03/10/2019

Company Directors May Be Headed For Litigation Over Climate Change

CPA INTHEBLACK - John Purcell

The Commonwealth Climate Law Initiative is investigating how company directors may be drawn into climate change-related litigation.
Australian directors face the greatest potential liability from the impact of climate change on their businesses.
At a glance
  • A significant challenge in reducing global carbon emissions is the fact that neither national laws nor international public law are designed to address problems that have global reach.
  • Projects such as the CCLI demonstrate adaptations to national laws and innovations to international law, while encouraging company directors to take account of climate change risk.
  • According to the CCLI’s project report, Australian directors face the greatest potential liability from the impact of climate change on their businesses.
The impact of climate change and marshalling global efforts towards emissions reduction present profound challenges. Neither national laws nor international public law are designed to comprehensively address problems that are interconnected and have global reach.
However, there are developments that illustrate adaptations in national laws, and novel innovations are being suggested in international law. These developments occur separately from international treaty arrangements under the United Nations Paris Agreement, where national governments commit to implementing domestic policies to reduce carbon emissions.
The Financial Stability Board’s Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) provides one of the most readily understandable summations of climate-related risks. There are two major categories: risks related to the physical impact of climate change, and risks related to a transition to a low-carbon economy.
Transition risk can occur from legal action brought by claimants seeking redress or wanting to force protective or remedial action. The TCFD says this could stem from “the failure of organisations to mitigate the impacts of climate change, failure to adapt to climate change, and insufficiency of disclosures around material financial risk”.
How realistic then is litigation risk to companies and their directors?
The Commonwealth Climate and Law Initiative (CCLI), a research project focusing on Australia, Canada, South Africa and the United Kingdom, examines the basis for directors and trustees to take account of physical climate change risk and societal responses to climate change. Each of these countries has common law legal systems where judicial decision plays a key role in interpreting statutes and in building legal rules based on an evolving body of precedent.
The CCLI's project report concludes that Australian directors face the greatest potential liability from the impact of climate change on their businesses.
The “adaptability” of corporate law, and in particular directors’ duties, within the common law tradition provides a sound and practical basis for linking climate-related financial risks with possible governance failures that spanning well-established legal expectations around identification, assessment, oversight and disclosure.
The CCLI’s project report concludes that Australian directors face the greatest potential liability from the impact of climate change on their businesses.
However, fundamental to each jurisdiction are two broad categories of directors’ duties, which the CCLI summarises as:
  • Duties of trust and loyalty, including good faith, proper purposes and best interests (fiduciary).
  • Duties of competence and attentiveness (due care and diligence).
Of the four countries, Australia is the most stringent in interpreting and applying these duties:
  • The duty of care and diligence can be breached in circumstances of “mere” negligence.
  • There is a particularly strong adherence to an objective standard of what a “reasonable director” would do.
  • There is minimal scope to argue “business judgement rule” protection.
Proof of dishonesty, intention or bad faith is not required for breaches of trust and loyalty.
In these terms, managing climate-related risk falls squarely within well-understood legal expectations of active and inquiring engagement in guiding and managing the affairs of a company – matters that the CCLI says are self-evident given that Australia’s economy operates in high-risk sectors from both physical risk and transition risk perspectives.
Australia is also a well-established litigation funding market. It has a strong track record of class actions for misleading disclosures and an independent regulator willing to test the boundaries of directors’ duties and enforce existing well-understood duties relating to disclosure.
What of the more speculative realm of developments in international public law?
The International Criminal Court, which is created under Article 5 of the Rome Statute (another treaty to which Australia is a signatory), has specific and narrow jurisdiction limited to the most serious crimes recognised by the international community, including genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.
Limited but strong lobbying is taking place to amend the Rome Statute to include an international crime of ecocide, defined as “the extensive loss or damage or destruction of ecosystem(s) of a given territory, whether by human agency or by other causes, to such an extent that peaceful enjoyment by the inhabitants ... has been or will be severely diminished”.
The CCLI cautions against overstating the practical likelihood of litigation, but also warns against dismissing the risk as remote or theoretical, particularly for those companies in high-risk sectors. Whether or not the advocates of ecocide succeed in their endeavours, the fact that the prospect is being canvassed adds to what should be self-evident to directors: the physical and economic transition risk realities associated with climate change.

Links
Posted by at No comments :
Labels: , ,

Iceberg The Size Of Sydney Breaks Off Amery Ice Shelf In Antarctica

ABC News - Carla Howarth

Satellite images show the Amery ice shelf before and after the D28 iceberg broke off. (Supplied: AAD)

Key points
  • The iceberg, named D28, broke off the Amery ice shelf on September 26
  • The last major calving on the shelf was in the 1960s
  • Scientists do not believe the event is linked to climate change and say major calving events happen every 60 to 70 years
A gigantic iceberg the size of urban Sydney has broken off an ice shelf in Antarctica, the Australian Antarctic Division (AAD) says.
The 1,636-square-kilometre iceberg — named D28 — was calved from the Amery ice shelf in east Antarctica.
AAD glaciologist Ben Galton-Fenzi said the iceberg separated from the shelf last Thursday, and was noticed by scientists using satellite imagery.
Scientists had been monitoring a section of the ice shelf known as the Loose Tooth, which is next to where D28 broke off and is so named because it looks precariously attached.
"The calving will not directly affect sea level, because the ice shelf was already floating, much like an ice cube in a glass of water," Dr Galton-Fenzi said.
"But what will be interesting to see is how the loss of this ice will influence the ocean melting under the remaining ice shelf and the speed at which the ice flows off the continent."

Last major iceberg broke off Amery in 1960s
The 60,000-square-kilometre Amery ice shelf is the third largest shelf in Antarctica and is situated between Australia's Davis and Mawson research stations.
A crack in the Amery ice shelf, pictured in 2003. (Supplied: Australian Antarctic Division)
An ice shelf is a section of ice that juts out into the sea.
Snow from the interior builds up and flows out to the edge of the continent. At the edges it thins, and because ice is less dense than water, it sits on top of the ocean instead of on the seabed.
Scientists have been studying the Amery shelf since the 1960s, and recorded the last major calving event in late 1963 or early 1964.
The massive tabular iceberg was about 10,000 square kilometres, and split into two smaller bergs a year later.
The anatomy of an ice shelf. (Supplied: Dr Sue Cook)
Calving 'not linked to climate change'
Helen Amanda Fricker, from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in the US, said scientists first noticed a rift in the ice shelf nearly 20 years ago.
"We … predicted a large iceberg would break off between 2010-2015," Professor Fricker said.
"I am excited to see this calving event after all these years. We knew it would happen eventually, but just to keep us all on our toes, it is not exactly where we expected it to be.
"We don't think this event is linked to climate change; it's part of the ice shelf's normal cycle, where we see major calving events every 60-70 years."
In July 2017, a 1-trillion-tonne iceberg measuring 5,800 square kilometres was calved from the Larsen C ice shelf in Antarctica.
The Larsen C ice shelf, which is Antarctica's fourth largest ice shelf, covers an area of 46,500 square kilometres.
An iceberg measuring 5,800 square kilometres calved


Links
Posted by at No comments :
Labels: ,

Climate Change Threatens The World’s Fisheries, Food Billions Of People Rely On

InsideClimate News - Georgina Gustin

More than 3 billion people depend on fish as a major source of protein. By the end of the century, a quarter of the sustainable fish catch could be gone.
In many islands and coastal areas, fishing is both a primary source of income and a main source of protein. A new IPCC report warns that ocean fish stocks could drop by as much as a quarter if greenhouse gas emissions continue on their current trajectory. Credit: Derek Hudson/Getty Images

The world's already overtaxed fisheries are being stressed to their limits by climate change, putting at risk a critical component of the world's diet. As temperatures rise, fish populations are projected to plummet and disappear in some regions, especially in the tropics.
In a major report published Sept. 25 by the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, scientists examined the interconnected web of the planet's oceans and icy landscapes, delivering a series of grim projections on the chaotic impact of climate change on super-charged storms, rising seas and the ecosystems that sea life depends on.They also looked at the consequences for global diets and the role oceans play in feeding the world.
Fisheries are often overlooked when researchers and policymakers focus on land-based agriculture as the primary food source for a growing global population, yet fish are an essential protein source for 3.2 billion people and provide 17 percent of the world's animal protein. They're especially important in some developing tropical countries that rely on fish for 70 percent of their nutrition.
"The changes in the oceans will have direct impacts on people who are depending on these systems for food," said William Cheung, a professor from the University of British Columbia and a lead author of the report's chapter covering fisheries.
The scientists determined that the sustainable fish catch—the amount of fish that can be caught without decimating populations—could drop by as much as a quarter by the end of the century if greenhouse gas emissions continue on their current trajectory.



The oceans have absorbed about 90 percent of the excess heat and about a quarter of the carbon dioxide from fossil fuel burning and other human activities, leading to rising ocean temperatures, increasing acidification and lower oxygen levels that will have an impact on sea life. Shellfish won't be able to develop shells properly; harmful algae blooms will proliferate, choking off coastal fisheries; and populations of fish will continue moving to cooler waters, leaving behind the fishing communities and economies that have depended on them for centuries.
"The current science suggests that as the ocean warms and loses oxygen, the body size of animals will be reduced, the distribution of fish will change and the surface production of phytoplankton is going to decline," said Lisa Levin, a professor at Scripps Institution of Oceanography and a lead author of the fisheries chapter. "When there's less plankton at the base of the food web, there's going to be less fish."

Impacts from the Tropics to the Arctic
As the world speeds toward a population of 9 billion people by 2050, the loss of fish as a protein source could mean increased pressure on other ecosystems, including forests cleared for cropland and existing cropland that's already strained from overuse.
In tropical countries around the planet's equatorial belt, particularly small-island developing nations that are also at risk from sea level rise, the loss of fish stocks could prove devastating, nutritionally and economically.
"Climate change will take the food out of their mouths and the places they live away from them," said Doug Rader, chief oceans scientist with the Environmental Defense Fund, who was not involved in the report. "Even with aggressive emissions scenarios and highly effective management, they will lose 20 to 40 percent of their fish production. There are literally hundreds of millions of people who live in that most at-risk belt."
Communities at middle and higher latitudes will see changes, too.
Cheung explained that some North American communities that rely on salmon could lose those populations as streams warm and fish migrate farther north, and that indigenous communities in the Arctic that depend on sea ice as hunting grounds could lose access to key food sources.
"Shifting the abundance and distribution of these resources may have direct impacts for food, culture and livelihoods," he said. "In Arctic regions, many communities are dependent on sea ice. With high emissions scenarios, we are seeing the continuous loss of sea ice and higher frequencies of no sea ice in the summer."
Researchers have also projected the northward migration and disappearance of some tuna species from the tropics and of cold-water-loving species like lobster, which will move poleward as waters warm.

Many Fisheries Are Already in Trouble
Fish populations in many regions have already dropped significantly because of overfishing and the accelerating effects of climate change. Roughly one-third of the ocean's fish stocks are already fished at "biologically unsustainable levels," triple that of the mid-1970s, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).
Overfishing by commercial fleets with large boats and aggressive fishing methods, such as trawling, led to the devastating collapse of the East Coast cod fishery in the early 1990s and, more recently, the herring population. Some researchers suggest that the drop in fish stocks is even higher than the FAO states because government agencies and regulators don't have complete assessments and figures.
"Ocean warming in the 20th Century and beyond has contributed to an overall decrease in maximum catch potential, .... compounding the impacts from overfishing for some fish stocks," the new IPCC report says.
Most of that overfishing has occurred as commercial fleets go after larger, high-value fish for the global marketplace and to satisfy growing demand for seafood from developed countries.
"Most of the overfishing has not been to feed the hungry," said David Helvarg, executive director of Blue Frontier, a marine conservation group. "It's been for supermarkets and white-linen restaurants in the developed world."
Fish consumption reached a historical peak in 2016 at about 45 pounds per capita. Much of that is attributable to aquaculture—farming fish in contained waters—which in 2016 produced more consumed fish than commercial and traditional "capture" fisheries.
"Globally, we're following the terrestrial experience. We're transitioning from buffalo to cattle," Helvarg said. "We're consuming more fish, but less of it is coming from the ocean as we've depleted the commercial stock."
"The shift toward aquaculture will expand, but we're going to become a nutritionally depleted world," Helvarg added. "We'll be eating a much more limited amount of fishes based on what we can grow in concrete tanks."

Saving Ecosystems and Managing Fisheries
In some ocean fisheries, fish stocks have rebounded or stayed level as sustainable management systems placed catch limits on species in certain areas. But these are under threat, too.
"Those systems are based on historical patterns that no longer exist," Rader said. "Fish populations are already moving, and they're moving faster than anyone expected. Unless more agile management systems are put into place, all bets are off."
Despite all the alarming news in this week's report, the authors emphasized solutions and options — but stressed that they need to happen quickly, across all ecosystems, not just the oceans. Storing carbon in forests and soils will also prove critical.
"It's a call to action," Levin said of the report. "The mitigation solutions that involve the ocean include protecting natural carbon storage and enhancing it through restoration of mangroves, salt marshes and sea grass beds. We can reduce emissions on the ocean by reducing shipping emissions. ... The ocean can be involved in the solutions."
Better management of fisheries and policing of illegal fishing also will help save fish stocks, as will setting aside large and more marine protected areas, among other measures. But reducing the fossil fuel emissions that drive ocean warming and all its cascading effects remains the critical priority.
"If we can reduce emissions ... we can substantially reduce the scenario we project," Cheung said. "If we engage with sustainable management and consumption of seafood, our report suggests that good resource management can increase the resilience of fish stocks to climate change."

Links
Posted by at No comments :
Labels: , ,

02/10/2019

Greta Thunberg’s Radical Climate Change Fairy Tale Is Exactly The Story We Need

The Conversation - 

Swedish activist and student Greta Thunberg, centre, takes part in the Climate Strike in Montreal on Friday, Sept. 27, 2019. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Paul Chiasson
It has been just over a year since 16-year-old Greta Thunberg started her “school strike for climate” outside the Swedish parliament in Stockholm. Since then, she has spoken to increasingly large crowds — including most recently in Montréal.
But there are many reasons why people are still talking about Thunberg’s Sept. 23 speech at the United Nations Climate Action Summit. She spoke with knowledge, clarity and passion well beyond her years.
What I find especially significant about the talk is her inclusion of a critique of economic growth in the climate change story frame. “We are in the beginning of mass extinction, and all you can talk about is money and fairy tales of eternal economic growth,” Thunberg said.
Scholars and activists share Thunberg’s concerns about the current system of endless economic growth. For example, Prof. David Barash powerfully equates endless growth to a Ponzi scheme. It is a system, he says, “predicated on the illusion that it will always be possible to make future payments owing to yet more exploitation down the road.”
Economist Juliet Schor similarly warns about the resource depletion implications for economic growth. She highlights that endless growth will lead to “blowback… which is now happening with the climate system, oceans and forests.”
Prof. Thomas Homer-Dixon succinctly offers that “it’s becoming increasingly clear that endless material growth is incompatible with the long-term viability of Earth’s environment.” And writer Naomi Klein refers to the “god of economic growth,” powerfully proposing that “our economic system and our planetary system are now at war.”

Where are the stories?
Thoughtful and well-researched scholarship makes clear that economic growth and environmental crises are related. And yet non-academic writing linking endless growth economics and climate change is almost non-existent.
I have conducted a content analysis on the Canadian Major Dailies database. In the 12 months prior to Thunberg’s talk there were 850 newspaper articles (including opinion editorials and letters) with “climate change” in the headline. Of these, 372 — or 44 per cent — were related to the economy. And yet only one letter to the editor raised concerns about economic growth in the era of climate change.
This is what makes Thunberg’s mention of “fairy tales of eternal economic growth” so remarkable — she put economic growth and climate change into the same frame.
It is easy to think that economic growth is essential — that we have always had growth at the core of economic policy. But scholars point out that this is not the case. Bill McKibben and Peter Victor point out that our “fixation” on economic growth as an “explicit object of government policy” began in the mid-20th century.
And in those 50 years, McKibben highlights that economic growth has not only devastated the planet, but also fostered inequity, insecurity and “is no longer making us happy.”
Cognitive scientist and linguist George Lakoff offers that “all of our knowledge makes use of frames, and every word is defined through the frames it neurally activates. All thinking and talking involves frames .”
In other words, we understand and act upon climate change based on what has been framed with the climate change stories we are told.

Time to change the story frames
The good news is that climate change stories can change. Not that long ago, there were few stories about climate change. Today, the number has dramatically increased.
Until recently, there were not many stories that linked climate change to extreme weather events. Increasingly, these stories are being told.
Climate change activist Greta Thunberg on the Malizia II boat off Plymouth, England, Wed. Aug. 14, 2019. AP Photo
Now it is time to question economics and foster discussions about the hard decisions and changes that need to be made. It is clear that we cannot simply consume differently — we must consume less.
Now it is time to frame climate change stories with eternal economic growth critiques. Now is the time for climate change frames that question whether a finite planet can sustain eternal growth. Now is the time for climate change frames to include voices like Klein’s, who proposes that “the frenetic and indiscriminate consumption of essentially disposable products can no longer be the system’s goal.”
And now is the time to be grateful for a 16-year-old who sailed across the ocean and dared to tell the world’s leaders that the fairy tale must end.

Links
Posted by at No comments :
Labels: , , ,

PM Sledges Media Over Climate

ABC Media Watch

Is the media misrepresenting the government’s action on climate change? Climate experts say no.



Transcript
ROS CHILDS: So what did you make of the Prime Minister’s speech?
AMANDA McKENZIE: The only reaction that I, that came to me was this is colossal bullshit, the claim that Australia’s doing enough on climate change. And I’m sorry to use crude language but I couldn’t think of a fairer term.
- ABC News Channel, 26 September, 2019
Hello, I’m Paul Barry, welcome to Media Watch.
And criticism of our politicians does not get much blunter than that. Or at least not from organisations set up to champion science.
So, what did Scott Morrison say that got the Climate Council’s CEO Amanda McKenzie so riled up?
It was this claim that Australia’s doing a fine job in the fight against global warming, but getting no credit for its work:
SCOTT MORRISON: Australia’s internal though, and global critics on climate change willingly overlook, or perhaps ignore our achievements, as the facts simply don’t fit the narrative they wish to project about our contribution. Australia is responsible for just 1.3 per cent of global emissions. Australia is doing our bit on climate change and we reject any suggestion to the contrary.
- ABC News Channel, 26 September, 2019
Ahead of his speech to the UN — as Greta Thunberg’s rebuke to global leaders hogged the headlines — the PM was telling reporters in New York that he believes media lies may be to blame for his government’s bad rap on global warming:
SCOTT MORRISON: What I’ve found in engaging with neighbours, and even here, is often times the criticisms that have been made about Australia are completely false and they’re completely misleading and people have had a prejudiced view about what Australia is actually doing. You know, they get their information, now where do they get their information from? Who knows. Maybe they read it, maybe they read it, but from what’s come out in the media and other things like this …
REPORTER: Is this fake news?
SCOTT MORRISON: … I’m not saying that. All I’m saying is when I’ve spoken to them they’ve been surprised to learn about the facts about what Australia has been doing.
- Speers, Sky News, 26 September, 2019
Cue for some in the media to fact check the PM’s claims.
And for the Climate Council’s Professor Lesley Hughes to press home her CEO’s attack by going on ABC Radio to give the government’s record another massive fail:
LESLEY HUGHES: We remain probably the highest per capita emitter of any developed countries, even higher than Saudi Arabia. And so that fall in per capita emissions, which has been rather slight, is mainly due not to government action but because we’ve got more people.
So it’s not hard to overachieve on really dismal targets and the fact is that our emissions continue to rise ...
- PM, ABC Radio, 26 September, 2019
Now, some will claim the Climate Council is an activist group — distinguished scientists though they are — who would naturally be critical of government efforts.
So, we decided to contact some leading Australian climate experts for their verdict on the PM’s charge.
Associate Professor Malte Meinshausen is from the Climate and Energy College at the University of Melbourne. Professor Frank Jotzo is director of the Centre for Climate and Energy Policy at the ANU. Bill Hare is a founder and CEO of Climate Analytics in Perth. Professor Steven Sherwood is from the Climate Change Research Centre at the  University of New South Wales. And the ANU’s Associate Professor Nerilie Abram was a lead author on last week’s IPCC report.
A more distinguished panel would be hard to find. And we asked them all: is Australia doing enough to combat global warming, as the PM maintains?
And they answered:
No …
- Email, Malte Meinshausen, Climate and Energy College, University of Melbourne, 27 September, 2019
No …
- Email, Frank Jotzo, Centre for Climate and Energy Policy, ANU, 27 September, 2019
No ...
- Email, Bill Hare, Climate Analytics, 27 September, 2019
No …
- Email, Steven Sherwood, Climate Change Research Centre, UNSW, 27 September, 2019
No ...
- Email, Nerilie Abram, ANU, 28 September, 2019
We then asked them: is the media’s reporting on global warming and the government’s climate policies false or misleading?
And they answered:
No …
- Email, Malte Meinshausen, Climate and Energy College, University of Melbourne, 27 September, 2019
No …
- Email, Frank Jotzo, Centre for Climate and Energy Policy, ANU, 27 September, 2019
No …
- Email, Bill Hare, Climate Analytics, 27 September, 2019
Not systematically.
- Email, Steven Sherwood, Climate Change Research Centre, UNSW, 27 September, 2019
I can’t give a simple yes or no.
- Email, Dr Nerilie Abram, ANU, 28 September, 2019
And finally we asked them: is the PM right to blame the media for creating an impression that Australia is not doing enough?
And they told us:
No …
- Email, Malte Meinshausen, Climate and Energy College, University of Melbourne, 27 September, 2019
No …
- Email, Frank Jotzo, Centre for Climate and Energy Policy, ANU, 27 September, 2019
No …
- Email, Bill Hare, Climate Analytics, 27 September, 2019
No …
- Email, Steven Sherwood, Climate Change Research Centre, UNSW, 27 September, 2019
No ...
- Email, Nerilie Abram, ANU, 28 September, 2019
So, pretty much a unanimous verdict on all three questions.
We also asked those climate experts for comments, which you can read in full on our website.
But on the specific question of media reporting of climate change, Nerilie Abram told us:
Some parts of the media do a very good job of reporting on global warming, others do not.
- Email, Nerilie Abram, ANU, 28 September, 2019
While Bill Hare made that more specific, telling Media Watch:
The reporting in the ABC, Guardian and former Fairfax press is generally accurate and non-ideological.
- Email, Bill Hare, Climate Analytics, 27 September, 2019
And Professor Meinshausen finished it off by observing more pointedly that the:
Murdoch press and some radio stations are often willfully misleading … But not in the direction that Scott Morrison suggested.
- Email, Malte Meinshausen, Climate and Energy College, University of Melbourne, 27 September, 2019
And finally, the Science Media Centre — whom we also consulted, and which specialises in proper reporting of science — observed:
… the major issue is with opinion leaders who use the media to undermine the science.
Blaming the media is akin to shooting the messenger.
- Email, Australian Science Media Centre, 27 September, 2019
So, if anyone is being misleading here, it seems to be the Prime Minister.
Who, as Janine Perrett observed on Sky, may have picked up a few tips at the White House from his American counterpart:
JANINE PERRETT: … what I found interesting was the blaming the Australian media. I think he’s had a good week with Donald Trump, blame the media, fake news, there it is.
- Speers, Sky News, 26 September, 2019
And we did ask the Prime Minister’s office to point us to any media stories they considered unfair or misleading, but they did not respond.

Read the full responses from:
Links
Posted by at No comments :
Labels: , , , ,

Scott Morrison Is Trying To Turn Himself Into The Ocker Trump – Australian Media Beware

The Guardian - 

The prime minister has demonstrated a Trumpesque ability to fudge, mislead and obfuscate
“Scott Morrison’s meeting Donald Trump truly was the apprentice genuflecting to the master.” Photograph: John Minchillo/AP 
We are at a two-fold tipping point on climate change – the point at which afterwards there is no return. The two tipping points are, first, for action to ameliorate climate change, and second, to report on it with credibility.
You could argue the final year at which action to prevent serious damage from climate change can occur without horrendous upheaval to our economy and society is 2020. If Trump is re-elected the likelihood of the USA doing anything to reduce emissions will be gone – lost amid the demented ramblings of an insecure sociopath whose main concern will be to stay out of jail and to hide his insecurity with insane blather about how great he thinks he is and truly weird tweets mentioning his daughter.
For Australia perhaps the tipping point is already passed.
After this year’s election we remain saddled for three years with a federal government laden with climate-change deniers and charlatans who may or may not accept the science, but who sure as heck accept the political opportunity from scaring people about pursing action.
This is what the ALP is currently wrestling with. Yes, at a minimum we need to reduce emissions by 45% below 2005 levels, but to do that in eight years will require a much more severe effort than it would have had the ALP been able to enact policies now.
So you can see some political reasoning for the ALP to think it is better to focus on reducing emissions to net zero by 2050 rather than the 45% cut by 2030. Because, as was made clear again this year, the LNP is more than willing to smash the fear button during an election.
It is why the prime minister’s committed the most contemptible kind of hypocrisy when he suggested in his speech at the UN this week that “we must respect and harness the passion and aspiration of our younger generations, we must guard against others who would seek to compound or, worse, facelessly exploit their anxiety for their own agendas”.
Someone should introduce Scott Morrison to the disingenuous fear monger who during the election campaign went around the country telling everyone that “Bill Shorten wants to end the weekend”.
If this year’s election has shown us anything there is no advantage at all from being the only major party with an emissions policy that supports the science.
We spent six weeks with far too many journalists losing their minds trying to discover a middle ground between logic and lies, and so ended up arguing the big issue on climate change was the cost of the ALP’s policy on the economy, rather than the manifestly inadequate cuts being proposed by the LNP.
And that brings us to the second tipping point.
Scott Morrison’s meeting Donald Trump truly was the apprentice genuflecting to the master. Morrison has demonstrated a Trumpesque ability to fudge, mislead and obfuscate, and to also suggest things are the opposite of reality.
With Trump there is no ulterior motive – his total lack of introspection combined with total ignorance leads him to lie and believe his own reality; for Morrison however the application is much more tactical.
So we saw him telling journalists that the argument on climate change has been “settled in Australian politics” – that there is agreement on the action: “The action that meets, that we meet our 2020 targets and we meet our 2030 targets. And that we have a $3 billion climate solutions fund, a policy for meeting our 2030 emissions reduction targets.”
What bullshit.
Those targets themselves are pathetic – a climate-change pea and thimble trick involving dodgy accounting of land-use and carry-over credits. Even with this the targets are well below what is argued as needed by scientists. If we excluded land use our emissions would have risen 7% above 2005 levels, rather than fallen by 11%.
Our government is so useless, they are essentially cheating in order to underperform.
As for that $3bn climate solutions fund: does any sentient being truly believe $3bn over 10 years is enough to adequately reduce emissions?
The government brings in $505bn a year in revenue, so spending less than half a percent of that each year over 10 years will do the trick?
If that were so then we would not be worrying about climate change – every nation in the world would have signed that pitifully small cheque and gone on their merry way.
And so we are at a tipping point.
The prime minister of this country is now suggesting the media are lying about the government’s climate change efforts.
He told reporters in New York last week, “See what I’ve found in engaging with neighbours, and even here, is often times the criticisms that have been made about Australia are completely false and they’re completely misleading and people have had a prejudiced view about what Australia is actually doing. They get their information now, where do they get their information from? Who knows? Maybe they read it, maybe they read it. But from what’s come out in the media and other things like this, how they get their information…”
I don’t know about the prime minister, but I get my information from the Department of the Environment and Energy, which shows that annual emissions have risen every quarter since the government introduced its “emissions reduction fund”.
The transformation into Ocker Trump (“Who knows? Maybe they read it, maybe they read it”) is now so obvious that no journalist or media company can miss it.
The tipping point is here.
After looking across the Pacific and raising eyebrows at how the US media has covered Trump, now Australian journalists have our chance to demonstrate how they would do it.
The tipping point is here. Falter now and there is no going back – not only for our climate, but also the credibility of journalists and our media organisations.

Links
Posted by at No comments :
Labels: , , ,

01/10/2019

We Fact Checked Scott Morrison's Speech To The United Nations. Here's What We Found

RMIT ABC Fact Check - Josh Gordon

Scott Morrison addresses the 74th session of the United Nations General Assembly. (Reuters: Lucas Jackson)
Prime Minister Scott Morrison has taken to the international stage to hammer the message that Australia is "taking real action on climate change and we are getting results".
In a speech to the United Nations General Assembly, Mr Morrison accused domestic and global critics of ignoring Australia's achievements in tackling climate change, complaining that "the facts simply don't fit the narrative they wish to project about our contribution".
RMIT ABC Fact Check has previously analysed Australia's record when it comes to reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
Here is our take on some of the key claims made by Mr Morrison in his speech.

Climate change action
"Australia is taking real action on climate change and we are getting results."
Scott Morrison

Fact check: Emissions 'deficit'
As Fact Check noted in April, emissions under the Coalition have risen for four of the past five years, and are higher today than they were in 2013.
Between 2008 and 2013 emissions trended down. But from 2014, following the repeal of Labor's carbon tax, emissions have generally risen.
In 2018, Australia produced 534 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent, up 4.3 per cent from 512 million tonnes produced in 2013.
According to the most recent official forecasts, annual emissions will reach 540 million tonnes in 2020.
As Fact Check has previously noted, the Coalition's "Direct Action" emissions reduction fund has played a positive, albeit modest, part in keeping a lid on emissions.

Kyoto commitments
"By 2020, Australia will have overachieved on our Kyoto commitments, reducing our greenhouse gas emissions by 367 million tonnes more than required to meet our 2020 Kyoto target."
Scott Morrison
The second Kyoto target, negotiated in Doha, Qatar in 2012, requires Australia to cut emissions to 5 per cent below 2000 levels by 2020.
Then UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon addresses the 2012 climate change conference in Doha. (Reuters: Fadi Al-Assaad)
A simple calculation, then, would suggest emissions would need to be no more than 524 million tonnes in 2020 to reach this target.
However, the Department of the Environment and Energy has taken a more complicated approach, creating an "emissions budget" for the period 2013 to 2020.
The cumulative effect of this emissions budget is that Australia is limited to emitting almost 4.5 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent in total over the eight years up to and including 2020.
In terms of achieving the 2020 target, what matters — as the department sees it — is whether cumulative actual emissions between 2013 and 2020 turn out to be 4.5 billion tonnes or lower.
As previously noted, in recent years emissions have been trending up under the Coalition's watch. However, Australia is still likely to beat the cumulative emissions target for two main reasons.
First, emissions in the early years of the second Kyoto period turned out to be lower than expected, particularly following the introduction of Labor's carbon tax, which came into effect in July 2012, and was repealed in July 2014.

Australia's greenhouse gas emissions: the view from 2012
Source: Department of Climate Change and Energy Efficiency
Australia's greenhouse gas emissions: the view from 2018
Source: Department of Environment and Energy

Second, the Doha climate conference agreed that countries that completed the first Kyoto period with surplus emissions credits could carry those credits over into the second Kyoto period if necessary.
While a number of countries voluntarily relinquished these excess credits, Australia put the "carry-over" from the over-achievement of the first Kyoto period at 128 million tonnes.
As a consequence, the department has estimated Australia will have reduced its emissions by some 376 million tonnes more than required over the eight years to 2020, thereby meeting its Kyoto obligations. This is consistent with Mr Morrison's claim.
But Australia's success has had little to do with Coalition policies. Rather, it reflects an accounting assumption allowing the carryover of emissions and emissions reductions achieved during the early years of the second Kyoto period.

Emissions per capita and emissions intensity
"Our latest estimates show both emissions per person and the emissions intensity of the economy are at their lowest levels in 29 years."
Scott Morrison
This is correct. Because Australia's population has been increasing, emissions per capita have been falling, and are currently at the lowest levels since 1990.
Likewise, the "emissions intensity" of the economy — measured by calculating emissions per dollar of real GDP.

Emissions per capita and per dollar of real GDP (2016-17 prices)
Year to December
Emissions per capita and per dollar of real GDP emissions have been coming down in Australia.
Source: Department of Environment and Energy
Credit: RMIT ABC Fact Check
However, these two measures are not particularly meaningful.
As experts have previously told Fact Check, what counts as far as the Earth's atmosphere — and international agreements — are concerned is the total level of emissions.
As Dr Hugh Saddler, an honorary associate professor at ANU's Crawford School of Public Policy put it:
"The atmosphere doesn't care how many people are contributing to emissions; it's the total quantity of emissions that matters."
Moreover, while Australia's emissions per capita have fallen, they remain among the highest in the world.

Electricity sector
Hazelwood power station in the La Trobe Valley in Victoria's south-east. (AAP: Greenpeace)
"Australia's electricity sector is producing less emissions. In the year to March 2019, emissions from Australia's electricity sector were 15.7 per cent lower than the peak recorded in the year to June 2009."
Scott Morrison
This is correct, but it has little to do with the policies of the Morrison Government. Using the raw data (which is not adjusted to account for seasonal variations), Australia's electricity sector produced 178.5 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent over the 12 months to March 2019.
This was, as Mr Morrison points out, 15.7 per cent lower than the 211.3 million tonnes produced over the year to June 2009.
(If the seasonally adjusted, "weather normalised" data is used, the decline is even bigger).
As previously noted by Fact Check, the fall in electricity sector emissions was the result of rising wholesale prices for electricity, the closure of big, ageing coal-fired power stations in Victoria (Hazelwood) and South Australia (Northern and Playford), and surging investment in renewable energy.

Links
Posted by at No comments :
Labels: , , ,
Subscribe to: Posts ( Atom )

Lethal Heating is a citizens' initiative