hot coals, the monthly and caveman cavanan...

cavanan

Pro-coal resources minister Matt Canavan was dead right yesterday when he talked about the terrible potential impact that a transition away from coal would have on communities in Queensland and New South Wales. After speaking for an hour at the National Press Club on Wednesday, Canavan was responding to a penetrating question from The Guardian’s Katharine Murphy about whether he felt a responsibility to plan for a just transition for people in regional communities, to prepare them for decarbonisation in the wake of the 2015 Paris climate agreement, and a phase-out of coal. Canavan was immediately on the attack:

“I find it highly objectionable to talk about people’s loss of jobs and livelihood as a transition. Let’s be frank, that’s a euphemistic term. That’s a term to try and hide what will be the real impacts of that happening. For many thousands of businesses and people in central Queensland and north Queensland and in the Hunter Valley, it won’t be a transition, it’ll be utter heartache for them and their families, and if you want to see that, go to a former country town that used to be in the forestry industry. Go to Danglemah [in northern NSW], or go down to the north coast of Tasmania, and see real poverty. See what it’s like when you’re promised a transition. It doesn’t happen. House prices halve. People get locked in to an environment they can’t get out of, and their lives are destroyed. So I don’t like the term transition, let’s be frank, if you want to shut down the coal industry and cost people jobs, say it. Say it. Have the guts to say it. That’s what’s going to happen.”

There are a million objections to Canavan himself, the rest of his speech, and the government’s climate and energy policies generally. But his central point in this response would ring true to many people in coalmining communities in Queensland and NSW, and, for that matter, Victoria’s Latrobe Valley, where Hazelwood has closed and the remaining brown coal-fired power stations have a limited lifespan.

https://www.themonthly.com.au/today/paddy-manning/2018/29/2018/152229841...

I find it quite ridiculous that The Monthly, a supposedly seriously enlightened magazine, published this soft crap by Paddy Manning. Yes Paddy Manning "is an experienced, awarded journalist who has worked for the ABC, Crikey, The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, The Australian Financial Review, and The Australian. He is the author of three books: Born To Rule: The Unauthorised Biography Of Malcolm Turnbull (MUP), Boganaire... etc. He got sacked for for speaking out against the Financial Review's editorial practices."

But what's lacking here is the necessary mention that we've had forty years to prepare for this transition of coal to another source of electricity and that this should have happened in the past not in the nebulous future, like in another 20 clicks — or never. Cavanan thus talks shit and Paddy Manning is a Liberal (CONservative) pen pusher in disguise, despite concluding that "Canavan is wrong: by refusing to put a transition plan in place, by pinning his hopes on a clean coal chimera, the minister ensures his dark prophecy will be self-fulfilling..."

The clock of global warming is ticking faster than we can see. Mind you if Bolton, the Saudis and the US generals have their ways, the planet has little time left to live anyway, but we better do as if these idiots and Cavanan did not exist, nonetheless...

crooks by the books...

Back in 2012, documents obtained from the Heartland Institute revealed that the industry-funded group had plans to send teachers climate denial resources. The person leading up that effort, reporters confirmed, was to be energy consultant David Wojick. But once exposed, the plan seemed to have disappeared.

Heartland again made news last year for trying to trick teachers into propagating their denial. This time, the institute decided to send out to thousands of teachers, unsolicited, its IPCC knock-off report. Most teachers contacted by reporters for stories didn’t seem to buy the ruse. (We’ve even heard that one professor uses it in his Intro to Climate Change class for freshmen in college--to use as a punching bag to teach the kids how to critically examine claims.)

Now it looks like CFACT is picking up where Heartland left off. The organization sent out a fundraising email yesterday begging for cash for a new “report that exposes the sad state of climate education in America.” It appears that David Wojick, whom CFACT names in the email, is still targeting schools: according to CFACT, Wojick has “conducted an extensive survey” of the information science teachers have at their disposal. Wojick’s conclusion, unsurprisingly, is that too much of today’s curriculum has a “reprehensible focus on activism over science.”

It’s worth mentioning that Heartland’s stalled 2012 project isn’t the only Wojick effort to fail to launch. A crowdsourced effort last year from Wojick to create an education portal for climate denial failed pretty miserably: it only met $6,400 of its $35,000 goal, raised by 18 people in 9 months. (It’s unclear why Wojick has consistently failed at infiltrating American curriculum, when Big Oil successfully enrolled Petro Pete into Oklahoma’s schools.)

Clearly CFACT sees all these years of failure in this project and thinks that’s a perfect reason to seek donations from its followers (free market groups, after all, love donations).

But wait, there’s more. CFACT reportedly plans to to cook up “an educational work/textbook” to go along with the mash-up of denier memes contained in its Climate Hustle movie. Seems like the brain trust at CFACT think that a workbook lends legitimacy to a movie critics raved is “not very watchable,” “very amateurish,” and “not good film making.”

We’re also positive this workbook is in no way shape or form an outgrowth of the infamous 1998 “Global Climate Science Communications Plan.” This document, authored by the American Petroleum Institute, laid out how groups, including CFACT, could cast doubt on climate science and inject doubt into the public’s understanding of the issue. Just like Pruitt’s science plan, this is yet another denier project pulled straight from the pages of big oil--and tobacco’s--propaganda playbook.

While these plans are not the kind you’d expect to find in a library, or want your kids to read, this educational project is being done by the books.

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2018/3/20/1750483/-CFACT-Carries-On-Hea...

By Gus Leonisky at 31 Mar 2018 - 5:55am
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decarbonisation is not optional...

...

Couple of things.

Canavan’s empathy for the coal and power workers – while doubtless sincere at a personal level – is a bit hard to square with his service for a government that shuttered the Australian car industry with barely a backward glance.

I really don’t remember much outward concern for falling house prices, or destroyed lives or “utter heartbreak” in Adelaide. Perhaps some displaced workers are more equal than others.

Then there’s the inconvenient fact that it is his own government’s policy driving the transformation he says shouldn’t happen.

Canavan was part of a government that signed the Paris climate agreement – a set of commitments that make decarbonisation not optional, or hypothetical, but inevitable. Nobody held a gun to the government’s head and made it sign an international agreement to reduce emissions. Abbott might have grumbled at the time, and he engages in active revisionism now, but the fact is he signed Australia up, voluntarily.

If Canavan thinks there should be no adjustment for coal communities, then he’s actually arguing that Australia should quit the Paris agreement – except of course he doesn’t argue that, because that would be problematic for Liberals trying to hold urban seats.

The resources minister attempts to tip-toe through the obvious contradictions by arguing that high-efficiency coal will help reduce reduce emissions and help Australia meet its Paris target. In this happy story, we can reduce our emissions and boost the coal industry too.

But is this happy story true?

While it is self-evidently correct that “clean” coal plants are better in terms of emissions than ageing dirty ones, the minister omits several relevant points. “Clean coal will help us meet Paris” ignores the fact the technology is incredibly expensive; that taxpayers would bear significant risks because clean coal plants are not financeable in Australia unless the government agrees to indemnify projects against the future risk of a carbon price being introduced, and against the cost of delays prompted by likely community protest action. And the electricity grid in Australia is moving inexorably in the opposite direction – towards decentralisation.

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/mar/31/sorry-matt-canava...

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usual suspects drawing monash over coals...

Almost on the eve of the last Anzac Day of the centenary of World War I, with the Australian Prime Minister about to dedicate a major memorial on the Western Front to the nation’s greatest general, John Monash, a small group of malcontents - double entendre intended - decides to draft Monash’s name into a political argument over … coal!

What a squalid exercise.

What a pathetic moment in Australian history.

To have pulled this stunt, clearly designed to undermine their own prime minister, serves only to prompt the thought that none of the members of the new pro-coal Monash Forum is worthy of licking the boots of a giant like Sir John Monash.

Why, they didn't even have the courtesy of inquiring of John Monash's descendants whether it might be all right to use the name Monash in their cause.

It wasn't all right, it turns out, with seven direct descendants issuing a statement on Wednesday declaring "we disassociate ourselves specifically from the Forum's use of the Monash name to give their anti-science and anti-intellectual argument an air of authority, and we ask that they withdraw the name".

The signatories to what you'd have to call now the illegitimate Forum, headed by the usual suspects - Tony Abbott, Eric Abetz, Kevin Andrews and Craig Kelly, and announced on Sky TV by Abbott’s non-commissioned officer, Peta Credlin - presume, in their “manifesto”, to be entitled to dedicate their cause in the name of Monash because in civilian life, he was an engineer who in 1921 became the first full-time chairman of the State Electricity Commission of Victoria.

In this role, Monash oversaw the creation of Victoria’s brown coal electricity-generating power stations. It was revolutionary at the time - the Latrobe Valley was the site of the second brown-coal station in the world after Germany.

Almost a century later, the members of the Monash Forum, climate change deniers and sceptics among them, want governments to continue focusing their energy and their treasure on the production of electricity by coal, including brown coal, ahead of alternatives. This is not news.

What is worth considering anew, however, is whether John Monash, an innovator as both a military man and a civil engineer, would want his name associated with propping up a creaking industry that hasn’t evolved much since he chose brown coal to power the state.

https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/deadheads-of-coal-wars-aren-t-wo...

By Gus Leonisky at 4 Apr 2018 - 5:34pm
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full of bad smells in the background...

One Liberal moderate bluntly characterises the "Monash Forum", which burst into the energy debate this week, as "the deplorables trying to give themselves a credible front".

Whatever else it might be, the so-called forum is Tony Abbott's latest weapon in baiting the Turnbull bear.

Coalition backbenchers who signed the forum's letter, which calls for the Government to construct a new coal-fired power station in the Latrobe Valley on the site of the now-closed Hazelwood, are driven by various motives — revenge against Malcolm Turnbull, an ideological commitment to coal, the desire to sharpen the differences with Labor, a passion for publicity.

For Mr Abbott and his allies, Kevin Andrews and Eric Abetz, this is a guerilla operation, in part building on an earlier loose conservative grouping. There is also a strong "coal constituency" within Coalition ranks.

It looks like the gathering of signatories involved a whip-around of the usual suspects and a few innocents. It's unclear how many signed. Invoking John Monash, famed World War I general who spearheaded the development of Victoria's coal power supply, turned out to be too clever by half — descendants of Monash issued an angry statement.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-04-06/tony-abbott-newspoll-play-coal-aus...

By Gus Leonisky at 6 Apr 2018 - 10:53am
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mixing sciences with ikea cabinets...

Mr Canavan said he instead supported children learning science.

"I want kids to be at school to learn about how you build a mine, how you do geology, how you drill for oil and gas, which is one of the most remarkable scientific exploits of anywhere in the world that we do," he said.

"These are the type of things excite young children."

Earlier this week Prime Minister Scott Morrison revealed he was also not impressed with students taking time off to protest.

"We don't support the idea of kids not going to school to participate in things that can be dealt with outside of school," he said.

"We don't support our schools being turned into parliaments. What we want is more learning in schools and less activism in schools."

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-11-30/australian-students-climate-change-protest-scott-morrison/

Scummo is an idiot. Cavanan is an idiot. Building a mine, drilling for oil and gas are not sciences. They are technologies. Sciences are: global warming, relativity, quantum mechanics, geology (as you so rightly mention — but not just to dig for coal, gas and oil — activities that induce global warming— but to understand the dynamics and EVOLUTION of this planet), botany, biology to understand the mechanics of life (not to fiddle in GMO — which is applied sciences in technologies of disruption of nature), etc... You're the one who should go back to school, Matt...

smart kids...

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By Gus Leonisky at 30 Nov 2018 - 4:26pm
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coal caps...

MINING
'Very disappointed': Ministers berate coal miner over climate change commitment

by Max Koslowski and Cole Latimer

Australia's largest coal miner Glencore has succumbed to shareholder pressure to take action to address climate change, and announced it will cap its global coal output.

Key points:

Glencore will cap its global thermal and coking coal production at the current level of about 145 million tonnes
The move comes after much global investor pressure, including from major Australian super funds
The company will also review its membership of trade associations, including the Minerals Council of Australia

The Swiss-based resources giant said it would freeze coal production at current levels, and instead focus on commodities including copper, cobalt, nickel, vanadium and zinc, as part of its "global response to the increasing risks posed by climate change".

The company, headed by billionaire Ivan Glasenberg, acquired Rio Tinto's thermal coal business in 2017.

It said it would cap its global thermal and coking coal production at the current level of about 145 million tonnes after holding talks with the Climate Action 100+ initiative.

The group, whose global members collectively manage more than $US32 trillion in assets, includes a number of major Australian superannuation funds such as AMP Capital, AustralianSuper, Cbus, IFM Investors, QSuper and BT Financial Group.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-02-20/glencore-moves-to-cap-global-coal...

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Note: the Chinese have also placed a cap on importing Aussie coal

the mad wisemen of the nuthouse...

The resources minister, Matt Canavan, has declared “now” is the time to build new coal-fired power, as the prime minister insisted his pre-election priorities were securing passage of budget bills and helping north Queensland recover from the recent floods.

The comments from Canavan and Scott Morrison follow a new push from Queensland Nationals for “immediate” government action to underwrite new power station construction in regional Queensland, and a separate demand the government pass the “big stick” energy package in the final sitting week of the 45th parliament.

Canavan backed the intervention from his Queensland colleagues, which was targeted primarily at their own party leader, Michael McCormack, although he left the timing of the passage of the “big stick” legislation “to the wiser people in the House of Representatives”.

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/mar/07/now-is-the-time-f...

Idiots: a lying rodent species of subhumans who infest Kanbra's political rightwing... Read from top. Time to put them out to the other side of the fence where the grass is cooked by global warming...

By Gus Leonisky at 7 Mar 2019 - 7:15pm
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cleaning up his desk with sandpaper...

As Cavanan is moving to better pastures — where the milk of nuclear farts and the honey of coal dust float in the sunset of turdish gold — it was good (not good at all — but we did not expect anything less) to see him have a sarcastic smile during the Wednesday Press Club address by Alan Finkel, in Kanbra.

Starting early from the woodblocks, Finkel explained the greenhouse effect and global warming to an audience of weirdo-journoes, it seems, as their stunned faces captured by the cameras seemed to ask "is there ice-cream for dessert?". I know I've been there trying to explain how EXTRA carbon dioxide is going TO CHANGE THE WEATHER, leaving people with mortuary made-up faces. Nothing gets through.

In order not to be chastised by the government, Finkel brought in the complex concept of energy mix through a highway of trucks, in which methane became like a transition campervan so to speak. The concept of independent energy supply has not hit the streets of Kanbra yet. Yet there are many folks in the country who manage to supply their own energy by using solar, wind and TRADITIONAL lead-acid batteries plus inverters. Simple enough. People CAN BE OFF THE GRID. We all should be. But for a government that needs to control people, being OFF THE GRID is like having the power to vote the government out at any time of your choosing — or WORSE!

This is where Finkel excelled by introducing the concept of hydrogen power. You might be familiar now with Gates having a boat built and delivered by 2024 powered by hydrogen.

But producing hydrogen isn't cheap enough yet to make it democratic... See Hydrogen is hungry. It eats carbon and oxygen for breakfast...

Read from top.

And of course, the Brisbane Times gets it wrong: Gas 'critical' for renewable energy future, Chief Scientist says... This is not what I understood: Gas is only a transition towards full renewable energy future, where hydrogen will become the better source when...

https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/politics/federal/gas-critical-for-renew...

By Gus Leonisky at 12 Feb 2020 - 12:35pm
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the COALition climate scare tactic...

The tried and true Coalition climate scare tactic – that ambitious emissions reduction policies will put a “wrecking ball” through the Australian economy – has been redeployed with gusto this week, as pressure builds on the Morrison government to get with the global program.

It started with a puffed-up tweet from Matt “Mr Coal” Canavan on the weekend, and was swiftly followed by warnings of “political suicide” from the back-benches, via the Coalition’s climate denier-in-chief Craig Kelly.

The PM, Scott Morrison, was next, telling Parliament during question time on Monday that “Australia’s policies will be set in Australia and nowhere else for Australia’s purposes and consistent with our national interest.”

And on Tuesday, Australia’s minister for energy and emissions reduction Angus Taylor did his own bit to firmly distance the Morrison government from the targeted climate policies of US President elect, Joe Biden, telling the Murdoch papers that the Coalition would not “slash” the economy by committing to net-zero emissions by 2050.

Biden – who on the weekend described climate change as the “number one issue facing humanity” – went into the US election with a $US2 trillion plan that promised to hit targets of zero carbon pollution from the electricity sector by 2035 and net-zero emissions, nationally, by 2050. He has also promised to rejoin America to the Paris Climate Agreement.

https://reneweconomy.com.au/australias-carbon-cabal-digs-in-for-fight-against-zero-emissions-targets-32584/

Meanwhile:

Labor frontbencher Joel Fitzgibbon has abruptly quit as resources minister, the latest escalation in an internal ALP war over climate and energy, claiming the party was losing its “traditional” base.

The pro-coal MP, from NSW’s mining region of Hunter, claimed the party was “drifting” and had “lost touch with the traditional working class”. The veteran MP blamed Labor’s calls for stronger action on climate change, saying the party spent “too much time” on it, instead of more basic issues like the economy and tax.

“We have to speak to, and be a voice for, all those who we seek to represent, whether they be in Surry Hills or Rockhampton. And that’s a difficult balance,” Mr Fitzgibbon told a packed press conference in Canberra on Tuesday.

He claimed he made only agreed to be a frontbencher for 18 months, after Labor’s 2019 election loss, and that now was the time to move out of the senior position. However, the timing of his announcement is interesting, coming after an escalating series of arguments with colleagues over energy.

https://thenewdaily.com.au/news/politics/australian-politics/2020/11/10/joel-fitzgibbon-labor-quits/

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By Gus Leonisky at 10 Nov 2020 - 8:40pm
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