A gargantuan effort is needed to maintain optimism and there’s a good chance it is an effort framed in delusion. The UNFCCC process and its meetings in COPs appears totally ineffectual. At a national level, governance has been captured by the players that are causing the problem. What are we to do?
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From: Maelor Himbury <M.Himbury@acfonline.org.au>
Date: 18 November 2024 at 8:38:38 AM GMT+11
To: Undisclosed recipients:;
Subject: Daily Links Nov 18
Date: 18 November 2024 at 8:38:38 AM GMT+11
To: Undisclosed recipients:;
Subject: Daily Links Nov 18
Post of the Day
Cybele Dey et al
As government representatives gather at the COP29 international climate summit in Azerbaijan, the impact of climate change on young people’s mental health needs to be an urgent priority.
On This Day
Climate Change
Revealed: more than 100 executives given special guest badges as activists challenge role of oil and gas firms at talks
More lobbyists for the controversial technology were present this year, despite debate about its viability
Climate leaders suggest new taxes on dirty old industries could help pay for the multitrillion-dollar cost of stabilising the climate.
George Monbiot
What would it witness in Azerbaijan? A species that knows it is destroying itself but is too greedy to change course
Nathalie Beasnael
Soaring heat and compounding natural disasters are triggering fatal heart-related illnesses, mosquito-borne viruses and other fetal abnormalities.
Gemma Tognini
Elitist activists with electricity oppose fossil fuels with no thought for poor sub-Saharan families
Bjorn Lomborg
The global climate process has lost its way. Most of the focus at this week’s UN climate summit will be on the need for huge transfers of wealth. These were never going to happen, even before Trump’s election – now they are utterly unrealistic.
John Hewson
Newly re-elected United States president Donald Trump has made it clear he intends to withdraw the US from the Paris climate agreement again, and a top priority of his administration will be to ‘drill, baby, drill’ for more oil and gas. This couldn’t have come at a worse time, in light of the urgency of the climate challenge and with COP29 under way in the former Soviet petrostate of Azerbaijan.
Alan Pears
The climate crisis is much more severe than most people and politicians realise.
National
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese refuses to commit to announcing a 2035 target ahead of the election, only promising to do it “sometime next year”.
As Australia surges past a solar-powered milestone, questions turn to how much is too much, and can we hope to store it all?
One of the world’s major miners has urged Labor to slow down the transition from coal to renewables, as Donald Trump put in motion his plan to expand the fossil fuel sector in the United States.
Australasian Centre for Corporate Responsibility accuses Australian oil giant of misleading and false claims in closing arguments
A new analysis has ranked the cities with the lowest air pollution around the world — but some experts contest the findings.
Australia’s cashed-up coal miners have put the brakes on contributions to an industry decarbonisation fund and the decision will be reviewed “periodically”.
More than 2000 seismic surveys have been conducted in waters off Australia since the 1960s, as companies map the seabed to prospect for new oil and gas reserves.
Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek’s struggling reforms have been offered a last-minute reprieve, provided she scraps an exemption for native logging.
Labor government ‘not acting in good faith’ when it stands on global stage and promotes its climate credentials, special envoy at Cop29 says
The boss of Origin Energy warns Australia is drifting closer toward a decade of extraordinary upheaval for the power grid.
This sci-fi tale of avengers hunting polluters in a scorched Australian dystopia serves as an essential call to arms over global heating
Chris Uhlmann
It is impossible to overstate the stakes if our energy transition runs off the rails. Red lights are flashing here and around the world.
The next election will be a contest about a subject that matters, because almost nothing is more central to the daily life of a modern economy than reliable and affordable electricity, writes Peta Credlin.
Chris Kenny
Not only is Labor’s plan to reach its net-zero goal physically impossible, the attempt is sending us a broke. At some stage the facts will break through the delusion – but it may be too late.
Peter Hannam
New analysis on the cost of decarbonising Australia’s power grid runs closely to the national market operator’s own – but you wouldn’t know it from the headlines
Gareth Hutchens
There are many problems with Australia’s migration system. Climate change will cause more.
Bruce Chapman
An innovative financing system could hold the key to returning Indigenous people to Country to sustainably farm the land that was taken more than 200 years ago.
Elizabeth Thurbon
A handful of years ago, South Australia’s Whyalla steelworks, owned by British industrialist Sanjeeev Gupta, was touted as the potential birthplace of an Australian green iron and steel industry. Today, the mounting crisis at Whyalla brings sharply into focus both the risks and opportunities of this pivotal moment in Australia’s energy transition, and the transition
Nick Cater
The rush towards renewables is driving a dangerous new dependency on China – it’s cornered 80 per cent of the global solar market.
Victoria
Avonbank mineral sands’ company informs farmers their land will be used for a 3,000-hectare mine, under compulsorily acquisition powers in Victoria’s Mining Act.
Firefighters battle two out-of-control blazes as other communities brace for winds, storms and possible flash flooding
The federal Coalition has made the Suburban Rail Loop a central issues at the upcoming federal election calling for it to be ditched and $2.2bn in promised federal funds be redirected to crumbling roads.
The nation’s rock climbers have united to demand transparency, consultation and evidence-based policy from the Victorian government over bans at world famous Mount Arapiles.
New South Wales
An exclusion zone has been issued ahead of next weekend’s Rising Tide protest and festival. Anyone caught in the water faces an $1,100 fine.
As world leaders debate ways to reduce carbon emissions at the UN’s COP29 climate summit in Azerbaijan, an Australian start-up believes it has one solution: fungi
ACT
There have been no further sightings of a koala in the ACT, the territory government has confirmed, nearly a month after the endangered animal was spotted within a future development site.
Only this week, one of the peacocks of Narrabundah was killed by a car, hit on a pedestrian crossing in Dalrymple Street.
Queensland
The Queensland government has been locked in a secret battle with coalmining giant Adani for years, forcing the latter to pay full royalties upfront instead of the deferral deal locked in by Annastacia Palaszczuk.
A much-hyped partial start to the $1.4 billion Metro bus project has ended just one month after it began, causing opposition concern.
Carly Randall et al
The Great Barrier Reef, which supports an estimated 64,000 jobs and has a social and economic value of around A$6.4 billion, is under threat due to human-induced climate change.
South Australia
The $368 billion AUKUS pact is promising to return submarine construction to Australia. But residents have just learned the deal also means nuclear waste will be stored on their doorstep.
Tasmania
Otto and Bruno Bell have always loved the natural world. They have become experts on some of the tiniest snails and weevils, and now a species of weevil is set to be named after them.
Europe deals with overcrowding due to a surge in tourism, sparking a warning from a retired park ranger who says Tasmania could fall into the same trap.
Northern Territory
Residents in the remote Northern Territory town of Elliott say they are at their wit’s end, as bats roosting on power lines cause recurring outages.
Western Australia
Australia has some of the best waves in the world and researchers say it could be a global leader in creating electricity from our oceans. So what’s the hold-up?
A rare WA turtle species will be introduced to a new habitat in the state’s South West, in a last-ditch effort to bring the reptiles back from the brink of extinction.
Amid the spinifex on a remote Western Australian island looms Chevron’s troubled carbon capture facility. The role the technology might play in cutting greenhouse gas emissions is likely to get a fresh airing at global climate talks in Azerbaijan.
Mining billionaire Andrew Forrest has become the first business leader to back a proposed treaty setting concrete deadlines for the global phase-out of fossil fuels.
Australian editorial
A proposed green energy hub threatening ancient caves beneath the Nullarbor raises serious concerns about the impact of renewable energy projects on pristine environments.
Sustainability
The black plastic spatulas and trays in our kitchens might be introducing toxic chemicals into our food, according to a new study linking black plastic recycling to dangerous flame retardants banned years ago.
A recent study suggests that even low-level exposure to bisphenol A during childhood may raise the risk of heart disease, diabetes, obesity and other health conditions later in life.
Researchers are calling for a ‘resilience index’ to be used as an indicator of policy success instead of the current focus on GDP. They say that GDP ignores the wider implications of development and provides no information on our ability to live within our planet’s ‘safe operating space’.
Peter Sainsbury
Carbon capture and storage fails to deliver carbon but succeeds for governments and industry.
Richard Hil
Two weeks ago, I was at a public event in Northern NSW listening to five speakers reflect on the state of the climate and what we might do about it – that, at least, was how it was pitched.
Philip Lawn
If you are like me, you are fed up with the so-called educated ‘Left’ who are not at all educated in the underlying causes of humankind’s current problems and the solutions to them.
Nature Conservation
Conservation group warns species threatened by exploding populations of grey squirrels who carry lethal virus
Rainforest protection is not only good for biodiversity and the climate — it also noticeably improves the health of humans who live in the corresponding regions
Animals and plants also live and thrive on public squares. This creates opportunities for greater biodiversity and well-being for the human population.
The Earth’s total amount of freshwater dropped abruptly starting in May 2014 and has remained low ever since. The shift could indicate Earth’s continents have entered a persistently drier phase.
How mountain lions in Los Angeles are adjusting to avoid human interactions
Fish stocks along the West African coast have declined significantly over the past five decades, threatening food security and the livelihoods of the fishing communities that depend on them, according to a new study.
Maelor Himbury | Library Volunteer
Australian Conservation Foundation | www.acf.org.au
1800 223 669
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