re-used. These are only some of the habits that are now long forgotton or just unknown in present day society.
It may sound simplistic to talk about past days of parsimony, but Andreas' point about the need for education and the passing on of knowledge about the real environmental effects of the things we all take for granted is SO TRUE!

Comment by Andreas Gavriel on June 15, 2010 at 8:34am

In defence of the Dr. In this day and age of technology (one that I myself have grown up in, being of the Y generation), what family actually knows the amount of energy/resources it takes to build their second TV or their second car? When people look at the little emission number on the spec sheet of their new second car, do they know what they are looking at? The balloon system is a good way of translating this number in to something physical, but what car manufacturer is going to put this information on their spec sheet?
'Education' is a system of control. Government controls the curriculum, which means they control what we learn. The media basically controls everything else we learn. Big corporation are the policy makers, they are the ones consulted when the government wants to make a change (for example, what does Kevin Rudd know about constructing a bridge?). The government is just a means of appropriating funds to the business’ who tell them what changes need to be made. These are the people feeding us our information. If there is something they do not want us to learn, my guess is, 99% of people will never learn it.
Just because you have earned the title of 'educated', does not necessarily mean you know a thing at all.

Comment by Peter Wignall on June 14, 2010 at 12:51pm

My goodness, dear Dr Chris, are you saying that educated Australians control their breeding to two children per family?
Are you also saying that educated Australians only have one car per family?
One TV per family?
Are you saying that there are more Corporate Executives than educated Australians?
Are you also saying that stabilising our population would not be cheaper and as effective as our proposed very expensive and divisive ETS?
Are you not able to see that Corporate Executives would be jumping for joy at the doubling of our population? Expansion, more power stations, more factories, more property magnates building tower blocks in our Cities, more sales of manufactures, more jobs for Executives.
Are you saying that by rescuing 10 million souls from any over-populated country, say: Bangladesh, India, Nigeria, or China and residing them here in Australia, is going to have a benefit for the control of World pollution?

If you are, then I believe it would be of benefit to the World if you put your present Doctorate away in a bottom drawer and then study the effects of Carbon Pollution on creatures of the Earth. Even an adult education certificate in this subject would be of considerable use to you.

Below is a “Google” site you may all like to go to.
Professor Jonathan Baillie,
Zoological Society of London. Dr. Jonathan Baillie - EDGE

PS: At the GP (medical practitioner) the other day I did a count of all of us in the waiting room. 40% were mothers with children, another 40% were pensioners, like myself, the final 20% were younger people.
As the Americans say, "do the Math" to get the see-saw level.

Look in any Bar or Club where there are Poker machines. At least 70% are being played by women Pensioners.
They could easily afford $4.50 per week "Medicare!"

Comment by Dr Chris James on June 13, 2010 at 4:58pm

Pensioners do not need to live more frugally, corporatate exectives do. As for population, if you let down the barriers and allowed people to share some of the wealth and be properly educated then we wouldn't have to worry about population. There is enough space on this planet for everyone the problem is not numbers, but distribution.

Comment by Peter Wignall on June 13, 2010 at 12:06pm

Politicians and Religious leaders around the world just cannot be expected or trusted to be strong enough to speak out against over-populating the Earth. Indeed, our local Politicians in Australia have used the argument that, “with the increasing life span creating a rise in pensioners, we must increase our population to pay for this.”

This hideous idea is a race to nowhere but chaos and destruction. It will be totally unsustainable. The population will always be behind the longer living elders, calling for further increases to finance them.
Pensioners must learn to live more frugally. They should continue, in Australia, to pay Medicare when they become pensioners, after all, they create the greatest demand on Healthcare!
Our scientific abilities to create machines and medicines to extend our life-span will continue.

From the West Australian Newspaper. 13/06/10.
“Queensland university will be home to one of three state-of-the-art high-field magnetic resonance imaging machines in the world.”

“Scientists in the Netherlands unveiled the largest radio telescope in the world on Saturday, saying it was capable of detecting faint signals from almost as far back as the Big Bang.”

“Widowed during the 1996-2001 Taliban regime, Magola confided that she needed her police salary to feed her family. She has 12 children and six are still dependent on her.”

It is time to get very serious about: What is holding up our brains to create a World in which, a balanced and smaller population can live well without destroying the very ground we exist on?
My impossible dream is, that All Religions start to worship Nature as God, rather than the fantasies they have at present. All religious buildings and music will serve just as well.
One of my favourite memories of childhood was Harvest Festival when I used to attend church. With Nature as God it could be celebrated every week!

PS: I am rather concerned about the low count of UN members. 350 should be 350 million, can we do anything to gather more?

Comment by Dr Chris James on June 10, 2010 at 10:38pm

Anger! I find this an interesting topic because as a psychotherapist I am now watching a shift in academic and social movement philosophies towards dispensing with 'anger' and moving towards positive ideals that have their roots in positive psychology. For example, some groups say that we should only focus on the positive things like growing vegetables and not be political - not challenging the big corporations that pollute our environment - because being political is perceived negative and futile. It is philosophies like this that help the power brokers to hide information and use loopholes in the laws. In my view it also takes something away from the individual, a freedom of expression that comes with individuation and development.
Psychotherapy strives for balance. Psychotherapy [aside from positive psychology] takes the view that anger needs to be expressed because its repression can also be harmful. Expressed anger doesn't have to be violent anger and I believe forums like this one are very therapeutic in this sense. I don't mind admitting that I feel angry and frustrated over what corporate capitalism is doing to our environment and innocent people. Also I see it every day in people unable to cope with the changes that are coming quicker than the emotional 'self' can relate to them. This seems to cause people to either become very dislocated from nature or passionate about it. I imagine I fall on the passionate side otherwise I wouldn't be bothered writing this.
Undoubtedly we all have to deal with our inner feelings before we can expect to manage the planet responsibly. I personally think every politician and leader should be mandated to seek some form of therapy before taking on the position so they don't carry a lot of their own baggage [bias] into world affairs. How often have inner wars become national and international catatrophes.

Comment by Andreas Gavriel on June 9, 2010 at 8:44pm

There is a lot of anger in this forum, understandably so, I feel a connection to this planet, the same connection I feel with my immediate family. Seeing it and it's inhabitants ravaged is painful, the problem is people do not really know what is going on behind the scenes.
Misinfomation is a powerful tool that governments and corporations use to hide the truth from the consumer. Ignorance is bliss? Not when the ecology of this planet is on the line. Once people know the truth, things will change from there.

Comment by Dr Chris James on June 9, 2010 at 2:42pm

Biochar in Victoria is coming from brown coal. Liquid fuels are also planned from brown coal at the HRL plant in Latrobe Valley. A recent RIS on changing the Victorian mining regulations has basically said the mine in the Valley is likely to collapse. It had a serious collapse in 2007. But what is the government doing? Expanding it! In addition Victoria is going into coal seam gas on farming land and on a collapsing coastline. This is not natural gas, but the old form that predates it, now to be used to generate electricity.
I realise there are many forms of biomass/biochar/charcoal, besides coal, indeed 'biomass' is the new name for woodchips. Kind of 'neat' don't you think! Green woodchips from native forests?
I take issue with the use of forest waste if it is coming from native forests, it's habitat for wildlife; and any logging from native and old growth forests is, in my view, unsustainable. A new leadership at Gunns might see a move to plantations. That would be good they won't need to threaten environment groups with law suits.
With respect to carbon sequestration, it 's expensive, unlikely to come on line for some time and has failed in many countries overseas, namely the US not to mention the dreadful spill of C02s into the North Sea. Although the company concerned maintain it's safe now.
One of the biggest hurdles now appears to be the gas mines, which are causing environmental devastation and hardship. I imagine you have heard about the recent gas explosion in the US; not the first.
You have to wonder how much more seismic shock this earth can take and how much more harm we can cause before our leaders wake up. I am however, very inspired by the number of individuals who are willing to make a stand now.
We need a new system maybe something like ecology economics, but it would need to include some form of humanism.

Comment by Peter Wignall on June 9, 2010 at 11:38am

True blanche, we must do something now as well.
BP is having to spend $one billion to help clean up the atrocious mess in the Mexican Gulf. On PBS news (SBS TV 5.00pm) it is said, "it won't send them broke, they made $5 billion profit in the first quarter of 2010!
Hound the US Government to tax gas/petrol higher and use the money to make Electric cars.
How many American Electric taxis could be bought with $one billion?

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