Wednesday, May 29, 2013

Energy reality: in Greece, books and trees are a cheaper fuel than coal to heat your home over winter.

To Eat or Heat? That’s the EU’s Question

Licia Corbella, Calgary Herald, May 15, 2013
For a growing number of Europeans, their continent’s global warming policies have forced them to decide whether to heat their homes or buy food. In short they must choose whether to “Heat or Eat,” which was the title of a talk by a British climate policy expert delivered in Calgary Tuesday.

Benny Peiser, director of the non-partisan, not for profit Global Warming Policy Foundation, laid out in graphic terms how Europe’s climate policies have “failed.” Peiser, a social anthropologist and a visiting fellow at the University of Buckingham, started his talk by showing a slide of the policy statement that came out of the Lisbon Agenda in 2000: “To make the EU the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world capable of sustainable economic growth with more and better jobs and greater social cohesion by 2010.”

Anyone who follows the news knows that the exact opposite has happened. Europe is divided, Europeans struggle to survive, and their countries face bankruptcy. About 27 million Europeans are unemployed, and in Greece, for instance, 65 per cent of youth cannot find work. Part of the reason for this, says Peiser is the European Union’s 20-20-20 green energy policy that with 20-20 hindsight has proven to be an economic and social disaster.

The EU intends to reduce CO2 emissions by 20 per cent from 1990 levels by 2020, increase renewable energy use by 20 per cent and improve energy efficiency by 20 per cent. The green lobby in Europe is so strong that it has pushed EU politicians to oppose virtually every kind of reliable non-renewable energy. The greens oppose nuclear, natural gas and shale gas and only seem to approve of wind and solar power — both of which are not reliable, since the wind doesn’t always blow and the sun doesn’t always shine — and it certainly isn’t “free.”

The German environment minister warned that Germany’s plan to shut down all of its nuclear plants to shift to renewables will cost citizens one trillion euros. “This is the biggest wealth transfer in the history of modern Europe — from the poor to the rich,” explained Peiser, who spoke to a crowd of 200 at the 10th annual Friends of Science luncheon.

The social implications of this failed policy are enormous, added Peiser. “Ordinary families and small and medium-sized businesses are essentially subsidizing the investments of green do-gooders,” who can afford to install solar panels on their homes and their businesses. But what’s really starting to cause citizens and policy-makers to question their green energy agenda, is that soaring energy costs are driving energy-intensive industries in Europe to move to the United States where the shale gas revolution has caused natural gas prices to remain low — or about one-third to one-fourth of what they are in Europe, exacerbating the EU’s unemployment crisis.

Peiser points out that in April of 2012, U.S. natural gas prices bottomed out at $1.95 to Europe’s $11.42 — the widest gap in recent times. More recently, U.S. natural gas prices hover at around $3 while in Europe they remain at around $12.“European industry is flocking to the U.S. to take advantage of cheaper gas,” said Peiser. “They can’t compete otherwise.”
As industries leave and more people are impoverished, the cap-and-trade scheme, which is the cornerstone of the EU’s green energy strategy — is collapsing. The price of to emit one tonne of carbon has plummeted from about 34.90 euros in 2008 to about three euros now. “The biggest irony is ... that it has now become very, very cheap to burn coal and as a result, there’s a new coal boom in Europe, of all places. Germany alone is building 25 coal fired plants,” said Peiser.

Swiss banking giant UBS says the carbon emissions trading scheme has cost EU consumers $287 billion for “almost zero impact”.

The Washington Post editorial board just last month wrote that Europe “has become the green-energy basket case. Instead of a model for the world to emulate, Europe has become a model of what not to do.” The result of these policies on individuals is widespread and grave. Greek citizens are chopping down their forests in search of wood and British pensioners are buying cheap old hardcover books as fuel to heat their homes since coal is more expensive. The Telegraph newspaper reported that half a million pensioners spent Christmas in bed in an effort to keep warm. Worse yet, Peiser says the Office of National Statistics in England and Wales shows that based on past numbers, one million Brits are expected to die from cold in their homes by 2050.Energy poverty is sweeping Europe. As many as nine million British families pay 10 per cent or more of their household income towards heat and electricity.
Meanwhile, all of the climate models that predicted catastrophic warming of the planet were a gross exaggeration. Indeed, for the past 16 years, temperatures have not spiked but remained stable. The Earth’s temperature has only risen 0.8C in 150 years, explained Peiser. This “flatlining of global temperatures” along with skyrocketing energy prices “is why the green agenda is crumbling,” said Peiser. Even in relatively wealthy Germany, 15 per cent of its citizens face energy poverty.

Meanwhile, the British Geological Survey says that Britain may have enough shale gas to heat every home for 1,500 years. Peiser says “Europe’s suicidal shale reluctance must change if Europe’s economy is to be transformed from stagnation to growth.”

Canadians should be very glad that past schemes for green shifts and the like never materialized and we don’t have to choose between eating or heating.

Tuesday, May 07, 2013

MAY IS BOWELSCAN MONTH: SAVE A LIFE - SAVE YOUR LIFE!

Bowel cancer is an insidious disease, with 9,000 new cases afflicting men and women around Australia each year. 4,500 of these people will die of the disease.

To give an early warning of the possible presence of bowel cancer, Rotary started its Bowelscan program in 1982. Each year, over 150,000 kits are distributed to pharmacists around Australia where they can be purchased for $8.00, this charge reflecting the cost of producing the kit and the subsequent sample analysis.

Kits are now available at several pharmacists in Busselton, Dunsborough and Capel at the following pharmacies:

* Terry White Pharmacy, Busselton
* Discount Drugstores, Busselton
* Dunsborough Pharmacy
* Capel Pharmacy

Members of the public are encouraged to purchase a kit, provide a sample in the privacy of their own home and return it to a participating chemist. The sample will then be sent to a testing laboratory to analyse for the presence of blood, a possible indicator of bowel disease.

To date, more than 1,000 people with cancer have used the Bowelscan kits to give them early advice of their cancers. Another 5,000 people with bowel polyps - a common precursor to cancer - have been diagnosed as a result of submitting a Bowelscan sample.

Bowel cancer is the commonest internal cancer affecting Australian adults.

People with a family history of bowel cancer are at particular risk of contracting the disease and are the group most strongly encouraged to provide a Bowelscan sample.

The Busselton Geographe Bay Rotary Club is coordinating the distribution and collection of Bowelscan kits to pharmacists throughout the City of Busselton and the Shire of Capel.

More information can be gained from Rotarian David Eyres, a now retired local pharmacist - phone 0407 697 717.


Bernie Masters
Publicity Officer
Rotary Club of Busselton Geographe Bay
9727 2474
0408 944 242

Sunday, May 05, 2013

Helping WA's Farmers: Here's One Suggestion.

Immediately after the March 9 state election, re-elected Premier Colin Barnett stated his desire to pay more attention to the plight of WA's farmers, many of whom were doing badly. Low milk prices, poor seasonal conditions, restrictions on the live animal trade, high labour costs, competition for labour with the mining industry, an aging farm population, loss of services as rural populations decline: clearly, many farmers were finding it hard to make a profit.

I don't have answers to all of the problems facing our farmers, but one issue has been quietly ignored by successive governments. I explained this issue and provided a solution in an email I sent to the Premier on April 10. I have yet to receive an acknowledgement or a reply, so I have to ask if the government is really serious about helping farmers. Here's what I said to the Premier:


Attention: Premier Colin Barnett
cc: Hon Albert Jacob, Minister for the Environment

Dear Premier,

May I congratulate you on your strong win at the March 9 election? It's pleasing that you have a clear majority in the Legislative Assembly to allow you to govern without the uncertainties that currently exist in our federal Parliament.

In recent weeks, you have made public statements of support for farmers who are doing it tough in the wheatbelt. I wish to raise with you an issue that is a legacy of the Gallop government and which is causing significant financial harm to a small group of genuine farmers throughout the south west land division of WA.

One of the great injustices arising from the time of the Gallop government during its term from 2001 to 2005 was the clearing ban imposed on private property owners in WA. As you are aware, I was the shadow minister for the environment at the time and I was basically lied to by the then environment minister Judy Edwards who said the ban would have a low impact on the farming community. By the time the extent and impact of the ban became clear in about 2004, I had resigned from the Liberal Party for reasons that I'm also sure you're well aware of. Nonetheless, the fact remains that between 50 and 200 farmers have from 25 to 75% of individual farming properties covered in native vegetation and hence incapable of providing them with an economic return on the financial investment they or their predecessors made when purchasing the land.

The problem therefore is three-fold. First, these 50 to 200 farmers are unable to earn an income from land for which the owners had a reasonable expectation of being able to turn into economically productive farms at the time of purchase.

Second, if these farmers are attempting to manage their areas of native vegetation to protect environmental values, they are paying money out of their own pockets to protect assets which were determined by the Gallop government and hence, by implication, all successive governments including your own, to provide public benefits.

Third, if these farmers are unable or unwilling to allocate money to adequately manage the bushland remaining on their properties, then the public of WA are losing environmental values from native vegetation which an act of Parliament had deemed to be worthy of protection by imposing a ban on clearing.

It is my understanding that, of the 50 to 200 farmers seriously disadvantaged by clearing bans, many (possibly a majority) are in the midlands area along the Swan Coastal Plain between Gingin and Dongara. However, a significant number are in the central and eastern wheatbelt where financial pressures are the greatest.

I believe the Royalties for Regions program is ideally suited to paying compensation to this relatively small number of farmers affected by the clearing ban. Your government, possibly through a Parliamentary committee, could urgently investigate the seriousness of this issue with a view to buying from aggrieved farmers those parcels of bushland which are currently a financial millstone around their necks. Clearly, some minimum conditions would need to be imposed on such land purchases, for example, the minimum area of bushland on an individual property title would need to be at least 50 hectares and would need to constitute at least 25% of the area of the property. The option of paying these farmers an amount of money per hectare to manage their bushland should also need to be considered, together with a government subsidy to fence off bushland from productive farmland, recognising that fencing is undoubtedly the largest cost facing the owners of bushland on private properties. It may even be desirable for government to buy suitable parcels of bushland affected by the clearing ban and then pay adjoining farmers to manage the bushland on an on-going basis.

To act now to correct this injustice will be seen by the WA community as a decisive, fair and positive way of helping farmers in need, while also protecting the environmental values of remnant bushland in farming areas that have generally been extensively cleared over the past 100 years.

I commend this suggestion to you.

Regards

Bernie Masters
Member for Vasse 1996-2005