Australia Needs a New Energy Policy
We need a new energy policy that relegates to the dust bin all the eco-religious nonsense about the supposed harmful effects of "greenhouse gas emissions", in particular CO2. The well being of the biosphere and mankind is vitally dependent on atmospheric CO2. The further greening of our planet requires more atmospheric CO2, not less.
The populace and politicians are rightly confused at the inventive and lax meanings of chemical and geological terms used by global warmists to further their cause. Climate change has never been a problem with geologists but now it is something new and dangerous caused by man and should be stopped at all cost. Similarly, chemists are quite familiar with "carbon emissions" and now they too are dangerous and should be stopped or buried at great expense!
When a carbon fuel is burnt it is helpful to consider the emissions as being of two types , viz., toxic and nontoxic. By far the greatest proportion of emissions to the atmosphere are nontoxic and consist of the life-giving gases CO2 and water vapor. In fact, CO2 is an essential plant fertilizer. No atmospheric CO2 and no water, means no life on Earth!
The small amount of toxic components of combustion are by definition pollutants which are harmful to the environment and mankind. These include particulate matter, aerosols, CO, and oxides of nitrogen and sulfur which may cause acid rain and smog. The correct approach to the problem of potential or actual toxic emissions is to remove them before and/or after combustion. This is what is done at thermal power stations and now with catalytic converters on car exhausts when such pollution is a problem.
Another deliberate deception inflected ad nauseum on the populace by the global warmist ABC TV presenters is the showing of conspicuous cooling towers at power station emitting
huge white clouds which are implied to be polluting "greenhouse gases" when in fact they are harmless condensing water vapor, like the fluffy clouds seen above on a fine day. Water vapor is by far the most abundant "greenhouse gas" and is harmless. Also harmless and beneficial are CO2 emissions which are invisible. A similar confusion exists between "smog" and "fog".
The Chinese have been criticized for blocking the Chinese version of the BBC which is noted for broadcasting biased political and global warming propaganda. Good on them. I sometimes wish we could block the English version too! This continual outpouring of spurious GW propaganda by the BBC and Deutsche Welle is why the Green's eco-religion has a wide following today. It is a movement that should be quarantined to the EU and so let them alone suffer the economic consequences.
The new Labor Government in Australia is proposing an ETS or "Emissions Trading Scheme" to be enforce by 2010 and is designed to reduce CO2 emissions from industry in order to meet the Kyoto Protocol requirements of a 20% reduction of Greenhouse gas emissions by 2020. This is a "carbon copy" of the ETS in force in the 25 countries of the EU, where it has caused economic chaos, and serves only to keep an increasing number of Green bureaucrats employed in cushy but useless jobs dependent on the global warming bandwagon..
Just because one country does something doesn't mean that we necessarily have to follow suit and behave like lemmings (EU), or sheep (Oz). We can certainly learn from observation and study of overseas policies and technologies but I like to think that in Australia we have sufficient political and scientific nous to decide what is best to do in our own interest on considering the energy resources available to us. That is the correct way ahead. On this criteria Kyoto doesn't get a look in!
An ETS is a new tax on industry. Any tax is a discouragement on doing what is being taxed. So is industry wicked ? Why should we discourage industrial development holus-bolus and head for economic disaster and a lower standard of living. I ponder over the underlying reasoning.
Leaving aside the obvious job protection reason it seems that we have to deal with a new intrusion of eco-religious beliefs into what was formerly a happy secular state. We can cope with Protestants, Catholics and Moslems believing what they like, but why should we tolerate the global warmists and their non-scientific Green eco-religion poking their nose into how we efficiently run our country?
The correct way ahead is for Australia to reject Labor's "Emission Trading Scheme" for reason that it is a nonsense and has no scientific basis supporting it, and if enacted would lead to economic disaster.
A new Australian Energy Policy should be formulated based on the premise that CO2 is a valuable component of the atmosphere and that their should be more of it not less.
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