Our guests and speakers in The Sustainable Hour on 21 September 2016 are senator Janet Rice, marine ecologist Alastair Hirst, anti-fracking campaigner Naomi Hogan, and Dr Alex Teytelboym from Oxford University.
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Content of this hour
Links, excerpts and more information about what we talked about in this Sustainable Hour
“We have a carbon budget emergency because, to keep a safe climate for humanity, there is no carbon budget left—zero. We need to be drawing carbon out of the atmosphere, not brazenly, profligately, criminally continuing to pollute and destroy our one and only planet, our one and only home. If we are to have a habitable planet for us, our children and our grandchildren to live in, we need to urgently tackle our carbon budget emergency. We need to massively increase investment in renewables, not slash it and try and pretend that half of not enough will do. It will not. We in this parliament have a choice. We can choose to direct ourselves towards a future where humanity does have a future.”
Janet Rice, Greens senator
► [Start 3:43] Senator for Victoria Janet Rice’s speech in the Australian Parliament about the ‘Carbon Budget Emergency’: Video – transcript
Politicians who take #fossilfuel money tell us #RenewableEnergy & #ClimateAction are too hard?! Letter in @theage nails the conflict #Auspol pic.twitter.com/tLw6nHxj1y
— Andrew Laird (@ReclaimAnglesea) October 8, 2016
Read also:
» CounterPunch – 22 September 2016:
If There’s a World War II-Style Climate Mobilization, It has to Go All the Way—and Then Some
► [Start: 11:00] Interview with Dr Alastair Hirst, marine ecologist and research fellow at Deakin University, about Port Phillip Bay and about that the “alarm bells are ringing”: Climate change threatens life in the sea – in our own bay as well as in the Great Barrier Reef.
► [Start: 36:57] Live phone interview with Naomi Hogan, Northern Territory coordinator for the Lock the Gate Alliance. Victoria now has permanent ban on fracking – but what is going on in the Northern Territory? Terms of Reference for the concurrent Fracking Inquiry is out for public comment by 13 October.
► [Start: 46:40] Interview with Dr Alex Teytelboym, Institute for New Economic Thinking, Oxford University
Dr Alex Teytelboym was a speaker at the Australian premiere of the documentary film ‘Demain / Tomorrow’.
At another event in Melbourne, Dr. Alex Teytelboym discussed Australia’s role in the global effort to tackle climate change, with an emphasis on how Australia can empower its energy industry to create and launch innovative green technologies to meet domestic energy needs and export to foreign markets:
Climate and Innovation – Green Growth and Green Trade: Opportunities for Australia
Calendar notes
22 September: World Car-Free Day, when people from around the globe get together in the streets to remind us all that we don’t have to accept a car-dominated society. Read more
26 September: World Maritime Day, aimed at ensuring that international shipping keeps up to date with technical and technological advances in safety, that it addresses the ever increasing number of environmental challenges and concerns of Member Governments.
28 September: Green Drinks at Beav’s Bar. Special theme: Sustainable House Day
6 October: Public hearing on the Paris Agreement in Melbourne on 6 October, and others in Sydney and Canberra – submissions close 7 October. An opportunity to talk to politicians about the climate emergency.
Climate action groups will be writing submissions on the need to declare a climate emergency.
Australia will likely miss its Paris climate commitments by around one billion tonnes of greenhouse emissions by 2030 if it continues with its current policies, and may have to cut another billion tonnes if it commits to what most analysts suggest is the country’s fair share of the Paris target.
7-8 October: National Divestment Day
8–15 October: Mental Health Week
Get your organisation involved in Mental Health Week 2016. It’s an opportunity to promote awareness about mental health and wellbeing, and equip people with the right information. The theme for 2016 is Act–Belong–Commit, with a focus on suicide prevention. Here is a list of ideas of activities/events that you can do in your school, workplace, club, community group or friendship network.
8–15 October: Barwon Mental Health Week
This year’s objective for Barwon Mental Health Week is to encourage connectedness on all levels: between our mental and physical health, with our community, between organisations and groups and with mental health drugs and alcohol services.
16 October: Licence-free fishing day in Victoria
16 October: Sustainable House Day in Geelong Region
(11 September was the national Sustainable House Day, with 150 homes across the country opening up their doors to visitors – but not in Geelong region where the day will be held on Sunday 16 October.)
Gas lies
“Hi folks, I just feel it is important that everyone is aware of this. Since Vic announced the onshore gas ban the industry has been claiming that the ban will cause a gas shortage and thus a price rise for consumers. I need to make this perfectly clear, the industry when pressed admitted that there is ‘no physical shortage of gas just a lack of long term supply contracts to the Australian domestic market’.
So basically what this means is the industry is deliberately choosing to export your gas to manufacture a shortage which in turn pushes your gas prices up.
So please when you read these reports in the Murdoch press blaming the Vic government for any future price rises please be aware of the facts. The industry thinks we are all fools so all I can say is dig deep, find the facts, knowledge is power.”
~ Damian Marchant from Frack Free Moriac
Climate change
Climate change is getting worse. The last 12 months has been the hottest on record. Glaciers and sea ice are shrinking. In 2015, James Hansen and a team of climate scientists warned that sea level could rise 10 times faster than previously predicted. Heatwaves are longer and more intense. Heatwaves last year in India and Pakistan killed thousands of people. In May 2016, India recorded its highest temperature ever. In Canada, USA and Indonesia forest fires
Catastrophic Forest fires in the US and Canada, along with Indonesia, add more carbon to the atmosphere over few weeks than some countries emit in an entire year. Flooding and droughts are getting worse. Hurricanes in the North Atlantic and Pacific are getting more frequent and more intense. Permafrost is melting. As it melts it’s releasing methane, and anthrax. Permafrost covers 20 per cent of the Earth’s land surface.
#ClimateEmergency -ocean warming may be biggest challenge for our generation https://t.co/A1dnpV5um0 @LEANAustralia pic.twitter.com/Lt79b8lYNC
— David Feeney (@Feeney4Batman) September 14, 2016
Mark Hertsgaard asks Hillary Clinton:
“The Democratic Party platform includes a pledge to mount a ‘World War II–style mobilization’ against climate change, which scientists say is urgently needed to avoid leaving our kids a ruined planet. Would this mobilization copy what the United States actually did during World War II, such as retooling automobile factories to produce electric vehicles and introducing price controls to discourage burning coal and oil?“
– Great question, Mark Hertsgaard!
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“The fact that we are not talking about this every single day is in some sense a great moral failure of every leader in this country.”
Joe Romm
An engaging and insightful presentation by Dr Joe Romm on the greatest challenge the human race has ever faced, the clean energy revolution, where the smart money is going, and where we should be going. Energy efficiency is here now. So is climate change. It’s 52 minutes long but well worth the time.
Joe Romm: ‘Climate Change Solutions: What you thought you knew is obsolete’. Published on youtube.com on 12 September 2016.
» ThinkProgress – 20 September 2016:
VIDEO: Almost everything you know about climate change solutions is outdated
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Get involved
‘Grassroots Climate Oz’ is a national discussion and announcement list for grassroots climate change activists in Australia. You can subscribe to the Grassroots Climate Oz email-list by sending a message to grassroots_climate_oz-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.au.
New members will be asked to provide names and locations and interest in the issue, and members must be approved.
» Read more: Get involved
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Divestment
Nearly half of all Australians would consider moving bank over climate change
Poll findings released as prominent Australians call on big four to withdraw backing for fossil fuel industry
About half of all Australians would be likely to switch banks if they found out their bank was lending money to projects that contribute to climate change, according to polling commissioned by the financial activist group Market Forces.
The findings came as more than 100 prominent Australian individuals and organisations signed a letter demanding that the big four banks stop supporting projects that expand the fossil fuel industry. Among the signatories are JM Coetzee, Charlotte Wood, James Bradley, Missy Higgins, Peter Singer and Jack Mundey, as well as unions, religious orders and conservation groups.
» Continue reading in www.theguardian.com
» ABC – 7 September 2016:
Religious groups lead the world on fossil fuel divestment
» Find the council divestment webpage here:
www.gofossilfree.org.au/fossil-free-councils
» Read more about divestment and Divestment Day
Podcasts and posts about climate change
Acknowledgement
We at The Sustainable Hour would like to pay our respect to the traditional custodians of the land on which we are broadcasting, the Wathaurong People, and pay our respect to their elders, past, present and future.
The traditional owners lived in harmony with the environment and with the climate for hundreds of generations. It is not clear – yet – that as European settlers we have demonstrated that we can live in harmony for hundreds of generations, but it is clear that we can learn from the indigenous, traditional owners of this land.
When we talk about the future, it means extending our respect to those children not yet born, the generations of the future – remembering the old saying that…
The decisions currently being made around Australia to ignore climate change are being made by those who won’t be around by the time the worst effects hit home. How utterly disgusting, disrespectful and unfair is that?
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Hours and hours of sustainable podcasts
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Criminally continuing to pollute and destroy https://t.co/EVl5jcQiup pic.twitter.com/2O36fyxxtP
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