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SILICON
SILIC
CHIP
www.siliconchip.com.au
Publisher & Editor-in-Chief
Leo Simpson, B.Bus., FAICD
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2 Silicon Chip
Publisher’s Letter
Let’s forget about a carbon
tax and concentrate on the
environment instead
Since I wrote the Publisher’s Letter entitled “Let’s
have no more of this carbon pollution nonsense” in the
June 2009 issue of SILICON CHIP, the political climate
seems to have changed dramatically – more than I could
ever have expected in such a short time. Not only did
the Copenhagen climate summit collapse in disarray
but there has been a general shift in people’s attitude
to climate change.
While most people seem to feel that climate change is happening and that human
activity is at least partly to blame, there is no consensus on what to do about it.
One thing is certain: the science is no longer “settled”, in spite of the increasingly
shrill declamations by those who are certainly not disinterested. And it seems that
the number of “climate change deniers” has greatly increased.
The Federal Government’s move to introduce a “carbon tax” next year has not
been favourably received and nor does there seem to be any remotely popular
alternative strategy. And there is a growing realisation amongst the populace that
action by Australia will have a significant cost and will have major employment
ramifications. A tiny reduction in our greenhouse gas emissions when they are already virtually insignificant in the total world emissions means the whole process
is futile, if not farcical.
All of which means that recent moves by the Greens political party to ramp up
the use of renewable energy are worrying. They have a long-term aim of making
all energy renewable and hang the consequences, whether it means much higher
prices for electricity or lots of job losses – they simply don’t care.
In an ideal world, we should not have coal-fired power stations and I have written
along these lines in Publisher’s Letters in years past. My opposition to coal-fired
power stations comes not from any concern about carbon dioxide – it is not a pollutant – but with the long-term damage to the landscape and water resources, both
by open-cut and underground mining.
However, there does not seem to be any support by the current Federal Labor
government for any reduction in coal mining, whether for use in power stations
or for export; quite the contrary in fact. With one eye on the union membership
of mines and the power industry and with the other eye on ever-growing royalties
and taxes, there is no stomach at all for any reduction; they want more coal mining, not less. And they want other forms of coal exploitation as well, in the form
of coal-seam gas projects.
Which also means that the current Federal Government’s infatuation with a
carbon tax to combat climate change is hypocritical to say the least. We can state
that the Greens are consistent in this respect – they want to stop all coal mining.
But they pretty much want to stop everything, don’t they?
I am coming around to the view that governments should do nothing to combat
climate change, since its causes are extremely complex and still not understood.
In any case, all previous moves to “do something” by the present government have
been seriously misguided, and that is putting it mildly.
Nor do I think that there is any need to panic. Even if we are experiencing global
warming, as opposed to the much more vague term, “climate change”, there is not
likely to be any “tipping point” in the foreseeable future. Secondly, as Climate
Change Commissioner Tim Flannery has admitted, any action that we do take is
likely to take centuries before it has any measurable effect.
Instead, governments should act to promote economic activity while still doing
all they can to protect our environment. The two aims are not mutually exclusive.
A carbon tax will not have any beneficial effects.
Leo Simpson
siliconchip.com.au
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