SA Liberals to continue energy transition.

May 25, 2018

Dan van Holst Pellekaan, the energy minister in the newly elected South Australia Liberal government, has vowed to continue the state’s dramatic energy transition and show other states “how it can be done”.

In a keynote speech to the Australian Energy Storage conference and exhibition in Adelaide on Wednesday, van Holst Pellekaan said expectations that the election of a Liberal government would be the end of clean energy in the state were false.

“We heard about the end of renewables and return to energy systems of the past,” van Holst Pellekaan said.

“The transition is underway, and the transition will continue. It is being driven by the fundamental economics of clean energy as the lowest cost new build energy source.

“South Australia will lead and show the world how a sensible transition can be done.”

More details in the reneweconomy website article “SA Liberals vow to continue energy transition…”

Adelaide FoE Notes

Ban Underground Coal Gasification

May 25, 2018

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Underground Coal Gasification (UCG) is an undeveloped, high risk mining technique involving the combustion of coal seams underground.

It has already caused pollution disasters in Australia and overseas.  In South West Queenland, Linc Energy polluted 175 square kilometres of prime agricultural land with dangerous chemicals and gasses, causing the death of livestock and damaging farmland for the foreseeable future.

The Queensland government recently responded to this disaster by banning Underground Coal Gasification.

However, this technology is not banned in other states or territories. There are currently plans to fuel a power station in the South Australian outback town of Leigh Creek through “in-situ gasification” (UCG).

It’s time to build on the momentum of this Queensland ban by instating a national ban on this dangerous practice.

We cannot let agricultural land, ground water and natural environments become the collateral damage of these high risk mining experiments, especially when we have safe, renewable energy options available.

There is no room for this dangerous, high emissions technology in a forward thinking country.

For background information on UCG, please check here.

ENVIRONMENT MINISTER, JOSH FRYDENBERG, HAS THE POWER TO ACT TO BAN THIS DANGEROUS TECHNOLOGY
Email Josh Frydenberg NOW!

 

Adelaide FoE Notes, FoE

Renewables campaign meeting Saturday

May 25, 2018

Just a reminder for those interested in campaigning on climate & renewables: there’s a meeting at 3pm this Saturday, May 26th, in the common room at Christie Walk (entry via 101 Sturt St). We’ve launched The Playford Declaration, and will be looking at how to promote it and what areas we might want to campaign on in the next few months.

Please RSVP by contacting Roman (email: roman.orszanski@foe.org.au, mob: 0424447817) if you’re interested in the campaign and/or are coming along to the meeting. Up for discussion: the declaration, low cost renewables for the poor, gas fracking, divestment, and a ban on fossil fuels.

Adelaide FoE Notes, Climate, Renewables

Why we must ban secret corporate courts from trade deals

May 14, 2018

Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) is a dispute resolution method included in hundreds of trade and investment agreements designed to give exclusive legal protection to foreign companies investing abroad, giving them the right to sue host governments in a private tribunal over any perceived breach of the rules around the treatment of investors. This secret corporate court system is system is a threat to Australia’s democracy and environment and we believe it should be banned.

Click here to read in full Friends of the Earth’s briefing on The case for banning Investor State Dispute Settlement in Australia

ISDS allows Foreign investors can bypass domestic courts and have their case heard by three arbitrators who decide whether the host state is liable to pay huge sums in compensation. The origins of the provisions came from the need to protect companies against the seizure of their assets by host states, for example a mine being nationalised without just compensation. Investment agreements have since evolved to include the values of non-discrimination, prohibition of performance requirements, fair and equitable treatment and free movement of capital, and most controversially, indirect expropriation, in which any government measure perceived to affect the actual or expected profits can be challenged.

Read more at https://www.foe.org.au/secret_corporate_courts_from_trade_deals

Adelaide FoE Notes, Environmental Law, trade