Power up at Euroa station

Euroa is the location of Australia’s first ultra-rapid electric vehicle charging station, which opened last week.

Victorian Energy Minister Lily D’Ambrosio opened the site that will form part of a network with sites to be installed at Barnawartha North, followed by Melbourne, Ballarat, Horsham, Torquay and Traralgon.

The ultra-rapid electric vehicle charging station opened at Euroa. 

Creators Chargefox said the sites would be powered by the world’s first solar, battery storage and 350 kW charging combinations, dramatically reducing charging time for drivers.

Ms D’Ambrosio said the station was capable of delivering up to 400 km of range in just 15 minutes.

‘‘More Victorians will be driving electric vehicles in the future, that’s why we're building the infrastructure to be ready to meet this demand,’’ Ms D’Ambrosio said.

‘‘Uptake of electric vehicles will help us reduce emissions and to tackle climate change.’’

Car manufacturers Audi, Hyundai, Jaguar Land Rover and Mercedes-Benz have committed to using the charging network, which resulted in an Audi e-tron prototype appearing at the announcement, almost a year before the Australian launch of the production model.

Live demonstrations of how the charging stations interact with a range of optimised and hybrid electric vehicles were also shown at the announcement.

The unveiling comes after Chargefox received $1 million from the Victorian Government to develop the Euroa and Barnawartha North sites. Chargefox matched the funding to build the stations.

The government announced a further $2 million to continue installing the stations following an initial combined $15 million in funding from investors including The Australian Mobility Clubs, Wilson Transformers and the founder of Carsales, Greg Roebuck, and grants from Australian Renewable Energy Agency and the Victorian Government.

The ultra-rapid charging station is located at the Service Centre off the Hume Hwy at Euroa.

Story from The Shepparton News - “Power up at Euroa station.”

More discussions on Saturday in Euroa's 'Watershed Year'

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onservation, volunteerism, biodiversity and citizen science will be discussed at another event in Strathbogie Voices “2015 Watershed Year” on Saturday, September 26.

Speakers will include Earth Watch CEO, David McInnes and citizen science and volunteers in conservation and biodiversity, Dr Mark Norman from the Victoria Museum, along with speakers from the Euroa Environment Group, Gooram Landcare.

Tickets for this event, at $15 for adults and free for pensioners and students, are available from the Strathbogie Voices website.

Saturday’s discussions will be held at Euroa’s Kirkland Avenue West, in The Flour Mill, starting at 11:00am and ends about 3pm, and lunch is included.

Organizers hoping for big roll up tomorrow at Euroa for environmental series



Rob Gell - an inspiring speaker.



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he organisers of the 2015 Euroa Environmental Series hope you will join the lively and energising conversation at the town’s Old Flour Mill Gallery tomorrow.

 

Richard Denniss (Australian Institute), Rob Gell, Professor Alan Pears (RMIT), Sarah Houseman (Victorian Association for Environmental Education), Vicky Fysh (University of Melbourne student), Australian Youth Climate Coalition, Child in Nature Alliance will discuss what is happening in Australia and how it relates to the Paris United Nation’s summit later this year.

Climate change advocate, Rob Gell will speak on "A Lust of Change" and be joined by Richard Denniss from the Australia Institute and Alan Pears, an Adjunct Professor at RMIT University.

Adding to this will be an address by Stephen Bygrave from Beyond Zero Emissions, Sarah Houseman from Victorian Association for Environmental Education and a speaker from the  Australian Youth Climate Coalition and a Child in Nature Alliance, Vicky Fysh.

Event organizers, Strathbogie Voices say all those involved are “Voices for Change”.

Richard Denniss, an economist by training has been at the forefront of the national policy debates surrounding climate change policy and the Australian mining boom.

Rob Gell's can-do approach to sustainable development is driving others to think outside the square and Professor Alan Pears has worked in the sustainable energy and environment fields since the late 1970s.

Tomorrow’s event in Euroa starts at 11:00am and continues through to 3:00pm and includes lunch. Tickets can be secured at Strathbogie Voices. 

Euroa Talks and Paris Listens

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small Victorian town to have a say in Paris and you can be a part of this lively and energising conversation.

Euroa's main street - it will soon be seen in Paris.

VoxBandicoot Theatre Company will bring new drama to the discussion about our changing climate on Saturday, July 4 at Euroa’s Old Flour Mill Gallery.

Happenings on that day at the gallery will be filmed and taken to Paris for the United Nation’s climate summit starting on November and continuing into December.

Climate change advocate, Rob Gell will speak on "A Lust of Change" and be joined by Richard Denniss from the Australia Institute and Alan Pears, an Adjunct Professor at RMIT University.
  

Rob Gell.

Adding to this will be an address by Stephen Bygrave from Beyond Zero Emissions, Sarah Houseman from Victorian Association for Environmental Education and a speaker from the  Australian Youth Climate Coalition and a Child in Nature Alliance, Vicky Fysh.

Event organizers, Strathbogie Voices say all those involved are “Voices for Change”.

 

Prof Alan Pears.

Richard Denniss, an economist by training has been at the forefront of the national policy debates surrounding climate change policy and the Australian mining boom.

Rob Gell's can-do approach to sustainable development is driving others to think outside the square and Professor Alan Pears has worked in the sustainable energy and environment fields since the late 1970s.

The July 4 event in Euroa starts at 11:00am and continues through to 3:00pm and includes lunch. Tickets can be secured at Strathbogie Voices. 

Two things - Strathbogie Voices on Saturday, Beneath the Wisteria is off

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et’s discuss two things – first, Strathbogie Voices this Saturday and second, because of that we will not be gathering Beneath the Wisteria that same day, May 30.

Shepparton's Mayor,
Cr Dennis Patterson.

We had envisaged a discussion Beneath the Wisteria about development in Shepparton’s Maude St Mall, but Chamber of Commerce president, Paul Lelliott, was unable to join us and Shepparton’s Mayor, Cr Dennis Patterson, was unable to make a firm commitment.

However, Saturday’s ”Conversations” at Euroa organized by Strathbogie Voices are about water management and environment flows, two matters of critical interest to Beneath the Wisteria supporters.

Saturday’s Euroa events will feature Christine Forster (Environmental Farmers Network), Michael Spencer (Water Stewardship Australia), Fern Hames (Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning).

More details about Saturday’s event can be found on the Strathbogie Voices website.

Euroa 'conversations' to focus on water - 'everyone has valid concerns'

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uroa’s Castle Creek has been empty more often than full and with the Seven Creeks totally drying up for the third time in 10 years - everyone has valid concerns about water.

Subsequently, water will be the subject for the next “2015 Euroa Environmental Seminar Series” on Saturday, May 30 “conversation”.
A brace of speakers will discuss the lack of rainfall, the reduced creek-flows, the proliferation of mega dams, and the plight of fish populations.

Chairing discussions aimed at considering social, economic and environmental impacts in Euroa and downstream will be Christine Forster from the Environmental Farmers Network.

Also at the May 30 discussions at the Old Flour Mill Gallery, Kirkland Ave, Euroa, will be Murray Darling Basin Authority representative, Bill Johnson and Janet Pritchard; the Chair of Water Stewardship Australia, Michael Spencer; along with Fern Hames, who will bring a wealth of knowledge about fish and Geoff Earle and Chris Norman from the Goulburn Broken Catchment Management Authority (GBCMA), who will discuss future challenges and possibilities.

The May 30 conversations start at 10:00am and continue until about 2:30pm, Lunch is included in proceedings.

People can book by visiting the Strathbogie Voices.

Driving a contradiction all the way to Euroa

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his Saturday (April 11) I will drive to Euroa for the next in the series of the Strathbogie Voices “Conversations”.

Former CEO of VicSuper,
Bob Welsh, will speak at
Euroa on Saturday.

Like most others, outside a few locals who will walk, I will drive.

There appears to be a strange disconnect, for Saturday’s session at the Kirkland Av flour mill see much discussion about climate change and how it will impact on our lives.

Driving a car about 80kms for the return journey is precisely the wrong thing to do.

In a somewhat utopian and ideal world, all of us from out of town eager to attend the Euroa conversation should be able to travel to and fro on a public transit system powered by batteries, charged through solar energy.

However, drive it will be.

Saturday’s Conversation will see the former CEO of VicSuper, Bob Welsh, explaining “What climate change has to do with my superannuation”.

Those keen to hear Bob and be a part of the Euroa conversation should visit the Strathbogie Voices website to register.

The link between climate change and superannuation to be explained by Bob

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ob Welsh will tell you next Saturday, April 11, what climate change has to do with your superannuation.

Bob Welsh - he will explain on
Saturday at "The Conversations"
 in Euroa about the link
 between climate change
and superannuation.

Twenty years’ experience in managing superannuation positions Bob perfectly to explain the connection between superannuation and climate change.

Bob, who was the driving force behind VicSuper’s adoption of sustainability as its central operating principle in 2001, will be the next speaker at the Strathbogie Voices series of events.

The title of his address at Euroa’s Old Flour Mill Gallery in Kirkland Avenue will be “What does climate change have to do with my superannuation”.

The Saturday, April 11, program will start at 11:00am and after nearly two hours a light lunch will be service for those who wish to stay on ask questions and discuss what Bob has been saying.

Bob is a local tree-changer – having recently bought property on the Bogie plateau – and is keen to be involved in local community activities.

As a key intellectual player in the superannuation sector, Strathbogie Voices have invited him to lead their next conversation at which he will apply his more than 20 years’ experience in managing superannuation to help those attending understand the complexities of what is a long-term investment.

Bob was one of the early leaders in the global institutional investment industry to recognise the emerging risk of climate change on long-term investment returns and will share his knowledge during “The Conversations” at Euroa.

People keen to hear Bob and share their superannuation investment experiences and hear about those of others can book by visiting the Strathbogie Voices website.

'Conversations' now turn to Local Government and Sustainability

Climate change and the Strathbogie region was the subject for the first of the “Conversations” staged recently by Strathbogie Voices and the Euroa Environment Group.

More than 100 people were at Euroa’s Kirkland Avenue historic flour-mill for the first of this year’s sessions in February, which featured the Professor in Atmospheric Science at the School of Earth Sciences at the University of Melbourne, David Karoly.

Professor Karoly is an internationally renowned expert on climate change and a key spokesperson on this topic.

This short Youtube clip illustrates the essence of that first session and people can now look forward to the second “conversation” to be held on Saturday, March 21 entitled: “Local Government and Sustainability”.

The March 21 “Conversations” will feature Winsome McCaughey, Mike Hill (formerly Mayor Moreland City Council), Lorna Pitt (formerly councillor Melbourne City Council), and Janet Bolitho (former chair of the Local Sustainability Accord with the Labor Government (State).

Bookings can be made by visiting the Strathbogie Voices website.

Local Government and sustainability at Euroa

Local Government and sustainability will be discussed on Saturday in the next of the series of events for this “watershed year” organized by Strathbogie Voices.

The Saturday, March 21, event will be held from 11am – 3pm, at The Flour Mill, Kirkland Avenue, Euroa and with lunch is provided the cost is $15 each, and free for pensioners and students.

The group believes that 2015 is a watershed year for action on climate change. And what does this mean for the Strathbogie region, they ask?

Strathbogie Voices, together with the Euroa Environment Group, have put together a series of seminars on climate change and its associated impacts on issues such as business, health, biodiversity and fire.

Community participation will be at the core of this series.  Discussion, ideas, actions will all be developed.

Speaking on Saturday will be Winsome McCaughey, Mike Hill (formerly Mayor Moreland City Council), Lorna Pitt (formerly councillor Melbourne City Council), Janet Bolitho (former chair of the Local Sustainability Accord) with the Labor Government (State).

Inattention to climate change and human rights linked

Inattention to climate change and its link to human rights surfaced briefly at a public forum in Euroa on Saturday.

The matter was really only mentioned in passing and although there was a noted bias in the group’s make-up, there appeared consensus that governments failing to actively respond to climate change were abdicating their human rights responsibilities.

The sense of a direct link between human rights and a move to mitigate the cause of climate change is not uncommon and the Climate Action Network reports on a call to have human rights included in any future climate agreement.

The story - “NGO Submission to the ADP Calling for Human Rights Protections in the 2015 Agreement, 7 February 2015” – tells of the call.

Saturday’s meeting at Euroa, organized by Strathbogie Voices and the Euroa Environmental Group, featured presentations by University of Melbourne climate scientist, Professor David Karoly. It attracted more than 120 people.

Stunningly simple or chillingly compex - contrasts obvious at Euroa

Negotiating the intricacies of climate change can be either stunningly simple or chillingly complex.

That contrast become clear as it crowded out the obvious yesterday during the first of the “Conversations” in the “2015 Watershed Year: Euroa Environmental Seminar Series”.

The variance in views about how we (humanity) should respond to the differences erupting around the earth because of human induced climate change is strangely disturbing.

Climate change has a rather disturbing momentum with the climatic differences already in train being of a dimension that takes them beyond “silver bullet” solutions.

Looked at broadly, climate change arrived after decades of diligent effort by humans and so any plausible solution will be equally complex, time consuming and socially difficult – the journey here was simply hard work, it demanded innovation, tenacity and dedication, and bravery (often misplaced as an even cursory glance at history, considered from where we are now, will show) and so to retrace those steps, or at least find a way back to a world that once was, will only be successful if we can unearth and apply similar attributes.

The hard work, innovation, tenacity, dedication and bravery any useful response to climate change demands was evident as more than 120 people gathered in the old flour mill in Euroa’s Strickland Avenue for the first of a year-long series of public discussions.

A decade of listening to similar discussions illustrates a few things – the intent, the innovation and the ideas abound, but the desperately needed sacrifice, commitment, energy and application that escape from catastrophic climate change demands always appears, at least generally, just out of reach.

Resolution of the dynamics of climate change is to be found in engineering, economic and measureable practical ways, but the prime solution is rooted in human social behaviour – we simply want and expect too much and so put demands upon earth’s resources that far exceed its capacity to provide.

We revel in our beautifully complex lives and so have a perverse allegiance to the inanimate and around and within that seem remote from the understanding that our interest should be in people, rather than machines, or things.

The energy that is evident at similar climate change events was again on show in Euroa yesterday and with just a few exceptions the commitment, dedication and desire to actual do something seems confined to the room – as people dissipate so does the group intention to “do something”.

David Karoly -
rock star-like
applause at
Euroa.

Maybe, just maybe something will happen and there will be a sufficiently large enough nucleus of committed and energetic people who will keep the process alive.

Yesterday’s “conversation” was energized by a Professor of Atmospheric Science in the University of Melbourne’s School of Earth Sciences, David Karoly.

He articulated the extent of climate change and its implications for the Strathbogie area (Euroa is in the Shire of Strathbogie), talked about resolutions to the dilemma, answered specific questions, gave hope and was thanked with a rock star-like applause.

Should the success of yesterday’s conversation point to what is ahead, then the people of Euroa and the broader Goulburn Valley can anticipate an inspiring and uplifting conversations through to November.

The March 21 conversation in Euroa is “Local Government and Sustainability”, featuring Winsome McCaughey, Mike Hill, Lorna Pitt and Janet Bolitho.

Details at the Strathbogie Voices website.

Euroa lecture takes on added emphais considering Lima outcome

A lecture in Euroa early next year has a rather special emphasis following the outcome of the Lima climate change conference.

University of Melbourne climate scientist, Prof David Karoly will discuss: “2015 watershed year for climate change: from Lima to Paris.”

That conversation will be on Saturday, February 7, at 11:00am at the town’s Four Mill in Kirkland Ave. The public is invited to attend and admission is free.

Exhausting talks at Lima ended up with a less the positive conclusion making the journey for intent from Peru to Paris somewhat problematic.

An Inside Climate News report noted: “It is "very clear" that countries' pledges on carbon emissions won't be ambitious enough to tip the world into a rapid reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, said Christiana Figueres, the executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change”.

The story head: “What Will It Take to Get a Climate Accord in Paris?” discusses a plan to successfully make the trip from Peru to Paris.

Euroa to hear early next year about Lima-Paris 'journey'

Euroa will hear early next year about the challenge of the global community successfully making the journey from the Lima climate change conference to Paris late next year.

Professor David Karoly will discuss those challenges in the first of the Euroa Environment Public Lecture Series begins early in February.

The University of Melbourne Meteorology Professor and ARC Federation Fellow in the School of Earth Sciences is the first in a series of speakers lined-up for the Euroa series.

He will speak on Saturday, February 7, at 11:00am at the town’s Four Mill in Kirkland Ave with the title of his lecture being: “2015 watershed year for climate change: from Lima to Paris.”

The Paris conference, being organized by The United Nations Climate Change Conference, COP21 or CMP11 will be held from November 30 to December 11 next year. The international climate conference will be held at Le Bourget.

It will be an interesting discussion as the New York Times has just reported that: “Nations Plod Forward on Climate Change Accord” at Lima.

Exciting ideas about 'why' come to Euroa

Ideas that help people understand why the world is like it is will soon be regularly expounded in Euroa.

David Karoly.

The Euroa Environment Public Lecture Series begins early in February with the first guest speaker being Professor David Karoly.

Prof Karoly is a Professor of Meteorology and an ARC Federation Fellow in the School of Earth Sciences.

He is an expert in climate change science and was involved, through several different roles, in the preparation of the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released in 2007.

Prof Karoly is active in research on climate variability and climate change, including greenhouse climate change, stratospheric ozone depletion and inter-annual climate variations due to El Niño Southern Oscillation.

Recently, he has been studying the impacts of climate change on weather extremes and their impacts on human and natural systems.

He will speak on Saturday, February 7, at 11:00am in what will be the first of the new lecture series at the town’s Four Mill in Kirkland Ave.

News of the new lecture series came today from Euroa’s Prof Kate Auty, who is the 2014 Vice-Chancellor’s Fellow at the University of Melbourne and before that was the Victorian Government Commissioner for Environment Sustainability.

She said: “We have Bob Welsh on 11 April, will have the MDBA and Ian Lunt, Drs for the environment, Indigenous Cultural heritage, Winsome McCaughey about local government and some others who were are lining up.”

The Four Horsemen of the Twenty
First Century Apocalypse.

Prof Auty will be in Shepparton on Wednesday at the SheppartonArt Museum (SAM) to talk with artist Penny Byrne about what motivated her to create her four-piece sculpture, “The Four Horsemen of the Twenty First Century Apocalypse”.

Wednesday evening’s program starts at 7:30 for 8:00pm and has been organized in partnership between the Friends of SAM and the Shepparton-based group, Slap Tomorrow.

Those keen to attend on Wednesday night should book by phoning SAM at 5832 9861.