What Price Global Warming?
Last night in Australia the government run TV station, The Australian Broadcasting Corporation, or ABC to its mates, screened a Four Corners special What Price Global Warming?. The show gave extended coverage to the Federal Government’s opposition to taking any real action to slow, let alone reverse CO2 emissions. The show explains clearly that Australia is the world’s biggest greenhouse-gas emitter per head of population and that 40% of our emissions come from coal-powered electricity generation; with more coal power stations being built.
John Howard, Australia’s diminutive Prime Minister, claims it’s pointless for Australia to take what he terms expensive steps to curb its own emissions:
“If we stopped them tomorrow, it would take all of nine months for China’s additional emissions to equal what we’ve withdrawn by stopping ours.”
This of course is entirely disingenuous as China’s emissions will happen regardless and Australia reducing its emissions can only help the world. Yes of course China should also reduce its emissions, but someone has to take a leadership role, and as the worst offender, Australians have a moral responsibility to do so.
The government prefers technology based ‘clean coal’ solutions but as Dr Kelly Thambimuthu, CSIRO scientist and CEO of The Centre for Low Emission Technology explains in the show, all current ‘clean coal’ technologies are 14 years away from real world applications. Thambimuthu also adds that the new FutureGen ‘clean coal’ power plant will cost a billion dollars to build. John Howard does not accept that new technologies will be more expensive in themselves however, despite the obvious evidence to the contrary. The show also explains that federal funding for such technologies does not match Howard’s rhetoric. The government has allocated a mere $500 million over 5 years and industry must match this dollar for dollar. - CSIRO gets its funding from the same fund.
Mark O’Niell of the Australian Coal Association proudly claims they have raised $300 million for R&D already. However, in view of the fact that only last week BHP Billiton declared over $13 billion in profit, Rio Tinto declared a $9 billion profit, and Anglo-American nearly $5 billion in profit, the figure of $300 million is almost insignificant.
As Harry Debney, CEO of packaging giant, Visy Board, said in a speech to Australian business leaders recently, “the longer we take to curb emissions, the harder it will be later.”
Clips from the show are available in a variety of formats on the Four Corners website, and if you are in Australia, the show will be repeated on ABC TV at 11.30pm Wednesday 30 August; also on ABC2 digital channel at 7pm and 9.30pm Wednesday. — DS
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