What you will find on this page: LATEST NEWS; Fossil fuel emissions have stalled; Analysis: Record surge of clean energy in 2024 halts China’s CO2 rise; does the world need hydrogen?; Mapped: global coal trade; Complexity of energy systems (maps); Mapped: Germany’s energy sources (interactive access); Power to the people (video); Unburnable Carbon (report); Stern Commission Review; Garnaut reports; live generation data; fossil fuel subsidies; divestment; how to run a divestment campaign guide; local council divestment guide; US coal plant retirement; oil conventional & unconventional; CSG battle in Australia (videos); CSG battle in Victoria; leasing maps for Victoria; coal projects Victoria
Huge task to decarbonise
Source: Australian Delegation presentation to international forum held in Bonn in May 2012
Latest News 25 March 2016, Climate News Network, Past emissions cause mounting climate havoc. Despite signs that the world will cut its future fossil fuel use, greenhouse gases already emitted are still driving accelerating climate change.Climate change has reached the point where it may outstrip the quickening efforts to slow it by reducing emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, scientists say. They say humans are now releasing CO2 into the atmosphere 10 times faster than natural processes have ever done in the last 66 million years, before the extinction of the dinosaurs. The disclosure comes in the World Meteorological Organisation’s State of the Climate report, published in the journal Nature Geoscience. The lead author, Professor Richard Zeebe of the University of Hawaii, said: “Our carbon release rate is unprecedented over such a long time period [and] means that we have effectively entered a ‘no-analogue’ state. “The present and future rate of climate change and ocean acidification is too fast for many species to adapt, which is likely to result in widespread future extinctions.” “The window of opportunity for limiting global temperature rise to well below 2°C . . . is narrow and rapidly shrinking. The effects of a warming planet will be felt by all” The UN secretary-general, Ban Ki-moon, said: “Climate change is accelerating at an alarming rate. The window of opportunity for limiting global temperature rise to well below 2°C – the threshold agreed by world governments in Paris in December last year – is narrow and rapidly shrinking. The effects of a warming planet will be felt by all.” The WMO secretary-general, Petteri Taalas, said the present “alarming” rate of climate change as a result of greenhouse gas emissions was “unprecedented in modern records”. “The future is now”, he said. Yet less than a week ago the International Energy Agency announced that global energy-related emissions of carbon dioxide had shown no increase for the second year in a row. The announcement was widely hailed as significant good news, with the IEA’s executive director, Fatih Birol, describing it as “yet another boost to the global fight against climate change”.Read More here 24 March 2016, Climate News Network, Humans tilt climate books out of balance. Greenhouse gases from cattle, fertilisers, manure and agriculture mean that human activities have turned the land and soil into part of the global warming machine. In the great book-keeping of climate change, scientists have just discovered a big mistake. They have been wrong, they now think, to count on the mountains, the plains, the forests and the grasslands as an agency that slows climate change by absorbing carbon dioxide. It does absorb carbon dioxide. But the chilling news is that the soil itself may be making the world warmer. That is because humans have changed the way the landscape and its living things works, and now – thanks to those other greenhouse gases, methane and nitrous oxides, from cattle, fertilisers, manure and agriculture – the terrestrial biosphere is actually accelerating climate change. Twenty-three scientists from 16 laboratories and institutions report in Nature journal that they re-examined the sums on which climate forecasts depend. They concluded: “We find that the cumulative warming capacity of concurrent biogenic methane and nitrous oxide emissions is a factor of about two larger than the cooling effect resulting from the global land carbon dioxide uptake from 2001 to 2010.” Read More here 24 March 2016, Renew Economy, Five things we learned about Malcolm’s attempts not to be Tony. Plus ça change. The more it changes, the more it stays the same. And that ageless expression seems to apply with Malcolm Turnbull’s desperate efforts to convince people that he is not Tony Abbott, that he is not the sword carrier for Abbott’s policies as his predecessor suggests, and that he is not a slave to the conservative rump of his party. This week, Turnbull turned to clean energy to show that his spots are not the same as Abbott’s. If publicity and headlines are the main indicators, it has been a smashing success. Mainstream media has lapped it up: “PM’s climate of change,” hoorayed Fairfax. “Coalition saves two clean energy funds,” chorused the ABC. “PM tilts at green windmills,” booed the Murdoch media. (That editorial is probably worth a complete dissection on its own, so many errors, misconceptions and prejudices in such a few short paragraphs, but time is not infinite). But what really happened this week? In the face of opposition in the Senate, Turnbull bowed to the inevitable and decided to keep the Clean Energy Finance Corporation. That is good. And that is change. The CEFC – once decried by its newest biggest supporter, environment minister Greg Hunt as a great big green hedge fund – has been behind many of the most important new clean energy projects and initiatives in the country, underwriting finance for large-scale solar projects, innovative solar thermal installations, battery storage trials, and any amount of energy efficiency and rooftop solar support. And in doing this it has also delivered a significant return to the government. Hunt should now feel free to turn up at one of its project openings. Turnbull then took $1 billion out of the CEFC kitty and rebadged it with his favourite buzzword, “innovation” and claimed the creation of a “new” thing called the “Clean Energy Innovation Fund”. But it does not represent new funding. Read More here 23 March 2016, Energy Post, Dispelling the nuclear baseload myth: nothing renewables can’t do better. The main claim used to justify nuclear is that it’s the only low carbon power source that can supply ‘reliable, base load electricity. But not only can renewables supply baseload power, they can do something far more valuable: supply power flexibly according to demand, writes Mark Diesendorf, Associate Professor of Interdisciplinary Environmental Studies at UNSW Australia. That, says Diesendorf, makes nuclear power really redundant. We have all heard the claim. We need nuclear power because, along with big hydropower, it’s the only low carbon generation technology that can supply ‘reliable baseload power’ on a large scale. For example, the UK Energy Secretary Amber Rudd, attempted to justify the decision to build the proposed Hinkley Point C nuclear power station on the grounds that “we have to secure baseload electricity.” Similarly, former Australian Industry Minister Ian Macfarlane recently claimed at a uranium industry conference: “Baseload, zero emission, the only way it can be produced is by hydro and nuclear.” Underlying this claim are three key assumptions. First, that baseload power is actually a good and necessary thing. In fact, what it really means is too much power when you don’t want it, and not enough when you do. What we need is flexible power (and flexible demand too) so that supply and demand can be matched instant by instant. Read More here 13 December 2017, Renew Economy, AGL says batteries are coming, but coal is uninvestable. AGL says no private investor would invest in new coal plant, but says battery storage is coming and will be major game changer as costs fall – which may not be far away. Several days after formally rejecting federal government requests that it invest hundreds of millions of dollars to keep the ageing and increasingly decrepit Liddell coal generator open, AGL held an “investor day” where it said no private money would support a new coal generator. “We do not believe that any private capital will invest in new coal plants,” CEO Andrew Vesey told the assembled analysts. “Someone may say they want to, but that does not mean they will.” AGL over the weekend unveiled plans to replace Liddell, which include 653MW of wind farms, currently under construction, 300MW of new solar farms, a 250MW gas peaking plant, and small amounts of demand management. AGL over the weekend unveiled plans to replace Liddell, which include 653MW of wind farms, currently under construction, 300MW of new solar farms, a 250MW gas peaking plant, and small amounts of demand management. The later stages of the scheme – depending on what else happens in the market, and the make-up of energy policy – could see another 650MW of wind and solar, 250MW of battery storage, or pumped hydro, and possibly more gas peaking plants and more demand management. The AGL plan made it clear to the government that the cheapest way to provide reliability, and reduce emissions, was to shift from coal to renewables, something the Coalition is finding hard to accept. But Vesey’s comments were unequivocal, and appeared deliberately aimed at the lingering push from many in the conservative arena to build a new coal-fired generator. “The government may say it wants to … but it is becoming an increasingly risky proposition.” Read More here 7 December 2017, The Guardian, Is this the end of the road for Adani’s Australian megamine? Adani’s operations in Australia appear to be hanging on by a thread, as activists prove effective at undermining the company’s chances of getting the finance it needs. China seems to have ruled out funding for the mine, which means it’s not just Adani’s proposed Carmichael coalmine that is under threat, but also its existing Abbot Point coal terminal, which sits near Bowen, behind the Great Barrier Reef. The campaign against the mine has been long. Environmentalists first tried to use Australia’s environmental laws to block it from going ahead, and then failing that, focused on pressuring financial institutions, first here, and then around the world. The news that Beijing has left Adani out to dry comes as on-the-ground protests against construction of the mine pick up. Two Greens MPs, Jeremy Buckingham and Dawn Walker, have been arrested in Queensland for disrupting the company’s activities. Is China’s move the end of the road for Adani’s mega coalmine in Australia, and will the Adani Group be left with billions of dollars in stranded assets? Environmental laws fail to halt mine Despite the mine threatening to destroy some of the best remaining habitat of threatened species of birds and lizards, federal environmental laws proved unable to stop the mine in the face of a government that wanted it to go ahead. The initial federal approval for the mine was overturned after it was revealed the then-minister for the environment, Greg Hunt, had ignored his own department’s advice about the mine’s impact on two vulnerable species, the yakka skink and the ornamental snake. One by one, each of the big four Australian banks ruled out financing the mine But Australia’s environmental law leaves very little opportunity for challenging the merits of a minister’s decision – it only allows for challenges on whether those decisions considered everything required by the law. As a result, the minister needed only approve it again, after formally considering the impact on the two species. Another court challenge argued the approval was invalid because the emissions caused by the mine – which would be greater than those of New York City – were a threat to the Great Barrier Reef. Hunt argued in court, successfully, that there was no definite link between coal from Adani mine and climate change. It became apparent Australia’s environmental laws were unable to stop a project like this if the government of the day was determined to push it through. Read More here 6 December 2017, Environmental Justice Australia, ACCC asked to investigate Adani jobs claims. Adani’s claim that its Carmichael coal mine project will create 10,000 direct and indirect jobs has been referred to the national consumer protection agency, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC). Public interest legal practice Environmental Justice Australia has written to the ACCC, asking it to investigate misleading or deceptive conduct under the Australian Consumer Law. EJA’s clients, Chris McCoomb and the Australian Unemployed Workers Union (AUWU), are concerned Adani is misleading jobseekers by suggesting a jobs bonanza is on the way. “Adani has been telling jobseekers 10,000 jobs are on the way,” said Chris McCoomb, volunteer co-ordinator at the AUWU. “Unemployed people are spending their meagre savings on training courses for jobs that don’t exist now, and may never exist.” The letter to the ACCC provides evidence of mining training outfits relying on Adani’s claims to lure jobseekers into training courses. “Plenty of evidence suggests Adani’s representations about 10,000 direct and indirect jobs are seriously flawed, yet the company continues to mislead people looking for work,” said David Barnden, lawyer at Environmental Justice Australia. Read More here 30 November 2017, Renew Economy, Finkel’s frustration: Everyone else has a strategy, but not Australia. One senses that Chief scientist Alan Finkel is just a little frustrated. The center-piece of his land-mark Finkel Review, the clean energy target, has been left in the gutter by weak-kneed politicians, and his attempts to bring perspective to the issue of storage has been branded as “eco-evangelism” by the same forces that make policy makers tremble in their bed at night. Little surprise, then, that Finkel chose to focus his last energy speech of the year on the “Myths and Legends of the Australian electricity market”, delivered to the ANU on Wednesday afternoon. And in doing so, he delivers some major brick-bats to both the country’s policy makers (politicians) and its regulators. Finkel argues that Australia has managed a unique trifecta – high prices, high emissions, and high uncertainty – and fallen behind the rest of the world. And he has no doubt who is to blame. “Everyone else has a strategy,” says one of the key points of his presentation (see above). The next line is equally damming: “Regulatory system suffering 10 years of policy paralysis.” Energy insiders and observers know exactly what Finkel is referring to: the first is clear, the political impasse caused by the Far Right and its opposition to basic economics and science. The second offender would be interpreted as the Australian Energy Market Commission – the rule maker that has stood in the way of blindingly obvious reforms such as introducing environmental considerations into the National Electricity Objective, and which has resisted and delayed nearly every proposed change that would nudge Australia’s ageing, creaking energy infrastructure into the 21st Century. Read More here 16 August 2023, The Conversation: Critics of ‘degrowth’ economics say it’s unworkable – but from an ecologist’s perspective, it’s inevitable. You may not have noticed, but earlier this month we passed Earth overshoot day, when humanity’s demands for ecological resources and services exceeded what our planet can regenerate annually. Many economists criticising the developing degrowth movement fail to appreciate this critical point of Earth’s biophysical limits. Ecologists on the other hand see the human economy as a subset of the biosphere. Their perspective highlights the urgency with which we need to reduce our demands on the biosphere to avoid a disastrous ecological collapse, with consequences for us and all other species. Many degrowth scholars (as well as critics) focus on features of capitalism as the cause of this ecological overshoot. But while capitalism may be problematic, many civilisations destroyed ecosystems to the point of collapse long before it became our dominant economic model. Capitalism, powered by the availability of cheap and abundant fossil energy, has indeed resulted in unprecedented and global biosphere disruption. But the direct cause remains the excessive volume and speed with which resources are extracted and wastes returned to the environment. From an ecologist’s perspective, degrowth is inevitable on our current trajectory. Read more: Degrowth isn’t the same as a recession – it’s an alternative to growing the economy forever. Carrying capacity. Ecology tells us that many species overshoot their environment’s carrying capacity if they have temporary access to an unusually high level of resources. Overshoot declines when those resources return to more stable levels. This often involves large-scale starvation and die-offs as populations adjust. Access to fossil fuels has allowed us to temporarily overshoot biophysical limits. This lifted our population and demands on the biosphere past the level it can safely absorb. Barring a planned reduction of those biosphere demands, we will experience the same “adjustments” as other species. Read more here 15 August 2023, Climate Home news: US sparks controversy by backing oil company’s carbon-sucking plans. The CEO of Occidental Petroleum has said that direct air capture is a way of prolonging the life of the oil industry. The US government has been criticised for plans to hand out up to $500 million to help an oil company suck carbon out of the air in Texas. The Department of Energy announced it would invest in two direct air capture facilities, which will suck the planet-warming gas out of the atmosphere and store it underground. One of those facilities will be built by Occidental Petroleum, whose CEO Vicki Hollub said earlier this year that direct air capture will help “preserve our industry” and get more oil out of the ground. The proper role. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) scientists say the world needs to develop some direct air capture to compensate for the emissions of the hardest to clean up sectors. But IPCC author Glen Peters told Climate Home that Occidental “do not really understand the role of carbon dioxide removal” and Hollub’s views are “not consistent with the science”. Peters said that “in principle” the US government should not have given Occidental this money, although he questioned how such an exclusion could be justified. The $1.2 billion handout. In November 2021, Congress members from the Democrats and Republicans agreed to a Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, which included $1.2 billion for direct air capture hubs. On Friday, they announced that up to $500 million each of this investment would go to Occidental’s hub in Texas and to another center run by air direct capture company Climeworks in Louisiana. Read more here 8 August 2023, Climate Council: BROKEN INSURANCE MARKET FAILING TO PROTECT PEOPLE IN CLIMATE CRISIS: NEW REPORT. Urgent government action is needed to make home and contents insurance accessible and affordable. New research from a coalition of advocacy groups has found the home and contents insurance market is failing to protect people against extreme weather events, with customers struggling to access and afford the insurance they need. The report, commissioned by CHOICE, Climate Council, Financial Counselling Australia, Financial Rights Legal Centre, and the Tenants’ Union of NSW, is based on a nationwide survey of home insurance policyholders, in depth interviews with people affected by extreme weather events and interviews with key civil society groups. “Two in five respondents to our national survey of home and contents insurance policyholders reported that they had been impacted by extreme weather events in the past five years, but our research found that the insurance market is failing to cover these events fairly and affordably. Many people are being forced to pay higher premiums, reduce their cover, or abandon insurance entirely,” says CHOICE CEO, Alan Kirkland. “We’re calling for coordinated action by governments and the insurance industry to ensure that people are effectively protected against the effects of extreme weather events. Home and contents insurance needs to be simpler, fairer and more affordable. We also need solutions to the problems that can’t be solved by insurance alone – such as planning for relocation of communities in high-risk areas and funding for people to make their homes more resilient,” says Kirkland. The research revealed five key problems with the home and contents insurance market: Read more here 8 August 2023: Climate Home News: Mainstream economists accused of playing down climate threat. Economic models have ignored tipping points, rainfall changes and indoor work, leading them to under-estimate climate change’s economic damage. Mainstream economics has consistently understated the economic damage of climate change, according to two recent reports. As economic models fail to include tipping points, floods, droughts or indoor work, they hugely underplay the economic damage that global warming will do, the reports argue. The models are relied upon by investors, politicians, central bank governors and influential bodies like the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). An IPCC report last year, which was signed off by all governments, summarised these models to conclude that warming of around four degrees Celsius “may cause a 10-23% decline in global GDP by 2100 relative to global GDP without warming”. Other parts of the same report warned of catastrophic physical impacts at that level of warming. The professional body for the UK’s actuaries (IFA), whose job is to judge risk for insurance companies and pension funds, published a report last month which argued that influential economic models like this “jar with climate science”. Read more here 27 January 2025, Carbon Brief: A record surge of clean energy kept China’s carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions below the previous year’s levels in the last 10 months of 2024. However, the new analysis for Carbon Brief, based on official figures and commercial data, shows the tail end of China’s rebound from zero-Covid in January and February, combined with abnormally high growth in energy demand, stopped CO2 emissions falling in 2024 overall. While China’s CO2 output in 2024 grew by an estimated 0.8% year-on-year, emissions were lower than in the 12 months to February 2024. Other key findings of the analysis include: As ever, the latest analysis shows that policy decisions made in 2025 will strongly affect China’s emissions trajectory in the coming years. In particular, both China’s new commitments under the Paris Agreement and the country’s next five-year plan are being prepared in 2025. Read More Here 3 November 2020, Carbon Brief: Hydrogen gas has long been recognised as an alternative to fossil fuels and a potentially valuable tool for tackling climate change. Now, as nations come forward with net-zero strategies to align with their international climate targets, hydrogen has once again risen up the agenda from Australia and the UK through to Germany and Japan. In the most optimistic outlooks, hydrogen could soon power trucks, planes and ships. It could heat homes, balance electricity grids and help heavy industry to make everything from steel to cement. But doing all these things with hydrogen would require staggering quantities of the fuel, which is only as clean as the methods used to produce it. Moreover, for every potentially transformative application of hydrogen, there are unique challenges that must be overcome. In this in-depth Q&A – which includes a range of infographics, maps and interactive charts, as well as the views of dozens of experts – Carbon Brief examines the big questions around the “hydrogen economy” and looks at the extent to which it could help the world avoid dangerous climate change. Access full article here Fossil fuel emissions have stalled 14 November 2016, The Conversation, Fossil fuel emissions have stalled: Global Carbon Budget 2016. For the third year in a row, global carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels and industry have barely grown, while the global economy has continued to grow strongly. This level of decoupling of carbon emissions from global economic growth is unprecedented.Global CO₂ emissions from the combustion of fossil fuels and industry (including cement production) were 36.3 billion tonnes in 2015, the same as in 2014, and are projected to rise by only 0.2% in 2016 to reach 36.4 billion tonnes. This is a remarkable departure from emissions growth rates of 2.3% for the previous decade, and more than 3% during the 2000’s. Read More here Do you want to understand the complexity of energy systems which support our high consumption lifestyles? Most people don’t give too much thought to where their electricity comes from. Flip a switch, and the lights go on. That’s all. The origins of that energy, or how it actually got into our homes, is generally hidden from view. This link will take you to 11 maps which explain energy in America (it is typical enough as an example of a similar lifestyle as Australia – when I find maps for Oz I’ll add them in) e.g. above map showing the coal plants in the US. Source: Vox Explainers Mapped: how Germany generates its electricity – another example Power to the People – Lock the Gate looks back at the wins of 2015 And there’s lots more coming up in 2016. Some of the big priorities coming up next for the “Lock the Gate” movement are: If you want to give “Lock the Gate” your support – go here for more info This new report reveals that the pollution from Australia’s coal resources, particularly the enormous Galilee coal basin, could take us two-thirds of the way to a two degree rise in global temperature. To Read More and download report The 2006 UK government commissioned Stern Commission Review on the Economics of Climate Change is still the best complete appraisal of global climate change economics. The review broke new ground on climate change assessment in a number of ways. It made headlines by concluding that avoiding global climate change catastrophe was almost beyond our grasp. It also found that the costs of ignoring global climate change could be as great as the Great Depression and the two World Wars combined. The review was (still is) in fact a very good assessment of global climate change, which inferred in 2006 that the situation was a global emergency. Read More here The Garnaut Climate Change Review was commissioned by the Commonwealth, state and territory governments in 2007 to conduct an independent study of the impacts of climate change on the Australian economy. Prof. Garnaut presented The Garnaut Climate Change Review: Final Report to the Australian Prime Minister, Premiers and Chief Ministers in September 2008 in which he examined how Australia was likely to be affected by climate change, and suggested policy responses. In November 2010, he was commissioned by the Australian Government to provide an update to the 2008 Review. In particular, he was asked to examine whether significant changes had occurred that would affect the analysis and recommendations from 2008. The final report was presented May 2011. Since then the Professor has regularly participated in the debate of fossil fuel reduction, as per his latest below: To access his reports; interviews; submissions go here 27 May 2015, Renew Economy, Garnaut: Cost of stranded assets already bigger than cost of climate action. This is one carbon budget that Australia has already blown. Economist and climate change advisor Professor Ross Garnaut has delivered a withering critique of Australia’s economic policies and investment patterns, saying the cost of misguided over-investment in the recent mining boom would likely outweigh the cost of climate action over the next few decades. Read More here Live generation of electricity by fuel type Fossil Fuel Subsidies – The Age of entitlement continues 24 June 2014, Renew Economy, Age of entitlement has not ended for fossil fuels: A new report from The Australia Institute exposes the massive scale of state government assistance, totalling $17.6 billion over a six-year period, not including significant Federal government support and subsidies. Queensland taxpayers are providing the greatest assistance by far with a total of $9.5 billion, followed by Western Australia at $6.2 billion. The table shows almost $18 billion dollars has been spent over the past 6 years by state governments, supporting some of Australia’s biggest, most profitable industries, which are sending most of the profits offshore. That’s $18 billion dollars that could have gone to vital public services such as hospitals, schools and emergency services. State governments are usually associated with the provision of essential services like health and education so it will shock taxpayers to learn of the massive scale of government handouts to the minerals and fossil fuel industries. This report shows that Australian taxpayers have been misled about the costs and benefits of this industry, which we can now see are grossly disproportionate. Each state provides millions of dollars’ worth of assistance to the mining industry every year, with the big mining states of Queensland and Western Australia routinely spending over one billion dollars in assistance annually. Read More here – access full report here What is fossil fuel divestment? Local Governments ready to divest Aligning Council Money With Council Values A Guide To Ensuring Council Money Isn’t Funding Climate Change. 350.org Australia – with the help of the incredible team at Earth Hour – has pulled together a simple 3-step guide for local governments interested in divestment. The movement to align council money with council values is constantly growing in Australia. It complements the existing work that councils are doing to shape a safe climate future. It can also help to reshape the funding practices of Australia’s fossil fuel funding banks. The steps are simple. The impact is huge.The guide can also be used by local groups who are interested in supporting their local government to divest as a step-by-step reference point. Access guide here How coal is staying in the ground in the US Sierra Club Beyond Coal Campaign May 2015, Politico, Michael Grunwald: The war on coal is not just political rhetoric, or a paranoid fantasy concocted by rapacious polluters. It’s real and it’s relentless. Over the past five years, it has killed a coal-fired power plant every 10 days. It has quietly transformed the U.S. electric grid and the global climate debate. The industry and its supporters use “war on coal” as shorthand for a ferocious assault by a hostile White House, but the real war on coal is not primarily an Obama war, or even a Washington war. It’s a guerrilla war. The front lines are not at the Environmental Protection Agency or the Supreme Court. If you want to see how the fossil fuel that once powered most of the country is being battered by enemy forces, you have to watch state and local hearings where utility commissions and other obscure governing bodies debate individual coal plants. You probably won’t find much drama. You’ll definitely find lawyers from the Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal campaign, the boots on the ground in the war on coal. Read More here Oil – conventional & unconventional May 2015, Oil change International Report: On the Edge: 1.6 Million Barrels per Day of Proposed Tar Sands Oil on Life Support. The Canadian tar sands is among the most carbon-intensive, highest-cost sources of oil in the world. Even prior to the precipitous drop in global oil prices late last year, three major projects were cancelled in the sector with companies unable to chart a profitable path forward. Since the collapse in global oil prices, the sector has been under pressure to make further cuts, leading to substantial budget cuts, job losses, and a much more bearish outlook on expansion projections in the coming years. Read full report here. For summary of report USA Sierra Club Beyond Oil Campaign Coal Seam Gas battle in Australia Lock the Gate Alliance is a national coalition of people from across Australia, including farmers, traditional custodians, conservationists and urban residents, who are uniting to protect our common heritage – our land, water and communities – from unsafe or inappropriate mining for coal seam gas and other fossil fuels. Read more about the missions and principles of Lock the Gate. Access more Lock the Gate videos here. Access Lock the Gate fact sheets here 2014: Parliament of Victoria Research Paper: Unconventional Gas: Coal Seam Gas, Shale Gas and Tight Gas: This Research Paper provides an introduction and overview of issues relevant to the development of unconventional gas – coal seam, shale and tight gas – in the Australian and specifically Victorian context. At present, the Victorian unconventional gas industry is at a very early stage. It is not yet known whether there is any coal seam gas or shale gas in Victoria and, if there is, whether it would be economically viable to extract it. A moratorium on fracking has been in place in Victoria since August 2012 while more information is gathered on potential environmental risks posed by the industry. The parts of Victoria with the highest potential for unconventional gas are the Gippsland and Otway basins. Notably, tight gas has been located near Seaspray in Gippsland but is not yet being produced. There is a high level of community concern in regard to the potential impact an unconventional gas industry could have on agriculture in the Gippsland and Otway regions. Industry proponents, however, assert that conventional gas resources are declining and Victoria’s unconventional gas resources need to be ascertained and developed. Read More here 28 January 2015, ABC News, Coal seam gas exploration: Victoria’s fracking ban to remain as Parliament probes regulations: A ban on coal seam gas (CSG) exploration will stay in place in Victoria until a parliamentary inquiry hands down its findings, the State Government has promised. There is a moratorium on the controversial mining technique, known as fracking, until the middle of 2015. The Napthine government conducted a review into CSG, headed by former Howard government minister Peter Reith, which recommended regulations around fracking be relaxed. Labor was critical of the review, claiming it failed to consult with farmers, environmental scientists and local communities. Read more here Keep up to date and how you can be involved here Friends of the Earth Melbourne Coal & Gas Free Victoria 20 May 2015, FoE, Inquiry into Unconventional Gas: Check here for details on the Victorian government’s Inquiry into unconventional gas. The public hearings have not yet started, however the Terms of Reference have been released. The state government’s promised Inquiry into Unconventional Gas has now been formally announced, with broad terms of reference (TOR). FoE’s response to the TOR is available here. The Upper House Environment and Planning Committee will manage the Inquiry. You can find the Inquiry website here. The final TOR will be determined by the committee. Significantly, it is a cross party committee. The Chair is a Liberal (David Davis), and there is one National (Melinda Bath), one Green (Samantha Dunn), three from the ALP (Gayle Tierney, Harriet Shing, Shaun Leane), an additional MP from the Liberals (Richard Dalla-Riva), and one MP from the Shooters Party (Daniel Young). Work started by the previous government, into water tables and the community consultation process run by the Primary Agency, will be released as part of the inquiry.The moratorium on unconventional gas exploration will stay in place until the inquiry delivers its findings. The interim report is due in September and the final report by December. There is the possibility that the committee will amend this timeline if they are overwhelmed with submissions or information. Parliament will then need to consider the recommendations of the committee and make a final decision about how to proceed. This is likely to happen when parliament resumes after the summer break, in early 2016. Quit Coal is a Melbourne-based collective that campaigns against the expansion of the coal and unconventional gas industries in Victoria. Quit Coal uses a range of tactics to tackle this problem. We advise the broader Victorian community about plans for new coal and unconventional gas projects, we put pressure on our government to stop investing in these projects, and we help to inform and mobilise Victorian communities so they can campaign on their own behalf. We focus on being strategic, creative, and as much as possible, fun! The above screen shot is of the Victorian State government’s Mining Licences Near Me site. Go to this link to see what is happening in your area Environment Victoria’s campaign CoalWatch is an interactive resource that tracks the coal industry’s expansion plans and helps builds a movement to stop these polluting developments. CoalWatch provides a way for everyday Victorians to keep track of the coal industry’s ambitious expansion plans. To check what tax-payer money has been pledged to brown coal projects and the coal projects industry is spruiking to our politicians. Here’s another map via EV website (go to their website and you should be able to get better detail from Google Maps: Red areas: Exploration licences (EL). These areas are held by companies to undertake exploration activity. A small bond is held by government in case of any damage. If a company wants to progress the project it needs to obtain a mining licence. Exploration Licence applications are marked with an asterix in the Places Index eg. EL4684*. Yellow areas: Mining Licences (MIN). A mining licence is granted with the expectation that mining will occur. A larger bond is paid to government. Green areas: Exploration licences that have been withdrawn or altered due to community concern. Green outline: Existing mines within Mining Licences. Purple areas: Geological Carbon Storage Exploration areas for carbon capture and storage. On-shore areas have been released by the State Government, while off-shore areas have been released by the Federal Government. The Coal Watch wiki tracks current and future Victorian coal projects, whether they are power stations, coal mines, proposals to export coal or some other inventive way of burning more coal. To get the full picture of coal in Victoria visit our wiki page. Get more info and see the full list of Exploration Licences current at 17 August 2012 here August 2015, Institute for Energy Economics & Financial Analysis – powerpoint: Changing Dynamics in the Global Seaborne Thermal Coal Markets and Stranded Asset Risk. Information from one of the slides follows. To view full presentation go here Economic Implications for Australia 83% of Australian coal mines are foreign owned, hence direct leverage of fossil fuels to the ASX is relatively small at 1-2%. However, for Australia the exposure is high, time is needed for transition and the new industry opportunities are significant: 1. Energy Infrastructure: Australia spends $5-10bn pa on electricity / grid sector, much of it a regulated asset base that all ratepayers fund much of it stranded. BNEF estimate of Australia’s renewable energy infrastructure investment for 2015-2020 was cut 30% from A$20bn post RET. Lost opportunities. 2. Direct employment: The ABS shows a fall of ~20k from the 2012 peak of 70K from coal mining across Australia, and cuts are ongoing. Indirect employment material. 3. Terms of trade: BZE estimates the collapse in the pricing of iron ore, coal and LNG cuts A$100bn pa from Australia’s export revenues by 2030, a halving relative to government budget estimates of 2013/14. Coal was 25% of NSW’s total A$ value of exports in 2013/14 (38% of Qld). Australia will be #1 globally in LNG by 2018. 4. The financial sector: is leveraged to mining and associated rail port infrastructure. WICET 80% financed by banks, mostly Australian. Adani’s Abbot Point Port is foreign owned, but A$1.2bn of Australian sourced debt. Insurance firms and infrastructure funds are leveraged to fossil fuels vs little RE infrastructure assets. BBY! 5. Rehabilitation: $18bn of unfunded coal mining rehabilitation across Australia. 6. Economic growth: curtailed as Australia fails to develop low carbon industries. Analysis: Record surge of clean energy in 2024 halts China’s CO2 rise
In-depth Q&A: Does the world need hydrogen to solve climate change?
3 May 2016, Carbon Brief, The global coal trade doubled in the decade to 2012 as a coal-fueled boom took hold in Asia. Now, the coal trade seems to have stalled, or even gone into reverse. This change of fortune has devastated the coal mining industry, with Peabody – the world’s largest private coal-mining company – the latest of 50 US firms to file for bankruptcy. It could also be a turning point for the climate, with the continued burning of coal the biggest difference between business-as-usual emissions and avoiding dangerous climate change. Carbon Brief has produced a series of maps and interactive charts to show how the global coal trade is changing. As well as providing a global overview, we focus on a few key countries: Read More here/cdn0.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/3915730/EIA%20coal%20power%20plants.png)
21 April 2015, Climate Council, Will Steffen: Unburnable Carbon: Why we need to leave fossil fuels in the ground.Stern Commission Review
Australia’s Garnaut Review
November 2014 – The Fossil Fuel Bailout: G20 subsidies for oil, gas and coal exploration report: Governments across the G20 countries are estimated to be spending $88 billion every year subsidising exploration for fossil fuels. Their exploration subsidies marry bad economics with potentially disastrous consequences for climate change. In effect, governments are propping up the development of oil, gas and coal reserves that cannot be exploited if the world is to avoid dangerous climate change. This report documents, for the first time, the scale and structure of fossil fuel exploration subsidies in the G20 countries. The evidence points to a publicly financed bailout for carbon-intensive companies, and support for uneconomic investments that could drive the planet far beyond the internationally agreed target of limiting global temperature increases to no more than 2ºC. It finds that, by providing subsidies for fossil fuel exploration, the G20 countries are creating a ‘triple-lose’ scenario. They are directing large volumes of finance into high-carbon assets that cannot be exploited without catastrophic climate effects. They are diverting investment from economic low-carbon alternatives such as solar, wind and hydro-power. And they are undermining the prospects for an ambitious climate deal in 2015. Access full report here For the summary on Australia’s susidisation of it’s fossil fuel industry go to page 51 of the report. The report said that the United States and Australia paid the highest level of national subsidies for exploration in the form of direct spending or tax breaks. Overall, G20 country spending on national subsidies was $23 billion. In Australia, this includes exploration funding for Geoscience Australia and tax deductions for mining and petroleum exploration. The report also classifies the Federal Government’s fuel rebate program for resources companies as a subsidy.
