Ashley Roffs: Water flow in the Murray Darling basin will be reduced by 50%. You think Adelaides quota is bad now, it will barely trickle into SA. Temperatures above 35 degrees for more than half the year. You can forget about working in the wheat industry.
Damien Roffs: Drought will be your biggest concern. You think farmers whinge now. With a 1 degree increase in temperature (we are almost there now) we can expect 70% more droughts.
Glen Roffs: Expect alot more cyclones and flooding in Lismore. The barrier reef will be finished due to bleaching. But that won't matter so much because you'll be delerious with Malaria!
Grant Roffs: Warmer weather. You lucky things! Of course, droughts may have bankrupted Australias economy by then so don't get too chirpy. The Vic ski fields will be gone.
John Roffs: WA forests will disappear, you'll need to pipe water down from the North for Perth, and the ocean currents might go whacky and kill Geraltons fishing industry.
Stuart Roffs: Your dream home in Redhead will be underwater, with no compensation. Camping in the bush will be less fun due to loss of core habitat for most species and mass extinctions.
New research shows plantlife may become net producers of carbon dioxide in the not too distant future, which would be bery, bery bad. Also, there's a 1% chance we'll cause a runaway greenhouse effect (that's where the temperature keeps going up until the oceans evaporate into the atmosphere and all life on the plantet is extinguished). Yikes! Click on the picture below to read a report from some other untrustworthy hippies. You might be pushing up daisies before then but think of the children. THINK OF THE CHILDREN!
23 comments:
I'll eventually get the hang of this..
Karl Marx once said the point of history was to change it. It's okay to identify these scenarios, Adam, but what do we do about them? How will changing the showerhead in my bathroom compensate for the industrialisation of China? And India? Give us a list of the things we need to do. I'm pessimistic about this already but I'm always open to advice...
Green Energy is a start dad. Call up your energy provider and ask if they have a 100% wind option, or at least a green power option (try http://www.greenpower.gov.au/pages/). It doesn't cost much more but grows the market in renewable energy. You can go carbon neutral if you are willing to spend the money. Companies like http://www.climatefriendly.com/ have set up windfarms and you can buy the carbon they are saving. A flight to Sydney and back costs about $16 to be carbon neutral. Go to http://www.climatefriendly.com/individuals.php to calculate how much carbon you use. If you can afford it, go climate neutral.
Buy local: Buy food & goods produced locally wherever possible - this cuts down on the emissions produced from transport. When you move out to the country get solar hot water and tank water. Al Gore talks about tipping points in society, if enough people want change something happens. Write to your local member and ask why we aren't signatories to the Kyoto protocol. Write to John Howard or get Uncle Stuart to run him over.
Unfortunately, there will lots of money to be made exploiting the last of the earths natural resources... to the last fish, to the last plot of arable land and to the last drop of oil.
Adam
At least when you want to swim in our pool in October, it'll be warm!
Seriously though, thanks for your analysis which is scary but likely to come true unless we do something about it. Australia is the world leader in dryland farming, so I'm hopeful that we will be able to respond to what's coming. In the meantime don't believe the gluten-fre crap and eat more grain products.
Ash
You have to be very cautious about quoting from Marx, Grant - particularly when it comes to his ideas about 'changing the world'. (And, yes, I am aware that much of what took place according to his theories might well be viewed as a misinterpretation). This is largely because Marx's conception of society reeks of 'destiny', saying there is an inexorable move towards a pre-determined conclusion. He laboured under what is called the 'poverty of historicism' and could never escape its problems.
The thing that is frightening about this whole environmental issue is that up until quite recently we had two very polarised opinions. One was saying everything was fine and the other exactly the opposite. Now, however, there seems to be a good deal of consensus that something needs to be done, although we are not doomed to a particular outcome; an inevitablity, if you will. The refreshing thing about this turnaround is the plethora of options being explored without the need for dogmatic protocol beyond acquiescing to a realisation that some form of action is a necessity.
When does the Roff Report get back to less serious stuff?
Acknowledging two polarised opinions is all very well, but I’ve always been frustrating by the assumption that the two arguments are equally credible. In the past 10 years we have had an overwhelming majority of the best scientific brains on the planet warning us about the effects of climate change, and a few niche groups that have refuted parts of it. Yet they seem to get equal coverage in the press, as if dissenting crackpots provide editorial balance.
George Bush famously disavowed the existence of human induced climate change not 5 years ago, in spite of the hard evidence provided by the US Chief Scientist. If you won’t listen to your chief scientist about science what the hell are you doing in government?
We are conducting a giant experiment into how long you can treat the atmosphere as a rubbish tip before you choke yourself. We are way past acquiescing to a realisation that some form of action is a necessity. Another degree rise will see the thawing of Siberian tundra, the composition of which will release massive amounts of carbon dioxide. They are talking about ocean currents slowing down with an increase in temperature. This is going to lower the amount of nutrients available to phytoplankton. In the past the have slowed the rate of climate change. It is likely that a drop in production from them will be the equivalent of a massive increase in carbon output. These tipping points are unpredictable but very real.
An inexorable move towards a pre-determined conclusion might be suspect in political science, but atmospheric science is a more precise (though very complex) field. We live in a closed system with finite resources. Despite having little influence in the last 4 million years of human habitation we have gone gangbusters in the last 100, and very few places are left unmodified by humans.
The International Panel on Climate Change is reporting this year after a 4 year cycle and it should make for interesting reading. It is way easier to convince people to take action now that the effects are so immediate. Out of the last 10 years, 8 have been the hottest on record. The very real and tangible effects of climate change are becoming clear.
I know I'm being a bit dogmatic and inflamatory, but it is such a relief. Usually I have to provide a reference for every statement and criticise my own reasoning. I can use "they" all the time here and get away with it.
The good news is, if you drink enough rum, none of it matters!
As an addendum, I am a monkey.
Cant the climate change be more attributed to the movement of the tectonic plates more so than pollution. Australia is continuosly moving north, bearing that in mind, the further north glenn and sue move the closer they get to the equator so yes there are going to get more rain, which in turn will mean more flooding. Of course newcastly is going to get nice and toasty, sadly i dont think there is much we can do about that. Im not doubting that the green house effect is a very real problem, but some things were bound to happen before anybody even dreamt of pollution in a can.
I love a good discussion and you seem incredibly passionate, Adam, so I'm going to keep talking.
My point is simply that there is no definite fate awaiting the earth (read: we are aware of the state the planet is in and can affect change, for good or bad) and that exploring different options with regards to global warming is in many ways sensible. That is not to say that global warming is not a live issue, only to say that being proscriptive about how we go about dealing with the environment is equally dangerous since that limits the debate in much the same way that denying there is a problem limits the debate proper.
Response.
It seems to me as though the two polarised views Daniel mention haven't disappeared - just morphed into something more insidious. Kind of like creationism --> intelligent design.
Where conservative leaders previously denied the problem, they now admit it, but argue that we shouldn't stop polluting, just rely on future technology to make the problem 'go away'. I may be wrong about this, but I think Australia is spending $500 million on 'clean' coal technology so that we can continue to use coal power plants without feeling guilty - while we spent a mere $30 million on research for alternate fuels.
Just as an aside, I've come to the view that overuse of quotation marks in one's writing makes one sound like a 'paranoid whacko'.
I am all for making every effort to save the planet so that Locho has an inhabitable environment to grow up in.
I am also all for involving myself in the discusion as I think that meaningful debate promotes thought and action.
That being said, as soon as Adam, Daniel, Annika and Andrew (and to a lesser extent Harry) get together and start using big words, I am happy to debate the merits of Rum in the other corner of Neils Bar.
.....with Nick
Here's the thing, Daniel: I don't think it's an academic argument anymore. The "invisible hand" of market forces (sorry for the inverted commas, Andrew) proposed by the early capitalists (supply will eventually match demand and, thus, nature balances) didn't envisage a demand that would tax the ability to supply. It's not a case of saying we can go one way or another - we've already done damage that we won't be able to repair in any forseeable future. We're having an election in Victoria soon and the Labor Party is saying rethink how we use water while the Liberal Party is saying we just need bigger dams. That's actually a microcosm of the big picture and it's political, not just environmental, but politics can have significant environmental consequences. Proper humans have been around for maybe 100,000 years but we've only been powerful enough in the last 150 years to negatively affect the environment that nurtured us. I'm with Adam on this: it's no longer about what we say, it's what we do.
Argumentum ad hominum, Adam.
It was meant to just be exageration and not be taken seriously. Don't drink and blog is the lesson.
I'm stuck on the nuclear power debate annika. It's so expensive and no one really knows what to do with high level radioactive waste, so it doesn't sound like a good option. But wind and solar can't provide the base load needed for industry and when we turn everything on in the morning. I suppose combining renewable energy and nuclear power would be the ideal solution for minimising greenhouse gases, the most pressing problem we face, but it's so problematic. I like the quote:
"if nuclear power really is the answer, then we must be asking the wrong question.
Why can't we consider nuclear power? Why can't we consider clean coal technology? Why can't we consider solar power? Why can't we consider wind power? Why can't we investigate a whole raft of ideas? Technology is, in part to blame, but why can't technology also be a part of the solution?
It seems that from the moment man has 'graced' the earth (sorry Andrew) we have had an impact upon it and with time, particularly since the industrial revolution, that impact has become even greater.
However, we cannot undo what has already been done. We can only attempt to minimise what damage we have caused and will, no doubt, inflict in the future, I believe primarily through technological advancement and the investigation of a wide range of ideas. It would be nice to re-evaluate our values - and I personally believe this is of the utmost necessity and ought to be done - but the reality is that this is being optimistic at best.
And nobody questioned Harry's theory. Why? We're both being argumentative. I at least have the decency to deliberately provoke by playing devil's advocate.
You did an excellent job of playing the devils advocate Daniel, thank-you. For my part I’ve been arguing from an extreme position for the sake of debate. I’m actually much more optimistic than I sound here. I'm working on the theory that we need extreme opinions just to drag everyone to a consensus in the middle. I was playing the role of shock jock.
My Grandad and lots of Murray’s worked in the coal industry... Hell, I don’t even have green power, so I am being terribly hypocritical, but after reading the pamphlet I blogged I’m going to look into it and that’s a start. You are totally right about considering al the options and I fully support an open debate in the Australian public on nuclear power. Hopefully, the participants will be more graceful than I have been.
As for Harry’s plate tectonic theory, he’s right. Climate change is primarily caused by plate tectonics and volcanism. They say 50 million years ago the average temperature was similar to todays due to massive volcanic eruptions. However, we’re only moving north at the rate fingernails grow so I think it will take a while for the movement to have an impact.
I have this fantasy about living in rural communities with market gardens, wind farms, and high speed internet access. I hope it happens. Daniel, can I make it up to you by giving you a hand moving in on the weekend? I can spare a morning.
What is going on with the Aussie Cricket Team? Bring back Steve Waugh.
Thanks for the offer, Ad. I didn't check the page again until late Sunday afternoon, by which time I'd already moved my stuff down. It only took half-an-hour. As the old man said, I haven't really taken the time to accumulate anything other than books and CDs.
I visited Amanda's house on the weekend and thought all their water systems were broken. It all works fine, but she and her housemates save every bit of water they use and recycle it - shower water is used to for the toilet (they've taken the lid off the toilet storage container and just pour it in) and there are buckets next to every tap in the house. Amanda doesn't have regular access to this blog so she hasn't been following the debate but their house is setting a fine example.
Great blog, have just enjoyed it all, and am only sorry I missed the removed blog. Relative to Australia, I assure you England are woeful on all matters conservation and environmental, not that relativism is a valid ethical excuse for not looking after our own backyard in Oz...
Watch out, Grant. Your days in the top three are numbered...
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