Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Sustainable Solutions

The world is running out of scant resources and it is up to us as individuals to conserve and slow our rate of consumption. This can mean using less water in the home and cutting down on power to reverse an alarming upwards trend.
Solar hot water and electrical power generation has been helped along with the government's renewable energy credits which go a long way towards making this an affordable and attractive option. Electric or hybrid cars will also play their part although I think many people are more excited about the new 3D TVs just along the horizon. Speaking of hybrids, I read recently about the next generation of nuclear reactors, some of which are fission/fusion devices that are designed to be both safe and economical. Even James Lovelock of Gaia fame has come out in support of technology which may have had a bad press over the decades but has reached a level of maturity that makes it preferable to coal fired power that is dirty and dangerous to humankind.
A techno fix is all well and good but history tells us that more individual sacrifice is required in order to rein in pollution and all that goes with it including Global Warming. So walk instead of taking the car when possible. Turn off all electrical appliances and lights when not in use and try to reduce your carbon footprint. Remember the old say; if you want something done, do it yourself.

6 comments:

  1. Come on everybody let's jump on the conservation and sustainability bandwagon, you have nothing to lose but your lethargy and indifference! For those who aren't joiners you can still make a difference by making a difference in your lifestyle and reducing conspicuous consumption. Do you really need the extra large screen TV or the air conditioning up to Arctic levels? Of course you don't, remeber the best things in life are free.

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  2. I think something needs to be said about fire safety. Although the country is experiencing an unusual Wet Period (although much like the Wet of previous generations)the tragic fires of "Black Saturday are wtill fresh in the collective memory.The coming finalization of the Official Inquest on those fires that killed hundred of people, should be revealing but that's another story.
    At the moment issues such as fuel reduction and the planting of fire retarding "Wet Leaf" trees are still of vital importance if we are to get a handle on destructive,out of control bush fires. This is not unique to Australia of course, California, Greece and Spain also have problems with drought and fire, and additionally, have large stands of eucalypt trees planted in previous centuries in a misguided attempt to deal with water shortages and the need for timber. Good old Aussie Gum trees may grow well in arid climates, but they are also combustibles waiting to happen. Restrictions on native tree use by property owners nation wide may have made the problem worse in Australia. New developments should have fire breaks, not just the importation and planting of tens of thousands of trees with little or no consideration for the effects of fire and the impact on public safety. Trees may sequester carbon yet it can be released almost immediately when they are consumed by fire.Lets put the public first before we start mandating misguided values for the sake of politically motivated public relations that are no friend of the public and sometimes quite the reverse.

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  3. Why is immigration so important? The short answer with respect to Australia, is that while we have the space we don't have the water to sustain another 20,30 or even 50 million people. Yet the suits on the big end of town tout this increase as some kind of economic Paradise in waiting. The planet not to mention the continent of Australia isn't big enough to accomodate these wild fantasies. NOrthern and southern Blue fin tuna is at risk of being fished out but both Australia and japan voted against restrictions on fishing. This unthinking appraoch to sustainability would get markedly worse with a two or three fold population increase.
    Australia has not been uneffected by the Great Recession either, just ask new home owners whose interest rates just went up. Foreclosure is increasing while foreign investment in residential properties forces up prices to world record levels. who said Australia has enough land for everyone? There is no law against profit but the banks and the mining giants can't have it all their own way. They and the PM and Treasurer seem to think more people equates with more customers yet the fact is that vital services would be stretched to the limit and this includes Health and Education. I currently work as a teacher and security guard but many of the positions in these areas are taken up by international workers. I too have worked overseas but the world was a very different place from even three years ago. Local citizens are takinjg up many of the vacanices in the UK with the credit crunch and this is not unreasonable. Here in Australia growth should not be the key mission, surely the unbridled and largely fictitious fiscal growth before the bubble burst led to problems we are still dealing with. The bigger they are the harder they fall and that goes for nations as well.

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  4. Oils ain’t Oils
    The disaster in the Gulf of Mexico is now officially the worst in American history. The amount of oil haemorrhaging has now been inflated over previous estimates by a factor of 10 and rising. Us President Obama has been politically lucky since first attaining electoral office as a Senator in 2004 but this may change with opportunists from all sides putting their own spin on whether he or BP is doing enough . The spill has mushroomed to the extent that the Heritage listed Florida Everglades could be under threat. The once thriving fishing industry of the US Gulf States could face extinction as oil laps the Mississippi Delta and smothers rich trawling spots across the gulf and beyond.
    I think Obama is right when he says the catastrophe is the fault of BP and that they will have to pay. Dismissing the company’s personnel and technical expertise is not the way to go even with calls for that mounting by the day. I watched a panel of experts on the PBS Newshour last night where the issue was looked at from a number of angles. One expressed such that a nation which put man on the Moon was being reduced to a pitiable, helpless giant by a simple undersea oil leak. The same person, a professor from the prestigious Rice University in Texas, remarked that the best and brightest technically speaking had been coopted by the lucrative charms of stock market derivatives and credit default swaps which eventuated in harming the nation through the Great Recession the US is still reeling from.
    Perhaps President Obama and other leaders of government and industry should lock themselves in a room with the so-called experts and not come out until something viable eventuates. I imagine something along those lines is already occurring and we shall see if the problem can be solved before many more millions of gallons of black crude despoils beaches and estuaries from New Orleans to New York.

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  5. Is there and end in sight for BP and the Gulf?
    It just keeps getting worse and worse. Last night I saw on 60 Minutes a segment about the Oil Spill disaster ravaging the Gulf of Mexico and the Gulf states. An entire industry is now in its death throes as fishermen (and women) struggle to survive in a rising tide of oil and human indifference. The effects of this will be long lasting and could impact on generations of workers and residents (not to mention tourists) live in these blighted coastal areas. The Mississippi estuary and the Florida everglades may never be the same again and I fear the worst when it comes to sensitive flora and fauna as they are force fed black tea.
    A thought does come to mind. In the first Gulf war Saddam Hussein set fire to some 900 oil wells and expert opinion had it that the clean up would take as long as a decade. In the event the clean up took less than a year and everybody breathed a sigh of relief that choking black smoke from oil fires wouldn’t trigger an runaway Greenhouse effect or even a Nuclear Winter. When the boffins and the technicians and workers on the ground got going on the task, many anticipated problems vanished in a tide of collective responsibility and activism. Perhaps something similar will eventuate here as the sheer magnitude and scale of the disaster galvanises those within BP, the US government and concerned citizens everywhere. Where there is a will there is a way the saying goes and I think humankind in the 21st century will be equal to the task. Failing here is not an option. Some genius somewhere (and yes even Kevin Costner’s technical fix should be given all due respect and diligence) might well comes up with something that could prove telling in this matter as well as future catastrophes.
    A Shakespeare once said,” Nothing from nothing leaves nothing”. This is not the time to wallow in self pity and helplessness. It is easy to sit back and criticise Big Oil or other demons corralled outside. We the people need to do whatever it takes, as long as it takes to solve this now world crisis.

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  6. Brave Dissenters East and West need your support
    We have just passed the first anniversary of the death of murdered Iran Green Movement Protester Neda Soltan. While much of the press was quick to hail ship bound Gaza Blockade runners there has been silence or an awkward acknowledgement that falls far short of what is required. Neda wanted to live her life without being imprisoned in a burka or the strait jacket of what passes for social mores in a virulent theocracy like Iran. Last night I saw footage of a 13 year old girl being flogged mercilessly by a whip wielding Islamic fundamentalist fanatic in Afghanistan. Again the criticism from some quarters will be muted; even western feminists seem to be strangely quiet when it comes to so-called cultural values. Germaine Greer our great Australian feminist pioneer has defended the imposition of the veil an even Sharia law under the Rubric of misguided cultural relativism. She probably doesn’t even mean it, anything for a good controversy to sell books eh Germaine? US President Obama has fallen into the trap by saying that the wearing of the hijab is a “right” for Muslim women while criticising those governments such as France or Belgium who have sought to ban it. Is there no end to this kind of duplicity? I think I know where the otherwise politically astute and cultural aware President is coming from. It’s the old political maxim of not getting into fights you can’t win. Banning the Burka wouldn’t even get to first base in the political jungle of Washington so why bother? Easier to bag other governments trying to counter a rising tide violent fundamentalism and polarisation politics than to fight that good fight at home.
    Back to the Iranian green Movement. It will take more than Twitter and I gadgets to bring about a new revolution to replace the old self-styled permanent Revolution touted by the murderous Dictator Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. In Arthur Koestler’s “Darkness at Noon” the Soviet oppressors did not even believe in the system but as benefactors of it were willing to go to any lengths in order to cling to power. The Great recession has been a great boost to Autocrats everywhere in that a person’s livelihood if not his life can be more easily controlled or destroyed in the face of even the mildest dissent. Frankly that can even happen in a Democracy like Australia in that any significant dissent from say a teacher can and does lead to the loss of work and the overall ability to make a living. Former Royal Commissioner Tony Fitzgerald has spoken of a “Power Elite” which abuses rank and privilege on many levels. Sometimes artists, writers and teachers are compelled to leave the country ( Germaine herself is in this category) in order to pursue a living and their Art. When Australia itself was once a Gulag as a British Penal colony the dream was to leave in search of physical and political freedom. That trend continues to a certain extent to the present day as artists and writers seek an environment that gives them respect and the chance to make a living.
    My heart goes out to those who perished as well as to those who have been exiled from Iran. Green Movement dissenters have been tortured, raped and killed with many forced to leave in the face of existential threat. A brutal theocracy like Iran can exist for decades but probably not centuries in the New Millennium. Iran’s cynical support of the Peace ships running through the Gaza siege is fooling no one except perhaps for those with an unvarnished anti-Israeli agenda. No doubt it is seducing Turkey into the loony camp comprising of Hamas, Al-Queda, virtually leaderless Islamic nations looking for Street Cred., and the poor misguided fools crowding out the ships of fools in Gaza. UN sanctions may or may not strangle the Iranian nuclear program but if it doesn’t expect things to get a lot hotter in the Middle East and beyond. Neda was one person but she matters. Let us not forget her and others prepared to sacrifice their lives for Freedom.

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