The Murray Darling and its lower lakes

What a bloody disgrace this government is becoming on environmental issues, one broken promise after another, one more committee appointed for the sole purpose of delaying another decision and in my view an easy decision. Save the lower lakes of the Murray River wher eit meets the ocean.

What right do any of us humans have to make a decision to flood these lower lakes and destroy a ecosystem that has existed for thousands if not millions of years, what right do we have to destry all the flora and fauna that have developed and adapted to live in this environment. NONE!!!!!!! this government needs to have a look at its self and its water buy back scheme. The we need to look at the type of farming we do in this country.

I am only going to touch on this in this post and will re-visit this topic later.

Let's look at the farming conducted in this country and the irrigation techniques

1. Rice Farms - What a joke, why would we farm rice, a flood irrigation crop, on the driest continent on earth. Let's look at where rice is grown, on the monsoon belt, why.....rain and lots of it. Get rid of the rice farmers, they contribute next to nothing to this country and do a lot of damage.

2. Cotton - another very very thirsty crop as well as a crop that requires ahuge amount of insectisides and pesticides to grow it. Again.....shut it down, we do not need it. The damage sheep do is bad enough, we do not need both wool and cotton

3. Irrigation Channels - why not pipe them, we hear talk about it but it never happens. I remeber Richard Pratt once challenged all the state and federal government to match him dollar for dollar to pipe the irrigation channels. No government agreed. Around 70% of all water in these channels is lost to evaporation. If we could reduce this lose, the water could stay in the rivers. Wouldn't this be an investment in our future, is this not consider vital infrastructure just like a dam or road or bridge.

As I said I have a lot to say on this topic and will come back to it later. The government needs to have a hard looka t itself and start making the tough decisions. Does the value of Rice and Cotton out weigh the value of the murray river and particularly its lower lakes???? I don' think so

What do you think?

Bring on the big end of town........

What a refreshing article.......congratrulations to the Australian Financial Review (Weekend Edition 16th - 17th August 2008) and to their journalist Ben Woodhead.

This is an article on a new initiative by Macquarie Bank to buy large tracks of rain forest all over the world as an investment in carbon credits. This new area is Macquarie's climate change practice and is heade by a guy called Oliver Yates. Why are they doing this? as quoted by Yates ' This is the biggest growth market you're going to see" Damn right it is, well done Oliver Yates and Macquarie Bank. A lot of people put a lot of shit on Macquarie Bank for paying large bonus's and being a greedy money making machine, well let me say, if institutions like Macquarie did not do this then they would not be able to take such a massive punt like this nor would they attract talented people like Oliver Yates. I say get off their back and encourage this type of investment. As Yate's says " If organisations aren't moving now to stake a claim in this market [Carbon Credits] are already falling behind their peers".

I know that there are a large number of Ethical or Green Funds that we can all invest in and these funds do a fantastic job in investing in Solar, Wind, Hydro, Geo-thermal which is fantastic and it should be encouraged. The difference with this Macquarie Bank initiative is that it is saving native and virgin rain forest. Why is this a good thing?

Well....if we cn save these native forests then we are saving the biodiversity in these forest, we can give the local people jobs in conservation and allows us to continue to find medical cures. Further more it will mean that the planting of tree farms and other mono cultures can slow up. All in all it is a win for everyone.

While this is a very limited summary of this article, I would encourage all people interested in this scheme to contact Macquarie Bank.

Hopefully....as more of our large institution start to realise the benefits of these types of investments we will see more and more of these types of initiatives and you never know maybe one day one of these organisations will buy up all of the native forests in Australia, well what is left of them, and preserve them forever.

WHat do people think of these types of initiatives and should it be allowed to happen?

More ETS

More interviews tonight on the ABC News. Again........complaining about the cost of this scheme to households and business!

Let me ask the following questions

1. What is the cost of not being about to grow food anymore due to a colapse of the ecosystem
2. What is the cost of running out of fresh water or hugely reduced water resources
3. What of the cost of wiping out flora and fauna that keeps the environment healthy and balanced
4. What about the cost of destroying the tourist attractions of the barrier reef, rainforests
5. What about the cost of not being able to go to the beach anymore
6. What about the increased cost in insurance as storms and droughts become more severe and regular

I could go on. Can we afford to gamble with the science. We need to take some pain now for long term gain?

Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS)

Can you believe the government and their ETS, how soft. In todays Financial Review and in most other daily papers it outlines the fact that the government is going to bend to the opposition request and offset the impact on petrol through a reduction in excise, further to this they are going to compensate households and emission-intensive industries to soften the blow. How is this going to be effective??

This is madness, isn't the whole idea of the ETS to change behaviour, to encourage investment in new technologies. I get that we need to remain competitive until the rest of the world falls into line, however how is the government going to change behaviour if it continues to let people and business off the hook???

Don't get me wrong, I think the Rudd government is taking a huge step in the right direction, I just wish he had stuck to his guns!

Take a look at the Opposition, Brendan Nelson, what a complete knuckle head, the best he could come up with on the news tonight was 'Well the Rudd Government has just confirmed the introduction of a new tax on Australian families" what a complete idiot! This guy clearly does not get it.

The reality is that the cost of living will go up, tough.

I say we should include petrol and emission - intesive industries and use the money to build more train lines and buses, what about investing in R & D for new sustainable energy solutions or build a large fibre optic network to make workiong from home more realistic for those that can. We never hear the politians talking about this type of investment. The sooner we make it easier for people to buy green energy or catch more trains the sooner the supply/demand issues on pertrol will decrease.

There are some sensible and practical solutions available, they just require some investment.

Give me your thoughts on the ETS so far?

Green-inculous!

Hi there

This is a new posting. In this section I am going to discuss and highlight some of the more outrageous, left field and downright ridiculous environmental ideas and comments I come across. I would welcome every to post similar things and comment on these ideas and concepts.

Opening Remarks

Hi,

I have set up this blog because I have a personal interest in the environment and the issues facing all of us today. I believe I can make a difference through what I do on a day to day basis and publishing it for other people to read and hopefully find useful.

I have an opinion on most things environmental. I am an avid reader of the daily papers, email newsletters, the latest environmental books, relevant blogs and the broader internet. I always have or soon develop an opinion what is being said and while my wife and 9 month old patiently listen to me and my world view (I am a believer of educating our next generation early!) - I am keen to cultivate a wider audience and dialogue on all things environmental - and recieve feedback on my views from a wider community.

I am very interested in seeking other people's opinions and views both for and against the environment and would encourage people to express themselves. I will convey my general view on 'the environment' in my next posting.

I will openly share my sources of information and reference all sources correctly and would ask that everyone do the same.

What else will appear on this blog

1. I am in the process of taking the organisation that I work for to a point where we will be certified 'Carbon Neutral'. I will not disclose the name of this organisation, however I will publish regularly and keep everyone informed about our progress and insight into our initiatives and any issues we face along the way.
2. We are already a member of the "Rainforest Alliance' and are a Certified Free Trade Company.
3. I have also launched the 'Environmental Business Institute of Australia'. While I am building the foundations and in early stages, the website is taking shape. Visit http://www.ebia.org.au/ and take a look. I hope to have a complete site up and running over the next month or two.

That is all for now. As topics arise, I will publish them and add new sections.

Thanks