Botany Bay and Catchment Alliance

The following article by Peter Christoff appears in The Age today.  Very timely considering the Business as Usual attitude (Channel Dredging in Port Phillip Bay and Desalination Plant) coming from the Victorian State Government.

January 15, 2008, The Age
 In a hundred years, the planet will be unrecognisable.

AFTER the hottest year on record for Victoria, and with a few scorchers already under the belt in 2008, most Victorians seem to have headed to the coast. Where better, then, to re-read Neville Shute’s On the Beach. Set in Melbourne, Shute’s novel explores humanity’s last months after a nuclear war that has annihilated the northern hemisphere, leaving radioactive fallout drifting inexorably southward, extinguishing all in its path and with Melbourne the last temporary refuge. (more…)

IPART will be finalising its recommendations over the coming months.  Responses to the Draft recommendations can be read at www.ipart.nsw.gov.au (click on Other Industries).  IPART is yet to address the issue of empty containers and the need to increase Customs and AQIS examinations.  It recommends that the State Government ask for Auslink funding to fix homegrown rail freight problems at the expense of funding for a national project such as the Inland Rail from Gladstone through Parkes to Melbourne.

IPART, the RTA, Sydney Ports and others recommend the introduction(beyond the trial) of Super B Doubles onto our roads.  The Port is not in a Greenfield site - it is surrounded by some of Australia’s oldest suburbs and it is inappropriate to be introducing these monsters (with BTriples to follow) when individuals are downsizing to bicycles and smaller vehicles.

In 2002 BioBanking under the name Green Offsets was placed on exhibition by the EPA.  BBACA put in a submission(http://botanybay.info/wp-content/uploads/2006/11/submissiongreenoffsets.pdf ) and then kept asking for an acknowledgement and/or further information - we forwarded our request to Lis Corbyn on a few occasions and each time we were ignored.  When the determination for the Port Expansion was put in the public domain(October 2005) it contained a reference to the Draft Green Offsets saying that it would be used for Penrhyn Estuary.  This year Sydney Ports used the Green Draft Offsets in establishing a ‘value’ for Penrhyn should the ‘enhancement’ plan for the area fail - link http://www.botanybay.info/wp-content/uploads/2007/07/penrhyn-estuary-offset-package-0705-5015b.pdf  Isn’t it grand to live in a parliamentary democracy?

Public consultation for BIOBANKING  - Compare with Draft Green Offsets(2002)

The Department of Environment and Climate Change (DECC) has released several important components of the BioBanking Scheme for community comment. They are the: Regulatory Impact Statement for the proposed regulation for the scheme, the Threatened Species Conservation (Biodiversity Banking) Regulation 2007

• Draft BioBanking Assessment Methodology
• Draft Compliance Assurance Strategy.

The closing date for submissions is Friday 1 February 2008:   biobanking@environment.nsw.gov.au   OR

Dr Richard Sheldrake,Deputy Director General
Department of Environment and Climate Change NSW
PO Box A290,Sydney South NSW 1232

Submissions should include your name, address, contact phone numbers and email address and indicate whether you:

would like to receive further information about the scheme;are interested in participating in the scheme and would like to attend information sessions and receive information for potential participants when the scheme commences:are interested in receiving information about training on the credit calculator.

The latest issue of Environmentally Speaking from Botany Bay Explorers: click here - enviro-speaking-14.doc

In today’s Sydney Morning Herald, psychologist Steve Biddulph paints a stark picture of the future and predicts that ‘business as usual’ political parties like the Liberals will decrease in popularity as we brace for the unique challenges ahead.  While he is confident that Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard have the values required for these tough times the same does not  apply to all politicians who carry the Labour label.  Biddulph need look no further than a swag of Labour cabinet ministers in NSW who support fast tracking unsustainable developments and place their faith in their god ‘the market’. 

“The issue of the future, coming down on us now like a steam train, is of course the environment, the double hammer blows of climate change and peak oil.”  says Biddulph.  “Energy, weather and human misery are the factors that will define our lives for decades to come. You can cancel your newspaper, those are the only four words you need to know………the subplot in economist circles, was that this election was one to lose. That whoever inherited Australia in 2007 inherited a coming economic collapse in globalised trade that would suck Australia and much of the rest of the world down with it. “……………………….full article… (more…)

The Botany Bay Coastal Catchments Initiative (BBCCI) is conducting workshops over the next few months to give a brief overview of the BBCCI and to seek stakeholder input into “resetting” or agreeing on some interim environmental values and levels of protection for the estuaries and freshwater waterways of the Botany Bay and its catchment.The workshop only takes about 1 ½ to 2 hours and can be brought to you. It will allow you to have your say on how you use/value Botany Bay’s waterways (including upstream freshwater catchments), what are the main pressures on them, what management measures you think will help protect the waterways. You will also be participating in setting some interim aquatic ecosystem protection levels for Botany Bay, its estuaries, and freshwater waterways.

Please contact John Dahlenburg at the Sydney Metropolitan Catchment Management Authority to book a workshop for your council, council area, community group or organisation - Phone (02) 9895 6244 or email bbcci@cma.nsw.gov.au

This article appeared in The Australian October 24, 2007

Biologists should stand up for species’ rights, argues Allan Greer.

Few scientists work with as much underlying anxiety about the state of the world as do field biologists. This is because botanists, zoologists and ecologists study species and their habitats, and these are being destroyed rapidly by human activity. The universe is fundamentally inhospitable to life.The childhood creek where they roamed like indigenes is now a stormwater channel through a McMansionville; the habitats where they did their PhD research have been cleared or filled, and the ecosystems that they have known all their professional careers continue to be degraded by both accident and design. 

(more…)

The Federal Department of Environment and Water Resources has released a new factsheet on Polychlorinated biphenyls.

These are the chemicals currently awaiting destruction at Orica. 

The NSW Treasurer, Michael Costa, in response to questions about Peak Oil reponded with ….The Stone Age did not end because we ran out of stones; it ended because we found a new technology. The Iron Age did not end because we ran out of iron and the hydrocarbon age will not end because we run out of hydrocarbons…….

The main game is the reduction in resources on which our life depends -fertile land for agriculture, clean water, rich biodiversity (to maintain stable climate).  As Jared Diamond writes about the decline of the Easter Islanders:  http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/24/042.html  In just a few centuries, the people of Easter Island wiped out their forest, drove their plants and animals to extinction, and saw their complex society spiral into chaos and cannibalism. Are we about to follow their lead?

For a good source of information on Peak Oil: http://peakenergy.blogspot.com/ 
 For the full Costa response: (more…)

Following the Burnley disaster in April another crash to illustrate the additional risks of tunnel travel.  3 lives were lost in Burnley and millions in tolls and repairs.  Now a similar disaster in California.  Burnely tunnel warnings ignored:  http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,21587866-5012713,00.html

 LOS ANGELES (Reuters 14/10/07) - Three people were killed and at least 10 injured in a multi-vehicle crash that caused a fire inside a tunnel and forced the closure of a major freeway in the Los Angeles area, authorities said on Saturday.

The fire broke out late on Friday, following a traffic pileup involving as many as 15 trucks inside a tunnel under Interstate 5. The highway connects Los Angeles to many of its northern suburbs and San Francisco.

More than 1/3rd all vehicle emissions come from freight related tasks and this proportion is growing and within a few decades will overtake private vehicle emissions.  It’s a figure that puts into perspective our dependence on road freight as well as the impacts.