Milne: Oil price rising — how surprising!
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I have to confess myself quite flabbergasted by the extent to which our governments, oppositions, economists, planners and media claim to have been caught unawares by the rocketing global oil price and imply that no one could have seen it coming. Not that I am surprised by their position – after all, they rely on ABARE. I have challenged ABARE at every Estimates hearing for two years and more as to their long-term estimates of oil price, and got the same answer each time - $40-45. Even as the price hit $100 early this year, they stuck firm to their projection. And yet ABARE continues to command more respect than the Association for the Study of Peak Oil (ASPO), which has been spot on in its forecasts. But, just as the reality of climate change is only now sinking in, years after the science was settled and the urgency unquestionable, no-one can truly claim that they weren’t warned about peak oil. One of my first actions after being elected to the Senate was to instigate a Senate Inquiry into Australia’s Future Oil Supply and Alternative Transport Fuels. In this Inquiry, everyone from Iranian oil guru, Dr Bakhtiari, to public transport groups, to the Councils of Western Sydney, to ASPO and many more, were all calling for the same thing: a rapid shift to mass transit, higher vehicle fuel efficiency standards, an end to the Fringe Benefits tax concession on motor vehicles and accelerated R&D into second generation biofuels. The Inquiry’s conclusion, which was tabled well over a year ago, involved Liberal, Labor and Greens in a consensus report making all these key recommendations. Then the old parties buried it. But, just as geosequestered CO2 will, it is now bubbling to the surface. A few months later, I released a major publication, Re-Energising Australia, which presented a comprehensive policy platform to deal with the twin challenges of climate change and peak oil and build a better, cleaner, cleverer Australia. The considerable discussion this report garnered means it cannot have completely passed everyone by. During last year’s election campaign, and as oil passed $100 early this year, I and many others repeatedly called for action to deal with peak oil and climate change together. And then, in my Budget Reply last week, I started with a reference to dwindling oil supplies matching the threat of Arctic Ice melt, and repeated my calls made in the 2006 Budget Reply, to use the surplus to oil-proof Australia. The Prime Minister cannot legitimately say he has done all he can when he is making decisions now that will make the situation worse. Last week’s Budget allocated to rail a tiny 5% of what was given to roads in the next year. $78 million on metro public transport is whistling in the wind. The much-vaunted Green Car program doesn’t even start until 2011, after the next election. Infrastructure Australia and the Building Australia Fund only have to consider climate change at the discretion of the Minister and peak oil not at all. To suggest that a price-watch program is all he can do, whilst waiting for Martin Ferguson’s energy security plan, is disingenuous. Particularly given that leaving the Minister for Coal in charge of resource planning is letting the cat guard the cream. Ferguson is already talking up liquefying coal to make a hugely polluting transport fuel. As the Senate Inquiry said, no plan for peak oil should make climate change worse, yet this is precisely what the Rudd Government is on track to do, with the support of the Coalition, in wanting to exclude transport from the effort to reduce greenhouse emissions. What about mandatory vehicle fuel efficiency standards and ending the fringe benefits tax concession for vehicles? What about tying subsidies to car manufacturers to increased efficiency? What about an immediate multi-billion dollar investment into mass transit, cycleways and redesigning cities? The great thing about climate change and peak oil is that the solutions are the same for both, and that these solutions will lead to a better quality of life in cities, better air quality, a healthier population and a more connected community. The re-design of cities will see more walkways, bicycle paths and localism as we move to urban villages linked by rapid mass transit, and as we encourage businesses to take their jobs to where the people are. It’s a chance to get off the treadmill if we embrace it. As Einstein said, you cannot solve a problem with the same thinking that created it. Those who now finally realise what we are facing should involve the people who saw the problem coming and listen to the solutions that we have advocated. Only then can we sweep aside the failure of imagination and the refusal to leave the fossil fuel age, and get on with building the post-carbon world. |
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11 Comments
Thanks Christine for that glimpse into the ‘experts’ advice to Estimates.
I can’t wait to see the media give the Greens some credit now … but I’m not holding my breath
A timely wake-up call, Christine, but let`s not expect to see any changes in the forseeable, and even not-so-forseeable future, as we roll on to a global dénouement, and increased insecurity and penury for `working families`.Perspective of a Government, of whatever hue, is to the next election and how it can retain political power, whilst rewarding those whose interests it supports, and I don`t mean the punters who vote at regular times. Perspective of the `Big End` is to constantly increase profits and maintain`shareholder value`, whilst aiming for bonuses and financial rewards at the `reporting period`. In other words, their focus is on the next AGM. As anyone can see, there is quite a beautiful symbiosis between Big Business and Governement, of whatever political coloration.
The only problem is that this conventional`culture` and mindset, is inexorably leading us here, and in a wider sense, the world, to a humanitarian and ecological catastrophe of proportions we can`t even begin to imagine, once the `point of no return` has been breached. We don`t where it is, but it certainly is there!
I am afraid that next year and the next we will still talk about this. The present economic and political system under which, and most of the world, lives, is incapable of solving these major existential problems, which it by a large measure, created, without the destruction of existing system and replacing it with new social relations that puts human need at the centre, rather than the profit motive. A sea change indeed, but can we raise to the occasion!
An excellent article. What jumped out was “Last week’s Budget allocated to rail a tiny 5% of what was given to roads in the next year.” On the one hand, funds are pouring into the government kitty as a result of the minerals boom. On the other hand, most individual Australians are going to do it tougher and tougher as a result of increasing petrol prices and higher interest rates. The best thing the government can do with its surplus is to invest in public transport solutions for the outer suburbs, because at this rate, weekly car commuting is simply going to be unaffordable for most people living outside the inner suburbs.
It’s early days yet but it interesting to see no “Green” bashing or hurling abuse at the messenger.
Thank you Sen. Milne I think you have hit the nail on the head.
On a happier note the subversive professionals with a public spirit are taking over the 20C political economy asylum - as per momentous reportage last night of Allan Jones MBE of City of London as Climate Change Agency boss. Reported on Catalyst abc tv here: http://www.abc.net.au/catalyst/stories/2244790.htm // such as micro generation: // “Narration: Annoyed by what he calls the rubbish way things are done, Allan installed 80 combined heat power units in the town, complemented by rows and rows of solar panels.// By 2004, humble Woking was producing 80% of its own energy. And in just 10 years it had dropped its CO2 emissions by a mind-boggling 77% // Jeremy Leggett: This is an incredible achievement and achieved with technology that’s on the shelf now, that’s available now.// Narration: And then came the call ….’// So Allan was recruited to do a Woking on London … 75 times Woking’s size … ” [end quote] //Get that - huge energy savings. So now we know - it’s about straight out corruption of the free market to prevent environmentally superior energy sector outcompeting dirty old energy sector. Bully big business. Bully big parties. It’s war - and I mean that metaphorically, Gandhi peaceful change sense. These dinosaurs will be reaching for the tar sands, the methane under the ocean. They are addicts to their 20C institutions and privilege. We will have to take political economic power off them. They won’t give it up freely.
You clearly use words that you don’t really understand. How we can have a “post-carbon” world? We are carbon-based lifeforms.
Top article/discussion. Einstein is just being quoted here so far not enacted. I can give you some different thinking and solutions that, when you finally get your mouth closed, will make you run back to the safety of politics and the usual thinking. I have it and can do it solution wise:-
1. reduce CO2 dramatically
2. create water
a new chemistry that through a series of steps can turn CO2 into water - problem - we may need to encourage coal burning to replenish falling CO2 levels
3. add carbon to the soil
open new farmlands for world food and more (water is abundant now)
4. new farmlands to grow bio-fuels (avoid starving the poor for our cars)
5 unlimited bio-fuels to replace that seductive black gold that must run out one day in the next century
6. actively lower rising sea levels
7. cool or warm the planet depending whether its sweat or freeze that’s coming after we’re gone
8. create a hugely profitable carbon trading business being able to reduce atmospheric CO2 and create unlimited amounts of solid planet surface fixed carbon
and … and .. there’s a couple of others for this list that I just can’t think of right now.
So like Einstein I don’t expect an audience, an inquiry or anything else positive especially from those frightened animals called politicians. I expect ridicule as I have turned lots of that on its head in the past. There’s the challenge. This could not only solve the world’s problems but make all the babbling nonsense.
That’s nic-picking, nit.
I stumbled onto this website & article tonight, but have been following the peak oil story for some time and am puzzled that it has so far failed to make the headlines. I’ve been expecting the current scenario - soaring petrol prices etc - for a couple of years.
We need to get our heads around the fact that our whole lives & lifestyles will change, regardless of whether we bury our heads in the sand or choose to plan a little ahead.
Some recommended sites for further info: Christine mentions ASPO which has a useful website; also try Energy Watch whose graphs explain everything about peak oil clearly for even non-scientists. Books - there are heaps - check out things like “the End of Oil” which I found at the local uni library. DVDs - see the End of Suburbia; also “The Power of Community - How Cuba survived Peal Oil”. Search terms [Google is fine] - just look up Hubbert’s Peak or “peak oil”, there’s plenty of info and solid science and it’s not, alas, a conspiracy theory thing as I first assumed.
FYI nic [23/05], “post-carbon” is a common term that’s been around for at least a decade, referring to a time when we will no longer have enough fossil fuels - coal, oil, gas, even condensate , all of which are essentially carbon - to squander as we have been in Australia & the West during the last half-century. Don’t quibble when YOU don’t understand. Cheers.
Thanks Christine for the article, I’ll be keeping an eye out for your writing in future.
Yes, it is curious to see how the shuffling of deckchairs with regard the price of oil and how governments can apparently do something about it continues to make the news. You don’t even have to believe in peak oil to understand the need to seek alternatives to it - basic laws of the market apply. Unprecedented demand from the two massive developing economies won’t drop anytime soon and nor will the price. We have to move on.
“Caught unawares”?
How we forget, if we are old enough.
1972 Gough comes to power. 2007 Kevin comes to power.
Vietnam coming to an end after US blowing up US$squintillions, borrowed from the world.
Iraq (hopefully near an end) - US spending at least US1 trillion. Sorry, also borrowed from the world, especially China.
Value of $US? Same: falling
Value of Oil? Same: rising.
it is uncanny…I am waiting for the call…”Ground hog Day!!!”