greenhouse gas emissions

This month, at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Lima, Peru, one of the most important battles facing humanity is playing out. At stake: the salvation of the planet. Climate change is already being felt across Latin America and the Caribbean, the World Bank says.

Rising temperatures are changing rainfall patterns, leading to flooding in some places and intense droughts in others. Climate change will mean dry places get drier and wet places get wetter.

Indigenous beliefs, structured by a sound relationship with the environment, are the world over, but unlike in North America, Australia or Europe. They have not been so successfully suppressed in many parts of Latin America, but in some places they are making a resurgence. People living on the slopes of the Andes Mountains, as well as their livestock, are suffering from health problems because the sources of fresh water are diminishing.

Argentina, Colombia, Chile, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Guatemala, Mexico and Peru and two regional conservationist programs joined the 20x20 Initiative that aims to have all the planned work of re-vegetation 20 million hectares of land well under way by 2020. The initiative aims to change the dynamics of land restoration in the region and initially focuses on bringing 20 million hectares of degraded land into restoration by 2020. The land will be restored partly into natural forests and partly into a “mosaic” of trees, crops, and livestock.

SMH: Latin Americal countries fight climate change

Greenhouse gas emissions from land use changes, such as deforestation, account for 15 per cent of global emissions, or more than what is generated by the world's transport sector. So, programs to avoid destruction of forests help to reduce the amount of heat-trapping gases.

(A main cause of deforestation in South America and Asia has been clearing land for palm oil production. Palm oil has become a major source of biodiesel, a supposedly green fuel - from Blogspot: now can the world have its forests back? )

The response of the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America (ALBA) was: for the rich nations to reverse the impact they had made, they must implement carbon emissions reductions of 25 to 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2020. They should shoulder costs of developing countries for mitigation actions, and provide finance and technological help to help developing nations deal with the effects of climate change.

Peru’s intention to show leadership later this year is part of a growing trend where Latin American countries are perceived to be punching above their weight when it comes to participating in global debates and forums on climate change action.

The 20x20 Initiative, which also aims to incorporate more countries of the region into the project, also seeks to tackle the carbon emissions through the protection of forests and fertile lands. UN Under-Secretary-General and UNEP Executive Director Achim Steiner said, "Today's pledges by countries in Africa and Latin America to combat deforestation and more than double restoration targets will bring significant climate benefits..."

“Land restoration in the region is an essential element to promote equity, poverty reduction, alternatives for development in poor rural areas as well as a mechanism to achieve a low carbon, more resilient future,” said Gabriel Vallejo, Colombia's Minister of Environment, in a statement.." - See more at: http://news.mongabay.com/2014/1207-initiative20x20.html#sthash.rTmKsh5D.Aq8Qlqlk.dpuf

Livestock industries

The global livestock industry produces more greenhouse gas emissions than transport and of the 95 million tons of beef produced in the world in 2000, the vast majority came from cattle in Latin America, Europe and North America.

The World Resources Institute in Washington estimates that converting land to farms and using it for agriculture and livestock accounts for almost half of all greenhouse gas emissions in the region. Degraded land can be restored by adding trees to properties that are currently used for farming or raising livestock, and over the long term, the trees themselves can be sustainably harvested to provide additional income to farmers.

The Green Revolution relied on the intensive use of water and fossil-fuel-based chemicals, giving the world a 40 year reprieve of food security, but we can no longer afford to increase food production through agricultural expansion. Trading tropical forest for farmland is one of the most destructive things we do to the environment.

Governments and environmental groups are reluctant to pursue policies or campaigns to change consumer behaviour due to fears of a consumer backlash. International think-tank, Chatham House , found that consumers with a higher level of awareness of climate change and its impacts were more willing to reduce their dietary behaviour. The greatest potential for behaviour change appears to lie in emerging economies, with respondents in Brazil, China and India showing a greater consideration of climate change when choosing meat and dairy, and a greater willingness to modify their behaviour than consumers in the United States, the UK and Japan.

Developing nations can make headway, and make a pro-active response to environmental repairs and a reduction to greenhouse gas emissions, but in contrast, Australia is going backwards.

Australia's refusal to participate on climate change initiatives

The Brisbane G20 summit yielded major pledges to the Green Climate Fund by the US (US$3 billion) and Japan (US$1.5 billion). Combined with earlier pledges by France, Germany and others, the fund is now three-quarters of the way towards reaching its initial funding target of US$10 billion by the time of a pledging.

Australia stands as the only wealthy country to have ruled out a contribution to the United Nations’ Green Climate Fund. As of last week, the fund had received pledges from 22 countries totalling $US9.6 billion ($A11.2 billion) against an initial funding target of $US10 billion.

The Abbott government's refusal to contribute to the $US10 billion ($11.8 billion) Green Climate Fund risked Australia "being marginalised", Erwin Jackson, deputy chief executive of The Climate Institute said Australia remains one of the few rich nations not to make a pledge to the UN fund. Even Canada, led by climate sceptic Stephen Harper, has pledged $C300 million ($311 million).

Australia will continue to directly pay for climate change adaptation in vulnerable South Pacific island nations through its aid budget rather than donate to a UN Green Climate Fund. Scientists say much sharper emissions cuts are needed in coming decades to keep global warming within 2 degrees C of pre-industrial times, the overall goal of the UN talks.

With heavy investments in population growth, and growth in livestock industries and exports, Australia is locked into high emissions and climate change denial.

Last year our Treasurer announced cuts of $213m to the Biodiversity Fund and $144m to the Carbon Farming Initiative, and native vegetation is in nation-wide decline.

The government's repeal of the "carbon tax" won't make climate change go away! it’s a political decision, not one based on science, or a rational reaction to any new empirical evidence contrary to its existence.

Denial of climate science is one that’s based on the assumption that you can believe it or not! We don’t doubt the findings of other scientific results, or discoveries.

According to the National Climate Assessment, the world is currently experiencing the effects of climate change, or the shifting of the planet’s climate zones due to environmental factors.

Small island states such as Tuvalu and many other countries have been shocked by the obstructive tactics of Australia at UN-sponsored climate change talks at Warsaw last year, particularly over negotiations to set up a new institution to deal with Loss and damage, a new mechanism for compensation to countries that suffer from climate change. Numerous other countries expressed their shock that major industrial nations had wound back their targets, rather than increasing them. This was widely seen as a direct reference to the stance adopted by Japan, Canada and Australia.

(Aerial view of Tuvalu’s capital, Funafuti, 2011. Tuvalu is a remote country of low lying atolls, making it vulnerable to climate change.)

In a radio interview with Neil Mitchell, Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott said that the Head of the UNFCCC, Christiana Figueres, is "talking through her hat" for connecting the NSW bushfires with climate change and that "these fires are certainly not a function of climate change, they are just a function of life in Australia."

The trick of Climate denial has been to pretend they are arguing science, but they are in fact impeding science education to the broader public to maintain general ignorance as a political lever.

(This figure shows the annual fossil fuel carbon dioxide emissions, in million metric tons of carbon, for a variety of non-overlapping regions covering the Earth.)

The problem is that climate change is long-term, and has tremendous implications for our economic model, government agendas, and the habitability of our planet. Anthropogenic climate change is bigger than the sum of us! It’s too big for governments and politicians to handle, and the whole economic paradigm of “growth” and “progress” is under threat!

Per head of population, we are some of the biggest emitters on the planet, and population growth is a strong driver of absolute emissions. There's bipartisan support for continuing population and economic growth, projecting future emissions trajectories.

In Australia we are also experiencing the impact of warming. Australia had its hottest year on record in 2013 a pattern ominously intensifying in 2014. Long heat waves extreme fire danger and a lengthening fire season, are all part of the new normal. The frequency of record heat events has doubled from the middle of the 20th century to the present, and over the past decade, record high temperature events are occurring three times more frequently than record cold temperatures.

UK

The United Kingdom experienced its coldest spring since 1962. Snow fell in record amounts in northern regions—in late March. This harkened back to the bitter 2012 European cold wave that brought freezing temperatures across the continent, resulting in hundreds of people freezing to death.

United States

Half of the United States is suffering through drought conditions — including all of California, which saw huge swathes of the San Diego area swept by raging wildfires during May this year.

Large portions of the United States are currently experiencing the effects of a "polar vortex", an area of low pressure bringing dangerously cold air over the country. Temperatures in the Midwest and Northeast are below zero in many areas, with wind chills as low as -50 degrees.

Temperatures in many cities are expected to hit record lows, 30 to 50 degrees below typical averages. Thousands of flights have been cancelled, and schools across the country have been closed.

If the earth is really becoming a scorched wasteland then why are winters still cold; why does it rain in the summer; why are there cool days in the summer and why does it still snow? These experiences cannot be used as evidence to disprove global warming.

Melting of Arctic sea ice and the resulting cold rush of wind dipping south are seen as the main temperature suppressors. The dip in the so-called "polar vortex"—which occurs when temperatures warm in the Arctic, directing cold winds southward—sent chills through the northern U.S. in January 2014, making Chicago colder than the South Pole. This phenomenon can be understood to result from the rapid melting of polar sea ice, which replaces white, reflective ice with dark, absorbent open water.

Australia

While Australia rejoices in the heaviest June snowfalls this century, climatologists say that one of the clear effects of climate change is fewer snow-bearing systems making their way from the Southern Ocean to the Australian Alps.

A rare Australian possum is being dubbed the "new polar bear" of climate change. The possums are found mainly in a far north Queensland rainforest on a single mountain range about 1000 metres above sea level.
Their numbers were in the thousands when a severe heat wave hit the area in 2005, which all but wiped out the species.

It's all too easy to blame climate change when Australia has the greatest rate of mammal extinctions in the world – since European settlement. Human activities, land clearing, feral pests and fragmented habitats have driven many animals to extinction. Weakening of environmental laws, loosening land clearing regulations, and a slash to funds for climate change are all wreaking havoc on native species.

Just four white lemuroid ringtail possums have been found in the wild and scientists say the species could soon become the first creature to be wiped out by global warming.

China's plans to reduce emissions backfire!

50 coal gasification plants, aimed in part at reducing pollution from coal-fired power plants in China's largest cities, will shift that pollution to other regions, mostly in the northwest and generate enormous amounts of carbon dioxide. Coal-to-gas, or coal gasification, is a water-intensive process that generates enormous amounts of carbon dioxide, which is the main greenhouse gas destabilizing the world's climate. China is responsible for half of the annual global coal consumption and is the world's the biggest emitter of greenhouse gases, followed by the United States.

The carbon dioxide they produce would equal about an eighth of China's current total carbon dioxide emissions, which come mostly from coal-burning power plants and factories, the organisation said.

Greenpeace says China's energy plans exacerbate climate change

Government concedes to increase greenhouse gas emissions

Despite the moderated emissions growth outlook from previous projections, underlying factors such as population and economic growth underpin a steady increase in emissions.
.
This growth is bolstered by the continued strong demand for Australian energy exports, in particular, the expected significant expansion of the liquefied natural gas (LNG) industry and coal exports. Agriculture emissions are expected to increase after 2020, as production is projected to expand across all major agricultural commodities.

Australia’s Abatement Task and 2013 Emissions Projections

National vehicle kilometres travelled (VKT), by all Australian vehicles, are projected to increase by around 1.7 per cent per annum between 2007 and 2020 under the BAU assumptions. By 2020, BITRE (Bureau of Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Economics) projects base case emissions to be close to 70.3 per cent above 1990 levels (at 105.2 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent). Australian transport demand is highly dependent on underlying economic and population growth, and relatively inelastic with regard to fuel prices.

BITRE: Greenhouse gas emissions from Australian transport: projections to 2020 Working paper 73

Rightwing powerhouses realise the financial potential of denial and turn reasonable men and women into conspiracy theorists. If politicians and deniers admitted they were wrong on climate change, they might have to admit that they were wrong on everything else and their whole political identity would unravel.

Even with all the scientific data that supports global warming there are deniers that will not accept the facts. Instead, they confuse uninformed citizens by creating pseudoscientific articles and websites that are filled with unproven statements.

Australia must show some leadership in the world, and accept some responsibility towards climate change and the devastation it will cause. Instead we are falling behind as global citizens, and risk becoming an outpost on the world stage.

In place of urban sprawl, urban consolidation is supposed to reduce our environmental footprint, by compacting housing for less car usage, more “affordable housing”, and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. On the contrary, it tends to have the opposite effect.

Trees, which provide shade and act as natural air conditioners, play an important role in helping to create cities that are more resilient to extreme temperatures as the climate warms. But, trees are being cleared for the cluttering of cookie-cutter, generic concrete multi-unit blocks, instead of the garden-surrounded an identifiable single houses of a few years ago.

The "heat island effect" results from hard surfaces absorbing and then radiating heat, thus capturing hot city temperatures.    Experts say this phenomenon is expected to become more prevalent with increasing urbanisation and will exacerbate climate change impacts.

ANU research shows that some of Canberra’s inner-city suburbs are the most heat-vulnerable in the territory, despite the benefits of their leafy tree-lined streets. It showed Canberra’s mostly-treeless outer suburbs were likely to be up to seven degrees hotter in summer than those with more established trees - such as those inner suburbs.

In that study of 21 Canberra suburbs, researchers found temperatures could vary by as much as 7.5 degrees between treeless postcodes and those with more trees.

Canberra Times: Canberra's heat vulnerable suburbs revealed

ANU Researcher Dr Liz Hanna said: "If we have planning designs and housing designs where there's insufficient front and backyard to plant a tree, and if street trees are not shade trees, we think that's foolish”. We agree it's “foolish”, but with high rates of population growth and increasing urban density, backyards and traditional housing with gardens and trees, are disappearing.

Power outages

Up to 100,000 Victorian premises were threatened to lose power during the January heatwave as demand crippled the state's electricity grid.

Melbourne is following the lead of Asian cities such as Hong Kong for extreme housing density, with more people living in apartments. The housing affordability squeeze, and the marketing of thousands of tiny apartments to investors, is threatening to undermine Melbourne’s liveability.

Mr Tony Arnel, Victorian Building Commissioner, suggests that buildings above three storeys begin to use more energy due to the need for lighting in common areas, lifts, security and the lifestyle of residents. The Victorian Building Commission has found there is “no conclusive evidence that vertical living was more sustainable than conventional homes.”

A NSW Energy Australia study found that high-rise apartments use 30 per cent more power than a typical detached house. The use of air-conditioners is a mandatory part of the lifestyle.

Climate change is predicted to increase the number and intensity of heatwaves experienced in Melbourne. Along with the densification of our city, and a population that's projected to double by 2060, it means the converging effects of more power being soaked up by a growing number of apartment dwellers, more power outages, higher utility and health costs - and the compounding factor of higher greenhouse gas emissions.

Loss of Vegetation to make way to mobilize more people

To build the East West Link tunnel under Royal Park, the Melbourne City Council estimates that some 5,000 trees, many very old, would be lost. The remnant bushland in West Royal Park, the only area of this kind of vegetation left in Melbourne, would be dug up. By actively cooling the urban landscape, vegetation helps reduce energy use and carbon dioxide emissions, and ultimately lessens the risk of residents suffering heat stress, heatstroke or even death…

Wetlands from storm water, which supplies water for Melbourne's parks and street trees plus the Royal Park Golf course,  will be completely destroyed.

The East West Link/tunnel will increase temperatures in Melbourne, and the nibbling away of Green Wedges for urbanisation will compound the problems of power demands, infrastructure break-downs, anti-social behaviours, and deaths/illness from heat stress.

Privatisation woes

The SEC provided cheap and reliable power to Victoria for 70 years. Selling off Victoria's power supplies and raised some revenue in the short term but in the long term it has resulted in a huge financial burden on the entire population through rapidly increasing prices. Now, unplanned overloads and outages are placing extra stress on the power grid, one that's fine-tuned for profits rather than service.

Privatising state owned assets is a strategy is to reduce employees, and  increase remuneration to share holders and owners. 

Population growth driven by heavy economic reliance on property development

The population of major Australian cities is expected to double in the next four to five decades, thanks to high rates of net overseas immigration.

The government powers-that-be in Canberra view the economic growth meta-statistics and see our economy is “growing”, without considering democracy, the costs of growth, and the human-environmental fallouts. They simply open up the draw-bridge of our borders and allow the new-comers to flow in from oversea! Planned increases in urban density are likely to result in the removal of a significant number of trees from urban areas.

Canberra’s population could increase to 904,000 by 2061 according to new projections released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics. This growth means significant challenges for governments and ACT infrastructure. There's no diplomatic, administrative or public service increases to justify this growth, except general population overflow.

Melbourne’s population is swelling by 2 per cent a year, or at a doubling rate of 35 years.   The power infrastructure must not only be routinely maintained and upgraded or replaced every 50 years, but must keep expanding at 2% each year - and also cope with outages and heat-waves.   

We need a u-turn in our economy from a growth-based, road-dependent, high resource and energy-consuming one that's trapping us in islands of heat - to an alternative model that's bio-centric and human-friendly,  and relevant to an age of extreme weather patterns, and the hostilities of climate change.

With so many contradictory policies coming from our mainstream political parties, it indicates they are in a quandary about retaining "popularity" with voters, being seen to address overarching national and global issues, retaining their power, and at the same time appeasing their powerful corporate supporters and their growth-agendas.

The fact that our State and Federal government decided to create a Melbourne @ 5 million , and the "big Australia" policies, contrary to consultation and democratic principles is due to our governments' direction mainly coming from big businesses, global and national corporations, and very large and powerful lobby groups.

Voters and grass-roots interests are increasingly being ignored in favour of the elite, and those with economic and political power.

Plans are now about defining the details of how are communities are to accept the growth that's taken to be already decided, not whether it is in our interests.
Sham "consultations" are on how, not "yes" or "no" do we want them, or whether they in our best interests.

Family-hostile high rise apartments are not appropriate in Australia, and at a time we are often preached to about being sustainable. It's given lip-service in reality!

Melbourne's "activity centres" of high developments mean energy-guzzling lifestyles with little options for alternative living and self-sufficiency.
EnergyAustralia NSW and the Australian Conservation Foundation (download main findings report) have both come to the same conclusion that high-rise living, as more people are being forced to "choose" due to population growth, means much higher per capita greenhouse gas emissions that villas, townhouses or separate dwellings. The NSW Energy Australia study revealed that high-rise apartments use 30 per cent more power than a typical detached house. Much of this is in the common areas such as foyers and car parks where lights are often inefficient and are left on night and day. They are ineligible roof-top solar photovoltaic (PV) systems and water-tank harvesting, or the ability to enjoy the benefits of eaves, the shade of trees or the self-sufficiency of home gardens.

Capitalism is a great ideology and can achieve many wonderful things and open doors, but unchecked, it can undermine democracy and the will of a nation's citizens. Former Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, by over-riding the concerns of the Australian people regarding population growth, saw his popularity plummet after he gave his unapologetic support to a “big Australia”. It was also his lack of action on climate change and the power of mining giants that undermined him too.

The groundswell against atrocities committed to Australian cattle sent to Indonesia was overlooked in favour of the power of the livestock industries and their well-financed lobby groups. Politicians are funded by big corporations and they will never “bite the hand that feeds them”.

Despite the overwhelming majority of Australians who don't want population growth, it is foisted upon us by compliant politicians pandering to the greed of big business, the banking sector and developers.

As a society we are succumbing to Stockholm syndrome - where victims start to comply with their prisoners - as we allow capitalist excesses to wreck our land, our cities, and clear bushland and wipe out the habitat of flora and fauna. All for greed and profits – even risking endangered species in the process,

Profits now come before people, profits before environmental sustainability, profits before community. It's money before life itself. The self-destructive human gene is being allowed a free reign to support “economic growth” at all costs, and allow us to collectively ignore the converging signs on our planet that should indicate our time of growth is OVER. Nothing living can keep growing without it becoming detrimental and destructive - to internal vital organs and infrastructures, and on a macro planetary level.

With so many contradictory policies coming from our mainstream political parties, it indicates they are in a quandary about retaining voter "popularity", being seen to address overarching national and global issues, retaining their power, and at the same time appeasing their powerful corporate supporters. Such contradictory forces are hard to reconcile.

One of the most important principles internationally when referring to greenhouse gas reduction schemes it that the polluter pays. This means that national targets for the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions should be based on the historical contribution of each nation to global emissions.

A most important factor is the levels of emissions per capita. Australia has the highest greenhouse gas emissions per person at 26.7 tonnes per annum and this it twice the average level for all other industrialised countries and 25% higher that per person in the USA (21.2tonnes).

It is obvious that Australia's population growth policies have a enormous impact on our greenhouse gas emissions. Our immigration rate is the major contributing factor of our population growth and thus the biggest contributor to increasing our greenhouse gas emissions, and not "natural" growth. Immigrants coming here therefore adopt our consumption habits and lifestyles, thereby increasing their emissions, and our overall output.

If Australia decides to increase our population rapidly, to 50 million by 2060 or more, then energy-related emission would grow to around 600 parts per million CO2, or about double 1990 levels! (Population Policy and Environmental Degradation Sources and Trends in Greenhouse Gas Emissions: Clive Hamilton and Hal Turton, Monash University)

People are not pollution -- Why climate activists should not support limits on immigration.
People are not "pollution" and neither is CO2, but both can cause problems from excess quantities!
Recently, as concern about greenhouse gas emissions and global warming increasing, the anti-immigrant argument has taken on a new form. Now the argument is: immigrants should be kept out because our way of life is a threat to the world’s environment.

According to the article: To calculate “per capita emissions”, we simply divide a country’s total greenhouse gas emissions by its total population. This provides a useful baseline for comparing countries of different sizes – but it tells us nothing at all about the emissions that can actually be attributed to individuals. In fact, most emissions are caused by industrial and other processes over which individuals have no control. In Canada, for example, no change in the number of immigrants will have any effect on the oil extraction industry at the Alberta Tar Sands, described by George Monbiot as “the world’s biggest single industrial source of carbon emissions”.

Monbiot site on Canada

However, Australians have made effort to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions, but unless our numbers are limited the gross output will continue to rise. Industry and technology cause anthropogenic emissions, and a higher population increase the demand for larger markets and increased production. More population naturally equates to a demand for more jobs, and thus more industries and more plundering of finite natural resources! Excessive exports are due to human greed and worship of growth.

The Government accepted the findings of Professor Garnaut that a fair and effective global agreement centred on stabilising long-term atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases was at or below 450 parts per million of carbon dioxide equivalent is in Australia’s national interests. However, the Australian National Greenhouse Accounts released in June 2009 showed emissions rose by an estimated 553 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent, or 1.1 per cent, in 2008. According to Climate Group, (Jan 2008) compared with 2000 levels, emissions from energy-use were significantly higher across all states, collectively up 19 per cent.

The Greenhouse Indicator Annual Report, released by the Climate Group, measures emissions created by electricity and petrol use across the eastern states. The report shows overall emissions were 5.3 million tonnes lower in 2009 than in the previous year. The base line should be 2000 (Copenhagen) or 1990 levels (Kyoto) , not 2008! So we are reducing our increase?

Australia has declared it will not go beyond a 5 per cent cut in greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 without guaranteed action by major emitters including the US, China and India. Little hope anyway of going beyond 5 %! By 2020 the Federal Government wants to cut emissions by 5 to 25 per cent. At our present rate of population growth, our numbers are likely to be well over 25 million by then!

THE United States (Jan 29th) officially stated a goal to cut carbon emissions by 17 per cent by 2020 off 2005 levels, in a submission to the United Nations as part of last month's Copenhagen meeting.

Our 5% is looking a little short now that the US have challenged it!
Kevin Rudd's drive for a "big Australia" and his efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emission are totally at odds, and are completely contradictory and hypocritical to addressing climate change, what he previously called the "greatest moral challenge of our time"!

The 2009 Copenhagen Summit “took note” of an 'Accord'.

Well, what a hell of an expensive note taking exercise that was!

The full cost of the Copenhagen Conference (or was it 'talk fest'?) should be disclosed including all return flights, accommodation, livestock killed and A4 paper printed off, etc. Given that green house gases are their specialty, the conference hosts (the UN) should also disclose the total tonnage of greenhouse gas emissions of this latest Conference of the Parties (COP15). This then must become the decadent standard never to be exceeded in future.

Why could the Copenhagen Conference not have been done online through a series of video conference calls? It would have set a leadership example of how human behaviour can be modified to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Stephen Minas in his review article ‘Flight From Copenhagen’ of 21 Dec 2009 at New Matilda is right – “Copenhagen shrank…from the comprehensive, legally binding treaty envisaged in the Bali Road Map”.

The Bali Road Map came out of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Climate Change Conference in Bali Indonesia in December 2007. Many developed and developing countries agreed to step up their efforts to combat climate change and adopted the ‘Bali Road Map’, which included the ‘Bali Action Plan’ charting the negotiating course leading up to the Copenhagen Conference in December 2009 (just gone).

But for the Copenhagen Conference to have been in an "oven-ready" political framework, capable of immediate implementation, time shouldn’t have been wasted since Bali. Just like cramming for an exam rarely works, drafting workable legislation, which was what Copenhagen was headlined to be, invariably takes many iterations of drafting and negotiating.

As Minas points out, "For the legally binding Copenhagen 'Accord' to have stood a chance of success, the positive willingness that emerged from Bali needed to have had its enthusiastic momentum tapped."

Between Bali and Copenhagen there were 24 months. What was achieved during those two years?

To label the outcome of Copenhagen Conference as an 'Accord' is false and misleading. An Accord is a binding agreement and that did not transpire. Copenhagen as an event was indeed an important global summit. But in terms of results, at best it was an 'in principle' broad undertaking by a few of the attending nations that requires follow up. Those now using such a label are only perpetuating the hype in an exercise of face saving - most notably China.

Perhaps the most poignant assessment of Copenhagen comes from Oxfam Executive Director, Andrew Hewett, in Fairfax's The Age and The Sydney Moring Herald papers simulateously dated 21 December 2009, in his article: 'Poorest of the poor ask why Copenhagen failed to listen'

"...it's hard to see how the Copenhagen 'Accord' delivers justice to people in poor countries that are least responsible for climate change but suffer its impacts right now.

The accord is an empty political statement, shredding two years of negotiations down to 2½ pages of purely aspirational goals.

While it recognises the scientific view that the increase in global temperature should be kept below 2 degrees, it does not set out a trajectory for achieving this.

In February, countries will list their emissions reduction targets, which will be voluntary. They will have little to do with climate science and everything to do with the political climate in capitals around the world. If this is all the world can muster, we can expect a world that is 3.9 degrees warmer, year-round droughts in southern Africa, and water shortages affecting up to 4 billion additional people."

---

One wonders what the thousands of delegates at Copenhagen achieved and whether any of them feel an obligation to follow up what is clearly unfinished business.

As for Australia's contribution, why was Australia not part of Obama's late minute accord that tried to salvage what was left of any undertakings over the two weeks?

---

The Australian newspaper on 11th December 2009 reported 'Aussie footprint 1817 tonnes, and counting' by Christian Kerr:

"THE Australian delegation to the Copenhagen climate change conference could number 114, official documents reveal.

The carbon footprint for 114 people travelling to Copenhagen and back business class amounts to 1817 tonnes of emissions -- the equivalent to the annual output of 2500 people in Malawi. The list appears to contradict assurances from Kevin Rudd's office last weekend that fewer than 50 federal officials would attend.

It includes 10 attendees listed as members of the Prime Minister's personal staff, on top of six representatives from the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet.

The names of 29 officials from the Department of Climate Change are listed, along with bureaucrats from the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, the Australian Agency for International Development, the Department of Resources, Energy and Tourism, the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, Treasury and the Bureau of Meteorology.

Tim Wilson from the Institute of Public Affairs, who discovered the list, told The Australian from Copenhagen yesterday: "I keep spotting commonwealth bureaucrats here. It seems to reflect the enormous bureaucracy that will grow to support any agreement from Copenhagen."

Was this Rudd putting on one hell of an extravagant staff Chistmas party to Scandinavia at taxpayer expense? If not, what return on investment did the Australian contingent make at Copenhagen?

See also: "A climate con: Analysis of the 'Copenhagen Accord' of 21 Dec 09.

Copenhagen was a deadline without a plan. Like Vikings, they rushed in. Too many issues, too many causes, too many delegates, too much reading, too many options and yet forced to deliver a global consensus solution in just 2 weeks!

Copenhagen's approach ought to have been pragmatic. It needed to come down from the statosphere in idealistic thinking to have focused on what could be the fastest means to offer the greatest reduction in greenhouse gases commencing in 2010.

Money is the obvious facilitator. The G11 response to the Global Financial Crisis 'Mark I' demonstrated the sheer scale of quick cash available from developed nations. Since developing nations need the cash, therein lies an obvious negotiating connector.

Try this scanario... rank countries on the basis of to aggregate carbon emissions and also carbon emissions per capita. The size of reduction responses and the amount of funding for carbon reduction programmes should be proportional on both bases. That is, the worst emitting developed nations pay more, and the worst emitting/deforesting developing nations get compensated more.

Pay compensation to countries to stop deforestation is simply a matter of money and there is certainly enough of that around it seems. This should start by Christmas - calculate the forest area, calculate the compensation value, sign the agreement, developing coutries countribute to a trust account, transfer the funds electronical to the host country of the forests, send in UN monitors to enforce the agreement to make sure no trees fall. If Copenhagen just did that, it would have achieve a significant inroad - 20% reduction in one year or something in that order.

News of the pledge by US based Climate Progress of US$1 billion over three years towards decreasing deforestation is an excellent outcome. The funding will go to developing countries that develop REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation) programs.

Horse trading in emissions is pure problem avoidance.

Perhaps a less patriarchal culture may have helped too. Perhaps less Viking patriarchal culture and perhaps a more matriarchial approach to negotiation would have achieved better. The alpha male approach has clearly failed.

'COP15' was also a silly name. It just meant the 15th United Nations Climate Change Conference. Rather than the meanlingless 'COP15' ('Conference of Parties' #15) , such a vital global forum series deserves a more accessible and meaningful name in order to better engage with ordinary folk. Perhaps the Greenhouse2009, then work towards Greenhouse2010, Greenhouse2011 and for each year, set and achieve a distinct global reduction outcome by legal treaty. Such numbering and annual frequency would better convey the sense of urgency.

Australia presently exports about 260Mt of coal each year, or about 30% of the world’s total coal export trade.

Coal produces 25% of the world's energy (including transport and heat), and 40% of the world's carbon dioxide emissions from fuel combustion . Coal is responsible for 88% of Australia's electricity generation, and 75% of Australia's greenhouse emissions from energy (including transport and heat).

"Every tonne of export Australian coal comes back to us as climate change – more droughts, water shortages and sea level rises," Ms Rhiannon, Greens MP and mining spokesperson, said.

Coal is the dirtiest of all fossil fuels. When burned, it produces emissions that contribute to global warming, create acid rain and pollute water.

Carbon Capture and Storage - “Clean coal”:

Those who claim that “clean coal” can help solve the global climate change crisis are referring to a process called “Carbon Capture and Storage” (CCS) , also known as “geosequestration”. This refers to the capture of carbon dioxide emissions from a coal- or gas-fired power plant or other industrial source, transport via pipelines or haulage, and storage of the gas underground or in the ocean, in isolation from the atmosphere.

The Government is putting hundreds of millions of dollars towards championing the commercial use of carbon capture, regarded by many as a key to cutting greenhouse emissions from coal by storing the polluting gases deep below the surface.

A report, prepared by the Global Carbon Capture and Storage Institute, finds the cost increase to coal electricity generation if fully-fledged clean coal technology is installed will be up to 78 per cent.

diagram source

ABARE predicts that Asia-Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate (AP6) has the potential to “reduce” global emissions in the year 2050 to between 11 and 23 percent lower than they would otherwise have been. This translates into a doubling of greenhouse emissions compared to today's levels.

ABARE's estimate assumes CCS deployment in all new coal plant in Australia, the US, and Japan from 2015, and in China, India, and South Korea from 2020. This seems hopelessly unrealistic, and it should be noted that the Federal ALP's enthusiastic embrace of CCS aims merely for commercialisation by 2030!

In 2006 a report by the Energy Supply Association estimated the wholesale cost of electricity would increase by about 50 per cent to make cuts of 30 per cent by 2030.  That's a 50% hike in electricity prices for a mere 30% reduction in emissions cut. 

According to the World Wildlife Fund: “The reality is that if CCS (or other renewable technologies) is ruled out or delayed we face the the reality of accepting a 2.5 - 3 degrees rise. If we reach a three-degree rise in temperature, 35 per cent of species will become extinct. “

Senator Brown cited generation of electricity as the largest source of green house gas emissions in Australia, noting further that 85 percent of our electricity generation comes from coal burning. " The government wants to inject billions of dollars into upgrading infrastructure in coal industries so we can export more rapidly once the recession is over.”

False hopes?

Former US deputy president Al Gore has likened "clean coal" to "healthy cigarettes" . 

"Clean" coal power stations are not viable until the carbon price reaches a minimum of $60 a tonne, and that is not predicted to happen before 2030, according to Rudd government's own global carbon capture and storage institute.

A recent Greenpeace International report, tracking all peer-reviewed studies of 'clean coal technologies', found that it remains a false hope peddled by coal industry PR merchants and some governments who are in their back pockets (eg. New South Wales).

According to the report:

CCS cannot deliver in time to avoid dangerous climate change.

CCS wastes energy.

Storing carbon underground is risky.

CCS is expensive.

CCS carries significant liability risks.

"The climate crisis requires urgent action. Climate scientists warn that to avoid the worst effects, global greenhouse gas emissions must peak by 2015 and then start falling by at least 50% by 2050, compared to 2000 levels".

Dr Mike Raupach, CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research and the Global Carbon Project:

Carbon dioxide concentration in the atmosphere is likely to reach the first climate change danger level by 2028 and if emissions growth continues at the present rate, the point of no return will be reached with dire consequences by 2046, according to new scientific research published at the National Academy of Sciences.

Dr Mark Diesendorf:
This is unproven technology. The reality is that this unproven technology needs a lot of research, development and demonstration. The timescale for developing this technology is longer than getting nuclear power up.

Yet if each person in the world had produced as much carbon as the average Australian, the total release of fossil carbon would have been four times higher.

Nations such as China and India may be in the top five emitters by volume, but on a per capita basis they are both way below the world average. As they industrialise, their per capita rate will go up.

Former Greenpeace International chief executive Paul Gilding said there was growing frustration at the Howard Government and now Labor for building their climate change policy response around long-term charismatic mega-projects with 40-year targets like clean-coal technology and nuclear power.

"It's easy for politicians to make statements about the long term because they don't require much policy action or affect voters now." ( The Australian in April 2007)

Emissions per capita:

Australia has surpassed the US as the world’s biggest per capita producer of carbon emissions, according to a report by a British risk consultancy.

Analyst Maplecroft estimates that Australian CO2 output per head of population now stands at 20.5 tons annually, putting it ahead of the 19.7 tons emitted by the average American.  By comparison, China – which emits more carbon overall than any nation – has a per capita average of about 4.5 tons. In India, where greenhouse gases are expected to double by 2031, emissions are just 1.1 tons per person.

An  audit, by the Global Carbon Project, found carbon dioxide levels from human activities are increasing by about 2 per cent per year, or 1.3 tonnes of carbon per capita.  By 2011, emissions will have "recovered" to something like 3 per cent per year, roughly what they were before the global financial crisis.

Scientists blame an increasing use of coal for the continuing rise in carbon emissions.

Livestock industries:

According to the WorldWatch Institute Livestock now account for 50 percent of emissions from agriculture and land-use change.
"Indeed, a cow/calf pair on a beef farm are responsible for more GHG emissions in a year than someone driving 8,000 miles in a mid-size car.  Serious action on climate will almost certainly have to involve reducing consumption of meat and dairy by today’s major consumers and slowing the growth of demand in developing countries."

Population Growth:

The Economics of Climate Change Report by Sir Nicholas Stern, former World Bank chief economist, clearly shows that reducing greenhouse gas emissions immediately is the cheapest option and essential to limiting the total damage climate change will bring.
How do we immediately reduce our greenhouse gas emissions?

The UN Population Fund report predicted that the global population could reach 10.5 billion by 2050, up from 6.8 billion today, unless urgent action was taken to reduce fertility rates. It said that even its medium-growth forecast of 2.3 billion more people by 2050, which assumes a fall in average fertility from 2.56 to 2.02 children per woman, would make it much harder to achieve the cuts in carbon emissions needed to prevent catastrophic climate change. 

Investing in birth control to reduce population growth could be more effective in cutting greenhouse gas emissions than building wind turbines or nuclear power stations, according to a United Nations report.

The emission of greenhouse gases, associated with industrialisation and strong economic growth from a world population that has increased sixfold in 200 years , is causing global warming at a rate that began as significant, has become alarming and is simply unsustainable in the long term.

"Even if humankind failed to produce a single baby during the next generation, its life on Planet Earth would still be endangered by climate change.
On the other hand, if the per capita consumption levels of the relatively small and slow-growing developed countries (under the same technological and environmental control conditions) were to be achieved by some of the large and/or rapidly-growing countries, the serious environmental problems of Planet Earth would inevitably take a quantum leap".

 
Can cleaner coal technologies really increase and overtake our rate or industrialisation and population growth without blowing out the costs? With the failure of Copenhagen summit, a more realistic "solution" to climate change would be to reduce our population with birth control, surely.

Copenhagen indeed has proven yet 'Another overhyped talkfest in a series of duds!'

Copenhagen's much hyped COP15 was all navel gazing on communications consultants' hype. Like Copenhagen tourism, I bet the consultants pocketed nicely! And what a setting, beautifully detached Copenhagen!

Arrogant to the needs of developing nations and of sea-level nations and strangely even to the needs of developed nations, Copenhagen was doomed to fail. Copenhagen was doomed to fail simply on the basis of distrust on entry by each of the 192 nations and on account of the threatening opening speech of the conference.

The previous climate forum of 12 years before, labelled the 'Kyoto Protocol', had developed/industrial nations in breach of its undertakings. So with trust breached by industrial nations going into Copenhagen, any offerings of goodwill by developing nations had been undermined before the Danish talks commenced.
So on the back of this leadership shamozzle, do gooding Scandanavians held fast to host 192 disunited countries make cast iron national decisions under the pressure of just 2 weeks. Forced marriages are outlawed in civilised countries these days.

Worse is that the participants were being asked to commit to economic restrictions in the wake of a global financial crisis so that the UN could impose a sense of idealism at a time when pragmatically traits of a recession lingered. Perhaps this aim was a tad adventurous.

When it comes to complex global issues posing long-term adverse economic, social and environmental consequences whose expectations thought a two week brainstorming session by opposing ideologies under duress would deliver a silver bullet consensus blueprint appeasing developed and developing nations in one go?

It's Alice in Wonderland and if the Danish government were accountable beyond its tourism boom it would make publicly transparent the total conference costs, the total greenhouse gas emissions by staging the conference.

Copenhagen was just another wasteful talkfest as predicted. The Scandinavians should think twice next time about offering their white knight image to solve the dirty world's problems.

Tuvalu should host the next one in a year's time, at the complete expense of the top 3 worst greenhouse gas polluters. Nothing like working at the 'coal face' to deal with the real problems and issues.

But wherever the next conference is held, it must be preceded by a series of multilateral negotiations on each of the issues with agreements and funding already legally secured. This should be done using online conferencing not airline fuels. Such a complex overarching conference can only be a consolidation of previously secured agreements.

The CSIRO recently released their Home Energy Saving Handbook – How to save energy, save money and reduce your carbon footprint.

CSIRO Total Wellbeing Diet championed a high animal protein plan - lots of beef, lamb and dairy - which was perhaps not surprising, given that the research behind it was partly funded by the Meat and Livestock Industry and Dairy Australia.

Western Victoria state Liberal MP John Vogels, has slammed the CSIRO's Home Energy Saving Handbook, which promotes vegetarian diets to reduce agricultural green house gas emissions.

According to John Vogels, the CSIRO should apologise to meat and livestock farmers for stating what is scientifically clear - that a move towards a plant-based diet is not only a way to limit greenhouse gas emissions and environmental destruction, but also a route to a healthier diet. "It seems tofu-munching climate change extremists and animal libbers have taken over the CSIRO, wasting taxpayer funds to publish books designed to wipe out our agriculture industries with the ultimate goal of forcing farmers off the land,'' Mr Vogels said.

The book grudgingly admits that although all that meat requires high greenhouse emissions, eating "high-carbohydrate, healthy heart and vegetarian diets…..is an easy way to lose weight and one way to adapt to a lower consumption diet".

In 2007 this MP
attacked Philip Wollen of the Winsome Constance Kindness Trust for telling the truth about the negative impacts of the dairy industry, even going so far as to question his Australian of the Year award. According to him, he could “afford" to be vegan? Surely the diet is actually cheaper?

Vogels says that the Home Energy Saving Handbook was "thinly veiled propaganda advocating Australians change to a vegetarian lifestyle in the name of reducing greenhouse gas emissions. If the populace took this book seriously our beef, sheepmeat, pork, poultry and dairy industries would be at risk because the authors want everyone to move to vegetable diets to reduce personal carbon footprints…” Exactly!

Somewhat contradictorily, Vogels is “pro-life" – against abortions. Apparently this does not include the lives of animals that routinely suffer mutilations, confinement and slaughter to feed our commercial meat and dairy demands. His “pro”-life stand does not include protecting our future generations from the devastation of climate change, or consumers from cancers and other diseases associated with high levels of meat and dairy consumption.

According to the book, the average person’s carbon footprint is about 20 tonnes of CO2 per year (not including emissions from our exported goods) and the biggest contribution to this figure comes from the food, goods and services we buy (about 60 per cent of the total).

The agricultural sector is estimated to account for about 16% of Australia’s total greenhouse emissions (National Greenhouse Gas Inventory 2006) making it the second largest source of greenhouse emissions in the economy. Most if it is from livestock emissions, and that doesn’t include transport, processing and cooking!

With health, the environmental burden, animal welfare and climate change concerns of eating livestock products, surely it is time our diets came under scrutiny from numerous levels? Being enslaved to traditions and tastes should be challenged.

The world demand for food and fibre will double within a single lifetime, eclipsing climate change as the world's next great challenge, experts told the National Agrifood conference in Sydney on 24 September.

Being constantly on top of the food chain is an extravagance in terms of natural resource usage, as well as pollution and methane emissions. Maybe it is time for our Government to actually promote alternative “green” plant-based foods to alleviate the demand for livestock products and transform our agricultural industries so that they become more carbon-neutral. The dinosaurs like Vogels need to be challenged!

A recent CSIRO/NASA report on rainfall in Australia’s southeast revealed that the prolonged drought there may no longer technically be a drought - lower rainfall levels may be the new normal.

Economic considerations always seem to over-ride logic and reasoning!
Science should be objective, and the CSIRO should not have been sponsored by industries with a conflict of interests. They do not have to apologise!

We constantly hear the use of the arguments of JOBS and ECONOMIC BENEFITS to justify environmental consumption!