Climate Change Research

trigger warning: I am not backing barnaby in any form.

and frankly I cannot believe he's still in the position he is considering the trails of corruption leading to him. amongst other things...

However I found this an interesting quote from the article and barnaby...

"...Private property rights are removed, by the implementation of vegetation laws, because of ‘climate action’. The state will limit your access to electricity because of ‘climate action’. You will drive an electric car because of ‘climate action’. You will divest the nation of its largest export because of ‘climate action’."

and following on from my recent discussion with indod and brutus...

I think in the current political climate (no pun intended) if you said...

We are strengthening vegetation laws because farmers have cleared way too much land, affecting our waterways, wildlife, and general health of the land. plus trees are good, they're beautiful and help you breathe...

It would gain much more support than barnaby's point...

"...Private property rights are removed, by the implementation of vegetation laws, because of ‘climate action’. "

And if you said...

We are going to stratify electricity prices, to incentivise lower consumption, and reward the people that are doing the right thing, because our per capita consumption has become quite extreme and wasteful...

Rather than Barnaby's point...

"...The state will limit your access to electricity because of ‘climate action’."

And said...

our plan is to encourage the manufacture and sale of electric cars, because they are clearly the future, and are much cleaner and efficient. plus they are just better, with lower maintenance and better acceleration (revhead ears twitch...)

Instead of labor's lame-arse thought bubble that lead to this...

"...You will drive an electric car because of ‘climate action’.

And then put it all together as part of a ....wait for it....

... 'a cohesive plan for the future'

a plan that will address the changing workforce, species loss, general amenity and health of our surroundings, plus address some concerns regarding climate change. That would go a lot further than telling queenslanders that they are selfish, dumb, backward, and have no morals...

just a suggestion...

if anyone is listening...

I reckon it'd geta lot more traction than the current MO

...just saying...

Having said that all that, ol' barney has a point here...

"...You don’t get the feeling when you listen to the political propaganda or the supporting lobbyists that there is any doubt about their capacity to ‘fix the climate problem’,” he said.

I think there's lots of good intentions, not so sure about the 'capacity' though. especially given the road to this place we're now at...

a crisis of confidence, in systems, academia, and governments, has taken us to a dark dark place.

and a long road back...

Death, taxes and,,,another dreary post from sypkan - very predictable!

Sypkan , the real problem we have ,which has come from the baby boomers , is that who out there in the Western World economies are prepared to take a hit to their current life style , as our current life styles are not sustainable , and we have potentially 2 Billion people just in China and India alone who want to live "like us" , Mc Mansion , 2 cars etc.....

are our current lifestyles to blame or is it the way we got here ,?

wasting so many resources with our collective disposable mentality , and as the "Franking credits issue" exposed the lack of any will to change as the cost was too high to change even a rort in the system.

I do not see any real sign s that western Society will change its current habits , but there will be a few wins like plastic bags etc , greener thinking....just a few smoke and mirror feel good moments , but the reality is we are heading for a situation that we will be forced to change ,when the change gets here....no real proactive actions , but we will be like the grasshoppers watching the dark storms of winter coming , and nothing in reserve or even a plan to for going forward !

It is becoming clearer everyday that the Morrison government's only loyalty is to those in the community who are already doing well. The simple numbers tell the story. The only way to provide a surplus is to reduce per capita government spending. Do not be fooled by his claim that there will be no cuts to services. He may manage that in absolute terms but with a population that is both growing and aging that means less government expenditure per person across the full spectrum of services. The word usually used for this is austerity and by far the greatest burden of these policies will fall on those least able to cope with further cuts to services and their real incomes.

The idea that tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy produce economic growth has been repeatedly and completely disproved since Reagan's time. Yet here we are forty years later with a Prime Minister willing to spout the same crap with a straight face. This nonsensical obsession with trickle down economics makes you wonder about the state of his prostate. Has he forgotten what a healthy stream looks like? Because that is what the Australian economy desperately needs now, a healthy income stream directed at those who will spend it immediately and by doing so improve both their own circumstances and the national economy.

This is not some experimental idea. Every mainstream economic commentator, with the exception of Moloch's slaves, including the Governor of the Reserve Bank, before being intimidated by Frydenberg, is saying the same thing. In these circumstances the only conclusion is that these policies are not a misguided but well intentioned effort to improve our deteriorating circumstances, nor are they driven by some fixed coherent ideology. They are class war. They are a deliberate attempt to increase the power and influence of the most priveleged section of our society.

The Liberal Party has always been a home to that class who believe they were born to rule. The boys who went to elite private schools and whose idea of hardship is a four star hotel. The boys who were brought up to believe in their inherent superiority, brought up to accept authority unquestioningly and to believe exactly what they were told to believe. Their aim is to establish what amounts to a feudal society in which all meaningful wealth and power is in the hands of an aristocratic class. If this sounds like an extreme view it is one that is backed not only by trends in Australia, but by similar, even stronger trends across developed economies.

This is not only about wealth. It is about the obscene discrepancies in our justice system which see the poor dealt with harshly while the rich, all too often, escape meaningful penalties. It is about the increasingly tiered access to health services and under-employment and insecure employment. It is about the reckless destruction of our environment, from the Murray Darling Basin to the Great Barrier Reef. It is about catastrophic declines in regulations which used to ensure safe buildings and carefully planned infra-structure. It is about the manipulation of public opinion by sophisticated use of advertising and social media. What are we really, surfers or serfs?

I share the same view Brutus. At the rate humans are over populating the planet and suffocating it at the same time due to our self centred nature, the shit will hit the fan soon. I wonder if any of us (over the age of 40-50) will be around to see/feel it?

Well , Laurie, you and I both know that the most effective starting point to prevent the degradation of every quantitative standard you’ve described in your post is to stem the tide of mass immigration into this country.

You may not like the arguments to repeatedly arrive at this conclusion , but there is no way you can have this discussion without referring to the single largest and only unifying factor over the entire spectrum of issues.

You can have maintained standards of living, wages growth, security of employment, a stop loss on furthered environmental degradation, water and food security

OR

You can continue to rapidly expand the human population in Australia.

But you can’t have both , no matter which political party is in power.

The sooner you accept this fact the better the world will be. Your continued denial is counterproductive and there is too much at stake to indulge your fantasies.

Nonsense.

Laurie please stop talking politics in this thread otherwise this thread will end up in the back room.

Indo this thread has been about politics for quite some time. You seem to think that people cannot remain civil while discussing Australian politics.

Blowin,
There is so much more we can do immediately to address all the issues that Australia faces, as stated by Laurie.
Immigration is one issue that does need to be addressed. Unfortunately the racism and dog whistling that immigration stirs up inflames hard right ideology of all kinds, making any rational argument in the public sphere difficult.
And let’s be honest stemming immigration is not going to fix taxes/rents to large resource companies, it’s not going to fix the influence of corporate lobbyists in our Parliament, it won’t stop farmers crying about drought as they clear more trees and vegetation, it won’t stop our government allotment of water resources to unscrupulous multi-nationals even in the face of ongoing droughts and being the driest continent on earth. It won’t stop our minister of the environment approving mining projects in the face of species extinctions. It won’t stop the break down of workers rights and a increasingly casual work force. It won’t stop endless corporate welfare and the denial by the state of a sustainable welfare rate for citizens.
Immigration is an issue, it does need addressing. Unfortunately it’s an issue that panders well to the hard right. But by no means is it a fix-all , that is your fantasy

Soggy dog , luckily most people on here are smart enough that they won’t mistake honest discussion of unsustainable mass immigration with the straw man argument of racist intent,

Addressing Laurie’s issues directly:

“It is about the increasingly tiered access to health services and under-employment and insecure employment. It is about the reckless destruction of our environment, from the Murray Darling Basin to the Great Barrier Reef. “

Unnaturally rapid population growth is the single largest contributing factor in each issue . How can you possibly have a discussion of the issues without addressing the number one cause ?

Not true.

"not true" . unlike your assertion all lnp voters all went to private schools, stay in 4-star hotels and are "born-to-rule". chip on the shoulder much lozza? and honestly, tell us if your profound insights didnt originate from an equally embittered parental background. but like loonie members of cults, religions etc when its suggested if you had been born across the street /border you may have been sunni not shiite, ford not holden, catholic not protestant, yes even alp/lnp atheist etc the usual response will be "thank allah/god my parents etc were able to show me the true path". most of us will never know what it is like to be a blinkered fool, enjoy it!

.

Scott Morrison wants more and more and more people in Australia.

He said it won’t affect house prices or wages or water availability or environmental pressure or competition for jobs leading to insecure employment .

And we believe him because he’s our Prime Minister and he’s only got the best interests of Australians at heart.

sorry, working weekends does it to me, especially when i reckon a famous sa novelty point may be firing today

Lizard my comments referred to Liberal politicians and are factual. If you care to do the research you will find that yes, most of them did go to elite private schools. My own background is irrelevant to the facts.

Everyone’s got their flash point , LL.

Mine is when pompous fools talk unsubstantiated dung.

"Unnaturally rapid population growth is the single largest contributing factor in each issue . How can you possibly have a discussion of the issues without addressing the number one cause ?"
You put this as an Australian problem , but it's a global problem , WTF are we going to do with all the people , when there are not enough resources for all of us?

his is not only about wealth. It is about the obscene discrepancies in our justice system which see the poor dealt with harshly while the rich, all too often, escape meaningful penalties. It is about the increasingly tiered access to health services and under-employment and insecure employment. It is about the reckless destruction of our environment, from the Murray Darling Basin to the Great Barrier Reef. It is about catastrophic declines in regulations which used to ensure safe buildings and carefully planned infra-structure. It is about the manipulation of public opinion by sophisticated use of advertising and social media. What are we really, surfers or serfs?

Lozza , it doesn't matter whether its labor or liberals , same result , just a few minor details that seperates them.......down here Labor have been the culprits who have delivered another 150 K People to this area , no infrastructure , no water , we are having a wet winter , already taxing Melbs water 20m litres a day since march still not enough , so now we are going to tap our local aquafiers for another 13m litres per day....and the plan is to bring in another 150K people ....no impact studies , just carnage and all Labor's doing!

soggydog, 11.10 post is spot on. Thank you for putting it so clearly.

indo, the environment in this country is all about the politics, haven't the last 11 years of AU politics taught you anything?

Your comment/question from 5.05 Thursday, I've also thought of that along the lines of if the world doesn't need Middle Eastern oil will that make the region more or less stable? Who knows.

But I'll go way further and think about the world where a vast majority of us were off grid or plugged into neighbourhood owned and operated power networks. What would that do to the power (political/lobby) networks if governments and large multi national energy companies can no longer control us with energy use/pricing?

No more household energy bills, no more petrol bills (we will all be driving electric before too long) and businesses small and large will have a competitive advantage on cheaper energy costs.

This disruption in energy markets does directly to the reason why the right of politics, your side of politics, is so very opposed to renewables and electric cars because the technology already exists today for this brave new world. Renewables, batteries, co-generation are all there to buy off the shelf now, the only trouble is big multinational energy and their political representatives can't figure out how they can get a piece of the pie or tax the bejesus out of it.

Think about that indo, just imagine what would happen if governments, our government actually encouraged these developments.

It's actually complete hogwash that the so called right side of government is opposed to renewables.

If this was true Australia wouldn't be the world leader per capita in roof top solar installations, we wouldn't be on track at current rates to be 78% renewables by 2030

Those things happen largely because of government run schemes and subsidies.

If they were against renewables they wouldn't have those schemes or allow 100 wind farms too built in Australia, they would actually ensure there was investment in more coal powered fired stations to met our every growing energy needs.

But any that have been built in the last 30+ years after Loy yang are quite small and i belle black coal fired we havent built one for about ten years or something.

I mean you cant even buy 2 stroke outboard boat engines anymore in Australia the government banned the selling of them because of emissions (not that all the outboards in OZ would put out much emissions at all)

The difference between liberal and labor is liberals are about sensible transition and being realistic that coal etc is still part of our needs and there is still demand around the world and still an import export, it's not some evil thing to them.

Labor on the other hand need to appear to be more radical in this area to be of appeal to the more green voter and just appeal different, liberals say black labor say white..

Problem is as we saw at the last election you can spin any kind of BS about this or that try to make an election about climate change, but if you cant even provide basic costing on these things, much of the public, aren't going to take you seriously, and then there is complete mixed messages like labor stance on Adani.

BTW. Im sure the government will make money from us no matter what they will find ways, we wont all be disconnecting from the grid, most will still be connected and find ways to tax us, it's just like you have mains water/septic running past your house, you could install tanks and a bore and go on septic and not hook up to the mains, doesnt matter you still pay water and sewerage rates and even if you dont use any water, the charges and fees are still the main part of the bill.

"""we wouldn't be on track at current rates to be 78% renewables by 2030"""

Thats because we are not ontrack for that target.

Have a look at the real numbers, those published by the government, the liberal one......they do not support anything like this fictitious number. Don't be sucked in by a single article you read on a random website.

When you've read something credible then repost an opinion on what you think, not regurgitating the same bullshit because it satisfies your argument.

Your smart enough to find those numbers for yourself Indo, the govt publishes it, don't be a sucker.

ID, now that Abbott has gone your argument may hold some water, but from 2009 (leader of the opp) to this year (voted out), the country was in policy stasis because of him. Yeah, roof top solar increased but that was despite his repeated calls to end it (Google is your friend), and same with his bogus wind farm committees, never mind the "climate change is crap" statement, while he also put the kybosh on the NEG for no other reason than to frustrate Turnbull. 

The whole Liberal party may not have been opposed but with Abbott holding sway, even from the back bench, renewables became a proxy for another pissant culture war.

Also, basic costings? Remember when the Libs under Abbott didn't even put there's in for the 2013 election?

Even if we only hit 50% renewables by 2030 that is still huge, even where we have got to now is big, changing the way you produce energy or fuel transport is no small feat.

The point is the BS that people like Guy and labor want to paint is just not true.

BTW. Tony Abbott is not the liberal party just like Bill shorten is not the Labor party, they are just individuals that got chewed up and spat out, end of the day results are what matters and the results and direction is on the right track, fairly safe to say most Australian just want well balanced sensible transition like we are seeing.

Yep 100 years after science identified the problem and 40 years after clear evidence (produced by the fossil fuel industry) that we needed to prevent further emissions ......... they are still rising. Fabulous achievement! A well balanced sensible transition? Nah mate that needed to start a long time ago. What we need is a massive investment and an immediate transition ......... and that is not only environmentally but economically. The real costs of the climate change we have already locked in will be huge ........ we should not be adding to them.

I'm sorry everyone I was crediting indo with some newly found objectivity, clearly I was mistaken. Indo, I think you will find federal funding for roof top solar ended or started to be phase out around the time Abbott became PM. Its state governments that have been doing the heavy lifting whether the figure is 50% or 73% by 2030 (your figures).

But why are solar panels so popular in AU? I'd like to wager its got a lot to do with the increase cost of power, caused in a large part, by not having any clear policy direction for the last decade at the Federal level and that indo takes us back to Abbott and his likeminded colleagues.

........ anyone heard what has happened to the short list of 10 recommended projects to be awarded funding under the Commonwealth's clean energy fund? ((A fund indo, that Abbott tried unsuccessfully to scrap many times)). Prior to the election it was rumoured that one of the 10 was a new coal fire power station in Queensland (WTF!!), not that the Qld state government had been consulted. Very secretive is this government, anyone heard?

Sorry reality is take away Australia's emissions and it makes close to zero difference, hence at what rate we cut emissions is irrelevant, it's more just in good will than anything or just a change of technology.

It's like holding your fart in at the sewerage farm and expecting because you did you so the air will smell like roses.

Nice one Indo but sorry our farts do smell. 1000 million tonnes of coal exported last year which is significant in total global emissions.

There is still many federal and state run incentives and rebates in regard to renewables and management of water, the bigger picture also includes all kind of other areas like i mentioned banning of sales of 2 strike outboards to star energy ratings to things like building codes in particular needing to met energy star ratings, where the bar keeps raising all the time.

"Nice one Indo but sorry our farts do smell. 1000 million tonnes of coal exported last year which is significant in total global emissions."

Yeah because off course if we just said oh sorry no your not having our coal, China and India will go..oh okay no problem we will just switch over to solar and close down all these newly built coal fired power stations.

Sorry you and me both know thats not how it works, all they would do is source coal elsewhere and in many cases higher emission producing coal and mined in countries with very lapse environmental measures.

Actually the figures on percentage of global emissions, I think 1.3%, compared to percentage of global population , 0.3%, puts us up there with the worst offenders.
The UK also contribute less than 2% of global emissions yet seem to be committed to some serious environmental reforms. Imagine if we joined them. That’s almost 3%......... you know ......maths......makes a difference.

Figures could be slightly out but not much. There was some good discussion on Q&A the other night regarding the bullshit of the “We’ only contribute, 1.3%, what difference will it make”.

"Encouragingly, China’s energy and environmental policies have already delivered many results. For instance, coal consumption has been capped to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions and to control air pollution. In tandem with slower but higher quality economic growth and an accelerated transition to clean energy, these policies led to a peak in coal consumption in 2013, at least seven years earlier than expected. Meanwhile, the energy intensity of the economy has decreased by more than 45 percent since 2005, meeting China’s Copenhagen target three years earlier than promised. China is also on track to meet its target for increasing the non-fossil fuel share of primary energy consumption. The credibility of the targets China continues to set is supported not only by this track record, but largely guaranteed by the system of policy implementation. When policy targets are set as “restrictive” by the central government, they are taken as binding at all levels of local governments and are consequently implemented by relevant administrative units and enterprises."

https://www.brookings.edu/blog/planetpolicy/2018/09/12/chinas-peaking-em...

Take a look at where UK gets it's energy from it's very diverse and a large part made up of natural gas and over 20% nuclear.

Similar to many areas in Europe.

We have historically been less diverse with focus on coal because we have a lot of it and easily accessible and had the power stations set up to produce electricity from coal.

The sensible thing to do now is exactly what we are doing, make a sensible transition to renewables and just close our coal fired power plants down once their lifecycles have ended.

Very simple.

In regard to selling our coal, it's like anything you close up shop once demand has gone, and no that doesn't mean you cant also plan ahead.

Proposals have been put forward in the NT for the world largest solar farm to supply Singapore.

But yeah we are pretty limited to what we can do in Australia because our wages are way to high compared to the majority of the world.

"these policies led to a peak in coal consumption in 2013"

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-45640706

"Building work has restarted at hundreds of Chinese coal-fired power stations, according to an analysis of satellite imagery.

The research, carried out by green campaigners CoalSwarm, suggests that 259 gigawatts of new capacity are under development in China.

The authors say this is the same capacity to produce electricity as the entire US coal fleet."

Article dated 26 Sep 2018, so way later than the supposed peak in coal consumption

".... make a sensible transition to renewables and just close our coal fired power plants down once their lifecycles have ended".

....... is there anyone in the country who is suggesting otherwise apart from those in the LNP federal government that are threatening to interfere in the free market and force privately owned power plants to be upgraded to extend their "lifecycle" e.g. Liddell.

One very large reason that oil use isn’t going anywhere in the short term :

Petrodollar. Deal with Saudis.
How the U.S. negotiated a military protection for Saudi Arabia’s oil fields, and in return the Saudi’s would accept only USD as a payment for their oil exports and invest surplus oil proceeds into US debt instruments and capital markets. And how by 1975, all of the oil-producing nations of OPEC accepted the same deal.
Why many developed countries were forced to hold large amounts of USD in order to continue importing oil, and how that created a consistent demand for USDs, regardless of economic conditions of the U.S., allowing the U.S. government to run high budget deficits.
How Saddam Hussein started selling oil for euros in 2000, but then Iraq returned the denomination of its oil sales back to the US dollar after the U.S. invaded Iraq in 2003. How Gaddafi was planning to sell oil for gold dinars and how the U.S. invaded Libya for crimes against humanity, so now the country sells oil only for dollars and has open slave markets as a bonus.
Let’s recap, OPEC countries were forced to sell oil for USD only, which created a constant demand for USDs across the world, allowing US to print dollars for deficit spending without runaway inflation.

Laurie : Don’t fall for the China propaganda. Their economy has required the construction of dozens of ghost cities , the wasteful use of resources and greenhouse gas generation in their construction dwarfs any farcical claims they make towards reducing energy dependence on coal.

And their claims that they are reducing the percentage of power generated from coal is a useless metric when the reality is that they are engaged in an exponential expansion of ther power generation.

So whilst it might sound great to hear that the percentage of their power from coal is dropping, it doesn’t alter the fact that China’s use of coal is unrivalled in the world and GROWING MASSIVELY . Forget percentages , China is burning coal like there is no tomorrow.

https://unearthed.greenpeace.org/2019/03/28/china-new-coal-plants-2030-c...

"There was some good discussion on Q&A the other night regarding the bullshit of the “We’ only contribute, 1.3%, what difference will it make”.

Soggydog I am not a climate change denier but could you summarise those arguments for me: I'm yet to hear a convincing version of them. I mean convincing in an actual practical sense of addressing climate change.

I repeat my earlier post that the pathetic moaners on this thread should stop crying over the ALP's election loss. Climate change is here to stay so get used to it.

Steve,

1) Aside from US and China, every other country on Earth is in our ballpark in terms of % of emissions and therefore they could all also claim their country's emissions makes no difference. Co-operation is co-operative.

2) Three-quarters of the Earth's population has a lower living standard than Oz and if we aren't seen to be kerbing our emissions then we have no truck when speaking to them about kerbing theirs.

Not from Q&A, just my own thoughts. Always considered the 'doesnt make a difference' argument as an intellectually weak position, and that's not even taking into account the notion that we have the capacity and smarts to lead the world in solar, wind, or hydrogen energy but our culture wars are chucking the early adopter advantage down the sinkhole due to lack of foresight.

https://unearthed.greenpeace.org/2019/03/28/china-new-coal-plants-2030-c...

Wowzzers its a recent article too, wonder if the source Is reliable?

I thought they had stopped planning more, i guess not.

Ha ha D-Rex wish you would post here more :D

BTW.

China 29.34%
USA 13.77%
India 6.62%
Russia 4.76%
Japan 3.56%

So 5 countries =58.05%

Australia 1.08% and about 194 other countries = 40.87%

Despite our transition to renewables etc we aren't going to save the world even if all those other 194 countries pulled their weight like us, which they are not going to, it would make little difference.

The argument is not that we shouldn't do anything, but "cutting the nose off despite the face" would be pretty crazy.

"1) Aside from US and China, every other country on Earth is in our ballpark in terms of % of emissions and therefore they could all also claim their country's emissions makes no difference. Co-operation is co-operative."

Thats not even really an argument Stu....it's a piece of rhetoric half way between wishful thinking and pure speculation.

Using the same flawed logic as above its a wonder women were given the vote, or the state provided education or health services, the civil law system of justice was established, SSM was legalised or abortion. Why did we do any of those things when most other countries in the world didn’t or hadn't at the time.

People like indo would have resisted all these things going back in time. That what very conservative or more correctly reactionary types do oppose all social or political progress.

Freeride, it was the science episode. I’ve just re-watched the episode. The question was in regards to Australian emissions making up such a small percentage of total global emissions. Specifically referring to Alan Jones rice equivocation .Actual figures where 1.5% of total global emissions contributed by 0.3% of the population and the irresponsibility of this as a population and the irresponsible misrepresentation of those figures. That was offered by David Correlly an Atmospheric and Climate scientist. Emma Johnston a Marine ecologist offered that it was a collective global effort and highlighted The UK commitment to 0%emmisions by 2050.
Ok the argument was not as extensive as I may have misremembered it. It was great episode, still up on I view.

cheers Soggydog, I'll check it out.

Of course if you include emissions from our fossil fuel exports the figure is about 4.5%. Australia is a big player in the carbon economy. What we do does matter. The income we generate from fossil fuels could easily be replaced by renewable exports.

Laurie with that type of logic with all the things that use energy made in China then Chinas emissions are really about 70% of world emissions. (yes both of us can just make up % figures)

If Australia didn't export coal as we know world emissions would be higher due to countries needing to burn higher emitting coal.

And sorry no it could not, we can export energy to some countries that don't have much land to use for renewables and have a decent average income to pay for it Singapore being the best example (BTW you do lose/waste energy when transporting it over distances), but any fool that thinks we can be competitive in producing things like solar cells has rocks in their head, even the technology.

BTW. Guy your comment like most of your comments is BS, seeing I'm not actually against reducing emissions, the main emissions factor in Australia is from the energy sector and i support the current sensible transition to renewables we are currently in.

BTW Australia biggest problem in regard to this issue is as Blowin has highlighted is we keep raising the bar for our energy needs and keep increasing demands because of our high immigration rates.

An interesting read in the Sydney Morning Herald this morning about the closing down of Germanys coal industry. Co-operation is the key

Indo - I agree with your post whole heartedly, except for the part about our uncompetitivness making solar panels.

The world is facing a monumental shortfall of silica . The high purity silica required to make solar panels is found in high quantities in certain parts of Australia. Whilst it is now ILLEGAL to export sand from most Asian countries, they are looking to secure their sand resources from abroad.

This will be Australia’s next mineral boom. We could create high end secondary industries. Solar panel manufacture and innovation.

Unless of course we allow the Asian countries to mine our sand themselves and completely erase us from the supply chain as they are want to to and have done with so many other resources.