Back to Basics : Breakthrough Proposals for the Australian Environment [1 ed.] 9781742231839, 9781921410314

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BACK TO BASICS BREAKTHROUGH PROPOSALS FOR THE AUSTRALIAN ENVIRONMENT

Geoff Wescott is an Associate Professor in the School of Life and Environmental Sciences at Deakin University.

BRIEFINGS A series of topical books exploring social, political and cultural issues in contemporary Australia

Back to Basics Breakthrough Proposals for the Australian Environment GEOFF WESCOTT

A UNSW Press book Published by University of New South Wales Press Ltd University of New South Wales Sydney NSW 2052 AUSTRALIA www.unswpress.com.au © Geoff Wescott 2009 This book is copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study, research, criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright Act, no part may be reproduced by any process without written permission. Enquiries should be addressed to the publisher. A Cataloguing-in-Publication entry for this book is available from the National Library of Australia ISBN 978 1 921410 31 4 Cover photograph: Aerial view of the Great Ocean Road near Lorne, Victoria. Rodney Hyett/Lonely Planet Images Printed by Ligare

Contents 1. Introduction

7

2. Nature under siege

13

3. Water: whose problem is it?

32

4. Cities, coasts and community

43

5. Waste not, want not

59

6. Big picture, big solutions

76

Endnotes

91

Acknowledgements

94

Further reading

95

CHAPTER 1

Introduction

W

hat a difference a year makes. Who would have believed that by late 2008, after a decade of climate change denial, Australia would have signed the Kyoto Protocol, received Ross Garnaut’s major report, and appointed two ministers – inside cabinet, for the first time – covering the environment. Environment, or at least environment in the guise of climate change and water, seems to have finally been getting the attention that many people believe it has deserved for years. But is the picture really that rosy? Have any substantial changes in environmental use and abuse occurred yet? Or are we getting window dressing and weasel words in response to popular concern? Australia still runs a dirty, coal-fired electricity sector, for example. The Rudd government’s proposed Emissions Trading Scheme, released in late 2008, demonstrated a continuation of politics based on economics and the estimated power of various groups (industry, unions and conservationists). The ETS did not meet the modest recommendations of the Garnaut Report much less those of environmentalists, but instead attempted to balance the demands of big business and big unions in a political compromise. The Renewable Energy Target scheme announced soon after appears unduly complex and will not offset the “business as usual” thrust of the ETS. 7

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And we have seen environmental revolutions before. During the previous one, in the late 1980s (under Labor, coincidentally), the concept of “ecologically sustainable development” took a temporary hold and excited great hopes for the future. But unfortunately, after the excitement died down, there had been little change. The big lobbyists in the road transport, electricity and agriculture sectors wait for the fuss to die down, support the introduction of some token environmental gestures – low energy light bulbs, voluntary industry guidelines and “codes of conduct” – while energy use per capita and waste-to-landfill continues to grow and environmental deterioration continues. This time the “environmental revolution” will need to be sustained. The environment will always return as an issue – “because it has to,” as Graham Richardson, environment minister in the Hawke government, once said – but we need to avoid some of the pitfalls of previous surges in environmental awareness. This time the concern for the environment must be turned into changes with sustained long-term positive impacts. There is a difference this time: climate change. The problems are more apparent to everyone and the solutions will require concerted long-term action across all society. In particular, the federal government will have to “walk the walk” as well as just “talk the talk”. This will require some significant shifts in its environmental involvement. For example the 2006 State of the Environment Report pointed out that the federal government (the main taxing government in Australia) spends less than half as much on the environment per year than local government and less than one third of what state governments spend.1 Of course a lot of the funds for state governments come from federal government (through the GST agreement and other programs) but most of these are tied to specific areas and functions, such as health and education. Unless the federal government 8

INTRODUCTION

directly expends the money in a particular policy area – the environment, in this case – or passes the money as earmarked funds to a lower tier of government, then that area is starved of funds. This “vertical fiscal imbalance,” as it is called, has worsened in recent years and will need to be rectified if – in this time of renewed environmental interest – the federal government is forced to put its (our) money where its mouth is. The community’s interest in the environment, as distinct from government and media interest, has continued at a relatively high level for nearly twenty years and has entered the mainstream of societal concerns along with health, education and economic matters. But for too long the onus for long-term sustained environmental action in Australia has rested on individual virtuous action – the actions of the small, but not inconsiderable, number of individuals who do all the right things (using bicycles, installing solar powered hot water services and sometimes even solar electricity panels, buying appropriate food, buying hybrid cars…). But it is now time for governments to step up and deliver some breakthrough policies for the environment. Among the plethora of books that have been published in the current resurgence of environmental interest is one titled You Can Save the World – another call for individual virtuous action. The book you’ve just started reading takes a different line: while individual virtuous action to improve the environment is highly desirable and does have a cumulative impact, it is not going to be sufficient to make the quantum improvements in how we deal with our environment. This book will suggest that the greatest individual action you can take is to direct your vote to a political party that has highquality environmental policies. The book’s hypothesis is that you can save the planet for humans if you use your most powerful tool to influence governments to take the kind of major 9

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action that will have significant impacts on environmental quality – if we get back to basics and force governments to govern rather than just avoid upsetting major corporate and sectoral interests. This book will not refer to an “environmental crisis.” Not because the position is not serious but because doom-saying is unlikely to induce the long-term fundamental changes in the way humans interact with our environment. There are very good reasons to be concerned about deterioration in the global environment but panicking people about immediate threats has failed in the past to gain the kind of long-term political commitment required. This is not to underestimate the problems, particularly concerning climate change. Our failure in Australia to lower our per capita greenhouse gas emissions gives permission to countries like India and China (where per capita emissions are much less) to say: Why should we do anything at all? The complex debate about the Rudd government’s Emissions Trading Scheme and the alternatives is continuing as this book goes to press. But it’s worth underlining the fact that the Garnaut report has highlighted the enormous opportunity for Australia’s economic and social future if we embrace the intellectual challenge of climate change to develop and stimulate the 21st century industries, policy processes and frameworks which could truly make Australia an intelligent service-based economy. Such a social, economic and environmental future can be stimulated by rising to the challenge of dealing with humaninduced climate change by using our intellectual capacities and leaving behind environmentally destructive primary industries. We have a long way to go. Not only have governments of all persuasions discouraged environmental improvement by punishing those doing the right thing, but they have rewarded environmental destroyers and even championed and protected 10

INTRODUCTION

them through environmentally destructive legislation and regulation. In Victoria, for example, Alcoa is reported to use between 20 and 25 per cent of the state’s electricity to run its aluminium smelters – electricity produced from brown coal, producing massive amounts of greenhouse gas. Yet Alcoa receives this electricity at a discount rate (less than residential consumers) with a state government discount of between $100 million and $200 million per year.2 Is this the way taxpayers want their dollars spent? This book shows how specific, politically courageous decisions could make far more immediate difference to environmental health than the accumulated self-sacrificing actions of individuals. This is not to say that individuals and groups of individuals should withdraw from positive environmental behaviour; it is to argue that enormous improvements can be made when people realise that the most powerful thing they possess (and polluting and environmentally destructive industries do not) is their vote. If people use their voting power to force government and oppositions to take specific action we will see immediate and sustained improvements in our environment. We owe it to our children and coming generations to behave as “good guests” on this planet – to leave it in at least in as good a state as we found it. At present we are robbing our children and grandchildren of their futures. This book proposes some substantial actions to start to reverse this process. A word on the layout of this book

The chapters which follow cover the major environmental issues of the day (water and pollution, for example), a neglected but vitally important issue (coastal cities, where over 85 per cent of Australians live) and the almost forgotten realm of nature conservation. 11

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In each of these chapters there are four sections. In the first section, the problem is explained briefly. The second section briefly describes the current (usually totally inadequate) way of addressing this problem. The reason that more significant reforms have not been forthcoming – the inhibitions on action – are discussed in the third section. Finally, each chapter includes “breakthrough” solutions to deliver significant gains for the environment. In the final chapter, a series of multi-sector proposals are outlined: these proposals cross over the boundaries of the issues discussed earlier.

12

CHAPTER 2

Nature under siege

N

ature conservation – now there’s something you don’t hear about much anymore, do you? A layperson could only assume that the protection and conservation of Australia’s unique endemic flora and fauna and our stunning sea and landscapes must be perfectly managed in a comprehensive national parks system. Or at least that’s how it might look, given that there is currently so little media or political attention paid to nature conservation in Australia. In this book I have deliberately avoided using terms like crisis and disaster. But when we turn to the state of nature in Australia it is very difficult not to use these terms. It is almost as if nature in Australia has been under siege since the arrival of the first European settlers. The conservation movement cut its teeth in Australia by concentrating primarily on nature conservation issues rather than those associated with pollution and waste – in other words, by concentrating on “green” rather than “brown” issues. The emphasis was on saving large tracts of near pristine natural ecosystems in national parks, with a particular emphasis on old growth forests. Even into the 1990s conservationists with interests beyond forests used to joke ironically about not mentioning the “f ” word (forests) because forestry issues attracted the great13

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est donations and tended to dominate the public debate and the activities of conservation organisations. How dramatically this has changed in such a short time. Nature conservation, now referred to by the much more prosaic and unattractive term “biodiversity conservation,” has not only slipped to the lower end of public interest in an environmental scene dominated by climate change and water, but inside some major conservation organisations themselves, which owe their existence to support for their early nature conservation work, it is also a low priority. The problem

Putting this chapter into context requires a little introductory information. Since European settlement the brunt of human impact has been shared by the Indigenous people of the country and the native – and very distinctive – flora and fauna. In terms of flora and fauna a few facts from the 2006 State of the Environment Report reveal the current diabolical position. Australia’s land mass can be divided up on an ecological basis into 85 bio-regions. In 33 of these regions almost a third of ecosystems are threatened. Wetlands (swamps, marshes, estuaries and so on) have suffered under the combination of drought and over-allocation of water resources. In general, wetlands in the north of the country are in a good state while those in the south are under greater stress. Over a quarter (27 per cent, or 231 out of a total of 851) of wetlands of national importance are under ecological pressure. For birds that need regularly flooded wetlands the figures are alarming. Overall average bird numbers have fallen in eastern Australian wetlands from 1.1 million in 1983 to 0.2 million in 2004 – an 80 per cent decrease in two decades. Frog species are struggling: four species are extinct, fifteen species are endan14

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gered, twelve are listed as vulnerable. In other words, 14 per cent of the species of this important group are threatened. In terms of changes in area of key vegetation types since European settlement the figures for some species seem quite good. For example, Acacia (wattle) scrublands cover 98.3 per cent of the area they covered pre-1750. But others are much less impressive: only 65.8 per cent of rainforest has survived – and less than 10 per cent of coastal rainforests of northern New South Wales – and 65.5 per cent of eucalypt woodlands. But even these figures disguise much more disturbing features. For example, the quality (rather than the quantity) of arid vegetation types (including Acacia scrublands) has been severely compromised by cattle and sheep grazing and a significant loss in riverside (riparian) vegetation. In fact, more than half (56 per cent) of Australia’s riparian vegetation has disappeared. When we turn to the most densely populated and most cleared state, Victoria, some figures are simply shocking. Overall, more than 70 per cent of Victoria’s native vegetation has been cleared since European settlement. Eighty-four per cent of the very beautiful box ironbark woodlands has gone. Despite this figure, it was not until after 2000 that a series of national parks were established to begin to protect the remaining areas. Local interests wishing to maintain access for fire wood, fence posts, grazing and mining had successfully opposed their protection in secure reserves until then. But the most dramatic figures concern native grasslands in temperate Australia. Of the 5.8 million hectares across the countryside in 1750 a staggering 98 per cent or more has been cleared. Yet native grasslands have continued to be destroyed in Melbourne within the last five years – for a freeway in the north and industrial warehouse development in the western suburbs. Elsewhere in the country – in case readers think that clearing native vegetation is a thing of the past – 17 million hectares 15

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of forests has been cleared since 1973, with 1.5 million hectares deforested between 2001 and 2004. The marine environment is less well known to the general community but we have an enormous number of species in our northern waters and a staggering number of endemic species (species found nowhere else) in our southern waters. Here the figures on protection in reserves, particularly in coastal waters, are dismayingly low. Victoria boasts that placing 5 per cent of coastal waters in “no take” protected areas is a great achievement, yet the state possesses no marine planning system at all and the vast majority of the other 95 per cent is there for open slather. The 5 per cent reservation compares highly unfavourably with Victoria’s terrestrial reserve system, where over 25 per cent of all land is in parks and reserves and 35 per cent of public land is reserved. Why then would Victoria brag about such a minor achievement? Because, with the exception of Queensland’s Great Barrier Reef Marine Park (30+ per cent in “no take” zones), Victoria’s 5 per cent is better than other states. Given that the global target for highly protected Marine Protected Areas is 20 per cent by 2012, it is not hard to see how poor Australia’s marine conservation efforts have been. Terrestrial reservation of specific types of plant communities varies considerably as well. While a substantial percentage of Australia’s remaining rainforests (54.4 per cent), heathlands (44 per cent), mallee shrublands (36.8 per cent), low open eucalypt forests (35.1 per cent) and tall open eucalypt forests (33.6 per cent, but often re-growth) are reserved, the figures are far less impressive for eucalypt woodlands (8.1 per cent), native pine forests (6.1 per cent) and tussock grasslands (3.0 per cent). These data make it very clear indeed that in Australia in 2009 nature remains under siege. A chapter on nature conservation could therefore be expected to start with a discussion of Australia’s protected area 16

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system – its national parks and conservation reserves – perhaps with a comparison to similar countries. This might be followed by a discussion of which habitats and species are underrepresented within the protected area system. A source for such data might be a national agency and/or a parliamentary inquiry if there is an overlap in state and federal government roles. Under the constitution, protected area management in Australia is a state and territory government responsibility (our “national” parks are actually state-declared parks, unlike the rest of the world’s national parks), so you might reasonably expect a substantial federal government coordinating role based on solid data and a parliamentary inquiry or two digging out other data. In fact there have been parliamentary inquiries in recent years, with the most recent being in 2006–07.3 What was its main finding? It could not produce a comprehensive data base on what was in the protected area system (and consequently what was not) and certainly could not locate or produce any reliable data on the funding and staffing of our national reserve system. The committee recommended that all states and territories publish annually comprehensive information in a “national consistent form.” The fact that this national data is not available, over a century after federation, is a disgrace. One would expect the national conservation groups to be onto this major issue. But unfortunately the non-government conservation organisations have evolved to reflect the government bureaucracies so there is little or no focus among state-based national parks associations on the national picture and most national NGOs are focused on climate change, sustainability and “brown” issues. But biodiversity is not confined to public land (parks) – it also exists on private land. If the war against the destruction of Australia’s nature is to be won then the last and crucial battleground will be marginal farm land – the areas of land that 17

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probably always lacked the “land capability,” as it is technically termed, to be used for farming and which are now clearly not economically or environmentally sustainable. One hopes, though, that a solution can be found (see below) whereby the people in these communities will be able to continue to live on this land and remain in their local communities while enhancing biodiversity. The current response

Although reliable current figures on the funding of our national parks system do not exist, past data provide some insight into how precarious our management of these important areas is. (These are vital economic areas as well, given that many overseas tourists visit Australia to see parks including Kakadu, Uluru, the Great Barrier Reef and Port Campbell.) A brief review of the patchy historic data reveals how difficult it is to assess the state of our national park and conservation reserve systems. In the early 1990s I calculated that, with a similar sized national park system to the United States and Canada (both of which are federations with similar per capita visitation rates), Australia spent a quarter as much on its national parks as similar sized Canada did and employed less than half the staff. The equivalent figures in comparison to the United States were 10 per cent and 14 per cent.4 The 2007 Senate report cited figures from the World Conservation Union in 1999 which revealed the expenditure on protected areas in the three nations shown in Table 1.5 According to the report, the average amount spent per hectare on managing protected areas in developed countries was $20.58, putting both Canada and particularly Australia well below their counterparts. In other words, Australia spends less than one fifth of the average spent by other developed nations on its national parks and protected areas. Yet we have a precious and internationally 18

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TABLE 1: EXPENDITURE ON PROTECTED AREAS Dollars spent per hectare Australia $3.59 Canada $10.17 United States $23.58 As percentage of developed country average Australia 17.4 per cent Canada 49.4 per cent United States 114.5 per cent Source: See endnote 5

significant asset to protect: according to the UN’s World Conservation Monitoring Centre, Australia is one of only seventeen “megadiverse” nations on Earth and the only developed country in the world with a “megadiverse” flora and fauna (and the only one with tropical rainforests). Australia also has 10 per cent of the world’s biodiversity (80 per cent of it native to this country).6 And yet we spend only $3.59 per hectare on protecting it. Over the past fifteen years nature conservation policy has been dominated by the views and prejudices of the agricultural lobby: farmers, the National Party and large agricultural corporations. Although it is referred to as part of the “natural resource management system,” nature is far more than a natural resource. Now biodiversity conservation faces the danger of being overrun by climate change as a surrogate for “environment.” If this is to be reversed there will need to be greater emphasis in the future on concepts such as ecological services, ecological processes and ecological resilience. Ecological services refers to the value natural and seminatural ecosystems provide to humans. These services include 19

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clean, reliable water, genetic diversity that may prove a useful source for human medicines in the future (as it has in the past), the aesthetic quality of natural land and sea, the potential mental health benefits of time spent in natural areas (the message of the Healthy Parks, Healthy People scheme) and the recreational (including tourism) value of natural areas. Ecological processes are the processes that operate to ensure natural and semi-natural systems continue to function effectively. They include nutrient recycling and energy flows (through photosynthesis), but also responses to fire, drought and the impacts of introduced pest plants and animals. If natural processes can be maintained then the ecosystems will look after themselves rather than requiring the considerable human intervention needed when a species within the system is threatened and has to be specifically conserved. Finally, ecological resilience refers to a healthy functioning ecosystem being able to resist and work through threats to its viability, again without needing the expensive contributions we see now when a system is threatened, when we must intervene to replant considerable areas of lost habitat, for example. What’s stopping significant reforms?

Under the federal constitution eight jurisdictions have a role in nature conservation in Australia, with the state and territory governments having the primary role. So while nature does not recognise state borders the laws covering nature treat them as solid barriers. The dominant theme in environmental policy in Australia has been state–federal government relationships – not the state of the natural environment.7 Politics has dominated over ecology. Our nature conservation performance is also limited by some fundamental attitudinal and cultural inhibitions. Australians have a perception of themselves, at least in literature and art, of living 20

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in a wide, sunburnt country where people battle the hostile elements. Nature is a foe to be tamed, subdued and finally beaten. Despite our best efforts, the landscape, droughts, floods and bushfires have not been tamed – they are forces of nature beyond human control, as we were tragically reminded in February 2009 – but the flora and fauna have received a real beating. The community’s response to nature has been the same since European arrival: stay in the cities along the south eastern sea board (or live on the veranda of a vast and spacious house, as the writer Philip Drew has put it). So we have 85 per cent of the population huddled on the urban edges of a vast continent, venturing inland only for occasional visits. The remaining 15 per cent, those brave enough to live away from the coast, have been effectively given carte blanche to plan and manage this vast landscape – and native flora and fauna have suffered away from the urban spotlight ever since. The inland dwellers even created their own political party to look after their interests (the only long-term narrowly based party in the country’s history, formerly the Country Party, now the National Party). Politically, the urban–rural divide was highlighted by the defeat of the Melbourne-centric Kennett government in Victoria in 1999. Labor won provincial seats, some of which it had never held before, but did not win all the outer urban seats that are considered the route to government. Other governments across the country sat up and took notice. To protect federal Coalition seats in rural and regional areas, the Howard government switched resources to the Natural Heritage Trust, whose funds were then (under)spent on purely rural projects in the regions, bypassing the state Labor governments. Alongside this process, the concept of natural resources management became a substitute for nature protection. State environment ministries were downgraded throughout the 21

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country and primary industry, agriculture, forestry and fisheries agencies were in the ascendancy as state governments “followed the money” from federal grants. Breakthrough solutions

The move towards habitat protection, primarily through the establishment of large protected areas over the past twenty years, has been welcome. While we need to maintain these efforts, the new horizon is the protection of ecological processes. If we can establish the circumstances in which these processes are allowed to operate in a healthy, efficient and sustainable manner then ecosystems will function adequately with limited extra human intervention. The habitats and the individual species that live in them will then thrive and we humans will not have to do what we try to do now – intervene to protect a particular species at great cost. The Victoria Naturally project, for example, has recommended that the focus must shift to protecting and enhancing ecological processes rather than maintaining a focus on species and to a lesser extent habitats.8 Our current efforts to save the Tasmanian Devil from a cancerous attack are a good example of what we’re forced to do when an ecological system goes badly awry. To put it in another way, efforts to maintain species and habitats in the absence of protection of ecological processes may prove fruitless. So maintaining and enhancing ecological processes is an economically as well as ecologically efficient objective. But managing ecological processes can be complex. Various programs across the country (notably the Wild Country program) have attempted to address the loss of biodiversity within the agricultural landscapes of Australia. But a combination of long-term drought, a fear of alienating rural electorates and a lack of community interest has seen a deterioration in biodiversity not only on private agricultural land but 22

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also on public land and even in protected areas such as national and state parks. If some parts of rural Australia are to be used sustainably over the long term (it is impossible for all existing agricultural land to be used sustainably – the soil quality is insufficient, the economic returns too low and the rainfall too unreliable) then more attention needs to be paid to maintaining and enhancing biodiversity in these landscapes. The following recommendations owe a great deal to the Victoria Naturally Project, in which I played a role, which has been examining policy mechanisms for protecting ecological processes. This effort will protect ecological processes: • by providing genuine physical connectivity between substantial parcels of natural or near-natural land and sea in which ecological processes are able to continue in as close as practical terms at natural rates (letting nature take its course); • by specifically addressing the processes, actions, excesses of humans that threaten to derail or to interfere substantially with ecological processes. The following recommendations attempt to combine these actions in a substantial but achievable way across all land and sea types and, when they affect private land, in a manner which reflects true ecological sustainable development principles by being socially sustainable as well. Strategic revegetation of Australia: This would involve a bold national-scale program of revegetation to enhance nature conservation and aid biosequestration of carbon. In essence, it would “scale up” revegetation projects, beginning with a series of revegetation programs designed to be highly visible to the general community, capturing their interest in becoming involved in indigenous revegetation and generating support for large-scale model projects (see also Chapter 6). 23

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A project of this kind is already underway in south eastern Australia. Habitat 141 (the 141 refers to the line of longitude), “connecting the outback to the ocean,” is an attempt to restore and reconnect the distinctive landscapes that lie along the South Australia–Victoria border. The initiative is driven by Greening Australia and will connect the Murray River red gum woodlands in the north through the heathlands and mallee areas of the Murray Sunset country to the Big Desert, Wyperfeld, Little Desert and Grampians National Parks, and then to the ocean in the Coorong region. Project Hindmarsh is part of this grand vision. Now in its tenth year, it has linked the Big and Little Deserts in western Victoria by restoring more than 2000 km of roadside vegetation and planting more than 1.5 million trees and shrubs. This project was started by the local Landcare group and is strongly supported by local and Melbourne-based groups, giving it the added benefit of bringing together local communities and city people at annual planting days. Similar north–south corridors could be developed across Australia. These are essential for maintaining species in a time of climate change by allowing migration from north to south. Habitat 146 could sweep from Wilsons Promontory and Bass Strait islands through the Strzeleckis, picking up the Southern Ark project into the Alps, then linking with the Eastern Escarpment project, which goes to Brisbane and beyond. The Eastern Escarpment project, an initiative of the Wilderness Society (through its Wild Country project) and other groups, proposes a continuous link of native vegetation from Brisbane to Melbourne along the eastern highlands. Significant areas of the highlands are already in national parks and conservation reserves and this project would link them into a continuous horizon of native vegetation. Similar projects are being developed in other parts of Australia. In the more highly populated south western corner of 24

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Western Australia – which is recognised internationally as a biodiversity “hot spot” – is Gondwana Link. The Alps to Atherton project is mainly in New South Wales and Queensland but also extends into Victoria. Kosciuszko to the Coast is in New South Wales and Naturelinks in South Australia. From the United States comes a related scheme that could readily be adopted in Australia: the Parkway concept.9 Australian Parkways could be inspired by South Africa’s grand-scale Parkdrive concept, which links their major tourist national parks with roadsides re-vegetated with indigenous species. A Parkway is not only a road but also its roadside vegetation, which is designed for maximum enjoyment of the natural environment by the road user. It is intended to be driven along slowly and has frequent pull-offs to allow first hand enjoyment of natural areas. It is the opposite of an urban freeway: the roadside is planted up with indigenous vegetation, providing a natural corridor for native flora and fauna, the road follows the topography, the speed limit is lower (to avoid injuring native animals as well as preserving the “scenic drive” experience) and there are restrictions on vehicle types. The economic and social attraction of the concept is that tourists are assisted in planning their trips between the national parks along these picturesque routes and are encouraged to stay in local towns along the way and hence boost local economies. Nationalise national parks: The management of Australia’s national parks, the cornerstone of protection of our unique landscapes, seascapes and flora and fauna, has been totally inadequate. This is mainly due to the management having to been funded by state and territory governments. The solution is to nationalise funding of our most important and significant parks – a point we’ll return to in Chapter 6. A land stewardship (or ranger) scheme: The objective of this scheme would be to refocus the management of marginal agri25

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cultural land while keeping local people on the land. It would combine carbon capture (or “biosequestration”) and nature conservation enhancement by creating sustainable land use based on indigenous local species. Rural communities would be sustained, land returned to native vegetation, greenhouse gases captured, and weed and pests problems reduced. (By contrast, weeds and pests would proliferate if farmers walked off the land, which will become the only other alternative in marginal farming areas if current conditions continue.) Plantings (of truly sustainable “crops”) under such a scheme could include broom brush (Melaleuca) cultivation, eucalyptus oil production, and hardwood production for house foundations, fence posts etc. Native species could also be cultivated for flower production and for the raising of indigenous species as meat substitutes for sheep and cattle (see below). Further details on the role of biosequestration are given in the final report of the Garnaut Review.10 Private land reform and connectivity: Since the major Focus on Farm Trees conference in 1980 a series of excellent private land initiatives have evolved. These include well developed projects across the country relying on the market-based initiatives that prospered under the Howard government and its farmfocused Natural Heritage Trust funds. Other incentives should include providing rate reductions and other incentives for rural land holders to protect ecological processes and rehabilitate their land. Readers might be surprised to learn that the farmer who chooses to keep a piece of remnant vegetation on their farm or to maintain a wetland area for birds (and hence lose income from that part of their land) still has to pay local council rates for that land as if it were yielding an income. While there are grants available for fencing and other measures to protect habitat on private land, a person who 26

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chooses to purchase and pay for the upkeep of a parcel of land being rehabilitated and protected for biodiversity also pays full rates. On top of that, because the land is not producing an income they can’t claim a tax deduction for the costs of protecting the land. In other words, the person contributing to long-term environmental improvement finds themselves in a worse financial position for doing so. While local councils do not have the finances to grant significant rate rebates the federal and state governments certainly have the capacity to compensate the local council for lost revenue if a rate rebate scheme was introduced. The use of private land covenants also needs further encouragement from governments, as do measures to access large potential amounts of capital from urban conservationists to protect and repair rural land. Superannuation funds could play a key role in generating funds for revegetation. The Victorian government scheme VicSuper, for example, has been buying properties with water rights attached, consolidating the properties and releasing some water rights to environmental flows. The fund then on-sells the consolidated property (at a profit to the investors and a gain for the environment). Bridging the divide: At present the divide between the treatment of public land and private land is almost absolute. By and large private citizens on private land have been allowed to manage the land – even if they do so in an environmentally destructive manner – as they see fit. The loss of species and communities and the alteration of ecological processes has been seen as a “public problem” to be solved by taxpapers on public land, usually through the declaration of parks and protected areas. But if ecological processes are to be protected this rigid boundary needs to be softened. One way of doing this would be to develop a new land use category with the objective of “protecting ecological 27

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processes while being capable of providing a sustainable use,” which could be continuous between public and private land. A second new category, “conservation and rehabilitating land,” where nature conservation is the prime objective but rehabilitation is needed, could also help bridge the gap. This latter category could take in Trust for Nature and other conservation network properties as well as projects to revegetate timber production areas. “Natural infrastructure”: Large-scale infrastructure investments by governments have always focused on physical infrastructure: roads, buildings and so on. We need a shift in thinking so that investment in natural areas is seen as infrastructure investment, which would provide the opportunity to scale up nature-based projects from a million dollars here or there to hundreds of millions – in other words, operating at the scale of all other major areas of government. Natural infrastructure would include large-scale revegetation projects and projects devoted to meeting multiple objectives – for example, the proposed land stewardship schemes mentioned above. Establishing this scheme, possibly through intensive infrastructure spending in a range of pilot areas, would have immediate employment benefits in regional areas, alongside the environmental benefits of sequestering carbon and enhancing native vegetation, the social benefits of maintaining people on the land and the economic benefits arising from the maintenance of local regional communities. A series of subsidiary actions would significantly enhance biodiversity by addressing some of the threats to establishing and maintain healthy and resilient ecological processes. First, we need to halt all new landclearing. At a time when we are trying to sequester carbon to reduce carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, removing vegetation is simply stupid. And 28

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there is also, of course, a strong case for no further land clearing for biodiversity conservation reasons. Second, we need to halt harvesting of “old growth” (over 100-year-old) forest. These forests are vital areas for nature conservation habitat and important protectors of water supplies (old forests use far less water than young forests). Third, we need to remove cattle and sheep from the arid inland and “harvest” kangaroos instead. The hard hoofed imported animals (cattle and sheep) have damaged inland arid ecosystems and use water that could better be applied to other purposes. Kangaroos, harvested humanely, provide healthy meat and are part of the natural system. The final Garnaut Report points out that if beef cattle were reduced by seven million head and sheep by 36 million the kangaroo population could increase from 34 million to 240 million by 2020. If 175 million of them could be harvested each year kangaroo would replace the meat production lost from cattle and sheep. This would be economically viable when the emissions trading price exceeded $40 per tonne of carbon dioxide and would produce a net reduction in carbon equivalents of 16 Mt per year.11 Even if these ambitious targets could not be met a movement in this direction would have significant benefits. Not only would the replacement of sheep and cows with native wildlife in Australian marginal farmland have a nature conservation benefit it would also have a very significant emissions benefit. New methods for controlling introduced species: The largescale introduction of exotic plant and animal species has had a significant negative impact on both commodity based land and natural areas. Although some of these species were accidentally introduced, others resulted from the deliberate introduction and dispersal of pests through what were called Acclimatisation Societies. These societies were established to “acclimatise” 29

BACK TO BASICS

English plants and animals for the enjoyment and benefit of the European settlers in Australia. They engaged in everything from spreading blackberries (to provide food in remote areas) to the infamous introduction of rabbits for sporting purposes. In Australia’s climate species that would “die back” each winter in their harsher native lands (blackberries and rabbits, for example) thrived through winter. In many cases their natural predators or diseases were absent and so they reproduced without restriction. And then, of course, there were the introduced predators – cats, dogs and foxes in particular – which are able to prey on native species (particularly small marsupials and ground nesting birds) which had no evolutionary defence against these animals. We will not be able to eradicate these species, but we can reduce their impact by strategic and concerted long-term management regimes. The blame game – “feral species are breeding in national parks then devastating farmland” – does not assist in eradicating or even controlling pest plants and animals. Controlling these organisms means transcending private–public land boundaries and must involve joint operations and joint funding from public land managers and private land holders. The benefits of reduced pest plants and animals will spread across private and public land holders. The opportunity here is similar to the early stages of the development of Landcare. The formation and power of Landcare came when traditional antagonists, conservationists and farmers, who had allowed governments to ignore the issues of habitat and tree loss and salinity by fighting against each other, banded together and created a community movement that governments could not ignore. The groups received government assistance to replant indigenous vegetation and fence off existing remnants across the countryside. The same coalition is critical to force governments to fund integrated, long-term pest 30

NATURE UNDER SIEGE

control programs that would benefit biodiversity and primary production simultaneously. • Nature in Australia has truly been under siege over the last 200 years. The impact on the land and seascape and the native flora and fauna has been immense. While national parks and conservation reserves have acted as the cornerstone of attempts to protect our natural heritage, they are still small in number and area (by comparison with other land uses) and the quantity and quality of management varies across the eight jurisdictions. The agencies who attempt to protect these last bastions of nature are grossly under-funded and under-staffed and too often the parks and reserves are seen as being primarily for tourists rather than nature conservation. But even greater threats and a greater need for action exist on other lands and seas. Only when we start to plan and manage for the whole of the landscape and seascape and ignore the human boundaries – state jurisdictions, public–private land divides and the land–sea boundary – will we be able to protect and enhance the underlying ecological processes which sustain a healthy (and productive) natural system.

31

CHAPTER 3

Water: whose problem is it?

A

longside climate change, water – and the politics of water use and abuse – has become the defining environmental issue in Australia. While climate change dominated during 2008, the two issues are obviously closely connected, so it is unlikely that “water” will relinquish its centrality as an issue in the near future – unless some dramatic action is finally taken by governments. The reasons for this have been analysed in many excellent books and reports.12 Water shortages and distribution issues will continue to be critical across the globe for many years to come. Australia is not alone in this respect. But because Australia is as an island nation we have total control over the water that falls on our land mass – unlike the many other nations that are reliant on countries upstream for the quantity and quality of the water they receive. This provides us with a great opportunity, but one we have culpably failed to act on. Back in 1994, as a result of the National Strategy for Ecologically Sustainable Development, a water reform program was agreed upon by the Council of Australian Governments. By 2004 implementation had been so slow that a National Water Initiative was created to accelerate reform. A strong driver of the 1994 program was concern over the increase in both dryland 32

WATER: WHOSE PROBLEM IS IT?

and irrigation-induced salinity in the Murray Darling Basin. This was the setting in which the Landcare movement arose in the 1980s: misuse of water was spoiling the environment. The misuse continues to be a major political issue, but has been further highlighted by a long-term drought and the overarching threat of human-induced climate change. The problem

The problem here is a combination of factors: a long-term drought laid over the climate change background and the fact that a rurally based problem is dealt with as if it is the fault of people who live in the city. Cause, effect and solutions have been wilfully confused by politics and prejudice. Most of us heard a lot about water in Australia as we were growing up. We live on the driest continent in the world (except for Antarctica); most of Australia is true desert; the rainfall of a city such as Melbourne is very low compared to other cities of comparable size around the world. A lot of these broad brush comments are true, but something strange happens in Australia once you start talking about water. Very early the discussion is side tracked into cul de sacs of partisan political debate – “our thirsty cities,” “cities stealing country water” or, more recently, state governments as “incompetent water managers” (from members of a political party that certainly knows the meaning of incompetent water management). Every Australian knows that we live on a dry continent and that water is one of our scarcest resources. One of the reasons for this state of affairs is that politicians have tended to think about water only in economic terms – that fixing water is about bringing the “market” into the picture. Given this economic preoccupation it’s surprising that we still don’t reliably know how much water we use and we can’t accurately measure how much water flows on to irrigated farms. 33

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Despite the much heralded and marketed National Water Initiative, independent observers such as the Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists and the environmental historian Daniel Connell highlight the lack of progress in implementing the most basic of reforms.13 As the Wentworth Group stated: “Very few rivers are properly monitored, allowing emotion and conflict to dominate water planning, not good science. Effective monitoring underpins effective accounting – you can’t have one without the other.”14 The key to improving the environment in terms of water, riverine and estuarine systems is to understand where the water extracted for human use from the natural system actually goes. The 2006 State of Environment Report provides water consumption figures for 2000–01, with a slightly different breakdown, for 2004–05, appearing in the National Water Commission’s Australian Water Resources 2005 (see Table 2). The headlines are usually about “city stealing country water” but the reality is quite different. The vast majority of water used in Australia (over two thirds) is used for agriculture – dairy farming, fruit crops, wine, rice and cotton growing. In 2004–05, a year when cotton and rice were reduced due to drought, the breakdown of where the agricultural water use went had livestock/pastures/grain using 36 per cent, dairy farming using 19 per cent, cotton 15 per cent and sugar 10 per cent. These patterns raise the question of whether a dry continent such as Australia should be involved in such water intensive export industries as rice and cotton In these cases we are basically exporting water – often to countries with no water supply issues. Very little of the total volume of water (around 11 per cent) is used by ordinary householders. The remainder is used by various industries and infrastructure suppliers, some of which have recorded significant increases in recent times (mining water use was up 29 per cent between 2000–01 and 2004–05). 34

WATER: WHOSE PROBLEM IS IT?

TABLE 2: BREAKDOWN OF WATER CONSUMPTION, 2004–05 Agriculture

65 per cent

Households

11 per cent

Water supply industry

11 per cent

Other industries (including electricity and gas)

7.4 per cent

Manufacturing

3 per cent

Mining

2 per cent

Source: See endnote 15

Put another way: one quarter of all agricultural production in Australia use two thirds of all the water used in Australia (and these figures were for a year in which rice and cotton consumption was vastly reduced). The impact of this massive use of water for agriculture in a dry continent is environmental damage on a grand scale and lack of water for environmental flows for nature conservation, indigenous concerns, salinity control etc. The problem is that there are some huge users of water in Australia. The big ones are on the border of Southeast Queensland who are rich and powerful, and there are some substantial political groups involved as well. This is a politically powerful combination – money and influence matched against strategically placed electors. Water politics means that it is very hard for logic, rationality and environmental responsibility to break through… but it must! The bottom line is that we will have less water over time with climate change (even if the southern drought ends) but we have over-committed the water we already had and we are not sure where and who is using the water even now. 35

BACK TO BASICS

The current response

How have governments reacted to this problem? First, they’ve transferred blame to avoid confronting the real culprits, by going along with the claim that city dwellers are using “country” water. Yet, in Melbourne, for example, a 10 per cent reduction in water use would reduce the state’s total consumption by less than 1 per cent. The equivalent saving in irrigation would yield 7 per cent – a seven times greater benefit.16 When bashing the city started to lose its effectiveness as a political weapon the federal government began blaming the states for the problem. What is really behind the problem? Water has been sold by governments to cotton and rice growers, for example, at far too low a price; in some cases more water has been sold by state governments (particularly New South Wales and Queensland) than actually exists. The environment and all other water users including those in the cities are paying for this mistake. These issues are politically complex and are further confused by the misleading pronouncements of the lobby groups whose members benefit from the current over-allocation of water resources. These groups know that if the wider community was aware of the wastage of water on crops which are of questionable total national value it would compel politicians to act in the overall national interest. The solution offered by those involved in the water industry is to buy back water from these users. Just reflect for a moment on what that really means: publicly owned water was virtually given away as “entitlements,” some of the users then “banked” the water in their massive storage areas – robbing inland rivers of their life blood, ruining ecosystems that took millions of year to evolve – and the solution to this is for taxpayers to buy our water back at much higher prices? The Australian environment is being ruined, taxpayers have been robbed, politicians have made extraordinarily bad deci36

WATER: WHOSE PROBLEM IS IT?

sions and the media has, by and large, gone along for the ride. The complexity is certainly confusing, but it is the politics that stands in the way of action. Breakthrough solutions

Water has been examined in such detail over such a long period of time (particularly the Murray Darling basin and particularly well by the Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists) that the management actions required to restore our rivers and streams are well known. The Wentworth Group’s overall conclusion in 2006 was: “We need to stop blaming each other, take a deep breath and get on with it.”17 The five key initiatives recommended by the Group are a good starting point (progress in implementation is indicated for each point): • Buy water for the environment (from anyone who will sell it) so as to secure our over stretched river systems. (The Rudd government has started to do this and should be encouraged to keep it up.) • Regulate to offset further water losses caused by timber plantations, farm dams, groundwater use and water efficiency. (There has been little progress so far due to the complexity of state and local government roles.) • Build a National Water Account to find out where our water is, who is using it and what condition it is in. (This is continuing far too slowly.) • Apply the same environmental, market and price disciplines to everyone so that all users pay the full cost of water including the cost of addressing environmental impacts (my emphasis). (There has been little progress on this approach.) • Accept that desalination, potable re-use, recycling and urban–rural trade are all legitimate options for our coastal cities and often better options than building new dams and 37

BACK TO BASICS

damaging more coastal rivers. (Governments have certainly switched their focus from dams to other “solutions” but their analysis of environmental impacts has been inadequate.) The last point requires considerably more debate – particularly concerning desalination plants which produce very substantial marine pollution and use enormous quantities of energy. These actions may be easier to achieve when the drought in southern Australia finally ends (it is difficult to discuss such an emotive issue when a scarce resource is at its lowest availability), although stream flows will probably be significantly reduced for some time. But there can be no further delay in federal action; we must have a national response immediately. In addition to the Wentworth proposals a number of other actions would improve water conservation in Australia: A set water allocation per household (urban and rural) with penalties for profligacy: Most water agencies in the country charge for water at staged tariff levels – for example, a certain minimal amount for the first set amount of water used, then an increased per litre rate for the next set amount. Then, when there is a need to reduce use, they apply across-the-board restrictions on certain types of uses within certain hours. These restrictions ignore the water users’ specific water use distribution. If the agency was instead to determine the total water use it needed to achieve, it could announce a per person (and hence per household) allocation. (Brisbane and now Melbourne have commenced this approach.) It could then enforce very strong penalties (including decreasing the rate of flow of water) for use above this figure. The benefit is it allows the consumer to determine how and where they use their water allocation. In terms of penalties for over-use, speeding fines can be used as a model. In the past some people drove over the speed limit 38

WATER: WHOSE PROBLEM IS IT?

and parked anywhere they liked because the fine had little impact on them. Penalty points overcame this problem: regardless of how wealthy you are, you lose your licence automatically once you accumulate a certain number of points. Similar penalties – fines and points – need to be introduced into water use. Simply increasing the price of water in different categories of use has little impact on wealthy, large-scale users (and severely affects less well-off families) so the penalties need to have real teeth and an educational component. If a householder exceeds an allocated amount, the fine would be waived if they sought advice and took actions to permanently reduce excessive usage. But if the person is a recalcitrant offender then stronger measures would be needed. For example, it is possible for water authorities to decrease the flow rate of water to a particular house. This provides the bonus of being very annoying (a real penalty) and serves as a reminder of the the offence every time the user turns the tap on. (This is similar to putting a speed limiting transponder on a vehicle). The fines and penalties from the overuse of water should be re-invested in buying water back for environmental purposes. Restoration of long-term environmental educational and capacity building programs: Over the past decade “water education programs” have tended to mean short, expensive advertising campaigns in the media. (Ironically, these are called “splash” campaigns in the industry.) The media itself has a huge vested interest in encouraging this form of campaign: advertisements placed are revenue in the bank, compliments of taxpayers. An unholy alliance of politicians and the media (and advertising agencies) has meant that money has been diverted from long-term, well planned educational campaigns. Every water bill should have a water conservation education levy component in it as well as an infrastructure investment amount. Not 39

BACK TO BASICS

only should we be paying for the amount of water we use but we should also be contributing to investment in water infrastructure and investment in long-term educational programs that reduce water use over time. These levies would be based on usage so heavy water users would contribute more. Meter all water to all users: All users should pay for what they actually use (apart from any bonus they yield from harvesting rain which falls on their properties). At present, different users are monitored differently – a city residential user, for example, has every litre measured while an irrigator may be allowed simply to estimate their use of water. We cannot hope to use water efficiently if we do not know where it is going, who is using it and for what purpose. We need to meter all water use for all users, with the cost of the meter and its reading factored into the litre-by-litre charge. There’s really no convincing argument against this proposal. The system would have a designated starting date with no retrospective excess charges, so if a person has been underestimating or adjusting their usage in the past they will not face any charges – but they will pay for all the water they use from the designated date. Charge all water equally: Currently there is a multiplicity of different rates charged to different classes of users. A more transparent and less complicated system would encourage community awareness of water usage and conservation and also slowly remove the blame game which dominates so much of current public water policy. Irrigators and industry users could initially argue for a rate for their water use which was less than householders, based on the “public benefit” of their industry and the efficiency of water use in their industry or sector. But it would be hard to argue for more than one or two different tariffs across the whole community. Unless disincentives 40

WATER: WHOSE PROBLEM IS IT?

are built into water use, waste is encouraged and innovation stifled. To give one example. Anyone passing a power station will see that water cooling towers are used to recycle some water, which is then used to drive the electricity generating turbines. But they will also note the clouds of water vapour rising from the water towers all day every day. A higher water tariff would encourage a greater effort to recapture this water and also provide an incentive for the power station to seek other sources for its water (from industries nearby, for example, or by recycling grey water from consumers). Using a transparent, simplified tariff system will encourage innovation among the big users and provide incentives to conserve among smaller users. Fair trade: If water is to be traded as a commodity, as the economists have forced upon us, then make it a truly open market. For example, allow city dwellers and environmentalists to trade water for environmental purposes. A conservation group might purchase water from an irrigator who does not require it and then release their purchased water to the environment (or leave it in the river rather than extracting it in the first place). Transparency: Finally, all water tariffs and water user data should be made available for viewing on the internet. Transparency is critical in water use in Australia. Blame shifting has poisoned the water use debate, so let’s have the figures out there for all to see. • Water is a major environmental, social and economic issue across the globe in the 21st century. In Australia the major issue with water use is the distribution of the water available in such a dry (and getting dryer) continent. Who should be allocated the 41

BACK TO BASICS

water? By whom? On what basis? Making these decisions requires a considered process with clear policy objectives. As a nation Australia would be foolish to continue with the historical water allocation that has brought the Murray Darling Basin and other areas to their current parlous state. We would be just as foolish to encourage and to continue to subsidise agricultural production for the export of products which can be grown more sustainably elsewhere in the world and which, in effect, involves exporting the water that our rivers and other agricultural industries need desperately. The time has come in water policy to stop the blame game and focus on the delivery of the National Water Initiative, based on the work of the Wentworth Group, a nationally derived policy approach that has taken years to develop.

42

CHAPTER 4

Cities, coasts and community

A

ustralians have a love affair with cities and coasts. This is both the most urbanised country in the world and the most coastally focused. So we shouldn’t discuss cities in isolation, just as we shouldn’t discuss the coast in isolation. Coasts and cities and people are inextricably linked, as are the environmental issues they create. Between the censuses of 1996 and 2006 this urbanisation continued. Major cities increased their populations by 10.5 per cent between 1996 and 2001 and by a further 4.9 per cent between 2001 and 2006. Over the same two periods, regional areas close to cities initially decreased by 1.5 per cent then increased by 8.7 per cent. The population of outer regional areas, meanwhile, decreased by 3.5 per cent and 1.4 per cent, remote Australia decreased by 0.7 per cent and 11.8 per cent and very remote Australia decreased by 2.8 per cent and 21.9 per cent. The problem

Coastal ecosystems are usually dynamic in nature – in some cases, they are literally built on shifting sands. Coastlines erode (and sometimes do the opposite – prograde); sand dunes are formed and then washed away in storms; estuaries close off 43

BACK TO BASICS

from the sea and reopen again, depending on inland flows; cliffs, bluffs and rock platforms erode continuously. In the past humans have often seen the sea as a dumping ground for wastes, so sewage is released, treated (to a degree) and partially treated, into rivers that end up in the sea. Estuaries, mangroves and mud flats were filled in because they were seen as mosquito-ridden swamps, when in fact they are nursery grounds for fish, protectors of the solid land behind them and among the most productive ecosystems on Earth. When you add industry location into the mix – drawn by shipping, the cheapest form of transport, and the potential supply of limitless seawater for cooling purposes – then what seems to be an ideal place for settlements becomes an environment at risk, particularly if human structures are located too close to the high water mark. With the potential for rising sea levels and more frequent and severe storms, cyclones and other erosive forces, much greater value needs to be placed on coastal environments and the use of these environments as buffers between the forces of nature and human settlements. Expanding cities and towns will need to head away from the coast. At the moment, though, these urbanised parts of the coastline are still growing. The 2006 State of the Environment Report estimated that 42.3 per cent of the Noosa-to-Nowra coastline of Queensland and New South Wales will be urbanised by 2050, by which time 9 per cent of the Australian coastline will be urban.18 This concentration of population is also geographically biased: over three quarters of all Australians live in New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland – mainly on the coast (where 85 per cent of all Australians live). A direct consequence of Australians’ love of cities, dispersed suburbs and coastal recreation is car dependency. Not only is car dependency a major environmental issue, but roads are very 44

CITIES, COASTS AND COMMUNITY

expensive. In the 2007 federal election campaign the well-publicised road promises came with very big price tags. In Melbourne, for example, $2 billion was promised for Western Ring Road improvements and $1 billion for the Western Highway. The Coalition promised a total of $6.9 billion for Queensland roads alone; Labor’s promise for the state was $5.25 billion. Compare this to Labor’s miserly $500 million fund for alternative energy (which is not outright expenditure but a fund from which the interest is used). If we significantly scaled back some of these road projects then we could have the funds for a series of major public transport and other environmentally favourable projects. Concentrating people in cities may have benefits in terms of providing a denser population which is easier served (and potentially with more environmentally sustainability by reducing materials and “supply lines”) by infrastructure such as electricity, water, sewage and health and other services. But the location of these concentrations need to be considered. Building on fertile farmland where food was once grown close to consumers (which meant lower use of transport energy) or allowing metropolises to expand along coastlines (forcing recreational uses to go further away from their homes, using more fuel, to visit beaches) is environmentally destructive. So we need to locate and design new human settlements and retro-fit existing settlements to minimise environmental impacts. This may necessitate locating new settlements away from vulnerable coastal areas, avoiding expanding onto high quality farm land near towns and ensuring public transport networks precede new suburbs and towns. Australians since European settlement have demonstrated their acute preference for living in urbanised coastal settlements in southern Australia and relying on cars for transport. Any environmental response to minimising the impacts of Aus45

BACK TO BASICS

tralian settlements needs to start from this clear demographic picture. The current response

The response to the concentration of people in coastal cities has been varied from ignoring it and hoping the problems it causes go away, treating it as a local government problem without giving it the resources to make a difference – or holding another inquiry. The federal government has held over a dozen coastal inquiries in the past 30 years (including the latest one, which began in May 2008) and has yet to take any serious national role in coastal planning and management.19 What’s stopping significant reforms?

The real problem is that there is little or no recognition that cities and coastal communities are the driving factor behind much of our relationship with the environment in Australia. The romanticised view of Australia as a nation of tough living outback dwellers distracts the community as a whole from confronting the reality of urban coastal living in a dry land. This has resulted in a focus on single issues without looking for longterm sustainable solutions and classic Australian politics: passing the buck to another tier of government. The issues have proved too hard to resolve and hence there has been little national leadership or willingness to involve the national government in a difficult area full of controversial local issues. But these “local” issues tend to be the same issues across the whole country, so national leadership is required. The 2007 federal election result had the makings of a seachange in the attitudes of federal politicians. An analysis of Australian Electoral Commission data for the 33 regional (noncapital city) seats abutting the coastline – urban and non-urban – from Cape York to the Victorian–South Australian border 46

CITIES, COASTS AND COMMUNITY

reveals that sixteen (or 48 per cent) are now listed as marginal. Fifty per cent of Labor seats, 45 per cent of Liberal seats and 60 per cent of National seats are in this category. Astonishingly, given that these are non-capital city seats, Labor and the Coalition each hold sixteen (there is now one independent).20 We may well see future federal elections campaigns concentrating on coastal issues rather than inland ones. Breakthrough solutions

The breakthrough solution must first recognise the preference of Australians for living in south-eastern Australia in cities and towns on the coast and using cars for transport. While the next chapter tackles the issues associated with pollution and waste produced from cities and rural areas alike, the work of people like the Melbourne-based urban systems specialist, Peter Newton, highlights the fact that these urban centres need to have clear objectives which have sustainability as the primary focus.21 This sustainability includes using natural resources efficiently as a prime focus in these urban concentrations (and hence a reduction in waste streams) and a clear link to nature in order to remind city dwellers that they are ultimately limited in their life styles by the natural environment and natural resources. To these requirements I would add that urban expansion should be directed away from the coastline, or at least not expand parallel to the coastline. This is vital not only because of the consequences of sea level rise and hence the potential retreat of many coastlines in Australia but also to allow a semi-natural protective buffer to be created between the ever-changing coastline and human settlements. Newton has identified a set of potential urban futures of varying desirability: • the decentralised city (car dependant, spread out and basically “business as usual”); 47

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• the smart growing city (social cohesion and sustainability emphasis, resurrection of local community identity with car “taming”); • the compact city (control of sprawl, defined boundaries and increased density); • the dispersal pragmatic city (where there is increased densities at nodes within the metropolis which re-vitalises outer regions, not just the centre).22 While the first alternative is clearly undesirable and unsustainable, some combination of the other three possibilities on a “horses for courses” basis might work. For example, in the larger capital cities the “smart growing” opportunity has probably already passed and it is now a case of attempting to implement a “dispersal pragmatic city” within existing boundaries (an element of the “compact city”). In smaller capital cities and larger towns the “smart growing city” is worth aiming for, with the “compact city” a genuine possibility. The proposals below attempt to push Australians’ demonstrated living preferences towards more sustainable, less environmentally damaging cities in a realistic and practical fashion. Inland towns re-born: People would be encouraged to leave the coastal metropolises if they could live in provincial towns with high quality rapid public transport linkages to the city, high quality internal infrastructure, localised renewable energy sources, medical services, educational institutions and high quality natural protected areas and recreational areas nearby. State and federal governments should combine to subsidise the capital costs of establishing this physical, human and natural infrastructure as a means of taking pressure off the capital city, reducing greenhouse gas production through excessive car use 48

CITIES, COASTS AND COMMUNITY

and minimising waste streams. Decentralising large government departments out of Canberra and the state capitals could also act as a stimulus, transferring high paid jobs and spending to these rural economies. In this way both the capital city (with their populations stabilised and their outer suburbs revitalised, using Newton’s “dispersal pragmatic city” model) and the provincial towns will thrive through mutual dependence. The way to do this is to increase services and facilities at nodes in the outer suburbs – in other words, concentrate community facilities at decentralised locations away from central business districts and then ensure improved public transport to, and between, these nodes (including provincial towns). This will help take pressure off the coastal zone, but the federal government will also need to backup its commitment to addressing continuing coastal issues with national action as well. National action on the coastal zone: In order to re-focus attention on the coastal zone the federal government must play a more prominent leadership role. I’ve argued elsewhere that this will require a dedicated national agency with legislative support.23 Leaving coastal management to the states has only been partially successful. It is surprising that the national government has not been more intimately involved in attempting to formulate overall responses to common city–coastal issues across the nation. There has simply not been, as yet, sufficient political will or community pressure for the federal government to get involved. The fascinating question is this: when will the twin challenges of the sea-change phenomenon – the threat to coastal ecosystems arising from potential over-development of significant areas of the Australian coast – and the rise in the sea level and its impact on our urbanised coastal 49

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society exert the community pressure required to gain a national response? “Nature in Cities” program: City dwellers need to be more aware of their impact on the environment. If communities are unaware of the impact of new dams on flora and fauna, for example, or the increasing waste mountain their lifestyles are producing then they become disengaged from the environment and unlikely to alter their habits. These impacts become someone else’s problem – out of sight, out of mind. If urban dwellers are reintroduced to the environment that supports and nurtures them and shown how nature operates then we would expect more responsive behaviour. Urban dwellers could be re-connected to nature with the creation of “green webs” (interconnected open spaces along creeks, foreshore reserves and corridors such as rail lines and roads) in all major cities. This brings wildlife back into contact with people and becomes a daily reminder that nature needs to be considered in people’s living habits. The creation and management of these webs could be financed by a park levy on all city rates (Melbourne has had one for decades), including provincial cities. One of the reasons that we do not have as many high-quality urban parks and seminatural areas as we need is that these areas fall between large-scale national park management (run by state governments) and municipal playgrounds and small corner parks (run by local councils). In general state government park agencies don’t have the resources or desire to manage semi-natural urban parks and local councils don’t have the resources or expertise to do so. A park levy and a metropolitan park agency would fill this gap. This proposal could also have the advantage of filling a need for urban people to commune in a controlled way with nature 50

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and decrease their desire to travel to national parks and conservation areas outside the cities for experiences with nature, which would reduce travel and energy use and lower the impacts on natural ecosystems. It could also take the pressure off national park agencies to provide structured intensive recreational opportunities more suited to urban users. National park agencies could then concentrate on nature conservation objectives in large intact natural systems in national parks, moving to the concept of “a park for everyone but not every park for everyone.” Whatever we might think of the choice, individuals and families have decided that they want to live in cities and they want to live on the coast. We must look to these communities themselves to improve the environment in which they live. Governments’ role is to recognise this demographic reality and assist people to live in an environmentally sensitive way. Cars and cities

Any conversation in a workplace in our cities sooner or later comes around to cars and travel time to work. ( “The freeway was hell today, it took me 30 minutes to move five kilometres.” “Isn’t petrol expensive? The train was even more packed than ever this morning.” “I got cut off on my bike by a four wheel drive bully again this morning.”) Australians love their personal “freedom devices” – cars – and politicians love to respond with dollars. So we can’t talk about cities without talking about cars and car drivers’ behaviour. If we are to decrease energy consumption, decrease greenhouse gas production and decrease pollution in our cities (not to mention lower the huge medical costs associated with deaths and injuries from vehicle crashes) then we must alter the way we view and use our cars and other fossil fuel driven vehicles. 51

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The government website greenvehicleguide.gov.au reveals that a Toyota Prius produces 1.6 tonnes of CO2 each year (based on 15,000 kilometres of travel) and a range of smaller petrol and diesel motored cars produce less than two tonnes (although the diesel cars produce more of other pollutants). Assuming $1.50 per litre, the Prius costs $990 in petrol. At the other extreme the Hummer H3 Adventurer produces a massive five tonnes and costs $3128 in petrol per annum. Among the most popular cars on the road in Australia, the Toyota Yaris (2.1 tonnes), Toyota Corolla (2.6 tonnes) and the Mazda 3 (2.9 tonnes) are more efficient by a significant amount than the Ford Falcon (3.6 tonnes) and the Holden Commodore (3.8 tonnes). This prompts a range of questions. Why should a Prius owner pay the same registration fee (adjusted for engine capacity but not for environmental impact) for their car as the Commodore owner who produces more than twice as much carbon dioxide? Below are a series of recommendations pertaining to car use – predominantly (but not exclusively) in our cities because this is where the most petrol is consumed in the most inefficient way and the worst pollution is generated. One-to-one equivalence in transport funding at all levels of government: Road transport is seen as the absolutely dominant transport mode and the federal government’s transport spending is almost solely devoted to roads. In fact, unlike most major spending areas – hospitals, schools, defence – roads are almost unique in attracting significant spending from all three tiers of government. All three tiers of government should match every dollar they spends on roads with a dollar spent on public transport modes (including rail freight) in the first five years of the policy, rising to two dollars thereafter. This fairer distribution of funding would massively increase expenditure on more environ52

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mentally favourable modes of transport rather than roads. A congestion charge in all large cities: Congestion charges – levies on vehicles that enter the inner city area in peak hours – have been introduced in major cities such as London (where it was extended due to its success) and Singapore. With e-tags already used widely in Australian cities, collecting a congestion charge would be relatively easy. In Melbourne, for example, a congestion charge set at $5 per vehicle would generate over $20 million per annum, according to VicRoads. The funds raised would need to be allocated to expenditure on public transport options; in this way there would be an inducement to travel on public transport (because it would be improving all the time, sponsored by those still on the road) and a financial disincentive to travel by car. In tandem with this approach more needs to be done for outer suburban residents in terms of public transport options – by providing car parking and radial public transport routes to major outer and middle suburban stations to interconnect to the city, for example. This would provide viable commuting options for those suburbs without rail connections without continuing to pollute inner suburbs, where residents benefit from (crowded) public transport options but are forced to suffer the pollution and “traffic sewers” created by commuters from further out. No one benefits from the current approach. City office hours could also be staggered to spread morning peaks on roads and public transport and staggered hours for schools could also be considered. Spreading the peak should improve car use efficiency and lower pollution. Living (environmentally) with cars: We have built our infrastructure, our cities, towns and the countryside around vehicles, and it’s going to take a while to turn this around. So, in the 53

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meantime, what can we do with cars that would be less environmentally damaging than our current use? First, there appears to be no good reason for not establishing staged, mandatory targets for fuel efficiency in Australian built vehicles as a way of lowering emissions over time. Certainly having Australian made vehicles more fuel efficient will make them more attractive in export markets. Salary packaging arrangements need to be changed to encourage people to drive fewer kilometres per year. It seems unbelievable, but at present the Fringe Benefit Tax on cars drops the more you drive the vehicle. This is apparently a side-effect of policies designed to encourage fleet owners to buy Australian built cars by turning them over when they reached a certain number of kilometres. There’s no need to limit tax benefits only to cars, of course. If people ride a certain distance per week to work on their bikes they should be able to deduct the cost of their bicycle and its maintenance from their income tax. (Car log books for taxation purposes are common place so there would be no administrative difficulties here.) Making the connection between aggressive drivers and aggressive car design and the environmental impact of these cars and drivers is important. These two policy aims can operate in tandem with the same mechanisms: reward non-aggressive, non-polluting vehicles, increase fuel efficient, safer car design and safer, environmentally friendly driver behaviour and severely penalise aggressive driver behaviours. A survey commissioned by the AAMI insurance group in 2008 found that 60 per cent of Australians surveyed thought the city was no place for 4WDs and two-thirds thought they were a danger to other road users. “More than half of the drivers surveyed (56 per cent) said higher registration fees should be imposed on 4WDs and a third said they were socially unaccept54

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able because of their carbon footprint.”24 Measures to reduce 4WD use would include the following: • banning all 4WDs from operating within 10 km of the city centre between 6am and 8pm each day; • banning 4WDs from parking in streets in the CBD at all times 24 /7 and from the centre parking at all times anywhere (for safety reasons as well); • making traffic penalties proportional to vehicle size (a truck or 4WD travelling 10 kmh over the speed limit will inflict significantly greater damage and/or injury in a collision than will a Jazz or Getz so why shouldn’t the penalty be proportionately larger as well?); • ending the 5 per cent tariffs on four wheel drives that are imported (other cars are 10 per cent so this actually is an incentive to purchase 4WDs). It is unbelievable that people should be subsidised by the taxpayer to drive a vehicle which uses more fuel but this is the kind of distortion that is now present in our taxation system. This concession is apparently a left-over from the days when 4WDs were used by only farmers and tradespeople and hence this was seen as a concession for production. New cars for a new era: The federal government should encourage the development of two new types of Australian made vehicles: the Green Car and the P-platers car. This would help revive the Australian car industry with two government assisted and promoted innovations. The first type would be a “green family” car. Australians like moderately sized six-cylinder family cruising cars i.e. the family sedan covered in the market place now by Holden Commodores, Ford Falcons, Toyota Camry and Aurions, and Mitsubishi Magnas. These are cars which carry four people comfortably and cruise comfortably on country highways at 55

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100km per hour. At present there are no hybrid cars produced commercially that fit this market (which is also substantial in the United States and probably will increasingly be so in the Middle East). Hybrid vehicles like the Toyota Prius are significantly smaller and lose some of their advantages at 100km per hour, especially in adverse driving conditions (for example, cross winds). Proposals contained in the Bracks car plan for government support for a green family car deserve support, but we must ensure that the car is planned from the beginning to ensure reuse of parts and also environmentally safe disposal or, preferably, re-use of materials. The second new car type would be the P-platers low-impact, safe car. Road deaths and injuries for inexperienced drivers (usually regarded as those under 25 years old) are well out of proportion to those of other drivers, as any insurance company premium demonstrates. A standard four cylinder fuel efficient vehicle with minimal extras would teach the young driver to be much more aware of how to drive a car, how it sits on the road, proper braking and accelerating (through the gears) etc, with the incidental benefit of considerably lower fuel use because it does not have all the fuel-hungry options. This low-impact, safe car would have the following characteristics: inexpensive, 1.5 litre engine (small and efficient), manual gearbox (more fuel efficient and helps teach car control), no power steering or power brakes, lots of air bags, a hands-free phone kit, and limited in speed. It could be twoseater only (with good sized boot) with stylish and individualistic bodywork on a standard chassis to give variations in appearance. This vehicle would have significant immediate and longterm safety impacts. If all people were required to drive a car with such specifications for the first five years they held a 56

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licence then each of the major manufacturers would have a guaranteed market for a vehicle and within these specifications they could vary its styling to suit different tastes. Such a vehicle would have tremendous export potential into the developing markets of China and India as well. Everyone would be a winner, including the car industry, the environment and the Australian economy. The critical point about policies relating to cars in particular and road transport in general is that, while we need to recognise that cars will be a key part of our future, we also need to break the mindset (the fixation, in fact) of politicians and the community with road dominated solutions. The proposals above would help with this (particularly matching funding) but a couple of more radical solutions might be needed to make the necessary quantum shift. Real user pays charges: At present the costs of running a vehicle (including registration and insurance) mean that people feel they need to use their car partly to recoup these costs. Meanwhile, the impact of different vehicles on road surfaces and in accidents varies significantly and yet registration fees do not reflect the true costs of vehicles. But in general the larger and more damaging vehicles do use more fuel. Therefore a breakthrough solution is to transfer the real total costs of vehicle use on to the per litre price of fuel – a true user pays scheme. That would transfer all registration costs and third party compulsory insurance costs to an average cost per litre of petrol, making the switch “cost neutral” at the time of the change. From that point, the more drivers use their vehicles the more they pay. More importantly, the less they drive the less you pay – so it does not cost you money to leave your car at home. Finally we should seriously consider a moratorium on new 57

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road construction for five years from 2010 onwards. All funds would be transferred to public transport funding, although road maintenance would continue. The aim of this proposal is to break “the habit” – the addiction of governments to road funding. Road construction workers would be redeployed to rail construction and enhancement. • The vast majority of Australians (more than four out of every five) live in coastal urban areas. This is where a large amount of the nation’s natural resources (although only about 11 per cent of water) are used. Yet there is little recognition of this urban coastal concentration, or the consequences for the environment, by other than local governments. The environmental impact of massive coastal urbanisation needs a national focus and coordinated national and state government action. First these governments need to recognise the implications of this settlement pattern and then they must assist local communities to implement the environmentally responsible breakthrough solution suggested above.

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CHAPTER 5

Waste not, want not

I

n previous chapters we have seen how humans interact with the biophysical environment in cities, towns and in the country through the use of nature (including ecological services) and natural resources – both renewable and nonrenewable. (Or, to put it another way, through consumptive and non-consumptive uses – activities that consume resources and those that don’t.) This chapter will complement those chapters by concentrating on the major ways in which humans use energy – another environmental resource – and the resulting wastes produced from energy and other natural resource consumption. One of the major waste products we humans produce, particularly as a result of energy use, is carbon dioxide (and equivalent greenhouse gases usually reduced to “carbon dioxide equivalents”). Hence, the critical issue of the impact of climate change and how to reduce greenhouse gases is inextricably linked to the degree and extent of use of resources. If we use less energy we will produce less carbon dioxide and reduce the rate of climate change. There are several difficulties arising from the centrality of climate change in the current debate, though. In fact, there are problems with the way climate change and water scarcity are used as synonyms for “the environment.” 59

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First, this way of framing the issue discourages a holistic approach to environmental improvement. Rather, it encourages the simplistic idea that reducing greenhouse gas production = solving the world’s environmental problems. Second, the size of the climate change issue (and the need for global action on a scale never seen before) risks engendering in individuals a sense of hopelessness. How can one person, even one nation, have an impact, many people wonder. Third, the benefits of action are a long way off and well outside standard economic, and hence political, time frames. On top of that, the institutions and arrangements we have established to deal with the environment in our everyday lives are not assembled to address such a broad problem. We have designed a governance system built around historically and culturally based approaches (such as planning and building permits) rather than a problem of this scale. So while climate change is critically important we cannot lose sight of other environmental issues. So this chapter’s solution section will deal with energy use, energy’s waste products (including greenhouse gases) and general wastes. First, though, an overview of these issues. The problem

Australia has known abundant supplies of at least two sources of energy for electricity generation. Governments only mention one – coal. The other is sunshine (solar). As well Australia potentially has significant sources in wave and tidal energy and in some locations wind energy. The cry that solar will “cost” too much is a reaffirmation of the economically dominant paradigm that says the only “cost” to be taken into account is the financial (dollar) cost. Coal is very expensive, not in dollar terms, but in terms of environmental damage and greenhouse gas production. It is all about 60

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TABLE 3: CONTRIBUTORS TO AUSTRALIA’S GREENHOUSE EMISSIONS, 2006 Energy sector Agriculture sector Land use, land-use change, forestry Industrial processes Waste sector

69.6 per cent 15.6 per cent 6.9 per cent 4.9 per cent 2.9 per cent

Source: See endnote 25

how you do your accounting. The 2006 State of the Environment Report states that Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions have risen by 2.3 per cent between 1990 and 2004 despite a decline of 12.7 per cent per capita (mainly due to a decrease in the clearing of native vegetation).25 In other words, the total increase is almost solely due to an increase in population. Emissions have since climbed between 2004 and 2006 by 2 per cent to a total of 576.0 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalents.26 This overall result is not encouraging given that Australia was committed to a decrease of 8 per cent (despite our nonsigning of the Kyoto Protocol) so even with generous concessions Australia missed its self-imposed target by around 10 per cent in the first decade and a half of monitoring. Where do these emissions come from? The energy sector is the largest and fastest growing contributor to emissions with 49.6 per cent from stationary sources – power stations and the like – and 12.5 per cent from road transport. (Energy’s overall contribution is 69.6 per cent of emissions.) As Table 3 shows, the other major contributors are agriculture (15.6 per cent) and land use, land clearing and forestry (6.9 per cent). The 2006 State of the Environment Report (using 2004 data) predicted emissions would rise from 1990 to 2020 by 120 per 61

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cent – more than double over 30 years – despite the commitment to a decrease of 8 per cent. In other words, it predicted we would miss the target by 128 per cent. You can see why some people have been arguing for action for so long and were so frustrated by the Howard government and its media cheer squad’s opposition to any action at all. The Rudd government has been a little better, but its Emissions Trading Scheme does little to address the half of all greenhouse emissions that come from power stations and the like. In this respect, the government is fiddling around the edges of the problem. If we look at energy consumption (rather than overall carbon dioxide emissions) the road transport sector looms largest, using approximately 30 per cent of all energy (see Table 4). Private passenger vehicles – or cars – account for three quarters of total travel. These figures reveal a second alarming feature – an increase in per capita energy consumption as well as an increase due to population rise. By 2003–04, on average, each Australian was consuming 265 units (GJ), up from 255 in 1997–98, a 10 per cent increase in just six years. Our total electricity consumption was up from 760 (PJ) units to 860 units per capita or 13.2 per cent in just four years (1999–00 to 2003–04). So the picture here is quite different from the water consumption picture – with water Australians have reduced their per head and overall consumption (although population increase has offset the latter somewhat) but with energy consumption individuals are using more each year, on top of the rise in total consumption as a result of population increase. And, as we’ll see, this increasing use of resources is reflected in the amount of waste produced: one tonne per person going to landfill sites every year.

Climate change Dangerous human-induced climate change has been the source of enormous public interest in the environment in recent years. 62

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TABLE 4: ENERGY END-USE BY SOURCE AND BY SECTOR IN AUSTRALIA, 2001–02

Agriculture Mining Iron and steel Chemical Other industry Construction Road transport Rail transport Air transport Water transport Commercial Residential Lubricants, greases, bitumen and solvents Total final energy consumption

Petajoules 85.5 268.1 97.1 167.2 712.4 28.2 996.7 28.9 172.0 46.3 248.0 393.0 64.0 3307.5

% 2.6 8.1 2.9 5.1 21.5 0.9 30.1 0.9 5.2 1.4 7.5 11.9 1.9 100.0

Source: Energy in Australia 2004, Department of Industry, 2004

This is probably because individuals can see for themselves how the climate seems to have gone awry with very noticeable personal consequences. A series of very hot summers and mild winters with a concomitant drought and water restrictions brought home some of the apparent impacts of climate change to everyone’s door (and backyard), as has the enormous firestorm that struck Victoria on a 46.4 degree day in February 2009. The impacts of climate change are many and varied and spread across the whole environmental spectrum: a rising sea level and its impact on Australia’s coastal and urban dominated society; drought and its impact on agriculture and environmen63

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tal flows in rivers; increased energy use from greater use of air conditioners in particular compounding the problem by increasing the rate of greenhouse gas production; changes in species distribution patterns and possible local or broader extinctions; increased spread of pest plants and animals; and an increase in storms and the extent and intensity of bushfires. Many, if not all, of these issues seem to have caught our political leaders unaware, but certainly not scientists and environmentalists. The first major CSIRO report on climate change was published over thirty years ago, in 1975.27 Without being alarmist, there might be a secondary shock on climate change for the general community. In their recent book, Climate Code Red, Philip Sutton and David Spratt highlight the potential immediate impact of climate change on sea level rise through dramatic ice sheet meltings in the northern hemisphere. They also highlight the fact that most discussion of the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) climate change predictions is based on the scenario where, globally, we have taken and are taking remedial action – not on a “business as usual” scenario (continuing our past habits). In other words, the conservative scientists of the IPCC, desperately seeking consensus within their profession, have included scenarios which assume that politicians had taken notice and acted on climate change several years ago. Given that the big polluters – the United States, China and India – have done nothing in the last decade to reduce carbon dioxide emissions then it is the IPCC’s upper level scenarios that are more likely. .

Wastes In 2002 Australians generated a total of 32.4 million tonnes of waste, with each person generating over 1600 kgs (1.6 tonnes) on average. Overall the sources of this waste were as follows: 42 64

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per cent from the construction and mining industries, 29 per cent from the commercial and industrial sector and 26 per cent from “municipal sources,” including domestic households. Putting that in perspective: industry produced almost three times as much waste as domestic sources – so why is the emphasis on domestic recycling and not on minimising waste production in the construction and mining industries in particular? And where does this massive amount of waste go? Although recycling rates increased by a massive 879 per cent between 1996–97 and 2002–03, “waste to land fill” only dropped 18 per cent.28 How can this be? Total waste grew by a massive 42 per cent in this period, despite the recycling effort by ordinary citizens.29 Recycling is helpful (in per person terms we send 0.87 tonnes to landfill and recycle 0.75 tonnes) but we have to decrease the total amount of waste being produced across all sectors including industry, mining and construction if any substantial change is to occur. The current response

Governments try to avoid consumption related issues because they are locked into an economically driven belief that “growth” (based on increasing consumption) is the basis for human happiness and economic prosperity. They are of course encouraged in this view by the huge industry – including media and marketing – that is dependant on continuously increasing consumption. At the moment the main means of addressing the challenges appears to be by resorting to the use of “spin.” There are a number of excellent books on this phenomenon.30 Of course not all economic activity produces these increasing piles of waste. Service industries (education and hospitality, for example) produce little waste in comparison to major 65

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primary and secondary industries, and still produce economic growth (although even these service industries could reduce their output of waste). But our focus here is on the big generators of wastes. What’s stopping significant reforms?

The reason for inaction on climate change and other environmental abuses deserves a book in its own right and certainly there are plenty of references (see Further Reading) to aid the reader on this topic. Many of the required actions are seen as being electorally risky: when you have been elected, as successive governments were in the 1990s and 2000s, by promising eternal economic growth and human happiness based on increasing consumption (the plasma TV and 4WD based recovery) sponsored by easy loans and massively increased personal debt, governments are unwilling to discuss the environmental and social costs of such a society for fear of losing office. But is that fear real? To politicians who are besieged by special interests this must appear to be the case. The wellfunded interest groups – the massive road lobby, which covers a spectrum from petrol and construction firms through road motorists organisations to transport unions, not to mention the coal/aluminium/electricity grouping – all using “spin doctors” to turn unpleasant truths into positive spin – and hence well and truly drown out the pleas for “ecologically sustainable use.” The final piece in this jigsaw is the attempts of the various lobbyists to stamp out even the remaining voices of environmental reason with highly dubious tactics. Sharon Beder’s excellent book Global Spin describes the great variety of methods used to quieten the opponents of big lobbyists, big donors and big consumers.31 Finally, in relation to waste the preoccupation with recycling 66

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at the expense of encouraging less usage and more re-use means we lose sight of the major problem: the oversupply of packaging, again serving the interests of major corporations not only involved in producing the packaging but also those involved in the major industry of recycling. Breakthrough solutions

Most of the major solutions to these issues are of such significance and, by necessity, cross sectoral boundaries that they are included in the final chapter of this book. But some more sectorally specific ones are still included here, and they share the theme summed up by that great phrase used by previous generations: waste not, want not. Recommendations covering motor vehicles were covered in the previous chapter.

Energy Define a transport hierarchy and work to its priorities: There are a myriad of transport-related decisions made at every level of government, in workplaces and in towns and small cities. A clear environmentally concerned hierarchy should be adopted to guide these decisions so that if funds are limited then the areas receiving attention first are the environmentally favourable ones. If all levels of government and their agencies were working to this same hierarchy we would see greater efficiency and a stronger focus on synergistic actions. Such a hierarchy of priorities would look something like this: Pedestrians Bicycles Trains Light rail Motor bikes Trams 67

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Buses powered by non-diesel sources Compact buses Standard buses Private hybrid and low fuel use vehicles Shared small vehicles Trucks Private SUVs, 4WDs Electricity: A major initiative would be to phase in full tariffs for aluminium smelters and other subsidised energy consumers over a maximum of five years. (If contracts forbid this then other means, such as levies, carbon taxes or waste taxes, should be used instead.) These huge consumers of electricity are not only given an unfair advantage over their competitors but are taxpayer-subsidised to pollute. A level playing field is the least that can be expected here. While a carbon tax or a balanced emissions trading scheme may assist in rectifying these matters over time there are issues associated with waiting for these approaches to “bite.” For example, the energy subsidy to the aluminium industry is coming from state governments (who initially fought other states for these smelters by offering them huge subsidies) while the ETS, or a carbon tax, will be imposed federally. This conundrum means that someone must act first (and it is hard to see how that can be anyone other than the federal government). A commitment to a fair and equitable electricity tariff (even if it takes some time to introduce) will at least send the long-term message to the aluminium industry and others that it will be playing to more equitable rules in the future. Electricity: Australia needs to adopt the German system of pricing renewable energy generated by rooftop solar systems at full price. Current state-based schemes in Australia pay a householder with a solar collector a fixed amount per kilowatt (a 68

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tariff) for the excess amount of power generated and put back into the grid (in other words, for the amount above and beyond the amount used by the household). This is called a net tariff. But this household is generating more solar power than this – they are just using the rest on site. And this power has social, economic and environmental benefits for all users: it reduces the amount of power that has to be generated by coal-fired power stations with all its associated pollution and greenhouse impacts, water use and so on, and it eliminates transmission costs. Paying a gross tariff to households means that they are paid for all the solar powered electricity generated on the roofs, irrespective of who uses it. The householder is rewarded for their social and environmental contribution and for not using coal fired generated power. Germany is the country most often mentioned as having used this “gross tariff ” approach. The German system requires electric utility companies to buy a certain amount of power from solar sources at a fixed gross tariff. The scheme was originally introduced in 1991 and enhanced in 2000. Between 2000 and 2005 the amount of energy fed into the grid doubled and is now 1500 megawatts. With much more sunshine than Germany, Australia has less than 0.5 per cent of Germany’s solar generating capacity. Germany now has a target of 12.5 per cent of total energy from renewables by 2010 and has increased its target for renewables to 27 per cent by 2020. The solar industry has blossomed, creating 250,000 new jobs, and the solar power sector now creates three times as many jobs per installed megawatt as coal fired power industry.32 Australia needs to introduce a gross tariff system with a high enough payment, fixed over a long enough time, to ensure it is economically viable for householders to install a solar system. Australia would then start to see the economic, social and envi69

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ronmental gains in the southern hemisphere that Germany has initiated in the northern hemisphere. The Rudd government’s solar credits scheme, announced in December 2008, appears complex and its interaction with state systems may take some time to resolve. The German system is simpler and proven. Coal: Coal is a huge industry in Australia and a large export contributor. The opportunity exists to influence the buyers of Australian coal to use it more effectively and to improve the efficiency of their usage by reducing emissions. The potential to influence global coal users should not be underestimated. The best comparison here is with uranium mining. Australian governments have claimed for many decades that we have control over the use of our uranium after it leaves Australia: why can’t the same be done with coal? Possibly a compromise could be struck: if the federal government is to give coal exporters concessions under an ETS then the quid pro quo from the industry is a commitment to influence the buyers of the coal to use it more efficiently and lower their emissions. The great unexplored energy option, ocean power: Australia has one of the largest exclusive economic zones (EEZ) of sea in the world – in fact we have twice the area of sea under our control as we do of land. One of the advantages of this zone that we are yet to exploit is wave power – and potentially tidal power as well (in northern Australia, where the tidal ranges can be up to 7 metres). Provided that the projects meet strict environmental standards – including aesthetic standards – the EEZ offers the opportunity for a major source of renewable power. In particular, the large tides in the north and the reliable and constant wave swells in the south provide a wonderful opportunity to lower our dependence on coal generated electricity. 70

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A number of companies are already researching the potential of this energy source and how best to capture it, and their progress is reviewed in a special edition of the Marine and Coastal Community Network’s Waves magazine.33 France is reported to have been using tidal energy since 1966 and generates enough energy to power 240,000 homes; Japan and Scotland have constructed tidal generation power stations. The potential also exists to tap into the temperature differences between the surface and deeper water. The article refers readers to the World Ocean Observatory site (www.thew2o.net/events/ oceanenergy/index.html). An experimental wave generator is being built off King Island and a tidal generator off Flinders Island is being constructed to generate power in 2009. The two plants (cost $10.3 million) will generate enough power to run the 500 homes on the two islands.34 Solar powered air conditioners (with capacity for retrofitting): A significant proportion of the increase in peak electricity use in recent years is a result of increased use of airconditioners for cooling, particularly in homes. Leaving aside the social reasons for this steep increase, there would appear to be great riches awaiting a person or company who could invent an on-site solar powered airconditioner. The reasoning is simple: air conditioner use soars on hot days, which are often sunny; if a solar powered airconditioner could be designed then this problem could be quickly neutralised. If it could be retrofitted to existing air conditioners we would reduce our energy consumption. A government prize or developmental partnership for such an invention would be a great investment. Gas boosted mini power stations for emergency summer power production: Although it would be better to reduce 71

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summer peak electricity use by using solar power the use of mini gas-fired power stations would use less energy from a cleaner source than using base load coal fired stations. They could also be located closer to the peak use areas and hence reduce transmission losses. The benefits of such stations are that the gas can be turned on and off as desired to meet peak summer use conditions – there is not much delay between “firing up” the station and the production of electricity – and they produce less greenhouse gas emissions and other pollutants per unit of energy produced.

Wastes In researching this book I’ve discovered a wealth of good ideas that are out there in the literature, on the internet and in the media. My main function has been to draw together the ideas that would make a major difference to improving the environment and can be implemented with political will and effort. The waste field presents a completely different picture. First, while the problem is obvious to those in the field and easily summarised – we are producing an ever-increasing amount of waste and, while domestic recycling is keeping domestic wasteto-landfill relatively constant, if still excessive – little seems to be being done to significantly alter industries’ habits, or to avoid the production of materials that end up as waste, or to reuse products. The whole problem seems to be treated as “too hard.” While there are good people in good groups and agencies trying their best to get attention paid to this topic,35 little impact is being made on the ever-increasing waste stream. The reason seems to be bound up in the relationships between the various agencies and companies and non-government agencies involved, and the area is ripe for a “crash through or crash” approach. Hence a breakthrough solution is not waiting on the shelf – there is too 72

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much sparring going on and not enough punches being thrown. My major recommendation is to have the Environment Commission (proposed in Chapter 6) establish as its first major inquiry an independent assessment of how to reduce the amount of wastes produced in Australia.

Climate change Biosequestration: There has been a lot of discussion about the classic “technological fix” (or “hard engineering” solution) to greenhouse gas production: geosequestration. This process involves locking carbon dioxide away in deep chambers. A number of experimental plants are testing the technology in Australia. This is not a bad thing, but it is very much a case of technology being used to solve a technologically induced problem – which means it is favoured by industry, engineers and geologists, all of whom hold great sway with politicians. There is another method which does not require huge technological advances and also sequesters carbon. It is called biosequestration, and involves sequestering the carbon in plants, other living organisms or the soil. This method has the added advantages of revegetating denuded landscapes (which also can enhance water collection). If local indigenous species of plants are used in multiple storeyed revegetation projects – not only trees but shrubs and ground plants as well – it will provide habitat for native species of animals to flourish, which provides a biodiversity bonus as well. Ross Garnaut discussed biosequestration in his final report on climate change in late 2008.36 He offered it as a solution to both rural land use decline (and its social and economic fallout) and climate change (to which I would add a third benefit, enhanced biodiversity) by suggesting the new range of choices (as well as traditional commodities) available to rural landowners: soil carbon, bioenergy, second generation biofuels, wood or 73

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carbon plantations and conservation forests. Garnaut’s report summarises his point very well: The realisation of a substantial part of the biosequestration potential of rural Australia would greatly reduce the costs of mitigation in Australia. It would favourably transform the economic prospects of large parts of remote rural Australia. Full utilisation of biosequestration could play a significant role in the global mitigation effort. This is an area where Australia has much to contribute to the international system.37

Biosequestration needs to be discussed alongside geosequestration, and we need to see at least the same positive financial incentives offered as are being offered to geosequestration. Elsewhere in this book I have highlighted a number of projects that would be valuable for nature conservation and water conservation and these also have benefits in terms of biosequestration. They include land stewardship, strategic and scaled-up revegetation projects, no further clearing of native vegetation, removal of cattle and sheep grazing from arid areas and replacing them with harvesting of wild native animals (if it can be shown to be sustainable), no old growth logging, use of native vegetation “crops,” including broom brush and eucalyptus oil, and natural infrastructure projects. • Human consumption of resources results in pollution and waste products. Pollution, and particularly carbon dioxide production and its impact on climate change, has received increasing attention over recent years, but in the meantime there has been an ever-increasing production of wastes (the “waste stream” has become a “waste torrent”). Yet of all the areas examined in this book the issue of product packaging and the consequent waste 74

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problem is the one receiving the least attention. Until we shift the focus on the waste stream “upstream” – by taking action to reduce packaging, re-use containers, investing further in recycling and shift the responsibility for handing and reducing wastes to retailers, wholesalers and industry – we will not make any progress at all in waste reduction. We have relied solely on individual virtuous action on wastes for too long – it is time for governments and industry to pull their weight.

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CHAPTER 6

Big picture, big solutions

I

ndividual virtuous action has not been and will never be adequate to address the deterioration in environmental quality. Individuals cannot hope, for example, to have the influence over big business that governments can have. It is also unjust to ask individuals who do behave virtuously – and currently bear the significantly greater financial costs and burdens of doing so – to subsidise the profligate behaviours of their fellow wasteful citizens and wasteful commercial enterprises (including areas of agriculture, government and industry). So governments will have to get back to basics and again act in the interests of the community if the quality of the environment lived in by all humans is to be improved. Currently governments at all levels and political parties across most of the spectrum do not behave in the interests of environmental quality. The problem

In general governments need to reverse their current policies (business as usual) to ensure two things: that people involved in individual virtuous action are rewarded (financially) for their efforts; and that anti-environmental behaviour is penalised (financially and by other means) whether it is carried out by individuals, corporations, government agencies or local councils. 76

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Individuals might not be able to act effectively on their own but they can compel governments to influence and control the environmental excesses of businesses and other levels of government. The most powerful influence individuals have is their vote, which can help to determine the agendas of all parties. The major parties have noted where the votes are trending – to the Greens – and why. Their first response is to try to denigrate and destroy the party eating at their vote, but they also adopt that party’s policies in order to reclaim their lost voters. As yet, though, they have been unwilling to implement these policies in any meaningful long-term way: they talk the talk but do not walk the walk. This concluding chapter summarises how these circumstances have arisen, how governments have dealt with the environment until now, and how they can make a real difference in the immediate future by scoring some breakthroughs for the environment. The current response

Under state Labor governments in recent years, and to a lesser extent in Canberra, the talk has been about “triple bottom lines” and “sustainability” to suggest that governments are interested in environmental and social outcomes and not solely with economic concerns. The reference to triple bottom lines is always made when the environment is being compromised: “We are working to a triple bottom line here, not just an environmental objective.” When was the last time an economic outcome was compromised in the same way? That is “triple bottom lines” and “sustainability” have been used to weaken environmental concerns and to dilute environmentally favourable outcomes. These concepts have not been used to dilute or weaken an economic objective. Reference to these concepts are a sop to the environment. The environment loses out immediately (and in the medium 77

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and long term as well) and social outcomes also lose out. Meanwhile there is a short-term economic gain (usually not shared equally across the community) followed by long-term economic loss (as the environment deteriorates – or, in the case of private–public partnerships, as the asset deteriorates and is dumped back on the public sector). The problem here is the recurring issue of NIMTO, or “not in my term of office” (as the environmental scientist Tim O’Riordan once called it): short-term, economically based time frames working against medium and long-term social and environmental benefits. The election of a federal Labor government in late 2007 might be seen by some as a solution in itself, but not if the performance of state Labor governments is assessed. There is a danger, as has occurred in the Labor states, of (big) business as usual. Let’s see if there is any fundamental change to business as usual when the Rudd Labor government starts to actually do something about climate change other than commissioning reports and proposing legislation – in particular, whether it takes substantial action to deal with the enormous threats to a coastal urban based society of sea level rise coupled to coastal over-development (the “pincer” effect of Chapter 4) and when it begins to see climate change reform as more important than tax cuts that may exacerbate some of the very causes of environmental deterioration. The first Labor Budget suggests otherwise and the decision to continue to “bail out” the coal / electricity/ aluminium industry (more industry welfare) in preference to renewable energy industry does not bode well. There are some positive signs though e.g. despite the global economic crisis the Rudd government is staying firm on its climate change agenda and introduction of an Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) and this government has actually bought water back from agriculture for 78

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environmental flows in the Murray Darling Basin – something their predecessors failed to do in a decade of promises. In fact in the case of the ETS the economic crisis (note how economists and financial types are allowed to talk of crisis and be doomsayers but environmentalists aren’t?) provides a great opportunity to use infrastructure funding inputs to stimulate the economy in ways that are also positively beneficial to environmental outcomes. For example funds could be used for stimulating a renewable energy industry, for natural infrastructure (e.g. massive re-vegetation programs) and for introduction of the land stewardship schemes outlined in Chapter 2. Of course the funds could be used against greenhouse gas improvements if used for road construction for example rather than railway infrastructure. What’s stopping significant reforms?

There are two major inhibitors to the implementation of the level of government driven change needed to reverse environmental deterioration. First, the tough decisions that need to be made will have impacts on people’s life styles in the short to medium term – the length of electoral cycles. The benefits will be seen in the longer term – longer than the electoral cycles. So the benefits are “not in my term of office,” but the costs are, so politicians shy away from wearing the costs of acting. Second, the big lobbyists happily swing in behind the NIMTO effect because its short-term, economic-based outcomes serve their clients’ interests. This maximises the influence of corporations, political donors and markets and marginalises the environment, the voters and future generations. There are several lobby groups who wield far more power than their numbers and long-term importance warrant. We’ve already seen the road transport lobby, the farm lobby and the coal-fired electricity lobby at work in earlier chapters. Another 79

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example of the kind of distortion that can result from the overinfluence of lobbyists is the promotion of desalination plants. These plants consume enormous quantities of electricity, produce hyper-saline wastes and are usually located in coastal, often scenic locations. Their energy consumption alone is cause for great concern. They usually take their power from current electricity production methods (principally coal), substantially increasing greenhouse gas emissions and contributing to climate change – which is one of the causes of the lower rainfall which led to the need for the desalination plant in the first place. Unless the desalination plant runs on renewable energy and disperses a cleaner effluent, it creates a vicious circle of environmental damage, appearing to solve one problem while contributing to another. Individuals, meanwhile, are overwhelmed by the amount and complexity of information, the fear of the consequences of inaction and the helpless feeling that they can’t really make a difference. Consequently there is a tendency to opt out, do nothing and leave the playing field to the major interest groups. This is what the proposals in this book are designed to reverse. If we can score some breakthrough on the big environmental issues of the day we will encourage and empower people to seek more environmental action from their politicians as well. Breakthrough solutions

The contributors to NIMTO need to be addressed. First, we need to eliminate the blame game and blame shifting. Finger pointing by different sections of the public (often with undisclosed vested interests) relieves the pressure on governments to act and diverts attention from the real issue. This is nowhere clearer than in “water politics’ (see Chapter 3). Let’s focus on the actual problem and a real and practical solution to that problem before blaming anyone else. 80

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Second, we need to focus on the facts. Where is the water used? (Irrigation.) Who is generating the waste? (Industry.) Who is producing the greenhouse gases? (The energy sector.) Third, we mustn’t allow the media’s short-term interest and its medium-term lack of interest in these issues to distract from long-term solutions. The temptation is for media and government – both running to short-term time frames – to whip each other into a frenzy of activity based on “crisis” talk. This overreaction is not sustainable, so inevitably there is a return to business as usual, often accompanied by a backlash against “environmental extremists” (have you noticed that there are no corporate extremists or media extremists?) – even though the environmentalists have stayed on message throughout. Earlier chapters have included recommendations in particular sectors, including transport, cities and water. The following recommendations cross these sectors and are critical to environmental improvement. These can be divided into a small number of major recommendations which need to be implemented at the highest level of government in Australia and then a series of more specific recommendations. The Environment Commission: If environmental action is to be coordinated across all areas and is to have a long-term focus then an independent commission is required. These issues are so important that we need to establish an environmental counterpart to the Reserve Bank (which has the significant power to set interest rates, drawing on the expertise of its staff and governors). Like the Reserve Bank, the Commission would be an independent body able to make decisions independent of party politics. It would be able to work around the major inhibitor of environmental action in Australia, short-term, election-cyclebased decisionmaking. Also like the Reserve Bank, the Commission would also have a strong research capacity. Com81

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missioners would be appointed for their environmental expertise for five year terms, extending beyond an electoral cycle. They would determine where funds raised through an emissions trading scheme were spent, prioritise specific environmental reforms and comment on environmental matters referred to them by either governments or the community. The Commission would replace bodies such as the Water Commission in order to initiate integrated responses to environmental action rather than having a narrow focus on say water or pollution. It would report directly to parliament. Organisations assisting the Commission would include a revitalised, reinvented CSIRO (the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation) as an independent supplier of technical and scientific advice, and a new Environmental Certification Authority (ECA, possibly similar to the Australian Consumer and Competition Commission). The original CSIRO was a fully funded government body carrying out applied long-term research to aid the development of Australian agriculture and industry – a “public good” body. But over time its role has been distorted. It has had to raise more and more of its funds from sponsored research, which means that research is often commissioned in areas where resources already exist (rather than in areas which may become significant). Research with immediate potential for raising funding tends therefore to swamp long-term ecological research, for example, and research scientists spend increasing amounts of their time chasing money or doing public relations exercises for the organisations – an inefficient use of their expertise and capacities. A return to a well funded (from carbon taxes or equivalent) independent research agency would bring a revitalisation of innovation for public good. An Environmental Certification Authority is needed to aid consumers in the increasingly complex area of environmental 82

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products and environmental claims by corporations. The Authority would certify all environment-friendly product claims (which are often made without supporting evidence) including green fleets and carbon “offset” schemes. It would be established using carbon tax funds but would move towards self funding by charging product manufacturers for certification – the method that accreditation schemes for ecotourism and organic food, for example, currently use. The Authority would be an independent source of consumer advice. But, you might say, wouldn’t this be just another government body overregulating the marketplace and placing a further cost burden on businesses – which is ultimately paid for by consumers? There are two responses to such an argument. First, as part of the process of establishing the new bodies a full review of existing bodies would occur with the aim of simplifying the environmental regulatory and leadership framework. The aim would be to end up with fewer bodies than we have currently but with a more effective and integrated structure. Given the way the environment has been divided unhelpfully into water, land, agriculture and so on by government, moving to the “simple side of complex” will not be as hard to achieve as opponents will claim. Second, unless there is a breakthrough approach to environmental decision-making that moves beyond the current piecemeal processes we will not get the long-term thinking and planning needed to address issues like climate change and biodiversity loss. The Commission is the breakthrough proposal we need to break out of our NIMTO mindset. The Environment Fund: Who is going to pay for the Commission, a revitalised CSIRO and the certification authority? Where do you put the money collected by environmental levies, penalties and taxes? How do you determine how and where to 83

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distribute or allocate the money? This would be the role of the Environment Fund. The Environment Commission and other initiatives would be funded by a carbon tax or through the carbon/emissions trading scheme at its inception. The money should be pooled into one fund. The major consideration is that the money raised from the emissions trading scheme, etc, is used for only two purposes: • to compensate individuals (definitely not companies, trusts and other corporate entities who should collect any greater costs from the end users of the goods provided – whether it is food, energy, transport whatever) in society who are disadvantaged by the introduction of a carbon tax or credit system. This will usually be financial compensation for increased costs associated with food, energy, water, transport etc. Note these individuals will benefit by improved public transport options and improved environmental quality as well; • to improve the environment. Strategic revegetation of Australia (see also page 23): A largescale and well-planned scheme for the ecological restoration of Australian native plants, using natural infrastructure funds, will bring both nature conservation benefits and significant biosequestration of carbon. Everyone wins from investment in natural infrastructure. The Ecological Society of Australia has provided the federal government with details of this proposal and Chapter 2 highlighted some substantial examples which can be used as models. What is now required is national government support for this natural infrastructure. A household water and energy allocation: An allocation would be made based on the number of people in the household; the household can then determine how and where to use its allocated resources. 84

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This will ensure that people take control of the way they wish to use their water and electricity allocation, rather than forcing on them specific restrictions which may not suit their way of life. It also means that people start to think about the resource they are using and hence become stewards of that resource and active, rather than passive, players in all discussions about resource supply issues (including proposals for new power stations, dams and alternatives). Water funds (from payments for luxury and discretionary water use) could be used to subsidise the cost of native plants that thrive in dry conditions, along with water saving devices, stormwater re-use facilities and so on. Environment bonds: Government bonds for conservation would provide the opportunity for individuals and funds to invest directly into natural infrastructure. As well as providing funding for environmentally sustainable projects these bonds provide the opportunity for the community to play a direct role in where funds go (people will pay attention and get involved when they see that it is their money that is running the projects). This enhances a community stewardship role. Restoration of long-term education and capacity building programs: Aimed at individuals and local communities, this proposal would include the return of environmental extension officers on permanent public service salaries in the regions and the cities. Over the last decade or so permanent public servants at all levels have been replaced by government-funded shortterm grants for community projects. Although the direct involvement of the community in environmental works undoubtedly has favourable stewardship outcomes and should continue, this approach has also led to a lack of continuity and a loss of knowledge from project to project. 85

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Take a sand dune revegetation project, for example. The sustainable approach would be to have a government agency responsible for this work. The agency would run a substantial education program about why the dunes need protection, why there need to be fences erected and why it is undesirable for people to run up and down particularly wind-exposed dunes. The agency would also coordinate a community group to replant the dune. This is the way soil conservation agencies worked in the past – immediate direct action supported by a long-term investment in preventing the problem arising again. Currently, the practice is to simply replant the dune over and over again. Long-term education programs need to be directed at the “non-believers” – the people who haven’t been receiving other messages – rather than preaching to the converted. To do this the programs will need to be developed by professional educators, designed with greater community involvement, carried out by and overseen by non-government organisations and local government, and backed up by the resources of state and federal governments. They would replace expensive “splash” advertising programs based on spin rather than substance. Nationalising national parks: Australia needs a nationally funded system of national parks, protected areas and private land nature conservation, including long-term programs to control pest plants and animals. Unlike in similar federal systems – including the United States and Canada – Australia lacks a federally funded national park system. Our national parks are by and large funded and managed by state and territory governments and are victims of a quirk of our constitution and history. As the need to properly resource these areas became apparent from the 1970s onward, and the park system rapidly 86

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expanded, cash-strapped state governments were left with new responsibilities and no money or new sources of income to fund them. National parks were expanding and needing a greater slice of the financial “pie” just when the size of the pie was diminishing. The only way out of this conundrum is to have nationally significant parks and reserves and critically important private land contributions to biodiversity funded from national expenditure. The planning and management of the reserves would stay with the existing experienced state and territory agencies, and state and territory governments would transfer the expenditure that they previously made on the nationally recognised and funded parks into their other parks to ensure a significant boost to overall park and reserve funding. Population (and consumption): How many people can Australia’s environment sustain (at current consumption rates)? This question is not simply about immigration: it can and must be answered unemotionally. If the Australian community decides we want more people (and the decision on whether they come from overseas or we increase the birth rate or a mix of both is separate to this overall point) then we will need to significantly reduce our per capita consumption of environmental resources inside this country. This will contribute to both local and global environmental benefits. But if we don’t reduce per capita consumption then we will need to halt population growth in order to achieve environmental sustainability Data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics shows that the growth in Australia’s population is largely due to immigration. Australia’s natural fertility rate has remained roughly the same, around 1.8, for decades, and on its own would mean that our population did not grow at all. Around two-thirds of our immi87

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gration program over the period 2004–05 to 2008–09 was made up of skilled migrants, and the skilled migrants program has grown by 71 per cent over that period.38 These figures point to the failure of successive governments to invest in the education and training of Australians. In other words, the problem is education funding not immigration policy. Governments have starved the tertiary education sector (universities and vocational education and training) of funds, causing a shortage of everything from general practitioners through scientists and managers to building trades. As a consequence the same governments have adopted a short-term solution to this shortage by importing skilled people through immigration. Not only is this a failure of educational policy but it robs poorer countries of their skilled professionals. The end result for the environment is that if the population continues to increase then any gains made by reducing the production of greenhouse gases per capita, and environmental resource use in general, will be directly offset by an increase in population. This book has shown that we must decrease per capita consumption of environmental resources and per capita waste production if we are to improve the environment for the quality of human existence on the planet. All of the benefits of this approach could be offset if population growth counteracts any improvements in per capita consumption. I want to emphasise that I am not opposed to immigration and I am certainly in favour of immigration on humanitarian grounds. But as a community we must lower our total environmental impact. If we significantly increase immigration, as we have done in recent years, we will have to reduce per capita consumption even more to compensate.

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The last word

In recent decades we have seen the major parties in Australia construct a political system which sees decisionmaking increasingly carried out behind closed doors often away from where most citizens live their daily lives. “Spin” has replaced informed debate with marketing campaigns replacing educational programs. It is all focused on short-term electoral success at the cost of the environment. Citizens feel helpless and isolated. But this is not the way it has to be. When citizens rediscover their most powerful weapon – their vote – and use it to influence all political parties, a new politics will have arisen. So vote for the party that will punish environmental vandals (large, medium and small). If market forces have failed to reflect the true medium- to long-term environmental costs of goods and services then the government must intervene to correct the cost structure and ensure that the funds made available from their intervention are used then to subsidise environmentally positive behaviours and to research environmentally positive alternatives. Over the last decade state governments have largely concentrated their environmental efforts on lowering per capita water consumption by city households – which, as we’ve seen, contribute about 11 per cent to total water consumption. Meanwhile, per capita energy consumption and waste production has continued to increase. Why the focus on urban household water use in preference to those two other vital areas? The answer appears to be political. Business and unions are intimately involved in the energy and waste producing industries, whereas water is largely government controlled. So it is easier to tackle water and to ask individuals to act virtuously and limit their consumption than to tackle the big lobbyists and interest groups in energy and wastes. We need to get back to basics: governments making decisions for the benefit of their citizens rather than for corporations and large political donors. 89

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Governments will only act if the public increasingly demands action. The community has accepted the reality of climate change (well before politicians did) and has repeatedly stated in polls that they are willing to bear the cost of improvements. The opposition to the emissions control has come exclusively from industry lobby groups, corporations, energy unions and their media supporters. Ordinary citizens have willingly accepted and obeyed water restrictions and have increased recycling rates. Again it is corporations who have resisted. The community is ready for decisive action and will increasingly demand it. Governments that do not deliver will not survive on the back of corporations and their donations because ultimately the community and politicians know one sure thing: people vote, corporations don’t.

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Endnotes

R. J. S. Beeton at al, Australia State of the Environment 2006: Independent report to the Australian Government Minister for the Environment and Heritage, Australian State of the Environment Committee, 2006 2. Age, 17 July 2008 3. Senate Standing Committee on Environment, Communications, Information Technology and the Arts, Conserving Australia: Australia’s National Parks, Conservation Reserves and Marine Protected Areas, April 2007 4. G. C. Wescott, “Australia’s Distinctive National Parks System,” in Environmental Conservation, 18(4), 1991, pp 331–40 5. Senate Standing Committee on Environment, Communications, Information Technology and the Arts, op cit, p 258 6. Ibid, Australian Greens Minority Report 7. G. Wescott, “Conservation Policy in Australia,” in P. Attiwill and B. Wilson (eds), Ecology: An Australian Perspective, Oxford University Press, 2006 8. A.F. Bennett et al, “Ecological Processes: A Key Element in Strategies for Nature Conservation,” submitted to Conservation Biology. See also http://www.victorianaturally.org.au 9. See http://www.nps.gov/blri, which describes the Blue Ridge Parkway which runs for hundreds of miles from near Washington DC to South Carolina and has been in existence for 75 years 10. R. Garnaut, 2008, The Garnaut Climate Change Review: Final Report, Cambridge University Press, 2008 11. Ibid, p 547 12. D. Connell, Water Politics in the Murray Darling Basin, Federation Press, 2007

1.

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13. Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists, The State of Australia’s Water, November 2006. D. Connell, op cit. 14. Ibid, p.7 15. http://www.nwc.gov.au/www/html/236-water-use-inaustralia.asp?intSiteID=1 16. Author’s calculations 17. Wentworth Group, op cit 18. R. J. S. Beeton et al, op cit 19. See N. Harvey and B. Caton, Coastal Management in Australia, Oxford University Press, 2003 20. Author’s calculations from Australian Electoral Commission data 21. P. W. Newton (ed), Transitions: Pathways Towards Sustainable Urban Development in Australia, CSIRO Publishing, 2008 22. Ibid, Table 1, page 568 23. G. Wescott, “Is There a Role for the Federal Government in Implementing Integrated Coastal Management in Australia?” in Neil Lazarow at al (eds), Coastal Management in Australia: Key Institutional and Governance Issues for Coastal Natural Resource Management and Planning, Cooperative Research Centre for Coastal Zone, Estuary and Waterway Management, 2006, pp 29–34 24. “Push for Mandatory Cameras in 4WDs,” Australian Associated Press, 6 March 2008. See also Mike Edmonds, “Big Wheels in the ’Burbs Drive Us Mad,” Herald Sun, 7 March 2008. 25. R. J. S. Beeton et al, op cit, is the main source used in this section as it is a fully independent report; where possible, figures are updated from other sources. 26. Australian Government, Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme. Green Paper: Summary, Department of Climate Change, 2008, p 14 27. A. B. Pittock, “Climate Change and the Pattern of Variation in Australian Rainfall,” Search 6: 498–503 92

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28. Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2007 29. R. J. S. Beeton et al, op cit 30. Affluenza, Global Spin and The Growth Fetish (see Further Reading) 31. Sharon Beder, Global Spin: The Corporate Assault on Environmentalism, Scribe Publications 1997 32. http://www.energymatters.com.au/governmentrebates/feedintariff.php 33. See, for example, in a special edition of the Marine and Coastal Community Network’s Waves magazine, volume 14, number 1, 2008 34. Stephen Cauchi, Sunday Age, 18 May 2008. Further information on a range of alternative energy sources is available at www.biopowersystem.com 35. For example, see www.packagingcovenant.org.au and The Status of Packaging Sustainability in Australia, prepared for the Packaging Council of Australia by MS2 and Perchards, 2008 36. Ross Garnaut, op cit, pp 531–563 37. Ibid, p 531 38. Josh Gordon, “Libs Call for Slash to Migration,” Age, 25 October 2008

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Acknowledgements The ideas and proposals in this book have their origins in a variety of sources and forums. I hope I have acknowledged the source of the proposals in the reference and further reading lists as appropriate. I apologise to any group or individual I have inadvertently left out. I would like to thank my colleagues at Deakin University and in various conservation groups and government agencies that I have been involved with over the past thirty-five years for their discussions and generosity of thought. I would particularly like to thank Peter Browne at Swinburne University for his ideas on, and editing of, the manuscript. Finally I would like to thank my family and friends for all their assistance, and particularly my partner, Victoria. To Alex and his generation: this one’s for you.

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Further reading

See also books and articles mentioned in the footnotes M. Archer and B. Beale, Going Native: Living in the Australian Environment, Hodder, 2004 S. Beder, Global Spin: The Corporate Assault on Environmentalism, Scribe Publications, 1997 S. Dovers and S. Wild River, Managing Australia’s Environment, Federation Press, 2003 E. T. Freyfogle, Why Conservation Is Failing and How It Can Regain Ground, Yale University Press, 2006 C. Hamilton, Growth Fetish, Allen and Unwin, 2003 C. Hamilton and R. Denniss, Affluenza: When Too Much Is Never Enough, Allen and Unwin, 2005 D. L. Lindenmayer, On Borrowed Time: Australia’s Environmental Crisis and What We Must Do About It, CSIRO Publishing, 2007 I. Lowe, Living in the Hothouse: How Global Warming Affects Australia, Scribe Publications, 2005 I. Lowe, A Big Fix: Radical Solutions for Australia’s Environmental Crisis, Black Inc, 2005 R. Nielsen, The Little Green Handbook: A Guide to Critical Global Trends, Scribe Publications, 2005 D. Spratt and P. Sutton, Climate Code Red: The Case for Emergency Action, Scribe Publications, 2008 D. Yencken and D. Wilkinson, Resetting the Compass: Australia’s Journey Towards Sustainability, CSIRO Publishing, 2000

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