After three decades of inaction, human-induced climate change is the greatest threat, and opportunity, facing this country, far outweighing the issues dominating our domestic political discourse, such as the US/China impasse, a faltering economy and religious freedom. The world faces the same threat. Climate change now represents an existential challenge which, if not addressed as a genuine emergency immediately, will destroy human civilisation as we know it within decades. Immediate, in that the actions we take today, particularly expanding fossil fuel use thereby increasing global carbon emissions, are locking-in that outcome.
Category: Energy
December 21 / 2019
Submission to the Western Australia EPA on Greenhouse Gas Emissions Assessment Guidance
Contents: • Preamble • Climate Change: the global context • Climate Change Impact • Existential Risk Management • Political & Corporate Attitudes • Community Response • Legal Implications • Conclusions and recommendations on Greenhouse Gas Assessment Guidance Preamble Thank you for the opportunity to make a submission to the Western Australia (WA) Environmental Protection Authority […]
September 01 / 2019
A Parliament Without Trust or Legitimacy Must Go
The insults hurled by David Leyonhjelm at Sarah Hanson-Young recently put parliamentary discourse in the gutter. Leyonhjelm was roundly condemned, but not by our leaders. A limp rap across the knuckles from Turnbull and Shorten, then on to more pressing matters, hoping it will all go away. But not so fast; in governance parlance “the […]
August 09 / 2018
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Climate Risk – MCA Directors Breach Duties of Care and Due Diligence
After 30 years of inaction, the focus on climate risk is accelerating as the physical impact of climate change worsens and the transition risks to a low-carbon world intensify. Despite effusive official rhetoric, nothing has been done to seriously address climate change, notwithstanding increasingly urgent warnings . Global climate-related losses are running at record levels […]
August 05 / 2018
Facing Reality: Reframing Climate Change as an Immediate Existential Risk
The Big Question: “Who at the highest levels of leadership in corporates and public service will take the bold risks that are required, not gradually or incrementally, but decisively in line with the new scale and speed that ‘unthinkables’ emerge.” ITD – Climate Change Emergency Response Rationale June 2018
June 08 / 2018
Climate Change: The Fiduciary Responsibility of Politicians & Bureaucrats in the Era of Existential Climate Risks
“Fiduciary: a person to whom power is entrusted for the benefit of another” “Power is reposed in members of Parliament by the public for exercise in the interests of the public and not primarily for the interests of members or the parties to which they belong. The cry ‘whatever it takes’ is not consistent with […]
April 23 / 2018
Climate & Energy – Appeasement Does Not Work
The current chaos around climate and energy policy brings to mind George Santayana’s caution that: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”. That is exactly what we are witnessing, albeit with far more profound implications even than the advent of the Second World War. In November 1936, Winston Churchill, concerned at […]
November 28 / 2017
Australia’s Coal & CSG Delusion
Energy policy is the issue to trump them all. We have already lost several Prime Ministers in its cause, and more will likely walk the plank before commonsense prevails. But the last few weeks have set new standards for national stupidity . The political rhetoric grows ever more florid, starting with Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull […]
September 26 / 2017
Facing “Disaster Alley”, Australia Shirks Responsibility
The first responsibility of a government is to safeguard the people and their future wellbeing. The ability to do so is increasingly threatened by human-induced climate change, the accelerating impacts of which are driving political instability and conflict globally. Climate change poses an existential risk to humanity which, unless addressed as an emergency, will […]
June 22 / 2017
The Leaders We Deserve ?
Rarely have politicians demonstrated their ignorance of the real risks and opportunities confronting Australia than with the recent utterances of Barnaby Joyce, Matt Canavan and other ministers promoting development of Adani and Galilee Basin coal generally, along with their petulant foot-stamping over Westpac’s decision to restrict funding to new coal projects. Likewise, Bill Shorten sees […]
May 15 / 2017
