Wizofaus,

Why MichaelK thinks there is anything Nazi-like about your last post is a mystery to me. I just think it is dangerously naive. I agree that we in the developed world probably could and should cut our contribution to climate change significantly, but you reach a point of diminishing returns. Please take a look at the link to see a graph plotting per capita environmental footprint (closely related to greenhouse gas emissions) against rank on the UN Human Development Index (a measure of human well-being).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Highlight_Findings_of_the_WA_S0E_2007_report_.gif

The sustainable biocapacity per person is actually less than the global average, because we are burning the furniture to keep warm. Not one of the countries consuming at or below the global average are giving their average citizens good lives. If it is easy to do this on a tiny footprint, why isn't anyone doing it?

Your faith in future technology reminds me of the joke about economists, that they don't worry about falling off a tall building, because the demand for a parachute will ensure that one appears on the way down. Try reading some of the science fiction of the 1940s and 50s and consider all the marvellous speculations about future technology that haven't come true. Jared Diamond's book "Collapse" summarises the archaeological evidence on what happened to a number of past societies that did collapse (largely because of overexploitation of the environment) rather than being saved by human ingenuity. It is true that the Green Revolution, which doubled and sometimes tripled the amount of grain that could be harvested from a given plot of land, averted the famines that were predicted for the 1970s, but we are now up against maybe 12 different limiting factors. As just one of them, grain production per person peaked in 1984, and in terms of days of supply, world grain stocks are at their lowest level in more than 30 years. Today's huge populations are an artifact of cheap fossil fuels. I expect Chinese style authoritarian solutions at best for most countries and Rwanda at worst. The universe doesn't care about what we want.

Thank you Professor Shearman.

"I do not recall any corporation ever receiving an “exemption” to the laws of Australia. (Col Rouge)

Col Rouge. Please do not make such rash statements without substantiation.

Pollutant industries are operating outside the law, 24/7, 365 days per year. The EPA agencies, established in Australia decades ago, to protect our environment and the health of communities, are an abysmal failure.

The culture within these agencies is to nurture an alliance with pollutant industries. The more these corporations pollute our environment and our health, operating under "covert" exemptions, the more praise they receive for their "productivity."

Enforcement of the Acts are performed only occasionally as a public relations exercise and to gag complainants - much like the brothels in Kalgoorlie who were always warned of an impending raid.

With regard to Professor Shearman's issue, I assure you, we live under corporate rule. It's corporations who have the freedom to contaminate our air, soil, water, animal and human health whilst manipulating community values and capturing successive, cowardly and ignorant governments.

These are the reasons why Western Australia is now officially one of this planet's environmental hotspots.

The evidence is indisputable.

But try driving your vehicle with a smoky exhaust pipe and see how far YOU get when requesting an "exemption."

The big polluters and their allies remain top dogs in this nation, denying us our democratic rights to clean air and optimal health.

Departments of Environment and their impotent senior bureaucrats should be banished and the remediation of our fragile environment should be placed in the hands of those more competent (and ethical) and those who will endeavour to secure a degree of equity between our desecrated eco systems and the avaricious corporate vandals.

These self-regulated corporations continue on rampage, here and in developing nations and are out of control, a result of the third world regulatory and enforcement standards of this country.

http://www.news.com.au/perthnow/story/0,21598,20702573-2761,00.html

http://indyhack.blogspot.com/2007/06/alcoa-poison-wagerup-alumina-refinery.html

http://209.85.173.104/search?q=cache:BTx7EF9lcoQJ:home.att.net/~thehessians/birds.html+dead+birds+western+australian+coastline+discovered+2007&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=3&gl=au&lr=lang_en

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2004/03/23/1071910.htm

http://s3.amazonaws.com/corpwatch.org/downloads/Barrick_final_sml.pdf

http://www.huliq.com/44227/government-found-interfere-public-health-research

*As just one of them, grain production per person peaked in 1984, and in terms of days of supply, world grain stocks are at their lowest level in more than 30 years.*

Just to make a point Divergence, grain stocks are low, not because
more could not be grown, but because of distortion of market forces, above all
subsidies by the EU and US. Many third world countries stopped
producing so much grain, when flooded with cheap imports.

We could produce quite a bit more grain, if it paid to do so.
What you now have however, is that due to rising grain prices,
people are rushing to produce more. Of course that needs fertilisers,
herbicides etc. The price of these is now going through the roof,
due to rising demand and no new phosphate mines able to supply
that demand. To cut it short, growing more food is quite possible,
but at a higher price then the giveaway prices of the last 20 years.

The real problem however relies with ever more babies, wether mothers
want them or not. Its a scandal and the religious have a lot to
answer for, in their seeming race to outbreed each other, never
mind the planet

Dickie “The EPA agencies, established in Australia decades ago, to protect our environment and the health of communities, are an abysmal failure.”

The only reason for that must be the failure of the state governments charged with implementation of that legislation. Since all the states are socialist run, I rest my case.

Vote for labor and you get higher taxes to pay for indolent civil servants, allowed to fill their seats and draw their salaries whilst ignoring their statutory duties through incompetent state parliament administration.

Such a failing does not a constitute companies operating with “exemption to the laws of Australia” but Labor State governments failing to enforce the laws of Australia.

“The big polluters and their allies remain top dogs in this nation, denying us our democratic rights”

I think you are getting a little hysterical Dickie.

Maybe you can show me in which statute is enshrined your “right to clean air and optimal health” actually whilst you are at it, please show me where “optimal health” is defined in statute.

Without the embodiment of commerce through joint stock companies (the real word for “corporations”) the world would have remained limited to small medieval towns and villages, with no one capable of financing the business institutions which we now rely on to generate the wealth which, through taxation, we all benefit from.

I repeat my view, all corporations operate within the laws as they are enforced by the state authorities in whom we, the electorate place our trust (in dickie’s view unwisely)

I suggest you direct your complaints to the “delinquent” party dickie, that being the labor state governments, not the corporations.

Yabby “Its a scandal and the religious have a lot to answer for,”

I agree, those who demand laws against abortion and contraception do neither the prospective parents nor their progeny any favours, they simply slake their sense of self righteousness.

The Church of Rome should use its resources to fund contraceptive education, instead of issuing threats of excommunication to those with the foresight to plan their families.

"The only reason for that must be the failure of the state governments charged with implementation of that legislation. Since all the states are socialist run, I rest my case." (Col Rouge)

Col Rouge. Perhaps you have not been in this country long enough to realise that Australian states have also been governed by the conservatives.

You don't really believe that the dire state of the environment has only just occurred recently and during the "socialist" reign, do you?

"I think you are getting a little hysterical Dickie."

Not I Col Rouge. My claims are supported by concrete evidence - yours are not.

"WA EPA Division 4 - Section 69 (b):

"Minister may make stop orders if the Minister is satisfied that:

"The non-compliance referred to in paragraph (a) has caused, is causing or is about to cause conditions detrimental to the environment or dangerous to human life or health.

Part 1, section 4 of the WA Environmental Protection Act 1986, states:

"This Act binds the Crown.

"4A: "The object of this Act is to protect the environment of the State.

"4A 2: The present generation should ensure that the health, diversity and productivity of the environment is maintained or enhanced for the benefit of future generations.

"4 (2): The polluter pays principle - those who generate pollution and waste should bear the cost of containment, avoidance or abatement."

"I repeat my view, all corporations operate within the laws as they are enforced by the state authorities in whom we, the electorate place our trust (in dickie’s view unwisely)"

Ah yes....the trustworthy corporations - the innocent bystanders, the self-regulators. I almost forgot, Col Rouge:

http://www.theage.com.au/news/business/activists-tip-a-bucket-on-big-companies/2007/08/15/1186857593122.html?page=fullpage

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23117745-643,00.html

http://www.abc.net.au/news/australia/wa/kalgoor/200507/s1424462.htm

http://financialrealtime.com/stocks/otc-stock-news/smallcap527501.html

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6VH3-4MH8BRR-3&_user=10&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=39ea67875b18b3e4a9c48b69bcb20d86

But I suspect, Col Rouge that the science pertaining to atmospheric pollutants could sadly be well over your head since I doubt you would know the difference between a VOC and a sock. Therefore, you will continue to argue off topic and remain in denial.

Divergence,

Climate change is a natural process occurring regardless of human intervention being a sure sort of further catalyst for. In this case, following up “preserving the nature” logic, not undeveloped BLACK they, but DEVELOPED white US should be exterminated to stop adding to a global disaster-as for humanoids.

Offering different is a mere racist even on merits of a stupid “fighting the global climate change” theory.