UOW Lecturer Says NSW Has 'Dropped The Ball' On Climate Change

Illawarra Mercury - Aidan Green

Picture: Michele Mossop

As our planet heats up, the politics is only getting stranger.
In this world of ‘fake news’ and ‘alternate facts’, getting impartial expert information on major global issues like climate change, has never been so important.
This is a view senior University of Wollongong lecturer in Science and Technology Studies, Dr Adam Lucus totally agrees with.
And he believes the NSW Government has “dropped the ball” on climate change.
“Recent April records have been higher than average and even recorded it’s hottest day ever,” he said.
Dr Lucus is an expert in the field of climate change and also a former policy analyst for the NSW Government.  He worked primarily with former NSW Premier, Bob Carr.
Dr Lucus isn’t happy with the environmental stance of the current state government.
“The NSW Government has been dragging its’ heels on the renewable energy target,” he said.
“If roughly 35 percent of Australia’s emissions are coming from the energy sector and another 15 percent from transport then clearly those two areas are what the government should be focusing on.”
But he believes that hasn’t been the case, adding that ‘eight of the 10 hottest years on record in Australia have occurred within the past two decades.”
His research on energy policy responses to anthropogenic climate change led him to state – “the abandonment of the carbon tax has led to increased emissions in the electricity sector and now we are going through this ridiculous argument about whether we should be keeping coal fired power stations open when the owners want to shut them down and can see the economic benefit of renewables and storage.”
The climate change advocate has chaired the non-partisan, volunteer-led climate change solutions education and research organisation, Beyond Zero Emissions.
However, Dr Lucas noted just how hard achieving zero emissions is, highlight that the Kyoto reporting period in 2012 “saw a significant increase in emissions at 55 percent for electricity and 45 percent for transport.”
He said the state government’s priorities were out of sync. “There are so many things they could be focusing on which would drive emissions down such as agriculture production, issues around manufacturing, energy, reliance on gas, waste recycling and waste processing.”
Dr Lucus’s current research is focused on drivers for, and obstacles to, the complete decarbonation of the world's energy sector.
2017 was the 41^st consecutive year with an above-average global temperature.

Links

• UOW students tell us how they would tackle climate change?
• Science Can't Solve Climate Change — Better Politics Can, Former IPCC Scientist Says
• Sydney Smashes April Records With A Month Of Summer-Like Heat
• Recent Australian Droughts May Be The Worst In 800 Years
• April 2018 Australia’s Hottest On Record Courtesy Of “Exceptional Heat”