Attribution: http://vimeo.com/36515698
Wednesday, 5 March 2014
Wednesday, 12 February 2014
UTOPIA
Attribution: http://vimeo.com/78062545
UTOPIA - Free Screening and Q&A Session [Sponsored by UNSW Computing]
Friday, 28 February 2014
Doors open at 5:30pm - Film commences 6:00pm sharp
Clancy Auditorium, UNSW
RSVP essential: http://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/utopia-free-screening-and-qa-session-sponsored-by-unsw-computing-tickets-10548955209
John Pilger interviewed by Radio New Zealand on his new film 'Utopia', about Aboriginal Australia. Broadcast on RNZ, 2.3.14. The programme lasts 21' 36". http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player/2587519
See also: The mismatch between indigenous communities and mining wealth: Indigenous communities rarely reap the benefits of mining and attempts by companies to redress the balance often fall short. Oliver Balch, Guardian Professional, Saturday 16 November 2013 01.52 AEST http://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/mismatch-indigenous-mining-wealth-utopia
Make carbon pollution a thing of the past
http://forms.climaterealityproject.org/page/content/Make-carbon-pollution-a-thing-of-the-past
© 2014 The Climate Reality Project -- We are powering a social revolution for climate action.
Friday, 7 February 2014
There you go! (Satirical video on "development")
Around the world ‘development’ is robbing tribal people of their land, self-sufficiency and pride and leaving them with nothing. Watch this short, satirical film, written by Oren Ginzburg and narrated by actor and comedian David Mitchell, which tells the story of how tribal peoples are being destroyed in the name of ‘development’. [Attribution: http://www.survivalinternational.org/thereyougo ]
Video link: http://www.survivalinternational.org/films/there-you-go
Progress can kill: http://www.survivalinternational.org/progresscankill
Sunday, 2 February 2014
Dark money: rubbishing the climate science
"In the 1990s the fossil fuel industry realised that action on climate change would be bad for their business and poured millions into rubbishing the science..."
verbatim excerpt quoted from Paul Brown, The Guardian, Tuesday 21 January 2014 08.30 AEST. Weatherwatch: The dark money that feeds climate change confusion
Thursday, 19 December 2013
Are We Falling Off the Climate Precipice?
Thought-provoking article penned by Dahr Jamail: The signs of a worsening climate crisis are all around us, whether we allow ourselves to see them or not. Scientists consider extinction.
Excerpt quoted verbatim from Nation of Change, Wednesday 18 December 2013. Available: http://www.nationofchange.org/are-we-falling-climate-precipice-1387375963
I grew up planning for my future, wondering which college I would attend, what to study, and later on, where to work, which articles to write, what my next book might be, how to pay a mortgage, and which mountaineering trip I might like to take next. Now, I wonder about the future of our planet. During a recent visit with my eight-year-old niece and 10- and 12-year-old nephews, ...
Read article here: http://www.nationofchange.org/are-we-falling-climate-precipice-1387375963
Wednesday, 27 November 2013
Just 90 companies caused two-thirds of man-made global warming emissions
Chevron, Exxon and BP among companies most responsible for climate change since dawn of industrial age, figures show
Interactive - which fossil fuel companies are most responsible?
Excerpt of article by Suzanne Goldenberg, US environment correspondent, quoted verbatim from The Guardian, Thursday 21 November 2013 03.07 AEST. Available: http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/nov/20/90-companies-man-made-global-warming-emissions-climate-change
The climate crisis of the 21st century has been caused largely by just 90 companies, which between them produced nearly two-thirds of the greenhouse gas emissions generated since the dawning of the industrial age, new research suggests.
The companies range from investor-owned firms – household names such as Chevron, Exxon and BP – to state-owned and government-run firms.
The analysis, which was welcomed by the former vice-president Al Gore as a "crucial step forward" found that the vast majority of the firms were in the business of producing oil, gas or coal, found the analysis, which has been published in the journal Climatic Change.
"There are thousands of oil, gas and coal producers in the world," climate researcher and author Richard Heede at the Climate Accountability Institute in Colorado said. "But the decision makers, the CEOs, or the ministers of coal and oil if you narrow it down to just one person, they could all fit on a Greyhound bus or two."
Half of the estimated emissions were produced just in the past 25 years – well past the date when governments and corporations became aware that rising greenhouse gas emissions from the burning of coal and oil were causing dangerous climate change.
Many of the same companies are also sitting on substantial reserves of fossil fuel which – if they are burned – puts the world at even greater risk of dangerous climate change.
Climate change experts said the data set was the most ambitious effort so far to hold individual carbon producers, rather than governments, to account. (... article continues ...)
Read entire article at: http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/nov/20/90-companies-man-made-global-warming-emissions-climate-change
Why We Don’t Care About Saving Our Grandchildren From Climate Change
A new study shows that human beings are too selfish to endure present pain to avert future climate change. That's why we need win-win solutions now
Carbon Policy; Intriguing article by Bryan Walsh 21 October 2013;
Excerpt below cited verbatim from Time, Science & Space: http://science.time.com/2013/10/21/why-we-dont-care-about-saving-our-grandchildren-from-climate-change/
You want to know what the biggest obstacle to dealing with climate change is? Simple: time. It will take decades before the carbon dioxide we emit now begins to have its full effect on the planet’s climate. And by the same token, it will take decades before we are able to enjoy the positive climate effects of reducing carbon-dioxide emissions now. (Even if we could stop emitting all CO₂ today, there’s already future warming that’s been baked into the system, thanks to past emission.) But we will feel the economic effects of either emitting or restricting CO₂ right now, in real time. While we can argue about the relative cost of reducing CO₂ emissions now — just as we can argue about the economic effects of climate change in the future — it should be clear that any attempt to restrict CO₂ emissions enough to make a dent in future climate change will cause some present-day economic pain. The global economy is still so dependent on relatively inexpensive fossil fuels that a quick transition to renewable sources would likely be costly in the short term. (See Naomi Klein’s 2011 piece in The Nation for a fairly clear-eyed view of what truly radical climate policy would mean.)
What that means, in effect, is that climate policy asks the present to sacrifice for the future. Human beings tend not to be very good at that kind of planning, even when their own future selves stand to benefit — a study this year found that...
Read entire article at: Study Shows That Human Beings Are Too Selfish to Fix Climate Change | TIME.com http://science.time.com/2013/10/21/why-we-dont-care-about-saving-our-grandchildren-from-climate-change/
Monday, 18 November 2013
Five warning signs Tony Abbott is turning Australia into a reckless charco-state
By Alexander White: Is Australia a risk of becoming the coal equivalent of a petro-state. Here are five warning signs.
This short text excerpt and photo are quoted verbatim from The Guardian, 17 November 2013:
"Today, tens of thousands of people around Australia rallied for action on climate change.
The rallies were organised by a coalition of environmental and social advocacy groups, including the Australian Conservation Foundation, the United Firefighters Union, and Get Up, in protest to the Abbott government's moves to scrap the carbon price, abolish the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, cut funding for the CSIRO, ignoring the Climate Change Authority on carbon pollution emissions, and much more besides.
This week, federal parliament sat. We finally were able to see the shape of the Abbott-led Liberal-National government. The extent of their climate denialism is becoming more evident.
It seems that Abbott is intent on turning Australia into a charco-state — a nation that pursues economic riches from coal, gas and other fossil fuels no matter the social or environmental cost. A charco-state is the coal equivalent of a petro-state, a country where the economy is dominated by oil interests and where the government is both highly dependent on oil tax revenues and deeply infiltrated by oil-industry interests.
Australia is at risk of becoming a charco-state. Here are five warning signs" [...]
1. Ignoring the Climate Change Authority's recommendation on carbon pollution reductions
2. Australia "missing in action" at COP Warsaw climate negotiations
3. Starving Australia's renewable energy industries
4. Handing over environmental powers to the states
5. Demonising climate action as "socialism"
Short text excerpt and photo quoted verbatim from The Guardian, 17 November 2013:
Read entire article here:
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/southern-crossroads/2013/nov/17/tony-abbott-climate-denier-coal-socialism
Related YouTube clip shared by GetUp Australia: http://youtu.be/kIOKHYxnTB0
Friday, 15 November 2013
The Pacific Adventures of the Climate Crab
This film goes by the name "The Pacific Adventures of the Climate Crab".
The animation is part of a larger information-kit compiled to educate communities and NGO's in the Pacific regarding the threat of El Niño and La Niña and climate change. "The Pacific Adventures of the Climate Crab" aims to assist communities to better prepare for disasters in the region. The film focuses on El Nino and La Nina events in the region and how we influence rainfall, cyclone risk and sea levels especially in the Pacific region.
Produced by EyeSpy Films
Producer: Shannon Owen
Director & Principal Animator: Jamie Clennett
Assistant Animator: Lindy Lou
Mastering: Oliver Clifton
Sound Design & Mix: Mark Kellow
Additional Music: Mark Kellow
Concept Art: Jamie Clennett & Joe Siri
Additional Artwork: Bianca Tweed & Lindy Lou
Climate Crab Animation project team: Philip Malsale, Salesa Kaniaha, Rebecca McNaught, Jill Rischbieth, Brad Murphy, Christopher Bartlett and Ula Majewski.
Narrator: Pearson Vetuna
MUSIC
‘6925′
Written by Stanleyson Antas
Performed by Stan and the Earth Force
Courtesy of Easy Rock Steady, Vanuatu
Pentecost tamtam beat
Courtesy of the Vanuatu Kaljoral Senta, Port Vila
Cook Island Drumbeats
Courtesy of Te Korero Maori Cook Island Dance Troupe
Thursday, 14 November 2013
Send a Message to the UN: Haiyan is a Wake-Up Call
Last week, Typhoon Haiyan hit the Philippines — and left a path of destruction and tragedy in its wake; more than 10,000 people are feared dead.
Governments are meeting in Warsaw over the next two weeks for the annual UN climate negotiations. This ritual has dragged on for years without conclusion, largely because the great powers have done so little.
Let’s send a message to UN delegates to increase ambition and action. Our team will deliver your messages to UN delegates gathered in Poland.
And please do donate what you can to direct relief efforts to help those in need.
Monday, 11 November 2013
Fighting the fuel giants for a fully renewable future
Tackling the world’s most powerful corporations, whose interest it is to continue consuming fossil fuels, is a formidable but essential task
Antony Loewenstein: theguardian.com, Friday 25 October 2013 15.50 AEST
The viability of a fossil fuel future is rarely connected to the human rights abuses required to sustain it. How often do we think about where oil and gas is obtained? Are the Europeans or Americans any more aware? This deliberate depoliticisation of our energy present, by the vast majority of politicians, journalists and self-described public intellectuals, is leading to an environment that is both unsustainable and dangerous for the planet.
Read whole article here: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/oct/25/climate-change-exxon-fossil-fuel
UK universities urged to pull cash from fossil fuel giants
Anti-carbon divestment campaign targets £5bn of British funds
Damian Carrington: The Observer, Sunday 27 October 2013 08.25 AEST
An international campaign to urge large institutions to dump fossil fuel investments reaches the UK this week, following rapid success in the US.
The year-old divestment campaign, Fossil Free, has grown even faster than similar efforts that once targeted apartheid, tobacco and arms manufacturers. It now aims to focus attention on the £5bn invested in coal, oil and gas by the endowment funds of UK universities. The move comes as financial giants such as HSBC, Deutsche Bank and Goldman Sachs are starting to take seriously the prospect that global action to reduce carbon emissions could leave two-thirds of the world's proven fossil fuel reserves unburnable and worthless. (... article continues ...)
Read whole article here: http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/oct/27/fossil-fuel-divestment-campaign-uk
Typhoon Haiyan: what really alarms Filipinos is the rich world ignoring climate change
As Haiyan batters the Phillipines, the political elites at the UN climate talks will again leave poor countries to go it alone
John Vidal: theguardian.com, Saturday 9 November 2013 01.31 AEST
Read the whole article here: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/nov/08/typhoon-haiyan-rich-ignore-climate-change
Friday, 8 November 2013
The 5 stages of climate denial
The 5 stages of climate denial are on display ahead of the IPCC report
Climate contrarians appear to be running damage control in the media before the next IPCC report is published
Read the whole article in the guardian, 16 September 2013: http://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2013/sep/16/climate-change-contrarians-5-stages-denial?CMP=twt_gu
Source/credit: 350.org
More on the issue:
Global Warming Is Very Real (Rolling Stone)
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/global-warming-is-very-real-20130912
Climate Change Report From UN Introduces Purple Color To Depict Worsening Climate Risks (Associated Press)
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/13/climate-change-report-un_n_3918823.html
Rupert Murdoch's Newspapers Mislead Public On Climate Change and Environment (DeSmog Blog)
http://www.desmogblog.com/rupert-murdoch-s-newspapers-mislead-public-climate-change-and-environment
Dollars for Deniers: Big Oil Funds Climate Science Denialism (Daily Kos)
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/01/26/1182365/-Dollars-for-Deniers-Big-Oil-Funds-Climate-Science-Denialism/
U.N. Climate Panel Endorses Ceiling on Global Emissions - The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/28/science/global-climate-change-report.html
What 95% certainty of warming means to scientists - AP Article
http://bigstory.ap.org/article/what-95-certainty-warming-means-scientists
IPCC climate report: human impact is 'unequivocal' - The Guardian
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/sep/27/ipcc-climate-report-un-secretary-general
Chart: 2/3rds of Global Solar PV Has Been Installed in the Last 2.5 Years - GreenTech
http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/chart-2-3rds-of-global-solar-pv-has-been-connected-in-the-last-2.5-years
Climate Change 2013: The Physical Science Basis - IPCC
http://www.climatechange2013.org/
PRESS RELEASE: Sceptical Climate Part 2: Climate Science in Australian Newspapers
Australian print media outlets produce a substantial amount of journalism that is sceptical about evidence of human-induced climate change, despite very high levels of scientific certainty, according to a new report published today by the Australian Centre for Independent Journalism (ACIJ) at the University of Technology, Sydney (UTS).
Sceptical Climate Part 2: Climate Science in Australian Newspapers
http://sceptical-climate.investigate.org.au/part-2/
The report, Sceptical Climate: Climate Science in Australian Newspapers, is the largest and most detailed report to date on how Australian journalists report climate science, and follows the ACIJ’s first report http://sceptical-climate.investigate.org.au on climate change reporting published in 2011.
“If you believe that the main obligation of journalists is to the public’s right to know, the results of this study are truly alarming,” said Tom Morton, Associate Professor of Journalism at UTS and ACIJ director.
“This report clearly demonstrates that important and influential sections of the Australian media are failing in their responsibility to provide their audience with information they need to make informed choices on a matter of vital public interest.
“Thus they are failing to fulfill one of the most important roles of a free press in a liberal democracy,” Dr Morton said.
The report’s author, investigative journalist and researcher Professor Wendy Bacon, said along with previous research the findings of this study suggest that Australia may have the highest concentration of scepticism in its media in the world.
“Our analyses of three months of coverage in ten major Australian newspapers revealed a decline of 20 per cent in coverage of climate science between February to April 2011 and the same period in 2012. More disturbing was the finding that the overall coverage became decidedly more sceptical in 2012,” Professor Bacon said.
Nearly all of the scepticism is produced by News Corporation, which owns more than two-thirds of Australia’s print media. Fairfax Media’s Sydney Morning Herald and The Age accept the consensus position on anthropogenic climate change and published only 9 and 6 articles respectively which might suggest to readers that the consensus position was in doubt.
“Such high levels of scepticism should be a matter of concern to the Australian public, governments, the scientific community and journalists,” Professor Bacon said.
Download full report here: http://sceptical-climate.investigate.org.au/part-2
END PRESS RELEASE (on file)
Sunday, 3 November 2013
The Hot Potato. The Road to Transformation
Follow the journey of #thehotpotato, cooling the heat on the asylum seeker debate with facts not fiction.
The more we talk about this issue the closer we come to an opinion we can be proud of.
Thursday, 31 October 2013
IPCC: Europe has been warming faster than the global average
UN climate science panel's full report shows how climate change could pan out differently across the many regions of the world
Quoted/repeated verbatim from the guardian 2 October 2013 http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/oct/02/ipcc-europe-warming-faster-global-average Europe has been warming faster than the global average over the last 30 years, the UN's new climate report reveals.
This week, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released part one of its scientific report in full.
Among some of the most significant findings from a summary of the report released a few days ago are that humans are responsible for at least half of the warming experienced in recent decades. The report also predicts higher sea levels and further warming worldwide if greenhouse gas emissions continue.
The full report also looks at how climate change could pan out differently across the many regions of the world. There will be much more on this when the IPCC releases the second part of its climate report in March 2014. But the first part provides some valuable insights about how climate change affects Europe.
Read rest/whole article @ http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/oct/02/ipcc-europe-warming-faster-global-average
Monday, 23 September 2013
UNSW 2013 Jack Beale Lecture: Dr David Suzuki (21 September 2013)
Australians scientists should be up in arms and storming the ramparts in response to the Federal Government's proposed climate change policy, according to geneticist and environmentalist David Suzuki.
In delivering the annual Jack Beale Lecture at UNSW, Suzuki put the boot in the new Coalition government when he attacked Tony Abbott's promise to eliminate the carbon tax, "it will probably make this politically toxic for at least a decade before it will be able to come back on the agenda". He went on to say that, "this is what the corporations have wanted".
Suzuki drew on the similarities between the Canadian and Australian government policies and the links made by both, in that a reduction in the carbon footprint would be catastrophic for both countries economies.
He describes the cancelling of the Climate Commission and the firing of Tim Flannery as "criminal negligence through wilful blindness".
Tune in... he's a passionate advocate.
Download audio (mp3) [49.62 Mb]
Download video (mp4) [259.93 Mb]
http://www.abc.net.au/tv/bigideas/stories/2013/10/21/3866521.htm
[21 September 2013, 6pm - 7:30pm; Sir John Clancy Auditorium, UNSW Kensington campus]
Wednesday, 18 September 2013
Bill McKibben: On Sept. 21st, Draw the Line on Keystone XL
For the past two years, a grassroots movement has erupted to confront President Obama over the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline. On September 21st, 2013, we will draw the line on Keystone XL and the tar sands to tell him that keeping his climate promises means rejecting Keystone XL.
Monday, 16 September 2013
The world does need a red line – on climate change
Activists agree we must fight the Keystone XL pipeline in the US, but also chip away at the political power of the fossil fuel industry.
In a few weeks, a new Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report, prepared by 2,000 climate scientists from around the world, will be released. Leaked early drafts reveal some frightening predictions for the next century, including a high likelihood that the globe's average temperature will rocket past the 2C target, the reddest of red lines for human existence on the planet.
More: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/sep/09/fossil-fuels-climate-change-keystone-pipeline
Sunday, 15 September 2013
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