I am about to say something that is going to make me sound totally crazy. But by admitting to you that I am about to sound crazy, then that really means I am not crazy as I just told you what I am about to say will make me sound crazy thereby proving I am sane because I realise it will sound crazy.
To get off fossil fuels, we may need to use more fossil fuels.
See? I told you. It sounds absolutely crazy. I really wish it was crazy. But unfortunately it is not. You see, the current percentage of renewable energy powering homes and businesses around the world is currently at 28% (In Australia we are at 24%). Do you see the problem? It means that 72% of our current energy supply comes from fossils, the thing we need to get off using and quickly! But to increase the supply of renewable energy infrastructure, we need to use fossil fuels 72% of the time to do so!
Sure, the more renewable energy sources that come online, the smaller the percentage of fossils we have to use. But until they do come online, we have to use fossils.
Sucks, huh?
Further to make more renewable energy sources faster, we have to rely on burning more fossils in a shorter time until we can connect those renewable energy sources because we have been talking about renewables now for decades and all we have globally is 28%. If we want to get to 100% renewables globally by 2080, we really got to pull our collective finger out of our collective buttholes. We are barely going to make it 50% by 2050, which means we will still be using renewables for the other 50%.
But wait. There is more crap news. Lets say we in Australia really go for it and get totally off fossils by 2050 and in the process do not open any new coalmines and close some of the ones that are open? Doesn’t that sound terrific? Well it would, unless you are in countries that are not Australia and you are still trying to lift your renewable energy supply to 30%. You see, then, with Australia out of the coal market, then we reduce the supply in the world by about 10%. Which means the demand for what coal there is still out there rises, which means prices rise, which means poorer countries will have to raise the cost of living for their people, which could lead to more civil unrest and to even more conflict because, lets face it, humans are arseholes. Of course, some govts may need to remove the energy going into the manufacturing of renewables or slow it down so they can reduce that cost burden on their people.
My point is, long after we in Australia stop burning coal as we have made our renewable infrastructure, do not forget that other countries around the world have most likely not done so and (here comes the crazy again) for us to help them get to renewables faster, we have provide them with fossils.
Now I may be talking out of my rear end here. I mean, as some countries move to renewables, the overall fossil demand will start to fall. The problem though is we have to wait for those countries to reduce their demand in their time frames BEFORE we remove what they need to let them do it.
I told you. Catch-22. And its a problem. A MAJOR problem.
A. Ghebranious 2022
I haven’t blogged for ages but I think I better put my hat back into the ring in regards to one rather important policy – that of emissions reduction.
People seem to have made climate change a very important topic. And the two major parties both claim to be ‘taking action on climate change’. So I thought I might try to dissect what this actually means. This is because act, the root word in action, is be both a verb and a noun. A verb, from my old primary school english class memories, is a doing word. A noun, also from the same memory, is a naming word. Hence when one party claims they are taking action on climate change, they may not actually be doing anything, just saying they are.
The main difference we are told is one of a figure. The ALP talk about 45%. The LNP talk about 26%. The latter also talk about ‘doing enough to meet our Kyoto agreement obligations’. What does obligation actually mean? I am glad you asked! The definition of obligation is ‘an act or course of action to which a person is morally or legally bound; a duty or commitment’ So the use of the word obligation by the LNP is a very interesting word considering the attack on Kevin Rudd when he made the statement that climate change is the biggest moral challenge of our time. How they mocked him. Now they use the same language.
The other fact that is thrown around is the year 2030. The ALP talk about life after 2030 with targets for 2040 and 2050. The LNP seem to assert that there will be no 2031, so they don’t like to talk about needing to do anything after 2030. Maybe 2031 is the year Christ is planning to make a second coming & god will fix everything. But I think they don’t mention anything after 2030 because they don’t really give a shit about ‘taking action on climate change’ at all.
At this stage, I want to interrupt this assessment on policy to talk about some harsh truths. If the feedback cycle of climate change has begun, and I believe it has, then reducing emissions to zero world wide by the end of this month will not stop it. The planet will be able to recover – over time. Most likely two hundred to three hundred years. Some will say then why are we bothering to do anything about emissions. This is because if we don’t, then the recovery time will be many more hundreds of years. Maybe thousands.
Let me also address the argument that CO2 does not drive temperature as seen from historical ice core readings. These readings do indicate that CO2 was not the driver for temperature. Heck, its only one of multiple greenhouse gases. But what the same graph shows is CO2 is an indicator – a canary in the mine. Temperature keeps rising until CO2 in the atmosphere begins to decline AND stays high for a very long time even after CO2 begins to decline. The graph below shows this clearly.
This time around though, our time, CO2 emissions started to rise before temperature. This is because we burned a lot of fossils fuels over the last 150 years or so. The planet did what the planet does – try to cope. It tries as hard as it can to store that carbon. And it has been doing this. In the oceans and what is left of the trees we haven’t chopped down to build palm oil farms or parking lots or holiday resorts or golf courses or land clearing for farms. Can we put back more trees than we chop down? That’s yet to be seen. What we also know now is the oceans are almost full.
This is why despite reducing global emissions through more efficient machines as well as renewable energy sources, CO2 in the atmosphere continues to rise. And as long as it continues to rise, temperatures are not about to even think about starting to come down. And as temperatures rise, more water vapor, also a greenhouse gas, will occur through evaporation & also releasing stored CO2 from the ocean as it evaporates, which will drive temperatures higher which can see permafrost melt and the release of methane, also a greenhouse gas, will also drive temperatures higher. So will shutting down all fossil fuel emission sources stop temperatures rising? Not immediately, no. And it may also not stop the rise of CO2 in the atmosphere which may continue to rise as oceans evaporate due to the heat. Imagine a snowball rolling down a hill. Well we already pushed the snowball. And its got momentum. And its picking up more snow and growing. And it will continue to get more and more dangerous for a long time before it runs out of energy. Basic physics. And we don’t have something big enough that we can put in its way to stop it. Does that mean we should not act? No. We definitely need to act. But don’t expect to see a result in your lifetime or your kids or your kids kids.
Okay, so back to the policies. The 26% target by the coalition is basically this (take a breath now) – they will spend $3.5bn putting in emissions reducing equipment to some businesses, many of whom make large profits now and can easily put their hands into their own pockets and upgrade their own equipment or pay for their own solar and wind and batteries to power their factories or spend money moving from fossil fuel powered vehicles to electric vehicles and not only reduce their emissions, but also save money on fuel since they can get it from any solar or wind or battery sources they invest in which will ALSO reduce their energy costs. Phew. Rather long paragraph that.
But wait! There is more!
The other thing the coalition are doing is increasing the amount of emissions a company can produce before they should even start looking at abatement or paying for the excess (yes Australia! There is still a carbon tax out there and has been for decades.) Basically, a company or a factory is allowed to produce so many emissions for ‘free’. Emissions over and beyond this amount incurs a cost OR incurs an obligation such as abatement (yes I said abatements and yes they can indeed be purchased from overseas now. Its how Qantas does it) by the company. In summary, under the coalition, businesses, mining facilities and yes even farms, will be allowed to emit more emissions before they need to do something about it. And if they exceed this, they can use taxpayer money to upgrade equipment or buy solar etc to help keep them below the target the next year.
The ALP has a much bigger target – gradually reducing the amount of emissions a company can produce per year till the 45% target. This means companies will need to start acting NOW. Investing some of the profits they make into new equipment or new technology so they can meet the ever lowering emissions limbo dance so they stay under the bar. If they exceed it, well they have to pay that carbon tax I was talking about OR buy domestic or overseas abatements.
At the same time, they plan to use $300mn of taxpayer money to help emissions intensive industries such as steel makers or cement etc. While these industries can reduce emissions through a move to EV fleets of trucks for transport and solar/wind/battery equipment to reduce the emissions to power their equipment and fuel their trucks, you still need to burn coal to make steel as its a combination of coal and iron. And the emissions produced in those kind of industries are unavoidable. But other businesses and companies who produce emissions and make profits will need to use their own monies to make themselves more efficient and same money on fuel costs etc.
That is basically the difference between both policies. The LNP’s is a ‘that will do’ kind of approach were they will say they will meet the required target but then do no more. Its like their NBN speed guarantee of ‘upto 25Mbs – you can get more, but they don’t guarantee it. Likewise, they say they will guarantee emissions reductions of 26%, but no more. Nor will they mention any targets after the arbitrary 2030 date. The ALP are aiming to reach a higher target, but don’t expect there to be no more emissions by the end of the year. Nor are either party saying they will happily go to jail for 15 years if they don’t meet their targets either. In fact, neither incurs any penalty for missing a target. Nor can one be imposed other than voter backlash in elections after 2031.
Is this post a valid interpretation of either the coalition’s policy or labors? Maybe. Maybe not. I could be right. I could be wrong. But I do know this – emissions need to be acted on and political parties will need to address them or be swept away by the rising emissions free anger of the young who demand action be a verb and not a noun.
Politicians should never forget: Anger is an energy.
A. Ghebranious
Due to mic problems, this weeks podcast is in three parts. I know what you are thinking. I should have planned ahead.
You should listen in to the longer version of this podcast as at first, I didn’t succeed. Yes I know. I must just suck.
https://www.spreaker.com/user/auspollive/ashrafs-friday-rant-if-then-maybe_1
Where to start! What a fortnight!
So the greens had ten federal parliamentarians hanging on the wall. Then one green federal parliamentarian followed by a second had an accidental fall. No this is not a nursery rhyme or a drinking song. But for some green voters, they may have turned to drink if not fetal positions.
The prime minister was extremely vicious in his commentary calling the greens extremely sloppy. The alternative prime minister may have not been as vicious, but he couldn’t let the event go past without a dig either.
Malcolm Roberts from One Nation called for an inquiry. Then it came to light that Malcolm Roberts may ALSO have dual citizenship. He refused to provide empirical proof. And here I was thinking he was in love with empire and empirical proof.
But before you could say mama mia, it was revealed that Matt Canavan was, to quote the prime minister, extremely sloppy.
Barnaby Joyce held a press conference in which he emotionally reported that Canavan did indeed have italian/australian citizenship. But he assured everyone that despite having dual citizenship, Matt was still a decent bloke.
Canavan did what all good decent blokes do – blamed his mother. He insisted that he had no idea he had dual citizenship or had ever applied for it. This was followed up by members of the national party, including Barnaby who claimed they found the application form and it’s not signed.
Well he must be innocent then right? Well…. no… Before I discuss the actual wording of s44 in all its legalese, there are a few things that have happened or been reported that tend to contradict Matt Canavan and his claim that he was only transporting the headphones because his mum bought them.
One report on Wednesday was the claim made by Italian immigration people themselves. They say that it would be impossible for someone to apply for citizenship for another adult and any claim had to be done in person by the applicant. But hey, who do you trust? Matt ‘the aussie’ Canavan or a bunch of ‘eyeties’?
The second report came the day after the first report as things do in our linear time line dimension. On Thursday it was claimed that the Italian govt had been sending Matt Canavan Italian voting forms. For ten years.
Maybe Matt thought these where newspoll questions. Or recipes for Bolognese. Either way, when Matt decided he wanted to be a senator, he didn’t mention the voting forms. Or that he once filled in an application form for citizenship of another country. Maybe he thought they didnt matter. But unfortunately for Matt ‘the eyetie’ Canavan, they do.
Two things here. Firstly a little about Italian nationality law and a little latin phrase called ‘jus sanguinis’ which translates as the right of blood. This is not the working title of a vampire movie. It is in fact, the right to be Italian by descent. This is how Canavan and his mum could apply for Italian citizenship – they had the right to do so by blood. It doesn’t matter if you were born in Italy or not. It’s a birth right.
“Any child born to an Italian citizen parent (including parents also having the right to Italian citizenship jus sanguinis) is ordinarily born an Italian citizen”
Now there are a few caveats – hoops to go through etc, but when Matt’s mum applied for and was awarded citizenship as was her right, her children (Matt Canavan included) immediately became Italian Citizens by birth. Matt didn’t need to apply. And while he may have been unaware that he was made a citizen, he was aware he had the RIGHT to be a citizen and so at one time filled out a form which he says he neither signed or lodged. Fair enough. Except he kept getting those Italian voting forms and yet never asked what they were or why he was getting them. But lets push that aside for now.
s44 subsection (i) is the relevant part of the constitution that disqualifies Matt.
The last part is the part that really gets him into trouble. While he may claim that he did not know he was a subject or a citizen, he DID know that he was entitled to BE a subject or citizen by right of blood. How can I say that he knew this? He filled out a form for citizenship, that is how. He knew he was entitled to citizenship, he even discussed claiming said citizenship with his mum. He knew his mum had the right to apply.
Now he may not have signed or lodged his form, but he did something astonishing. He kept it. For over ten years. A form he never signed or lodged, he kept. Why would you do that? Saving it for a rainy day?
So while Matt can claim he did not personally apply for citizenship, he can’t say he was unaware of his right to do so. And that means according to the law of the land, he is disqualified to sit as either a member of the house of representatives or the senate.
And that is why Matt, you are in trouble. As your momma would say, and no doubt your lawyer, shaddaup your face.
Ashraf Ghebranious 27th July, 2017
This weeks Ashraf’s Fridays Rants deals with the topic ‘The Stupids’. Am I talking about you? Well you will need to listen to find out!
Ash's Machiavellian Bloggery 