Hi JBowyer

In regards to your question of why we don’t finance and build power companies it is very simple: Greenpeace is a campaigning organisation not a business. If we were to become an energy retailer it would be impossible for us to retain our position as an independent lobbying/campaigning organisation, not to mention our status as an NGO. We do not accept money from corporations or governments, and would not accept profits made from an electricity retailer.

As you can see here http://www.greenpeace.org/australia/about/ we have a very clear definition of our values and mission, and would not compromise these fundamental principles and undermine 37 years of independent global environmental campaigning.

Our role is to provide solutions and run campaigns to ensure the preservation of life on our planet.

In regards to your question about the hole in the ozone layer you may be interested to know the following information:

After a series of rigorous meetings and negotiations, the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer was finally agreed upon on 16 September 1987 at the Headquarters of the International Civil Aviation Organization in Montreal. In 1997 we saw the start of the ozone recovery thanks to this protocol.

Greenpeace campaigned to have CFCs and HFCs (used in refrigeration systems and one of the biggest contributors to ozone depletion) removed from refrigeration systems. In fact it was a campaign run in Sydney as a part of our green Olympics work that saw one of the biggest users of refrigerators agree to use Greenfreeze technology that does not produce ozone damaging gasses. You can read more about that campaign here http://www.greenpeace.org/australia/news-and-events/news/Climate-change/coca-cola-to-champion-our-cool-2

If you are interested in seeing where the donations people give to Greenpeace are spent please look here http://www.greenpeace.org/australia/about/financials. All of Greenpeace’s financial information is available there

Having read the greenpeace report, I am in two minds as to whether they are merely naive (read incompetent) or deliberately misleading.

Most of the assumptions they make have holes you could fly a jet through, and others would appear to be made up.

GP has donned the mantle as high priests of the new religion of climate change, and as such expects its converts to quote its doctrine unchallenged.

I believe that climate change needs to be tackled, but would prefer to rely on projections from those that are technically competent and have no overt political objective.

A CSIRO report on the issue several years ago completely rubbishes the GP claims in the report.

All this rubbish from Grinpiss assumes that the climate is changing due to emissions from human activity.

Well I, and a good many other people, many of them far more qualified to comment than Ms Pittaway, do NOT BELIEVE. Yes, I'm talking about holocaust.... oops sorry... AGW deniers.

It is totally obvious to anyone who has studied the figures regarding energy production from "renewables" that they cannot now, and will not in the foreseeable future, provide the level of base-load power required.

If you drive up the price of electricity to say double what it is now, yes, you will get demand destruction, and an impoverished lifestyle, which is what these lefty idiots seem to want so fervently.

For people who claim to be concerned about the future of humanity, the left sure seems to be doing everything it can to shorten people's lives; for that is what will happen to many older folk unable to afford electricity.