Escaping extinction through paradigm shift

For the last month, as a journalist and academic, I’ve experienced a strange sensation of paralysis.

Drone footage of displaced family tents in one settlement
 in Badghis, Afghanistan, due to ongoing drought and
climate change. There are thousands of makeshift homes
 spread between mountain hills on the outskirt of Qala-i-naw city. 

I don’t usually experience this. Usually I find myself driven by the pressures of wanting to cover with due justice a full spectrum of intersecting crises and potential solutions.

But this month watching the spectacle of political madness unfolding across Washington, London and Brussels, while chaos and suffering continues to kick off across Venezuela, Yemen, Israel-Palestine, Syria, Nigeria and beyond, I experienced something I haven’t felt in a long-time. A sense of total burn-out. Of futility. Of tiredness.

Read the Medium story by Nafeez Ahmed - “Escaping extinction through paradigm shift.”

A moral obligation' – MCG goes carbon neutral for finals season.

Few images are as emblematic of Melbourne as the MCG, floodlit and heaving with tens of thousands of punters.  Packed to the rafters. But this spectacle comes at a cost.

Staff in the MCG control room monitor energy
 use at the ground during the finals series.

Have you ever wondered how much electricity is consumed to power those light towers? Or how much carbon is emitted in transporting those fans to the ground, heating their pies, cooling their beers or frying their chips?

The Melbourne Cricket Club, which runs the venue, has. It says the 'G and its surrounding Yarra Park precinct consumes about 1.65 million kWh of electricity during the finals alone. Last September, that amounted to 20,531 tonnes of carbon emissions.

Read the story by Peter Hannam from The Age - “‘A moral obligation' – MCG goes carbon neutral for finals season.”

Controlled 'implosion' set to level Anglesea power plant on Wednesday

A former power station on Victoria's Surf Coast will be demolished with explosives this week but anyone hoping to catch a glimpse of the spectacle has been warned to stay away.

An aerial view of the Anglesea mine and power station in 2014.

The six-storey-high decommissioned Alcoa power station in Anglesea is set to be imploded on Wednesday morning, weather conditions permitting.

According to a notice of demolition, the implosion will sound akin to claps of thunder that will last for 10 to 20 seconds and will create some “localised dust”.

But some townsfolk fear that the dust could include asbestos, despite assurances that the building had been renderd harmless by a pre-demolition safety program.

Read the story by Benjamin Preiss from The Age - “Controlled 'implosion' set to level Anglesea power plant on Wednesday.”