Sgt Hulka Uncut

uncensored opinion and technical information on stuff

Join me in the future?

Dec 9

Posted by Sgt Hulka in Climate Change, Economics, Good Ideas | 1 Comment

I want to discuss a couple of questions I have had that have been bubbling away in my head for a long while. So, in no particular order, what are we going to do about coal?, and what are going to happen with jobs in a future low carbon emitting world?

See, you can get most anyone who will accept the scientific method to buy into the need to take action on anthropogenic climate change. And to fix the problem, I don’t see any way burning coal for fuel is going to work going forward, due to the huge rate of emissions in relation to the energy that can be produced. But when you talk about eliminating the vast majority of all the jobs in the industries of coal mining, shipping, and burning for fuel, you are talking about a lot of disruption. I see these as key issues that are locked together in the short and long-term. In achieving a low carbon future, we also need to attempt to limit damage to people’s current livelihood, while we at the same time entice them to a better one.

We need to have an answer for where we are going to employ people who leave the coal industry, and what sort of short-term safety net we will put in place to assist those effected, if Australia as a nation decide to make big cuts in our emissions rapidly, and at least start to satisfy the goals of the scientist greenies on the left. Because crap though they may be as a political party, their goals are closer to what are required than anyone on the right of politics, I suggest.

For the sake of argument, let’s assume we are to make cuts in CO2 emissions that are deeper than currently proposed, and more rapidly than currently proposed in the draft legislation in front of the Australian Parliament. We can save all the planet for our grandkids, great, but right now, the issue is jobs, and who is going to gain them and who is required to lose them in the near to mid-term.

Let’s first look at the losers. As I have said, there are going to have to be massive amounts of job losses in coal mining, some in shipping, and almost all those currently in coal burning. Below are some numbers from the Australian Bureau of Statistics from August 2009:

• 40,800 persons in Coal Mining (full and part time)
• 6,600 persons in Coal and Petroleum Product Manufacturing (full and part time)
• 31,400 persons in exploration and mining support services
• 10,706,500 persons employed in today (full and part time)

Also, just for later discussion:

• 2,200 persons in electricity, gas and water services
• 55,200 persons in electricity supply

If every one of the 47,400 persons in the coal mining and coal products manufacturing industries were to lose their job, we would need to re-employ 0.44% of working population in Australia. That is a conservative number, since we know that not all of them would lose their jobs, and some of them are actually employed in petroleum refineries and not coking coal plants. But that is the direct severity of how bad the problem could be. How many people involved in shipping coal to the ports and power plants, and shipping coal overseas, would lose their jobs? I am not sure, as the statistics I have are not broken down well enough. But lets say half of the 31,400 persons in the exploration and mining support services area were put out of work. This is probably a conservative estimate, since coal doesn’t make up half of the mass of the minerals that are explored for and mined in Australia.

In the power generation area, I don’t think that there is a good argument that any people will be put out of work, because the electricity demand will continue (and in fact grow), and the persons required to operate and maintain power generation facilities should be roughly similar, regardless of the type. But let’s assume that we do lose 80% of those jobs too, based on the coal usage fraction of our electricity generation. Yes, we are that addicted to burning the magic dirt.

So all up, we have just under 1% of the working population will lose their jobs. And if you told me that we were going to suffer an additional 1% unemployment in a year, or six months or even a month, it would be a challenge, but not an insurmountable one, for either our society or our economy. And the reality is, we couldn’t lose all those coal plants and replace them with anything else in less than about 10-15 years. We are talking about 80% of our generating capacity, after all.

Then, remember, all those people need not be out of work long, and they don’t all have to go take low paying jobs at McDonalds either. To replace 80% of our generating capacity is going to create so many jobs, it will make the stimulus effort last year look like a bake at a school fete. By my estimate, those jobs will include:

• R&D work for renewables that can be installed in the next 10-20 years;
• Energy efficiency equipment and materials manufacturing;
• Energy efficiency designers and installers;
• Designers of new plants and equipment to deliver power over the mid term (nuclear, gas, geothermal, wind, solar, etc.);
• Manufacturers of equipment to generate power; and
• Construction supervision and labour to build all this new infrastructure.

Of the above, I suggest that all but the semi-skilled installers of the energy efficiency equipment and some of the construction labourers will have jobs that are equally as valuable as the mining, trucking and shipping jobs that will be lost. However, having a job is not all, and we need to consider the disruption of the migrations that may be caused from places like Musswellbrook, NSW. It should be government policy to provide a safety net in the form of re-training, relocation and direct unemployment relief to workers displaced by the conversion away from coal burning.

That is, provided we don’t have to face any arguments based on the reasoning that just because a grandfather was a coal miner and a father was a coal miner, that somehow the son has some sort of mystical right to be a coal miner. There are many communities that have been built around the industries of salt, whale oil, steam engines and asbestos that are all relegated to history, and coal is going there too, whether you like it or not.

But let’s not dwell on the negative. The low carbon future has so many positives going for it, it should be a no-brainer to get society to go along, even those now working in coal. So, I challenge any real people out there working in the coal industry to call me on my facts if they are wrong, test my logic, and help refute or improve my argument. Because it is an argument I feel we must win, and now. And also recognise this: While people may face some uncertainty and disruption over the move away from coal, there are some legal persons (companies) that have a vested interest in using that disruption to real persons in an effort to thwart any attempts to reduce the activity of those companies, even though the change is in the best interest of all the real persons. We should expect that, as those legal persons are sociopathic by design.

NASA scientist embraces the Rapture?

Dec 4

Posted by Sgt Hulka in Climate Change, Economics, International, Politics, Science | Comments off

James Hansen, a top NASA scientist who helped bring attention to the dangers of global warming more than 20 years ago, wants Copenhagen to fail.

That’s right, and from the dude who is like the godfather of climate change science.

His major complaint seems to be that the Danish plan reduces emissions over 40 years, which he says is too long, and we will be in a disaster by then. I tend to agree. However, we will also need to recover from that disaster, and having a long term cut in CO2 emissions will also be part of that solution, in real or in spirit. Let me explain.

James is saying that any cap and trade type ETS, won’t work fast enough and that a straight energy tax is what is required immediately. If I ran the show worldwide, I would agree with him, do that immediately, and stifle all debate as strong as required to maintain my control on power. And believe me, you’d have a shit fight on your hands, taking on all business that use energy worldwide, and the energy intense ones most of all. But I would do it, because I believe fundamentally that James is right, and we are either at or just past the point where we must act to stop anthropogenic climate change. However, I am not ready to go join the rapturists, and unless we find a way to reduce emissions soon, and possibly reverse feedforward loops in climate change, we might not be ok long term, like as a species.

Assuming we have not passed the point of no return with regard to overall average warming, then the major advanced economies (in terms of lower energy intensity, or $/GDP, but high overall emissions) are going to have to cap our emissions and reduce them over time. No question about it. And as they do that, industries in those countries will have to either directly reduce their emissions themselves, or get someone else to do for them, through the only flexible compliance method specifically identified in the Kyoto Agreement, an ETS. They are proven to work, use economic drivers and markets for efficiency, and can be on the whole fair and egalitarian (just as Wall Street can be).

So I hope Copenhagen succeeds, although I don’t like the track record of the politicians anymore than James does. Copenhagen would be a real coup if we could also get some countries to sign up to firm commitments on the real issue, so we can quit worrying about how much CO2 we put out in total.

See, while the spirit of the long-term solution will retain emissions reduction, the functional design of it should be an energy intensity tax (or a mix of energy intensity limits for equipment, facilities, industries, etc.), much like vehicle efficiency standards, which improved the fleet so much in the USA beginning in 1978. Pity they didn’t keep that up. So, what we really need long term is for everyone in the advanced and the developing world to sign up to energy intensity targets. Otherwise they will continue to install more high-CO2 emitting, low energy efficiency crap, like they are doing now. It may surprise you to know that coal fired electricity production not only has the largest installed base (50% of production) but that it is also the fastest growing rate of new plants that are being installed (primarily in China, Russia, India). So, as James is saying, we better get cracking on that, or we will also be in need of a zombie plan even if the big emitters now all achieve fantastic reductions in CO2 emissions.

So what after CPRS?

Dec 2

Posted by Sgt Hulka in Climate Change, Economics, Politics | 2 Comments

Before a brief note on the pending death of the emissions trading system (ETS) in the Australian Senate, and the implications of that as well as the change in leadership of the opposition in Australia, I first want to provide an update on the climate change fraud post. It is noted today that the head of the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia has stepped down over the issue of the leaked emails. Good, but let’s hope the authorities continue to pursue any issue of lawbreaking as a result of that affair to the full extent of the law. For those on my side, it does not help our scientific case to take action if we harbour liars, cheats or those who encourage others to such behaviour. This is a particularly pertinent point when debate needs to begin again now toward another election in Australia that will depend largely on winning an argument in the public sphere with a Coalition that is now led by its vocal minority which believes that anthropogenic climate change does not exist.

Despite her hard work, I see the failure to pass a CPRS largely as a result of the failure by the Minister For Climate Change (Penny Wong) in being able to advocate and articulate the issue to the public at large, who would then pressure their elected representatives to take action on the issue, followed by the Greens failure in making the perfect the enemy of the good, as I have discussed in detail previously.

I also see it as a failure on the part of people like me, who have taken the effort over the last 15 years to understand the issue of anthropogenic climate change, decide a position on it, and know some of the solutions, but have failed to lobby hard enough at every opportunity to achieve the goal. This record of my thoughts was begun recently as one means to try to address that failure, in an educational manner. So, I encourage those on any side of the issue to ask me any specific questions and debate me on the merits of your arguments and solutions (if you see a problem).

While we have the science and popular opinion (hearts) on our side, what we need to begin effective action is the minds of the population. We need to detail specifically what an ETS or a simplified carbon tax will cost, and who will pay for it. Because this change isn’t free, and by choice or by coercion, eventually we are going to have to require everyone, as individuals or through their companies, to pay up if we are to address anthropogenic climate change. It is a challenge on the scale of the largest human society has faced, but one I am convinced we could meet, if we so choose. It reminds me of the words of John F Kennedy in 1962.

“We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard.”

Almost 50 years later, there are hopefully enough of us left to look past our own short term self interest and do something hard.

The smoking gun of climate fraud?

Nov 30

Posted by Sgt Hulka in Bad Ideas, Climate Change, International, Science | Comments off

I am all for a good conspiracy theory to pass the time, but mostly due to the fact that they are a good read, rather than that they lead to a fundamentally modified understanding of reality. The latest from the climate sceptics is that they believe to have uncovered a vast conspiracy on the left to falsify science in order to win the argument on climate change. They site mass volume of hacked emails from the University of East Anglia in England, one of the centres where climate change research is being carried out, and a participant in the IPCC. Now, like all good conspiracy theories, it starts out with some kernels of fact and possibly even the smoking-gun of fraud.

According to the best news report of the substance with regard to the issue in the American Academy for Advancement of Science (publishers of the peer-reviewed journal Science) the facts are that the Director of the Climate Research Unit there asked other scientists to delete data that might be the subject of Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests. But why would they do such a thing? Well further examination of the emails shows that the motivation was, that ,“. . . colleagues feared that releasing information would draw them deeper into disputes with amateur scientists, who would use it to create new controversies and cut into their research time.”

Now, while I could understand the motive, if say, I had to argue science with a demonstrable moron such as Steven Fielding on a repetitive basis. However, deleting information subject to a FOIA request is against the law, so regardless of the motive, one or more people at the University of East Anglia could face some heat and possibly prosecution. And good thing when they do. Just as I would want someone like Dick Cheney to face the music if we could prove he lied, I don’t want liars and obfuscators on my team. The rules are the rules and they apply to all.

That being said, there is no proof in all these hacked emails that any of the people who were asked by others from England to delete files or data aver did so, and coordinating such a mass deletion across countries, institutions and by other scientists would leave a trail, even if it were attempted. In fact, the hack that resulted in the release of the information was very possibly caused by one of the scientists asked to do something improper instead leaked a bunch of the information. That is, unless Occam’s Razor wins out, because in fact one of the scientists left their email and data wide open to the outside world by including their password in their email address. And let’s face it, you aren’t going to run a very good conspiracy with people like that involved.

So basically, despite an inappropriate (or possibly illegal) request by one person, there no evidence in the information released that there was a multi-organisational, worldwide conspiracy to modify data, carry out false modelling, or alter the peer-reviewed system of the IPCC for arriving at their conclusions on climate change.

The rules of science are that one sound data set can prove all the science before it wrong. Unfortunately for the climate change sceptics, this is not that data set, and for the time being, I will stick with the peer-reviewed science on the side that demonstrates anthropogenic climate change as being real and a problem. Anyone still with me?

For an amusing side of this story, watch as the chaos over the Coalition leadership plays itself out this week. I venture to guess that Fielding, Minchin, Abbott or other climate change sceptics will attempt to use the smoking gun they think they now have to win the argument. They will continue to attempt to tear the other side down, but they will find no bullets in their gun, and they are not be able to offer a substantive alternative explanation of the scientific data we all can agree on. And eventually, their logic on the CPRS will also collapse, either this week, or during the double dissolution election to follow.

Carving Up the Cap

Nov 26

Posted by Sgt Hulka in Climate Change, Economics, International, Politics | 1 Comment

The discussions are shaping up for Copenhagen, as more countries like the US now are floating actual proposals for cutting their emissions, while other countries like China seem to want to refuse to do anything until those that got us to this point commit to paying their fair share. The arguments seem to be shaping up along these lines: Developing countries want the developed countries to “pay” for the reductions required in CO2 by drastically reducing their emissions from a baseline, as they have been the ones that have benefited from the failure to control emissions in the past. The developed countries are more worried about the rates of increase in CO2 emissions from the developing countries, partly because if the developed nations were to agree to reduce their emissions greatly, those emissions reductions would simply be “eaten up” in a few years by growing emissions from the developed world. The answer to getting any sort of binding agreements in Copenhagen (or later) seems to be in finding the metric to balance out both the developed world and the developing world in doing both.

If we are going to get to where we think we need to go, we need to do something along the lines of limiting average temperature rise to 2C, which translates into something like limiting CO2 concentration in the atmosphere to about 350 parts per million by volume (ppmv). To achieve this balance is going to mean a cap of emissions worldwide, which will be reduced over time to get where we need to go. It is not as simple as just dividing up the contributions to this cap by what contributions are now, which means developed economies get more since they started making the emissions first. We also can’t just divvy up the contributions to the emissions cap on a per capita basis, since that would mean that developed nations would have to reduce their emissions (and lifestyles) to those equivalent to the developing countries. But a balance can be struck, and possibly in ways that may not drive us all into economic ruin.

The US, most of Europe, Japan, Australia and other developed countries should be willing to make very challenging cuts to their 1990 base emissions, and in exchange India, China and the rest of the developing world should be willing to accept limits in their rates of emissions increases, or a limit in their per capita emissions which is lower than that in the developed world. Negotiations should focus on the definitions of developed/developing, and the size of cuts and per capita limits required worldwide to reach the goal. Negotiations can start with the voluntary unilateral cuts and commitments to go farther if others do their bit, as Australia has proposed to do. This is why I have advocated having our CPRS completed before the Copenhagen meeting.

If an international agreement is reached, we can then get on with achieving it, and despite the costs, it won’t have to ruin economies worldwide. I will post in the near future on why I don’t believe the costs will be significant in the overall scheme of things, even if the miniscule chance of the overwhelming scientific opionion proves to be incorrect!

If you won’t kick in your $1.05 . . .

Nov 25

Posted by Sgt Hulka in Climate Change, Economics, Science | 2 Comments

. . . or $2 or $5, who will? That’s the number that and independent analysis by the Citi Group has found that a ton of coal would increase as a result of the CPRS being introduced. Now, 5 bucks a ton sounds pretty severe when you look at it on a cost/ton basis. My current look at energy prices suggest that this average rise of $5 would raise the average price for a ton of coal from $45 to $50. That’s an 11% increase! If I was selling coal, I would want to make a huge issue out of that sort of rise that I would undoubtedly have to pass on to my customers. But, let’s look a little closer at how that cost rise plays out on the basis of the measure used throughout the energy industry in dollars per kilowatt hour ($/kWh). The results may surprise you a little. When converted to cost per amount of power delivered, some sources of energy break down like this:

Coal: $0.007/kWh
Gas: $.0.03/ kWh
Oil: $0.05/ kWh
Solar: $0.38/ kWh
Nuclear: $0.006/ kWh

So, if you look at it on this basis, that 5 bucks a ton only converts to only 1 tenth of 1 cent a kilowatt hour (or a cost of $0.008/kwh). That means what is an absolutely screaming deal on a cost basis becomes only an incredibly good deal, or only a third the price of gas rather than a quarter. Damn, I think we better subsidise those lost profits right away rather than risk any coal companies cutting jobs, huh?

Finally, when examining the numbers, the other thing to keep in mind is that it is not all about cost, is it? Because if it were, we wouldn’t be worried about making coal more expensive in relation to say, solar power. Instead, we would be working on plans to locate a lot more nuclear plants much closer to the users of the power in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth, wouldn’t we? I’m sure we are all on board with that, right?

Right?

Is this thing even on?

Autopsy of Failure

Nov 24

Posted by Sgt Hulka in Bad Ideas, Climate Change, Good Ideas, Politics | 4 Comments

[Reprinted from Oct 2009]

Now on to this month’s rant, which might be subtitled “autopsy of failure”. I want to examine the failure of Labor, for basically being themselves in arriving at their current position on climate change legislation, as well as moving it forward to a conclusion. But first, I must return to an earlier target, the Greens, for their act of taking jobs they were either completely unqualified for, or that they never intended to carry out the responsibilities of in the first place, and thereby being frauds.

It all stems from a brief summary of what would be the Greens amendments to the CPRS (as provided by the Environment Manager) of about a week ago:

  • A 40% cut to Aust’s GHG emissions on 1990 base by 2020;
  • A 100% renewable energy target and national gross-feed-in tariff;
  • Enshrined in Aust law a commitment to stabilise global emissions at an atmospheric concentration of 350 parts per million;
  • An emissions trading scheme with no price cap, full permit auctioning, no five-year warnings for business on emissions caps, voluntary offsets included in the caps, agriculture excluded and two yearly reviews;
  • Agriculture to be dealt with under a “green carbon” sequestration plan that would end all clearing of native forests;
  • Compensation for emission-intensive industries based only on their trade exposure, as determined by the Productivity Commission;
  • The axing of fringe benefits tax on inefficient cars and fuel tax credits for mining and forestry; and
  • Energy efficiency upgrades in all Aust homes and businesses.

Now, here’s a shocker. After reading through all the amendments above and having a bit of a think about them all, I could agree to all IN FULL. Even the couple that I find a bit fluffy and more populist than substantive. They are not the same sort of impractical aspirational rubbish we normally get from the greens. Had all of these been available and on the table back in August when the government was telling the Coalition to put up or shut up (and possibly face an early election), the Greens should have been out there with a simple summary of the above and been campaigning on the merits of their position then, rather than just bitching and whining about the target levels back in August, and then bitching and whining about how Labor will do a deal with the Coalition last week. Essentially, they are now whining about the fact that because they failed to follow the process for making amendments, they are not responsible for the fact that their really super ideas are not going to be in the final legislation, and some deal between Labor and the Coalition (possibly, or possibly not including the Devil) will shut them out of the process.

See, the thing is, that laws don’t get passed by some snapperhead having a bright idea in the shower in the morning that he jots down on a recycled serviette over a bran toast and green tea, and then bicycling into the house or senate and saying to his colleagues, “Hey guys, I have this CPRS thing sorted”, after which they have a quick read, all applaud his brilliance and then have the thing all passed through both houses that afternoon before heading out to volunteer at the local animal shelter. The fact is, REAL legislation is passed with lots of work that involves arm twisting, sharp elbows and lining up alliances quite early, and most importantly through a pre-set PROCESS that must be followed. Liberals aren’t allowed to offer vocal “NOs” as a documented set of amendments to legislation, and if the Greens wanted Labor to do a deal with them to do some real good for the environment and sell Australia’s credentials as a green leader in the world, the time to do that passed by in July or August.

It’s a real pity that the good ideas of the Greens will not be included in the CPRS that will eventuate from the negotiations on its finalisation, but it will be their intransigence and failure to follow the process of adopting new legislation that will be at fault. They were the ones that made the “perfect” the enemy of the “good” initially. They failed to participate in the process, leaving the field of play to a competition between an overly pragmatic idea with too many giveaways, and no idea at all. The only good news resulting from the way things have played out in Australia with respect to the CPRS is the potentially looming split between the Coalition on the issue, or perhaps even a split between the Nationals, the Liberals and Liberal Climate Change Deniers.

The Greens should have been inside the tent with Labor, fighting out the points of facts and fairness on the CPRS along with those in business who are getting too much of their way. But unfortunately, they have excluded themselves, are irrelevant to something that should have been their core, and possibly are doomed to the same fate as the Democrats before them.

Are we not men?

Nov 24

Posted by Sgt Hulka in Bad Ideas, Climate Change, International, Politics | 1 Comment

[reprinted from August 2009]

In a previous article, I touched on an issue about which the Coalition in Australia has coalesced, namely taking a wait and see attitude to Climate Change, based on what comes out of the USA. I got to thinking about this issue further this morning when I watching on ABC Breakfast the speculation about whether or not Nathan Rees may see a coup in the near future. A name of a woman was dropped as someone up and coming in the Labor Party, and then quickly dismissed by the ABC commentators as still having a US accent, so unlikely to be acceptable. This was accepted without dispute by all those she was engaged in conversation with, and included no discussions of the substance of any positions held by the woman. And I got to thinking, hell that’s stupid, but its probably right, even I wouldn’t trust me on first impressions, given my accent. And it dawned on me that there is a third issue why the Coalition position on the CPRS is a loser, even amongst the Nationals.

Basically, why would we as Australians accept that anything the USA would produce programatically would be good for Australia? Do they have a history of doing things in Australia’s interest, particularly when it may be in conflict with their own self interest? On tariffs, subsidies and any number of other trade issues, nope. In my 15 years an Australian citizen alone, I have see the US dump steel, wheat, and other commodities into world markets and significantly damage Australia industries at the time. Hell, W even signed into law a major subsidy for their steel industry right after the Australians were the first to commit troops to an Afghanistan effort – BEFORE EVEN BEING ASKED TO DO SO! This is also the mob that tried to come gut our Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme in their last round of  trade negotiations with Australia. Hey, far be it from me to be a US basher, but there’s no way I trust these arseholes with defining my CPRS.

Remember also that the US is likely to produce nothing in the next sitting session of their Congress. They are currently heavily distracted with health care, and whether to require all their citizens to get health insurance coverage through the same private health companies that have been ripping them off, denying them treatment, and putting the US in a position where it pays twice as much as the next major industrialised country for health care per capita, but is raked by the UN 37th in health care performance (proudly next to Costa Rica). Of course their Congress and President could pass a strong government run public option for health care and demand that pharmaceutical companies negotiate on price with a large public entity, but let’s face it the Democrats are in power there, and they are likely to be too big of pussies to move anything like that through, despite their filibuster-proof majorities. So don’t even expect the US to even get to the climate change issue, and get a bill through both houses and signed into law. Remember, they are several years behind us in the legislative effort, and even we haven’t got our well discussed and heavily negotiated CPRS through yet. If we wait for the Yanks it will be another lost opportunity, and by the time we get around to it, we will be selling summer timeshares in the Antarctic.

Finally (and potentially most importantly), what are we, f**king sheep? We have to wait around for the Yanks to move on this because they are smarter than us? or more determined to make a difference? or perhaps maybe more morally and ethically prone to leadership than we as Australians are? Sure they represent the bulk of the problem on an emissions basis, and if they, China and India don’t make some moves, it will make stuff-all difference what we as Australians do.

But the fact is, we are smart enough, we do know how to develop and run a CPRS trading scheme that will set a real market for carbon emissions, and begin to internalise the cost of those emissions. And the country I embraced the culture of when I signed up is also brave enough to show some leadership and ignore the lies and doomsayers about the new economy. Sean shared a interesting article from the ACF that exposes some corporate lies in relation to the NGERS/CPRS reporting in relation to what those same companies are telling their shareholders. It’s a worthwhile read for investors as well as those interested in the CPRS.

Process, Not Completeness

Nov 24

Posted by Sgt Hulka in Climate Change, Good Ideas, Politics | 1 Comment

[reprinted from July 2009]

“Process, Not Completeness” is the theme for the next discussion about climate change that I want to take up, and this time, I am unfortunately going to have to get stuck into those who I would normally plan to have as allies in the fight to begin addressing climate change, The Greens. But I suppose I should have suspected that  they would fail me now, since they suffer from what many who are too philosophical in their approach as politicians do, by letting the perfect be the enemy of the good.

You see, there is a lot of debate about the science of climate change, even amongst those who are convinced that there is a problem, it has an anthropogenic cause and it is a problem we can do something about. The point in the debate that the Greens make is that the emissions reductions under the proposed CPRS system are far too low, and the 5% and 15% targets provided by the government proposal will not solve the problem (with respect to Australia’s contributions) and the cuts should be much deeper. Without deep cuts in emissions in the CPRS they will not support the bill at all in the Senate. They point to the modelling of temperature rise and its correlation to CO2 parts per million in the atmosphere and they are possibly right, but by this point in their argument it doesn’t make much difference, as only me and a few other dweebs who want to investigate their claims in full and develop expertise in the subject matter are listening. And by making their position an all or nothing proposition, they are making the perfect (assuming their argument about targets is correct) the enemy of the good. Without Greens support, the government will be forced to negotiate with the real freaks in the Senate (I’m looking right at you, Steve), or delay or gut the legislation by making substantive changes the Coalition would require. Australia will suffer as a result, as I will detail further later, under a system that is modelled or implemented after the USA gets involved in climate change. But make no mistake, the USA and other large powerful nations will get involved in implementing a process worldwide to address climate change, and Australia will not get a fair say in that system by following the lead of the USA, as proposed by some.

So, the time to act is now, in my opinion, and a smart Green, that really wanted to have some early positive effect not only on the environment itself, but also on achieving an outcome that is in the national interest of Australia, would adopt a position that embraced the process of the CPRS, while maintaining their strong assertion that the targets need to be adjusted in the future. The process is the good in this discussion. The process by which we cap, trade, acquit and monitor emissions in our country is much more important than the actual targets. Think of the process as a big machine, not unlike the GST system implemented by the first Howard government. The targets in the CPRS are not unlike the rate of the GST, in that we don’t know exactly all the effects of it on the overall tax system, and we may find the need to adjust the rate in the future to meet our tax needs to run government. But setting the rate initially is not the important part when compared with the process of collecting it, holding it, and divvying it up, or just feeding it into general revenue of the government. Same with the CPRS, where the important parts are whether we have a cap and trade, an issue and trade, or a straight tax on carbon emissions. The discussion and decision to go with a cap and trade system has been well established over the last 10 years by those focusing on the subject that also recognise there is a problem to solve. I agree that it is the most appropriate model to use for Australia, and am interested in seeing it come into action to start to make a real difference (as far as we can make as Australia goes) in halting the rise of CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere, and beginning their reduction.

Under the system, the government sets the cap based on international agreements to limit CO2 emissions, and the permit acquitting system and trading system are the means by which we verify and administer that cap, and set the price for permits, respectively. The three interlocking processes are a sound means of  administering our international commitments, and the targets set carry over into the cap of the permit system, and will then directly effect the price of emissions permits. And a new commodity will be traded all over the world, like wheat orange juice or pork bellies. Will the systems be a little complicated and possibly need adjustment moving forward in order to serve their purpose and achieve the stated goals, including adjusting of the CO2 target levels – likely “YES”. But will waiting to develop and implement these processes further help to make any targets harder to achieve, fail to demonstrate leadership, and fail to protect Australia’s interests in the discussions – unfortunately “YES” again.

So lets get the process in place now, set a good example for those who follow us, and make sure that we have our interests built into the systems, rather than wait and hope the yanks treat us benevolently. Because being a puppy to W worked out so well for us in foreign affairs when Howard was running things, didn’t it?

Incentivise the positive and publicise the negative

Nov 24

Posted by Sgt Hulka in Climate Change, Good Ideas | 1 Comment

{reprinted from June 2009]

I would like to present a concept for your consideration. I like to call it incentivise the positive and publicise the negative, and it specifically applies to the introduction of new environmental laws and regulations. I have seen a number of introduction of new environmental regulations since 1987 and been able to examine others I have no first hand knowledge of. The concept has become abundantly obvious to me, and probably obvious to many once they have had to examine the issue in detail.

The concept comes about as a result of the understanding that industry’s first response to the introduction of any new regulation is typically going to be that it costs jobs, eliminates exports, or by some other means generally cause the downfall of capitalism and society as we know it instantaneously. This is a tried and true argument for them and has often been used to undermine any support for doing the right thing in democracies where you basically need to control things, but you need not get the paras on the street immediately. The concept also harnesses that slight taste of greed, as we should all recognise that there is no way to motivate a capitalist by letting them get a sniff of an opportunity of a profit. The concept also makes use of acting upon any vanity, celebrity or good reputation the focus of it has.

Now, from my experience before, I found that no new enabling legislation and set of regulations combined the above qualities better than than the US Toxics Release Inventory (TRI). The TRI in 1989 is the direct antecedent which led to the implementation of the National Pollution Inventory (NPI) here in Australia. The TRI did something new in environmental legislation worldwide, as it wasn’t prescriptive in requiring any reductions in any emissions whatsoever. All it required reporting industries to do is report what they were emitting to the local communities where they live, and give informational support to the local emergency response authorities near them in planning for major incidents. However, the results of this piece of legislation resulted in more emissions reductions in the USA than any other single piece of environmental legislation I have seen before, because companies saw the profit in it, and saw the benefit (or detriment) to their reputation at the same time.

So to me, the key to introduction of something like the CPRS in Australia is to embrace a similar approach, using the principle of incentivise the positive and publicise the negative. We should make use the NGERs inventories, and reports of surrendered credits to the government under a CPRS, as our means to examine companies in a new way based on this new commodity. The increased scrutiny will help them find where they should be finding savings, or in a perfect storm, realise a profit opportunity form doing the right thing by the environment. For those that choose to do nothing, the press and NGOs will likely do what they do best and sensationalise those who are large emitters and bad publicity will encourage them to get on board.

There are also new ways to incentivise take up of clean power of consumers, as Zac and I have been discussing in the office, as well as ways that smaller businesses could help the adoption of the climate friendly activities and assist at arriving at the “real” price of a ton of CO2 by “opting in” to the carbon trading system early. I will be writing more about these in coming weeks.