Bushfire victims want Australia to know they are ‘suffering from climate change’

Australia holds the potential to sit amongst the world’s renewable energy superpowers, but “unprecedented” bushfires across NSW reveal just how lacking the government’s climate change policy is.

Firefighters have been working tirelessly to
contain out-of-control bushfires in NSW. 

Days after thousands of scientists from across the globe declared humanity was facing a climate emergency, scores of bushfires tore through NSW, so far killing at least three people.

It appeared Prime Minister Scott Morrison wanted to steer clear of another climate debate, dodging the topic on Saturday as fears grew more people may have perished.

But a local mayor, climate change policy expert, firefighter and resident whose father’s home was destroyed in the early-season fires have all told The New Daily they want climate change at the centre of the conversations about the deadly emergency.

Read the story from The New Daily by Christiane Barro - “Bushfire victims want Australia to know they are ‘suffering from climate change’.”

BHP joins Bill Gates in backing technology to kill off CO2.

BHP has invested $6 million in a company that has developed technology with the potential to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere on a large scale using huge fans.

A digital image showing "direct air capture" technology
 which removes carbon dioxide from the atmosphere
deployed on a large scale.

BHP said Canadian company Carbon Engineering, which counts Bill Gates among its private investors, was leading the development of "direct air capture," a technology with the potential to deliver "large scale negative emissions”.

Read the story from The Age by Darren Gray - “BHP joins Bill Gates in backing technology to kill off CO2.”

Donald Trump's border wall could cause great ecological damage, scientists warn US government

Scientists in the US are warning of the potential for serious ecological consequences if Donald Trump's proposed border wall between the US and Mexico goes ahead.

Researchers fear barriers like this stop many larger
animals from being able to migrate or move with the seasons.

The wall, which would span the majority of the border from the North Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico, will impede animal migration, shrink animal habitat and split populations of species into smaller, less viable groups, according to the 18 researchers who published their findings today in BioScience.

More than 2,500 scientists endorsed the article, which calls on the US government to "recognise and give high priority to conserving the ecological, economic, political and cultural value of the US-Mexico borderlands”.

Read the story by Nick Kilvert from ABC News - “Donald Trump's border wall could cause great ecological damage, scientists warn US government.”

Six reasons you should care about El Niño

El Niño translates to “the little boy” in Spanish and, together with La Niña (the little girl), has the potential to wreak havoc on our weather patterns. But what do you really know about it?

Good reasons why you should care about El Ninõ.

Last month our friends at the Bureau of Meteorology (aka da BOM) raised their El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) Outlook to El Niño WATCH; meaning that the likelihood of El Niño forming this spring has increased from approximately 25% to 50%. And today, some of our climate scientists had a paper published in Nature looking at the complexity of El Niño (you know it must be complex when even the experts haven’t got it completely pegged yet!).

So with the possibility that El Niño is on its way we thought we’d take a look at this climate phenomenon, how it’s likely to impact you, and why it’s so tricky to predict.

Read the story from CSIROscope by Fiona Brown - “Six reasons you should care about El Niño.”

The 'softening' view apocalyptic temperature increases

by Robert McLean

Earlier, most people conscious of the apocalyptic potential of climate change shuddered at the thought of a two degree increase above preindustrial temperatures.

And “earlier” was just several years ago.

The image being used to promote "Guardians of the Earth."

That’s changing, subtlety but definitely and it was witnessed only last night at the screening of “Guardians of the Earth” at Melbourne’s Nova Cinema’s.

The 90 minute film takes viewers to the 2015 Paris negotiations at which 190 nations gathered to discuss a potential agreement aimed at reducing global greenhouse gas emissions and thus avoiding the threat of dangerous climate change.

Director Filip Antoni Malinowski, who was at the Nova screening, used the movie to give viewers a special insight on the drama and machinations of what happens when the delegations from nearly 200 countries discuss, debate and reach for a conclusion about how the world’s atmosphere should be preserved from the accelerated dangers brought by excessive carbon dioxide.

Each country came to the near two-week conference with particular agendas and left with an agreement of which the key elements were:

• To keep global temperatures "well below" 2.0C (3.6F) above pre-industrial times and "endeavour to limit" them even more, to 1.5C
• To limit the amount of greenhouse gases emitted by human activity to the same levels that trees, soil and oceans can absorb naturally, beginning at some point between 2050 and 2100
• To review each country's contribution to cutting emissions every five years so they scale up to the challenge
• For rich countries to help poorer nations by providing "climate finance" to adapt to climate change and switch to renewable energy.

However, while each country submitted Independently Nationally Determined Contributions (INDC) and arrival at and agreement to those voluntary targets was often contested and controversial with developed countries frequently arguing for an easing of agreements and poorer countries, frequently among those likely to first feel the greatest impact of climate change, pitching for more aggressive goals.

The agreed - “To keep global temperatures "well below" 2.0C (3.6F) above pre-industrial times and "endeavour to limit" them even more, to 1.5C “ - has brought a strange and misplaced comfort to many people as it is commonly acknowledged that even an increase of 1.5 degrees will bring systemic changes that will make live increasingly difficult, if not impossible, for many people around the world.

That “comfort” was obvious at the Nova on Wednesday night as no one spoke up about the dangers the world faces even if all those signatories to the agreement meet their voluntary INDCs, world still faces temperature increases of well more than two degrees and maybe even in excess of three degrees.

The first would be remarkably challenging and the second would render many parts of the Earth unliveable for humans.

A grasp and understanding of that fact appeared to be absent on Wednesday night and many people appeared at ease about the two degree increase.

Victoria's Energy and Enviroment
Minister Lily D'Ambrosio was
represented atWednesday's
 screening was the Deputy
Decretary Energy,Envronment
and Climate Change, Kylie White.

Such a judgement may well be a little harsh as the educated group at Wednesday night’s screening are probably well aware that the two degree increase is already unavoidable and rather than sit about lamenting that, we simply need to state it and then get on with devising methods of adaptation.

Wednesday night’s screening was followed by a panel discussion involving, along with Filip Antoni Malinowski, a senior German climate official currently researching climate and energy transition strategies at Murdoch University in Perth, Dr Ursula Fuentes Hutfilter; United National Association Victoria,  Graham Hunter; and  Carolyn Ingvarson from Lighter Footprints who commented that the Paris Agreement at least gave activist groups such as hers something on which to pin their arguments. 

The screening was organised by the University of Melbourne’s Australian-German Climate and Energy College, supported by Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany, the Austrian Embassy Canberra, the Embassy of Poland in Canberra and the Embassy of France in Canberra.

”Guardians of the Earth”, according to Filip Antoni Malinowski highlights the dilemma between solidarity versus perceived national self-interest.

Biofuel the forgotten renewable energy, report says

Australia's biofuel industry has the potential to add more than 8000 jobs and $1 billion a year in revenue to the economy despite being neglected for more than a decade.

Biofuels in Australia are mainly made from food processing waste.

Queensland University of Technology economists have outlined how Australia could lift its energy security by increasing the levels of locally-produced biofuels and bioproducts.  The first step was to grow our bioethanol and other biofuel industries, lead author Ian O’Hara said.

Read Cole Latimer’s story from The Age - “Biofuel the forgotten renewable energy, report says.”

Irreversible climate change due to carbon dioxide emissions

The severity of damaging human-induced climate change depends not only on the magnitude of the change but also on the potential for irreversibility. 

Susan Solomon.

This paper shows that the climate change that takes place due to increases in carbon dioxide concentration is largely irreversible for 1,000 years after emissions stop. Following cessation of emissions, removal of atmospheric carbon dioxide decreases radiative forcing, but is largely compensated by slower loss of heat to the ocean, so that atmospheric temperatures do not drop significantly for at least 1,000 years.

Read the 2009 paper by Susan Solomon - “Irreversible climate change due to carbon dioxide emissions.”

South Australia’s Iron Duchess mine could be given new life as 90MW pumped hydro plant

The Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) has today announced its support of a feasibility study to assess the potential to turn a mothballed mine in South Australia into a 90MW pumped hydro energy storage (PHES) plant.

Mothballed mine to become pumped hydro energy storage plant.

On behalf of the Australian Government, ARENA is committing $500,000 to GFG Alliance to begin the first phase of establishing the technical and commercial feasibility of bringing a disused mine site in the South Middleback Ranges, near Whyalla, back to life as a potential PHES power plant.

The $1.7 million project will investigate if the existing mine pit of “Iron Duchess North” could be utilised as a lower reservoir for a PHES plant creating an estimated capacity of 90 MW and 390 MWh of storage.

Pumped hydro works by pumping water uphill between two connected reservoirs when electricity is cheap and abundant, and running water downhill to power turbines when electricity is needed.

Read the ARENA story - “South Australia’s Iron Duchess mine could be given new life as 90MW pumped hydro plant.”

Are You a Wizard or a Prophet?

The term “GMO” can be a Rorschach test. It makes some people see potential for plants that can grow in any ecosystem, resist drought and disease, and yield massive amounts of food and prosperity for all. Human innovation, this camp says, can get us out of any jam.

But many environmentalists see a racket that will give mega-corporations control over the world’s food supply and encourage thoughtless consumption. We are part of the Earth’s global ecosystem, the second group contends, we can’t “bio-hack” our way out of every problem.

In his latest book, The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Dueling Visions to Shape Tomorrow’s World, journalist Charles C. Mann traces current incarnations of these world views to two 20th-century figures — agronomist Norman Borlaug and ecologist/activist William Vogt. Both men were unlikely scientists, and both have left their fingerprints all over environmental thought.

Read the story by Diana Crow form Neo.Life - “Are You a Wizard or a Prophet?”

The case against Tesla and battery storage just hit peak stupidity

It is clearly getting under their skin, this battery storage technology, and its potential as a “game changer” in the energy industry.

Battery storage and peak stupidity,

We’ve had the politicians mocking Tesla’s big battery as little more than a “Big Banana”, and the far right railing against it because it’s not coal, and taking umbrage when the likes of AGL dare suggest a big battery as a possible partial substitute for an old generator like Liddell.

But the case against battery storage has just hit peak stupid.

It came in an article in Australian Financial Review over the weekend, under the authorship of one of its “Chanticleer” columnists, Michael Smith, and supposedly quoting Snowy Hydro CEO Paul Broad and its CFO Gordon Wyler from an interview and a “previously unreleased presentation”.

The article makes claims about the cost comparisons of pumped hydro and battery storage are so absurd that it is stunning to think that it could be repeated in a leading business journal, let alone the back-page column that claims to the country’s most authoritative.

Read the RenewEconomy story by Giles Parkinson - “The case against Tesla and battery storage just hit peak stupidity.”

Power from the sun and battery storage draws closer

The idea of generating power from the sun and storing it in a battery has drawn a little closer.

Supported by the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) a $3.3 million trial of a combination of rooftop solar photovoltaic (PV) with battery storage is happening at a new housing development in Alkimos Beach, north of Perth in Western Australia.

ARENA CEO Ivor Frischknecht said the model being trialled included new tariff options for consumers and had the potential to be replicated in future residential developments across Australia.

A release from ARENA - “Residential rooftop solar with battery storage a step closer” – explains what is happening at Alkimos Beach.

Adaptation interest needs to focus on our cities

Our interest in adapting to climate change needs to focus on our cities.

Something like 75 per cent of the world’s potential population of nine billion is expected to be living in our cities.

Our cities, along with deforestation and the breeding of livestock for food, are pushing climate change beyond survivable limits and we need to urgently consider what we should do ensure their liveability.

It was in 2010 that the University of Melbourne’s Professor of Urban Policy Studies, Brendan Gleeson, published his book, “Lifeboat Cities” in which he was optimistic about correctly planned cities being our refuge as climate change really began worsen life.

Writing in a story headed “Sweltering in the city: Surviving climate change in our great urban metropolises”, The Carbon Brief discusses rapid population growth and the profound impacts urbanization is having on our environment.