environment

Action and reaction on climate change

22 May 2011

Regular guest contributer James Glover (@zebra) takes a closer look at the Coalitions climate change policy. Malcolm Turnbull, an Australian MP, did a rare and risky thing last week. He actually broke away from the political spin-cycle and explained some figures underlying the cost of the Coalition’s “Real Action on Climate Change” policy. Naturally he [...]

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Holiday reading

21 January 2011

My now traditional annual pilgrimage to the South coast of New South Wales saw the rainiest weather I can remember. While it was nothing on the scale seen in Queensland and Victoria over recent weeks, it did take its toll on some of the wildlife: we saw dozens of dead porcupine puffers washed up on [...]

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Polls apart on climate change

7 December 2010

Regular Stubborn Mule guest James Glover (@zebra) turns his statistical expertise on some apparently contradictory polls gauging opinions on climate change. Two polls came out today on the question of whether people believed climate change is real and if so whether it is caused by human activity. The first was a Newspoll published in The [...]

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Emissions League Tables

13 July 2010

Everyone knows that the biggest carbon emitters are China and the USA, but how to other countries perform when emissions are viewed by population or economic output? This post charts a few league tables.

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Who are the big carbon emitters?

4 March 2010

Earlier this week, @pureandapplied brought to my attention the emissions data that has been published by the Department of Climate Change in Australia. Their report comprises data for the 2008-09 reporting year provided to the Greenhouse and Energy Data Officer by corporations whose greenhouse gas emissions exceeded 125 kilotonnes*. A few corporations are missing from [...]

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No hiding the cost of emissions reduction

10 February 2010

No politician in Australia is brave enough to say that if we want to reduce carbon emissions, there will be a cost. Rather than arguing about what is or is not a “tax”, everyone should just accept that reductions will come at a cost and move on.

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Left, Right and Climate Change

7 January 2010

In the wake of the singularly unproductive COP15 Climate Change conference in Copenhagen, I have been reflecting on the polarisation of views on climate change along political lines. Whether or not human activity is leading to climate change is a question of scientific fact: it is either happening or it is not. So knowing someone’s [...]

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Dubai Perspectives

30 April 2009

I’m hoping to try something a little bit different here on the Stubborn Mule: a guest post. But first some background. Recently I came across this article in the Independent exploring the “dark side” of Dubai. It paints a very grim picture of massive crumbling developments, environmental degredation, Western ex-pats who either revel in luxury [...]

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Burning Candles

27 March 2009

The third Earth Hour takes place tomorrow night and once again I have been asked about carbon emissions from candles. So, without wanting to be a party-pooper, I thought I would dig up some calculations from a year ago, courtesy of the friendly family power engineer (you know who you are!). Tomorrow night, many people [...]

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Rudd, Carbon and the Price of Petrol

19 December 2008

Australia’s Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, triggered waves of protests from environmentalists this week when he annouced that Australia’s target for emissions for 2020 would be a mere 5% reduction from the levels in 2000. With substantial commitments to emission reductions from other countries around the world, this target would be increased to 15%. The Government [...]

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