Has anyone read this book? (Natural Capitalism)

http://www.natcap.org/
http://www.natcap.org/sitepages/pid5.php

It goes through the ways that industry can save money by conserving resources and reducing emissions and pollution.

Some interesting bits:

p159-169 Green Tax Shift - broadens the concept to include all forms of waste, extraction of non-renewables and destruction of ecological services. Not sure how far you can extend this rpactically, but many European nations are. It acknowledges how European taxation has undermined jobs and describes how they are changing the system (p14 also).

p197 - GM crops undermining organic crops by increasing insect resistance to natural insecticides.

p191 - compares US agricultural subsidies etc to the soviet economy

p192-196 - reduced crop output due to topsoil loss - this is starting to reverse the 'green revolution' in many places, reducing agricultural output. This threat is alrger than I had realised.

p153 - ecosystem services - scientific statement on the value, their destruction and our inability to replace them, gives some examples and an economic value

p60 - waste is counted as GDP, and many important services people do are not, the destruction of many assets is ignored, thus GDP can (and does) hide negative growth in our societies

p53, index of social health is going down while GDP going up

p19 - In 1998 there was more destruction from extreme weather than all of the 80's, compounded by deforestation and climate change. Water, arable land and fish availability declining since 80's

p194 - risk due to lack of diversity on crops that provide most of our food. Diversity and adaptability are the key to overcoming climate change, as well as pests etc [there is no market mechanism to encourage diversity before it is too late - should we tax the most common crops?

p200 - 15% of global food already grown in cities

p201 - example of transport subsidies - strawberry yoghurt in Europe - 13000 miles of transport, despite 'local' origins

p202 - pig farming innovation, reducing emissions, producing mulch, friendler to the animals

p204 - agriculture produces 25% of greenhouse gasses. This can be reversed so they start absorbing a significant quantitiy of greenhouse gasses.

From p 261:

For all their power and vitality, markets are only tools. They make a good servant but a bad master and a worse religion. They can be used to accomplish many important tasks, but they can't do everything, and it's a dangerous delusion to begin to believe that they can - especially when they begin to replace ethics or politics. America may now be discovering this, and has begun it's retreat from the recent flirtation with economic fundamentalism. That theology treats living things as dead, nature as a nuisance, several billlion years' design experience as casually discardable, and the future as worthless. (At a 10 percent real discount rate, nothing is worth much for long, and nobody should have children.)

The 1980's extolled a selfish attitude that counted only what was countable, not what really counted.

Economic efficiency is an admirable means only so long as one remembers it is not an end in itself. Markets are meant to be efficient, not sufficient; aggresive and competitive, not fair. Markets were never meant to achieve community or integrity, beauty or justice, sustainability or sacredness - and, by themselves, they don't. To fulfill the wider perpose of being human, civilisations have invented politics, ethics, and religion. Only they can reveal worthy goals for the tools of the economic process.

Some market theologians promote a fashionable conceit that governments should have no responsibility for overseeing markets - for setting the basic rules by which market actors play. Their attitude is, let's cut budgets for meat inspection and get governments off the backs of abattoirs, and everyone who loses loved ones to toxic foos can simply sue the offenders.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/National/Greens-attack-Bluescope-carbon-tax-deal/2007/02/02/1169919526615.html

The NSW government has come under attack over a deal exempting one of the state's biggest greenhouse gas producers from paying any future carbon tax for the next 25 years.

NSW Greens MP Lee Rhiannon has attacked the deal, which was signed last November.

Ms Rhiannon said carbon taxes did not yet exist in Australia despite such a system being one of the best ways to drive down greenhouse gases.

Bluescope's Port Kembla plant produces 10.7 million tonnes of carbon dioxide a year, which is about seven per cent of the greenhouse gases emitted in NSW, Ms Rhiannon said in a statement.

"Premier [Morris] Iemma has no right to undermine a future carbon tax system. His action locks NSW out of the development of sensible economic mechanisms for reducing carbon emissions," she said.

Mr Iemma said the 25-year agreement, which helped secure 6,000 jobs, was binding only if Bluescope built the electricity plant.

"The outcome is this. We get a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions. We get Bluescope working on technology to further reduce emissions from that plant.

This really shows that Howard is putting the pockets of his business mates before the rest of Australia. A carbon tax will not harm business any more than carbon trading. The only difference is that carbon trading would give his mates a one-off windfall, and be a lot harder to work with later on.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/National/PM-considers-workable-carbon-trading/2007/02/05/1170524021015.html

Carbon trading in Australia is a step closer to becoming a reality, with Prime Minister John Howard backing an approach which protects businesses.

Despite acknowledging the need for a trading market to help reduce greenhouse emissions, Mr Howard voiced his strong opposition to a carbon tax.

But West Australian Premier Alan Carpenter is considering a carbon tax after a WA's Greenhouse and Energy Taskforce report recommended a $25 a tonne tax.

He did not commit to implementing the recommendation but said such a tax would enable WA to meet the report's aim of reducing WA's greenhouse gas emissions by 50 per cent of 1990 levels by 2050.

Greenpeace was more cautious in welcoming the government's moves.

"Prime Minister Howard's comments that (emissions trading) would not affect Australia's resource industry is a warning sign that, if sweetheart deals are struck, the trading system would essentially be ineffectual," energy campaigner Ben Pearson said.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/World/Greenhouse-gas-ocean-burial-approved/2007/02/10/1170524331910.html

International rules allowing burial of greenhouse gases beneath the seabed are in force in what will be a step toward fighting global warming, if storage costs are cut and leaks can be averted.

A 2005 UN report, however, warned that such storage would be widely applied only if the penalty for emitting carbon dioxide to the atmosphere was $US25-$US30 a tonne - far above current prices in a European Union market.

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http://www.smh.com.au/news/Business/Pratt-calls-for-doubling-in-water-price/2007/02/15/1171405365603.html

Leading philanthropist and cardboard king Richard Pratt has called for a doubling in the price of water and says desalination is the only major source of unlimited new water.

Mr Pratt, who is chairman of packaging and recycling company Visy Group, said a doubling of the water price would make people more conscious about their consumption.

"If they (government) doubled the price of water it would make people more conscious in regards to their water usage," he told about 500 people at an Australia-Israel Chamber of Commerce lunch in Perth.

Mr Pratt called on the government to allow private interests to become involved in water management but was sceptical whether it would happen.

"I really believe private enterprise should get mixed up in water," he said.

"A partnership between governments and private enterprise, where the government decides what price they're to charge and the private enterprise decides how it's to be managed.

"(But) they (the government) can make an income out of the water they are charging ... they don't want to lose their profits."

Mr Pratt said Australia should adopt a national carbon trading scheme rather than waiting for a global initiative to be implemented.

"We do need to factor in the costs of pollution into the costs of production.

"We've got to start with Australia, we can't tell the Chinese government what to do or the Indian government what to do. It is a global issue but we have to do what we can do."

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http://www.smh.com.au/news/World/Groups-plans-global-warming-fight/2007/02/21/1171733799041.html

More than 100 corporate heads, international organisations and experts set out a plan to cut greenhouse gas emissions, calling on governments to act urgently against global warming.

The group, which includes executives from a range of industries including air transport, energy, and technology, called on governments to set targets for greenhouse gases and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions.

The agreement urged governments to place a price on the carbon emissions released by power plants, factories and other sectors to discourage emissions.

The largest carbon-emitting sector is power generation, responsible for more than 40 per cent of global energy-related emissions.

Industry accounts for more than 18 per cent of emissions, transport contributes another 20 per cent, and the residential and services sector roughly 13 per cent.

The group estimates that technology to head off mounting carbon dioxide concentrations would cost about one per cent of global gross domestic product. Costs would fall as technologies become more established, it predicted.

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http://www.smh.com.au/news/World/EU-agrees-to-20-cut-in-CO2-by-2020/2007/02/21/1171733801533.html

EU environment ministers said that they would cut overall carbon dioxide emissions 20 per cent by 2020 and were ready to go to 30 per cent if other industrialised nations would match European efforts to curb global warming.

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,21316167-601,00.html

THE Howard Government is exploring how it can get Australia back under its Kyoto target by guaranteeing immediate greenhouse gas cuts of about six million tonnes a year.

John Howard has already signalled that this year's election budget will contain a number of greenhouse initiatives, while the Government is understood to be considering an environment or energy levy that could help fund a pre-election suite of clean energy and efficiency reforms.

Modelling conducted in 2002 for the electricity supply industry found that a $10 per tonne charge on electricity could deliver the required greenhouse gas cuts and raise about $2 billion a year, but would increase retail bills by 7per cent - $100 to $300 a year - per household.

The cuts would be achieved by a slight fall in demand from the higher price as well as a slight change in the dispatch pattern in power stations feeding into the national grid, triggering marginally more gas-fired power at the expense of black and brown coal.

Power stations represent about half of Australia's emissions profile and accelerated funding to fast-track power station efficiency upgrades may also help get Australia back on the Kyoto track, although a voluntary national efficiency program by the Australian Greenhouse Office has been addressing this since 2000.

The Prime Minister signalled this week that COAG should set a timetable to establish a fully national electricity market and transmission grid, while reiterating the Government's support for a national rollout of smart meters to help curb electricity demand.

The Government also has to announce two more solar cities and complete the rollout of its $500 million low-emissions technology fund, with the announcement of the latest project, believed to be in Victoria's Latrobe Valley, postponed this week.

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Rates rise to fund water plan

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,21355794-2702,00.html

WATER bills will more than double and wasteful householders face heavy fines and rationing following the introduction of level-five water restrictions in southeast Queensland.
And within six months, level-six restrictions are likely to result in public swimming pools not being topped up and all outdoor watering banned.

The Queensland Water Commission yesterday revealed the Beattie Government's $7 billion plans to improve water infrastructure will be funded through water bills.

The bill for the average home will rise $71 next year. The average annual householder's water bill will increase from $355 to $876 by 2012.

Mr Newman described the rises as outrageous and warned that the region's mayors would not be used to do the state's "dirty work" to fund infrastructure it should have provided long ago. "This is a ruthless cash grab on the ratepayers of southeast Queensland," Mr Newman said.

Under level-five restrictions, newly built swimming pools cannot be filled from the town supply. Owners will pay between $2500 and $4000 to fill them from tankers.

About 120,000 households using more than 800 litres a day will be asked to complete audit forms to explain why they are using so much water.

Ms Nosworthy defended the water price hikes. "I don't think people have much to whinge about. We've been charged too little in the past," she said.

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Greater action on renewable energy urged

http://www.smh.com.au/news/National/Greater-action-on-renewable-energy-urged/2007/04/23/1177180491655.html

Household electricity bills would rise by just $1.23 a week if a quarter of Australia's energy came from renewable sources, a report has found.

The report by three green groups says setting a renewable energy target of 25 per cent by the year 2020 would deliver more than 16,000 new jobs, slash greenhouse gas emissions by 69 million tonnes and generate $33 billion in investment.

Although the average power bill would rise by $64 a year, continuing to rely on current power sources would cause prices to jump by $234 a year.

The study, A Bright Future, was released Monday by the Australian Conservation Foundation, Greenpeace and the Climate Change Action Network.

It warns Australia is missing out on the economic benefits of renewable energy that are flowing to California and European nations which have boosted their renewable energy targets.

"Provided we put Australia on track for sustained renewable energy development, costs should fall to below the cost of fossil fuels over the next 15 years."

Canada to ban incandescent light bulbs

Canada has switched on to Australia's plan to ban incandescent light bulbs, with Ottawa announcing its own timetable to ban the sale of the inefficient bulbs by 2012.

Meh...CFL's have problems all of their own such as mercury content among other things, plus we don't have the recycling facilities in Australia. All CFL's are supposed to be shipped overseas for recycling but they aren't. Guess where that mercury is going to end up?

http://www.smh.com.au/news/National/Solar-panel-initiative-an-insult-Greens/2007/05/08/1178390273474.html

The government's solar panel rebate, to be announced in Tuesday's budget, is an insult to the environment, the Australian Greens say.

In its efforts to address climate change, the government will deliver a cash handout of $8,000 to households that install solar energy systems.

The initiative, expected to cost $30 million in the first year, will cost a total of $150 million over five years.

Australian Greens leader Bob Brown said "a veneer of green is not going to fool the Australian electorate".

"The fossil fuel industry subsidises to the tune of 10 thousand million dollars each year," Senator Brown told reporters in Canberra.

From one of the articles in the post before that:

Power firms heavily subsidised: report

The report, commissioned by Greenpeace, was done by the Institute for Sustainable Futures at the University of Technology, Sydney.

It says subsidies to fossil fuel energies, worth close to $10 billion, result in a serious market distortion, create an unfair disadvantage to renewable energy, and help increase greenhouse gas pollution.