Vote Green for real action on climate change

I have compared Labor and Liberal policies on climate change, as at July 2007, and drawn the conclusion that there is actually little difference between them. Both Labor and Liberal policies do not translate into meaningful or real action on climate change.

This diagram illustrates the widespread concerns with climate change and why we need to take immediate action to address it:


Climate change affects us all. A comprehensive and widespread strategy is required to tackle it.

Comparing the Greens policies on climate change to the Liberal (John Howard) and Labor (Kevin Rudd) policies reveals how shallow those of the major parties are, as illustrated in the following table:



This leaflet is being distributed across the Kooyong electorate and elsewhere in Australia. Please email me if you are keen to help us with this.

Forests can slow climate change

This letter was published in The Age and The Heraldsun on July 25, 2007

Once again we are faced with the unedifying spectacle of Kevin Rudd and Malcolm Turnbull both playing political football with Australia's forests.

Kevin Rudd has just fully endorsed John Howard's forest policy which supports the destruction of remnant majestic old growth forests in both Tasmania and South East Australia. He has done this to curry favour with the Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union in the run up to the federal election.

Deforestation and land clearing accounts for around 10 per cent of Australia's greenhouse gas emissions, yet Kevin Rudd is doing nothing to stop this, despite the recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report which identifies protection of forests as a key global strategy for combating climate change.

Malcolm Turnbull says he recognises the importance of forests as carbon stores, yet he also supports the ongoing destruction of Australia's forests and the resulting export of 4 million tonnes of woodchips from Tasmania and 1 million tonnes from Victoria each year. The Howard government is allocating $200 million to protect forests in South East Asia, but is unwilling to protect Australian forests that store up to 1200 tonnes of carbon per hectare.

Carbon dioxide emissions from logging in Victoria in 2004-2005 were almost 10 million tonnes which is equivalent to emissions resulting from an additional 2.4 million cars onto Victoria’s roads each year.

The solution is remarkably simple. We need to protect all remaining old growth forests to preserve both their intrinsic value and the carbon they store.

Unfortunately, Kevin Rudd and Malcolm Turnbull can only see woodchips rather than our trees.

View some Tasmanian forests and hear why local people want them protected.

MEDIA RELEASE: Canadian Green leader says Australian energy and building standards must be improved

July 17, 2007

Ontario Green Party leader Frank de Jong visited a sustainable house in Surrey Hills owned by Peter Campbell, Greens candidate for the federal seat of Kooyong, on Tuesday July 17 to raise awareness about domestic energy standards.

He said Mr Campbell's house, which produces three-quarters of its power requirements, was a fantastic example of how home owners can reduce their emissions, and highlighted that standards in Australia need to be lifted, as they have been in Canada.

“Improved energy and housing standards have been successfully introduced in Canada to reduce energy use and reduce greenhouse gas emissions,” Mr De Jong said.

“We have recently improved our EnerGuide standards for heating and cooling, water heating, gas and electric appliances, lighting and windows.

“Consumers in Canada also use the Energy Star symbol and ratings to buy energy-efficient TVs, VCRs, DVDs, audio equipment and other audio visual products,” Mr De Jong added.

“For the future, we need to set a target of net-zero energy construction as the standard for all renovations and new buildings. This means that buildings could be energy neutral in the long term by a combination of passive solar design, solar panels and hot water systems, and energy efficient appliances such as we see in this Surrey Hills house.”

Mr Campbell stated, “Our Surrey Hills house produces 75 per cent of the power we consume and we are net producers of clean green power over summer.


“If all new homes built in Australia were this efficient and if we implement widespread energy efficiency measures to reduce demand for power, we could avoid building new coal-fired power stations like the one on the drawing board for the Latrobe Valley, which would increase greenhouse gas emissions,” Mr Campbell said.

“While the improvements introduced in 2005 to the five-star energy efficiency requirement for housing in Victoria are a step in the right direction, they clearly don’t go far enough.

“Average energy-related emissions for new dwellings are almost six per cent higher than those of existing dwellings, mainly due to people buying inefficient appliances and lighting, so clearly the five-star building standards need to be further improved” Mr Campbell continued.

“Some large-screen plasma TVs consume more electricity than a fridge while in use, and consumers have no easy way of knowing this when they buy them.

“If we are serious about addressing climate change, we need to consider six-star building standards that include assessment of solar building design and efficiency of appliances, similar to the standards in place in Canada, and we urgently need to expand the energy star rating to cover all electrical goods rather than just whitegoods,” Mr Campbell added.

Frank de Jong is visiting Australia as a guest of Earthsharing Australia.

MEDIA CONTACT: Peter Campbell mobile 0409 417 504 kooyong@greens.org.au

Links

• Frank de Jong, Green Party of Ontario leader
• EnerGuide standards
• Overview of Australian Regulatory Requirements - Labelling and MEPS
• Options to reduce greenhouse emissions from new homes in Victoria through the building approval process. Report to DSE by George Wilkenfeld & Associates (2007)
  5_star energy report May 07 (PDF - 531 Kb)
• Surrey Hills house
  
  
  
  

LETTER: Howard luke-warm

Below is a letter from Phillip Walker, St Kilda East, that was published in The Age on Sunday July 8, 2007. I think he sums up John Howard's complete lack of action on addressing climate change, and his political maneouvering on the topic. I think is completely unacceptable for the Australian Government to avoid setting targets for reducing carbon emissions for 2010, 2020 and 2050 despite clear scientific evidence that the future of our planet is now at stake.

And Labor's avoidance of setting 2020 targets makes them not much different from John Howard.

Letter text follows:

The report in The Sunday Age (1/7), "PM warms to his task", highlights the Liberal approach, which is a diversion that will not reduce Australia's carbon emissions to the levels required to stop catastrophic global warming.

Dealing with climate change is an international issue and that requires working through international institutions. As Michael Raupach noted (The Age, 25/6), "the biggest value of the (1997 Kyoto) protocol was its effort to build social capital".

Howard's APEC initiative undermines international efforts and of the 16 Pacific island countries, only PNG is a member. This means the Pacific countries that are in the forefront of coping with the negative consequences of climate change are excluded from the negotiation process.

It appears unlikely that Australia will meet the Kyoto commitments, which even permitted us to increase greenhouse emissions by 8 per cent on 1990 levels. As it is, Australia's per capita emissions are 4.5 times the global average, second only to the US.

The criticism of Labor for failing to set a mid-term (2020-30) reduction target is accurate. What is not mentioned is that the Liberals have neither a medium nor a long-term target for greenhouse emissions reduction.

Similarly, a national emission trading scheme needs to have stringent limits and be applicable to all emitters. Howard has put the start date off for five years, has not yet set limits, and will not apply it to all industrial emitters, which is self-defeating.

Scientific consensus is that we have 10-15 years to get it right on climate change and that we need to limit global warming to 20 degrees Celsius, a target both Liberal and Labor are silent on.

What Australia does need is leadership that provides a clear strategy for steady reduction in greenhouse emissions, and the political will to apply it. That's why I'll be voting for the Greens.

Source