Back in the chaotic dying days of the Whitlam-Cairns-Connor government, Canberra was buzzing with Rex Connor’s grand plans for nationalisation of the mining industry, a national energy grid and gas pipelines linking the NW Shelf to the capital cities, all to be funded by massive foreign loans arranged by a mysterious Pakistani named Khemlani. Malcolm Frazer staged a parliamentary revolt. The economy slumped.

A British observer at that time was asked who was the greater Prime Minister – Harold Wilson or Gough Whitlam. He replied:
“Any fool can bugger up Britain but it takes real genius to bugger up Australia.”

Australian politicians are again showing real genius.

Now, we have incredible tri-partisan plans to cover the continent with a spider-web of transmission lines connecting wind/solar “farms” sending piddling amounts of intermittent power to distant consumers and to expensive battery and hydro backups – all funded by electricity consumers, tax-assisted speculators and foreign debt.

We are the world’s biggest coal exporter but have not built a big coal-fired power station for 11 years. We have massive deposits of uranium but 100% of this energy is either exported, or sterilised by the Giant Rainbow Serpent, or blocked by the Green-anti’s.

Australia suffers recurrent droughts but has not built a major water supply dam for about 40 years, and the average age of our hydro-electric plants is 48 years. And when the floods do come, desperate farmers watch as years of rain water rush past to irrigate distant oceans.

Once, Australia was a world leader in exploration and drilling – it is now a world leader in legalism, red tape and environmental obstructionism.

Once, Canberra and the states encouraged oil and gas exploration with geological mapping and research – now they restrict land and sea access and limit exports.

Once, Australia was a world leader in refining metals and petroleum – now our expensive unreliable electricity and green tape are driving these industries and their jobs overseas.

Once, Australia’s CSIRO was respected for research that supported industry and for doing useful things like controlling rabbits and prickly pear and developing better crops and pastures. Now CSIRO panders to global warming hysteria and promotes the fairy story that carbon taxes and emissions targets can change the world’s climate.

Once, young Australians excelled in maths, science and engineering. Now, they are brain-washed in gender studies, green energy non-science and environmental activism.

Once, Australians were proud of our history, our ancestors and our achievements – now we are supposed to feel guilty and apologise.

Once, Australia had a big coastal fleet carrying passengers and goods and catching fish. Now our roads are clogged with cars and freight and we import seafood.

Once, the opening of a railway or the discovery of oil, coal, nickel or uranium made headlines. Today’s Aussies harass explorers and developers, and queue at the release of the latest IPad.

As Australia’s first people discovered, if today’s Australians lack the will or the knowledge to use our great natural resources, more energetic people will take them off us.

Viv Forbes

By Graham Williamson

According to Australian Climate Commissioners Tim Flannery, Roger Beale, and Gerry Hueston, in their recent report ‘The Critical Decade: International Action on Climate Change’, the reason why Australians are disproportionately to blame for global climate change is because of so called per capita emissions. According to the Climate Commissioners, (21) “the average Australian produces emissions almost five times that of the average Chinese person and 16 times that of the average person from India.”

This was confirmed by Climate Change Minister Greg Combet:

“The fact is that Australia has the highest per capita emissions of all developed countries, about 27 tonnes per person. This compares to a world average of about 6 tonnes per person, and an average of about 14 tonnes per person in other developed countries. Developing countries consistently point to Australia’s high per capita emissions to justify why we should take strong action on climate change.”
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Graham Williamson, Sydney, Australia
September 2018

Controlling Climate and Global Wealth Redistribution – a costly agenda indeed!

2015 was a very big year for the global problem solvers at the UN. In September Australia’s former Foreign minister, Julie Bishop, signed the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals agenda, and in December the UN conducted the Paris climate change conference, which was later signed by Australia’s Environment Minister, Greg Hunt. Earlier, in July the same year, Australia participated in the Addis Ababa Action Agenda to discuss ways of financing the UN’s exceedingly costly agenda.

The first part of this agenda, namely, controlling the climate, is extremely costly in itself, and the folks at the UN tell us they need much more of our money to turn down the heat. But they also need more of our money to pay the ‘climate debt’ to compensate socialist and theocratic countries, which seem to be selectively targeted by our ‘damaging’ CO2 emissions, or so the story goes.

However, the really big dollars are needed to implement Julie Bishop’s 2030 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals. For this agenda the UN needs a further $6 trillion annually so we can all be compelled to manage our properties and lifestyles correctly and meet the UN’s ‘sustainability’ requirements. And under SDG 4.7 the UN seeks to teach our children, through global citizenship education, that only the UN can ‘solve’ problems which the UN defines as ‘global’ problems. So called ‘climate change’ is ‘global problem’ SDG 13. The $6 trillion figure is expected to blow out considerably as fixing the climate and ensuring the sustainability of the earth, and educating children to believe all this, is a costly business indeed. No wonder virtually all government departments are devoted to helping the UN. (more…)

It is clear that the push to meet the Paris carbon dioxide emission targets is leading to higher power costs, and hence prices, and unreliable supply.

It is also a fact that the predictions of the warmists have not happened.

The IPCC scientific reports are stated in possibilities, yet the guidance for policy makers is written as certainty. A farce.

I hope the new leadership of the Australian Government has the courage to guide our country in a rational manner on this subject as Angus Taylor seems keen to do, and abandons the Paris Treaty.

Jerry Ellis AO
Retired Chairman BHP, retired Chancellor Monash University, and retired Chairman of Landcare

By Howard “Cork” Hayden

Dr. Howard Hayden is Professor Emeritus of Physics, University of Connecticut. He is the editor of “The Energy Advocate” a pro-energy, pro-science, and pro-technology newsletter. www.energyadvocate.com

We have about a dozen pumped-hydro plants in the US. In some places (that’s why they’re not abundant) it is economically feasible to store energy by pumping water uphill to a higher reservoir, and then release it when demand is high.

Hydro has the advantage of being a system that can turn on or off in a hurry. Typically, a dam has a lot of independent water turbines. So you can turn on (say) 50 MW, 100 MW, and so on.

Greenies look at storage systems as their salvation. (Indeed, solar and wind are nearly worthless without back-up.) What they fail to realize is that back-up is far better used with conventional power.

If a back-up system (of whatever type you care to mention) is used with wind or solar, it has to have enough storage to last for days — possibly even weeks — to keep the grid from going down.

Now look what happens in you increase conventional baseload power (the cheapest, most reliable) beyond the actual baseload demand. During times of low demand, you store the excess energy, and then release it during times of high demand. The upshot is that you need to store only something like 20% of one day’s energy rather than 100% energy for many days. (Even a greenie ought to be able to see that 3 or 4 or 5 or … is greater than 0.2.

As to the Australian Snowy 2.0 project, I have no idea whether it makes any sense or not. But if it does, it makes far more sense for conventional power than wind and solar.

Canberra breeds many white elephants, but now they are breeding a gigantic new breed of pachyderm in Australia’s Snowy Mountains – a Green Elephant. Grandly named “Snowy 2.0 Hydro-Electric”, it has the compulsory green skin, but it is just another big white elephant under a thick layer of green paint.

Snowy 2.0 plans a hugely expensive complex of dams, tunnels, pumps, pipes, generators, roads and powerlines. Water will be pumped up-hill using grid power in times of low demand, and then released when needed to recover some of that energy. To call it “hydro-electric” is a fraud – it will not store one extra litre of water and will be a net consumer of electric power. It is a giant electric storage battery to be recharged using grid power.

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