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Australian matters, Local Geelong matters

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The Sustainable Hour no. 483 | Podcast notes

Our guests in The Sustainable Hour on 15 November 2023 are Matt and Brigid Kelly from Low Footprint Lamb. They are first generation farmers, farming sheep in western Victoria with a strong focus on ethical and sustainable meat production.

Matt and Brigid farm shedding sheep that have been bred to require very little human intervention. They don’t require shearing or crutching because they naturally shed their wool and are not susceptible to wool related problems like fly strike and lice. They have been selected for intestinal worm and foot rot resistance. These things combined are the biggest health risks for sheep, taking them out reduces labour, chemical use and health problems. 

They see it as a privilege to be on the land and have a responsibility to at least maintain it, but also have an opportunity to improve it. Land ownership gives them the opportunity to plant trees, improve pasture and increase production to reduce their business impact on the environment. 

→ For more information on their farming techniques go to: www.lowfootprintlamb.com.au

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We start off today hearing a brief clip from UN head Antonio Guterres. This is followed by our own climate striker Gregory Andrews as he started day 12 of his climate hunger strike in front of the Australian Parliament in Canberra.

→ You can follow Gregory’s updates on X on twitter.com/lyrebirddream and on #ClimateHungerStrike

Stories we have published about Gregory’s climate hunger strike so far here on climatesafety.info:

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Mik Aidt hones in on hunger striking Gregory Andrew’s words as he outlines Victoria’s position as the most polluting state in one one of the most polluting countries in the world – nothing to be proud of there. 

Mik then details the current impacts of this in terms of extreme weather events, both here and other places world wide. He also emphatically sheets home the blame for all of this to fossil fuel extraction, transportation and combustion and leaves us with a passionate plea for this to stop. (Transcript further below.)

The carbon neutral eggs Mik mentions are from Woolworth.

Our roving reporter Rusty returns today. The fact that we have farmers on has attracted him from the latest farm he’s looking after.

We hear an excerpt of Chris Packham‘s documentary on Channel 4: ‘Is it time to break the law’ and from school climate-striker Nirvana on Instagram.

The Sustainable Hour wholeheartedly supports the School Strike for Climate which is happening this Friday 17 November 2023. For more information on this go to: www.schoolstrike4climate.com

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Music: The songs we play are Oscar Stembridge‘s ‘We March’ and Missy Higgins‘ ‘The Difference’ along with an excerpt from one of Greta Thunberg‘s early speeches in 2018.

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Colin Mockett OAM‘s Global Outlook for the week is dominated by a new report tabled at the United Nations in New York. The 2023 Production Gap report was produced by four climate think tanks in partnership with the U.N. Environment Program.

The report’s scientists used the countries’ own data. They analysed the plans and projections published by governments from 19 of the 20 largest fossil fuel producing nations. South Africa didn’t release theirs. And they found the world’s top fossil-fuel producing nations are all planning to increase their output of oil, gas and coal considerably more than what their own, and the world’s climate targets would allow. The findings revealed a widening gap between the emissions-cutting pledges these nations have made and their continued policies to promote mining and drilling within their borders.

Of course, Australia is one of those super polluters and it, too, has plans to increase its fossil fuel yield. Australia, like the vast majority of countries, has adopted net-zero pledges to slash its climate emissions. Yet we, in common with all of the biggest producers, have plans and projections that would extract more than twice the level of fossil fuels by 2030 than would be consistent with limiting warming to 1.5° degrees Celsius, and nearly 70 percent more than would be consistent with 2.0° degrees Celsius of warming.

This is according to Inger Andersen, the executive director of U.N. Environment Program, who said in a statement accompanying the report that “governments’ plans to expand fossil fuel production are undermining the energy transition needed to achieve net-zero emissions, throwing humanity’s future into question.” 

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres called the report’s findings “a startling indictment of runaway climate carelessness.”

So of those 19 leading fossil fuel-producing countries, the United States, Brazil and Saudi Arabia have all forecast significant increases in domestic oil production, while Russia, India and Indonesia all project substantial increases in their coal production. The report found that Australia, which sits squarely amid those 19 biggest polluters, our governments are planning to increase their national production of coal and gas by 0.2 per cent and 0.7 per cent in 2030 compared to 2021 levels.

“The UNEP report is a damning indictment of the Albanese government, and its LNP predecessors,” said Professor John Quiggin, of the University of Queensland. “It shows that under current policies encouraging the extraction and export of coal and gas, we are contributing almost as much to the destruction of the global environment as Saudi Arabia, and more than any other country except China, Russia and the USA.”

And I’ll emphasise again that the data wasn’t independently sourced. They used each government’s own projected figures. Undoubtedly, the report’s release has been carefully timed for it to be central to the discussions in the COP 28 meetings at the end of this month. It has a clearly written conclusion suggesting that all the named governments should aim for a near total phase-out of coal production and use by 2040, and cut oil and gas production to at least three quarters by 2050 compared to 2020 levels.

Now for two snippets of information and action from the Federal Government this week. The first concerns Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s visit to Tuvalu, where he reached an agreement with the island nation’s government to take residents affected by rising sea levels into the Australian community. This was seen as significant in curtailing the influence of China in the South Pacific. It should be noted that all South Pacific nations have been pleading with Australia to reduce its fossil fuel impact for years as a means to reduce the Climate change impact on their homes.

The other federal news came when the Greens warned that fossil-fuel companies are expanding their influence into government science organisations. They cited that BP had collaborated with CSIRO to give corporate approval to scientific studies that the government’s science organisation is undertaking. We’ll keep you posted as this advances.

Now to the uplifting good news story to finish this bulletin and it comes from a surprising source. Viva Energy in Geelong has outlined its future strategy last week and it contained no mention of floating gas hubs or increased carbon emissions.

Viva’s Geelong refinery pumps out more than a million tonnes of carbon emissions each year. It is listed among Australia’s top 215 polluters who must reduce their emissions by five per cent annually under the current government’s climate change initiatives.

It’s apparently doing this by embracing the future. The company bought all 700 of Coles Express service stations in May of this year for $300 million and it’s in the process of buying 205 outlets from the Adelaide-based On The Run convenience stores. This will make it among the biggest roadside retailers in the nation.

The plan is to update all their facilities to become places where EV drivers can link their cars for a fast charge then go and have a coffee or shop while that happens. They will still sell petrol and diesel fuels, but these will be as low-emission as they can make, including biofuel for diesel cars. Again, we shall have to keep a close eye on how this rolls out – but it’s a bit of good news to close our report for this week.

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That’s it from The Sustainable Hour for another week. Isn’t it amazing that, as the news of the impact of the climate crisis gets more and more dire, governments the world over continue to approve new fossil fuel projects, and fossil fuel companies continue to do everything they can to prolong their demise?

As clearly shown by Exxon going to the extent of buying out one of its competitors. In the process they are effectively saying “What climate crisis?” to the rest of the world. Yet more evidence of the psychopathic nature of this industry.

We’ll be back next week to continue our contribution to The Climate Revolution and continue our quest to empower our listeners to find a way to transition into a low-carbon lifestyle and stand up publicly and in unity to protect life on earth and all our futures. #FindYourRole

“We are really proud of our ethical and sustainability goals of our business. From a family perspective we have three girls, two in their twenties and a teenager who are very concerned about the lack of action on climate. They really think that our generation has let them down by not protecting their futures. We have some pretty good conversations around that at the dinner table. We all need to see ourselves as protectors of the environment. We just can’t rely on others.”
~ Brigid Kelly, Low Footprint Lamb

“I want to be a responsible lamb producer first. From then, if I’m then in a position where I have proven myself to be that and have excess carbon for a certain amount of time, well, then maybe I would consider profiting off that [by selling carbon credits to companies who want to offset their emissions]. But first things first. I need to do the right thing right here.”
~ Mat Kelly, Low Footprint Lamb


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Transcript of the introduction

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres: “Global challenges are mounting, and we seem incapable of coming together to respond.”

Program signature start jingle: “The Sustainable Hour. For a green, clean, sustainable Geelong. The Sustainable Hour.” 

Tony Gleeson: “Welcome to The Sustainable Hour. We’re broadcasting from the land of the Wathaurong People. We pay tribute to their elders – past, present and those that earn that great honour in the future. We’re broadcasting from stolen land, land that was never ceded, land that always was and always will be First Nations’ land. They have nurtured their land and their communities for millennia before their land was stolen. And in that ancient wisdom, there’s so much for us to learn as we face up to the climate crisis. We can’t have any form of climate justice until we have justice for First Nations Australians.”

Gregory Andrews: “Good morning, Australia. It’s 5:00am, and Australia’s elected representatives are coming back to Parliament House today. It’s Day 12 for me. I’ve lost nearly 7.5 kilograms. But I’m here, and I’m waiting for all of them. I’m waiting for Albo. I’m waiting for Peter Dutton. I’m waiting for every single Member of Parliament, and senator, in that building to explain: Why isn’t Australia doing enough for a safe future for our kids and our country. I’ll be here in my swag every day this week. I’ve gone too far now to give up.”

Mik Aidt: “Gregory Andrews is on hunger strike, climate hunger strike, in front of the Australian Parliament. To go on hunger strike, think about it. It’s like the last resort – when you really feel you’re not being heard. The hunger strike is obviously an act of desperation, but really, we are in desperate times. The warning signs are everywhere: 

Half of the Northern Territory has burnt, and the fire season hasn’t even started. They say that up to 80 per cent of the Northern Territory is going to burn when we reach the end of this summer. Already 33 million hectares have burned. And people are losing their homes. If not to fire, then to water. Or to strong winds. Extreme weather events and floodwaters are causing devastation everywhere. We hear from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare that more people than ever are hospitalised because of extreme weather events.

The global average temperatures are being shattered. This year, 2023, has already been declared the hottest in at least 125,000 years. And we now hear from the scientists that the average global temperature for October has climbed above those 2° degrees Celsius for the first time – that is that line that the scientists have warned us about for so long: We do not want to cross the 2° degrees line. Because that is where the runaway, the tipping points begin to set in. 

Just for one month, still, but it shows, not surprisingly, where the graphs are going. We’re going up, up and up.” 

Climate scientist David Karoly: “It’s getting much worse, and it’s getting much worse very quickly.” 

Mik Aidt: “And meanwhile, governments, including our Australian government, are opening up more fossil fuel projects and subsidising the fossil fuel industry with billions of dollars. Gregory Andrews is right in his call. He’s not a madman. It’s the politicians in the parliament who are insane. 

We should be scared. We should be angry. And to me, that’s exactly what Gregory Andrews in front of the Parliament is expressing. 

Hunger. Hunger is a powerful form of activism. I would say it’s the grown-ups version of what we saw Greta Thunberg do up in Sweden when she started her school strike for climate. And all the many activists and organisations here in Australia that spent all their time on fighting for climate action. I say we need to come together and unite behind Gregory Andrews’ hunger strike, and his petition in particular.

But that’s of course just my opinion.

The fact is that we release something like 120 million tonnes of greenhouse gases here in Victoria alone every year, and as we are 6 million people, you can divide 120 million tonnes with 6 million people. That means that each of us are responsible for an average of 20 tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions per person. 20 tonnes. That’s 20,000 kilos of greenhouse gases every year. 

Which makes us here in Victoria, one of the most polluting states in a country which is one of the most greenhouse gas polluting countries in the world.

If we want to put an end to the climate chaos, let’s put an end to fossil fuels, and get behind Gregory Andrews. But it’s not just about fossil fuels, in reality, because for instance food production is responsible for something like 26 per cent of global emissions. So we also need to talk about how we produce our food. That’s a quarter of our emissions. And that’s what we will do in The Sustainable Hour today.

I’ve put out a long blog post about these topics here that I’m talking about, and I’d love it if more people would go and, you know, engage in this debate. Put a comment there, either on my blog post or on Gregory Andrews’ blog – and consider whether you would like to sign his petition.”



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→ Canberra City News / Australian Associated Press – 14 November 2023:
Make it law: young people want healthy environment
“Young Australians overwhelmingly want the right to a healthy environment enshrined in law to keep pace with standards overseas.”



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→ RTE – 14 November 2023:
What’s the carbon footprint of the meat and veg we eat?
“A sustainable diet is one that considers not just your physical health but the health of the planet. Analysis: achievable changes to the familiar foods we consume would represent a 25% reduction in emissions from our current eating patterns.”



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ARRCC Newsletter 14 November 2023:

Stop the fires

With bushfires raging, temperature records smashed, and world leaders about to meet for the annual global climate talks, it’s a busy time for the climate movement. There are many ways to step up our contribution to climate solutions: huge mobilisations are on the cards over the next few weeks, and we strongly encourage people of faith to turn out on the streets with our movement allies.

This Friday: School Strikes 4 Climate

Young people are the future, and it’s important that we support them to hold governments and large corporations accountable for fossil fuel expansion, especially because they’ll have grave consequences for the future. Put on your ARRCC t-shirts, grab a placard and a few others in your faith community and join the School Strikers on Friday November 17 at your local strike. Together, let’s tell the government to #ShiftThePower. Find details of a strike near you at http://ss4c.info/nov17

Next Week: Let’s Get to 60 Letters to Tanya

Impressive. So far, we’ve had 43 people send letters to Tanya Plibersek to tell the Environment Minister that people of faith want climate to be at the heart of Australia’s national environmental laws. The Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act is currently under review, and the minister is expected to reveal the details of the proposed reforms in early December. We therefore have a crucial window over the next few weeks, and it is important that she hears that the faith community wants climate to be a key consideration to the EPBC Act reform.

Can you help us get to 60 letters next week? You can also write to her in festive cards – belated Diwali or early Hanukkah and Christmas cards would send a clear message that diverse faith communities want climate to be part of the Act. You’ll find talking points and background information on our website https://www.arrcc.org.au/epbc_act

So we can keep track of how many letters have been sent, please let us know via email if you’ve sent one (info@arrcc.org.au).

Next Week: People’s Blockade of Newcastle Port

ARRCC supporters will have a visible presence at the People’s Blockade of the world’s largest coal port on 24 – 27 November. We will have a base with ARRCC banners on Horseshoe Beach, an Interfaith Sacred Space early on Sunday morning, and an ARRCC boat on the water! If you are interested in joining the ARRCC boat for a harbour tour, let the Hunter ARRCC team know here.

December: Turn Up the Heat on Labor

We are three weeks away from Move Beyond Coal’s Turn Up The Heat week of action on the 4th to the 12th December during COP28 global climate talks. People of faith in Geelong, Sydney and elsewhere are planning actions at Labor MP offices or iconic landmarks to show that communities everywhere want the Government to pick the side of our safety and futures, not corporate billionaires.

Can you organise a faith- based action in your electorate? You’ll find all the information you need to take action in this guide, and if you need help please reach out at fahimah@arrcc.org.au.  

Podcast: Laudato Deum at Climate Action Show

Recently ARRCC President Thea Ormerod sat down with Vivien Langford at the Climate Action Show to discuss Laudato Deum and what’s next for climate action. Listen to the episode “Playing God with Climate” 

Salam, shanti, shalom

Fahimah – ARRCC
www.arrcc.org.au



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Climate strike on Friday

Newsletter from 350 Australia on 14 October 2023:

It’s not yet summer, and already extreme heat and bushfires are gripping communities across Australia. Climate change is here and it is being driven by the burning of more coal and more gas.Our political leaders should be doing everything they can to protect us from climate impacts, but instead the Albanese Government is pouring more fuel on the fire by approving and subsidising massive new coal and gas mines. That’s why school students are going on strike across the country on 17 November and are calling on everyone to join and support them. 

Students will walk out of their classrooms, to the office of their local MP, and demand the Government #ShiftThePower away from the corporations profiting from new coal and gas projects. They need thousands to join them to make these rallies impossible to ignore. 

It’s going to take an intergenerational movement to shift the politics, and students are calling on you to show up. Right now, young people are showing the kind of leadership that we need from our politicians – saying NO to new coal and gas and YES to a just and planned shift to 100% clean energy and jobs. 

Join them at a strike near you on 17 November and add your voice to the growing pressure on the Labor Government to step up and take action!

Bring your sign, your loudest voice and show your solidarity with young people leading the way!
I’ll be there, will you?

Kelly for the whole 350 Australia team



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Events we have talked about in The Sustainable Hour

Events in Victoria

The following is a collation of Victorian climate change events, activities, seminars, exhibitions, meetings and protests. Most are free, many ask for RSVP (which lets the organising group know how many to expect), some ask for donations to cover expenses, and a few require registration and fees. This calendar is provided as a free service by volunteers of the Victorian Climate Action Network. Information is as accurate as possible, but changes may occur.

Petitions

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→ List of running petitions where we encourage you to add your name

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» To listen to the program on your computer or phone, click here – or go to www.947thepulse.com where you then click on ‘Listen Live’ on the right.



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