Save the Planet! Renewable Energy not Wars for Oil!
Capitalism fouls things up
In Al Gore's film An Inconvenient Truth, he called global warming "the greatest threat humanity has ever faced". James Hansen, senior climate scientist with NASA, has said the world has ten years to make severe cuts to greenhouse emissions or else face a bleak future. We know what the problem is: the relentless burning of coal and oil to fuel economic growth. A business-as-usual scenario where emissions are allowed to spiral uncontrollably will cause an ecological meltdown. Melting ice sheets, destructive weather patterns and increasing desertification will create hundreds of millions of climate refugees.
And while demand for fossil fuels is rising, oil supplies are becoming increasingly scarce. The US, in an attempt to control the world's remaining major reserves of oil, has embarked on barbaric energy wars in Iraq (which has killed more than 650,000 Iraqis) and Afghanistan. The US is also threatening military action against other oil-rich countries, Iran and Venezuela. Isn't it time the world quit its fossil-fuel addiction?
We can solve the problem
Coal — leave it in the ground!
Coal-fired electricity plants, the dinosaurs of energy generation, need to be shut down. There is no such thing as 'clean coal'. So-called 'clean coal technology', where CO is captured and buried 2 underground, is unproven, expensive, and aims to safeguard the profits of the coal industry. Governments should not spend money on this — let the coal industry pay! Public money should be invested in renewables. Resistance supports the campaign against the new coal mine planned for Anvil Hill in Newcastle. Displaced workers can be retrained for jobs in the renewable energy industry.
Renewables now!
The technology exists right now to produce truly clean energy. The solar power plant being built in Victoria, which will power 45,000 homes with no ongoing emissions, is evidence that it can be done. Wind power is also viable. Ultimately we need 100% renewable energy, but as a starting point Resistance supports the call for the Mandatory Renewable Energy Target to be increased from the pathetic 2% it is now to 10%. This should be coupled with increased investment into renewable energy research and incentives for renewable energy companies. Currently renewable energy companies are closing down or scaling back operations in Australia due to lack of demand.
Nuclear — no solution.
Nuclear power will never be the solution to anything. Howard's only concern in pushing nuclear power is increasing the profits of the mining companies and the big infrastructure groups who want to manufacture new nuclear plants. The construction of new plants is CO -intensive 2 and would take a minimum of 10 years, by which time we may have already passed tipping point. That's not to mention the risk of another Chernobyl and where to put the waste — a problem someone's yet to solve! Howard is also pushing the development of the nuclear industry in other countries, which serve as markets for Australia's uranium.
Other measures that can and should be taken include:
- Increasing energy efficiency.
- Stop chopping down the forests — we support the campaign to stop the construction of the Gunns paper mill in Tasmania and other anti-logging campaigns.
- Massively expand public transport & train freight.
Australia: greenhouse renegade
Rich countries need to lead the way
Australia, thanks to John Howard, has earnt itself a reputation as a greenhouse renegade. Despite being the second-highest emitter per capita in the world, Howard has refused to ratify the Kyoto Protocol. His idea of a "new Kyoto" would be a major step backwards — it wouldn't include emission reduction targets!
Another reason Howard hates Kyoto is that it recognises the need for First World countries, which have grown wealthy through unmitigated economic growth, to take the lead in reducing emissions and developing clean technology. But Howard would rather help giant corporations grow rich by exploiting the Third World — witness Australia's shameful stealing of East Timor's oil, its military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, its neo-colonial attitude to its Pacific neighbours, and the list goes on.
Ratify Kyoto!
Australia and other countries that have taken no action to curb emissions have now guaranteed that some degree of global warming is inescapable. Some islands in the Pacific already have to evacuate residents. Australia should accept all environmental refugees that seek our help. Refugees should not be treated as criminals or second-class citizens.
Howard should ratify Kyoto immediately. This would finally draw Australia into a global solution and away from the Asia-Pacific Partnership on Climate and Clean Development (AP6). As the AP6 includes the US, China, Japan, South Korea, Canada and Australia — who are responsible for 50% of the world's emissions — it is a blatant attempt to delegitmise Kyoto. While Kyoto's target of emission reductions of 5.2% by 2012 are inadequate, it binds the world into a united approach and is far superior to Howard's pollute-to-the-death non-solution.
Beyond Kyoto's carbon trading
However, Kyoto is not faultless. Kyoto gets the idea of binding emission reduction targets right, but prescribes the wrong tool to reach those targets — carbon trading. Carbon trading is the neoliberal solution — it relies on "market forces" to solve the environment problem. But it was "market forces" that have caused the problem: how can they then fix it? The carbon trading nonsolution is like trying to put out a fire by throwing petrol on it!
The carbon trading regime set in place by Kyoto is not working. The climate action group Rising Tide North America has pointed out that while "the global carbon market has nearly doubled from [US]$11 billion in 2005 to $21.5 billion in 2006, there is no equivalent in … carbon emission reductions". In fact emissions are rising faster than ever: between 1990 and 1999 emissions rose by 0.8%, while between 2000 and 2005 they rose by 3.2%.
Carbon trading will inevitably exacerbate the problem as it does not challenge fossil fuel dependence. Increasingly carbon trading is having a negative impact on the Third World. In one case, Norwegian power companies set up major "carbon sinks" (tree plantations) in Uganda to "offset" their emissions but had to evict the traditional residents of that land — displacing 10,000 people — to make way for trees. Heavily armed park rangers have killed 50 people who tried to return to their land.
Any new negotiations for Kyoto post-2012 should ditch carbon trading and make renewable energy generation the centrepiece of a strategy to solve global warming.
Cuba's example
When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, Cuba faced lost a large percentage of its food imports as well as 70% of its petrol, pesticides, fertilisers and machinery parts, which propped up their main export, sugar. Cuba faced possible starvation among its people.
Cuba was able to overcome this crisis by converting to organic, low-energy-input agriculture. Oxen replaced petrol-driven tractors, bio-pesticides replaced synthetic pesticides and organic fertilisers replaced oil-derived artificial fertilisers. By 2003 Cuban food availability was at a level recommended by the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation, and in 2006 the WWF rated Cuba as the only country in the world to achieve sustainable development.
Cuba was able to achieve such progress because its economy and political system is not run by and for capitalist-owned businesses seeking to maximise corporate profits, but is largely run by publicly owned businesses directed to a nationally decided-upon plan that aims to maximise the wellbeing of working people.
Cuba's example shows that major change is possible but only if the world's working people are actively involved in creating and implementing the solutions, rather than relying on the profit-driven capitalist corporations for answers.
Venezuela is undergoing its own struggle for people power the Bolivarian Revolution and is attempting to go the same way as Cuba. It has implemented a program called Mission Tree, which aims to plant 100 million trees in the next five years.
Change the system — not the climate!
To force Howard to take meaningful action to stop global warming, we need to build a movement that this government cannot ignore. The destruction of our environment affects all young people, and we need to be at the forefront of this movement — to fight for our future.
Young people and students have a huge role to play in inspiring, activating and organising the broader community to take up the fight to save the planet. We should link up with young environmental activists from our neighbouring region and around the world, and share ideas and lessons for effective action. We can build the campaigns on our schools and campuses that demand administrations use clean energy; and we can also take initiatives that bring the issue into the streets.
Ultimately, we need to build a people power movement strong enough to replace the system that has created this mess — capitalism — with a system based on social, economic and environmental justice.
As Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez told 10,000 young participants at the World Federation of Democratic Youth and Students in Caracas, 2005: "We don't have centuries in front of us, it could be decades at most that are left for the peoples of this planet to make a decision … we say now a new, renovated socialism of the 21st century, or we decide that life finishes on this planet. Each one of you needs to be an importer of this idea, go and repeat it on the street corner.â€
So don't just get angry, get active and join the struggle to save the planet!
Join Resistance!
www.resistance.org.au
