Protecting the seabed and foreshore
With the sudden departure of deep sea drilling company Statoil from Northland here’s a timely look the role of community action in that, the state of play in NZ and what is next.
Economy
energy
Statoil leaves Northland, Greenpeace announce summer of Climate Action
Congratulations and thanks to the people of Northland!
International Days of Prayer and Action with Standing Rock
What we know is coming largely from outside the mainstream. Which is how it should be.
Why we need to stand with Standing Rock
For seven months the next movement of social and environmental justice and resistance has been growing. We should be paying attention.
Big Oil in plain packaging
Big Tobacco was hit this week in New Zealand after Parliament passed laws requiring smokes to be sold in plain packaging. The science about the health threats posed by smoking is settled, as is the science over climate change. When can we expect laws being passed against the oil companies?
Abrupt climate change: CO2 equivalent now at 485 ppm
We are now at 485 ppm CO2 equivalent greenhouse gas concentrations, up from 250 ppm in the 1700s. And climbing fast.
Charles Hugh Smith – The Ultimate Long Game: Autarky and Resilience
Today, electronic numbers in electronic bank accounts are the most important things to the people who lead NZ. That’s going to have to seriously change. The country’s capacity and resources in terms of food, energy, water and cultural/social resiliency is what actually counts.
July 2016 was the hottest single month recorded since 1880
July 2016 was the hottest month ever in recorded modernity.
Financial capital is crazy OP. Time to strip it back to basics.
Financial capital is way over powered in our current political economic system. Every aspect of our lives has been financialised and securitised, from our homes to our educations. From our drinking water to our power supply.
Free Petrol Pt IV
Part IV of IV
Free Petrol Pt III
Part III of IV – a focus on road transport.
The New Silk Road
The New Silk Road is a massive economic transport system being built at rapid speed with Chinese money, Chinese politicking, Chinese engineering, and yes, Chinese steel.
Free Petrol Pt II
Part II of IV. How to achieve zero carbon from the shipping and aviation sectors by the 2030s.
Free Petrol Pt I
Part I of a IV part series of posts on what we can do to hold global warming below 2 degrees C.
Climate change pedal to the metal
Avoiding 2 deg C warming is a ship that’s sailed. Global warming is now happening at about 4.3x the previous long-run rate. And it might go up to 18x the previous rate over the next few years. That’s what the pundits call “abrupt climate change.”
Chris de Freitas now is the time to be afraid
As the temperatures increase and the sea rises Chris de Freitas still claims that anthropogenic climate change is not a happening thing. And shows his inability to analyze by misinterpreting a Jarrod Gilbert article which describes climate change deniers as charlatans.
Jeremy Corbyn apologises for Blair and Bush’s Iraq War
Jeremy Corbyn’s full response to the Chilcot response. Corbyn says that the Iraq war “was an act of military aggression launched on a false pretext” and that he apologises for it on behalf of Labour, who was in Government at the time.
Official climate change fraud
Scientists and experts have been knowingly understating the unfolding climate change catastrophe to governments and decision makers. Why? For the sake of what is “politically palatable”.
Scottish Parliament votes to ban fracking.
Imagine a country where the political divide is over whether to ban fracking outright or to be opposed to fracking but have a moratorium first in order to gather more evidence.
Is the petro world in decline?
There are various suggestions that the metro industry’s domination of the world may be in decline.
Time to wake up to the Electricity Authority
The Electricity Authority is planning hearings on proposals that will mean that Rio Tinto will save money on electricity charges but people living in Auckland and Northland will pay more. Time to make your voices heard.
The Mother Budget
There are budgets and there are budgets. And for all the presence or absence of bright ideas, there’s a budget that threatens to subsume all others…
We’re going to burn it all, until we burn it down.
What does it really mean to reduce NZ’s total fossil fuel use by 50% by 2030: a warm up discussion for an upcoming thought experiment.
Portugal
There are bits of good news out there, but there’s a lot of denial around the mess we’re in.
Nice weather down here…
… and a freight train coming down the tracks.
Logging truck roll overs meeting: Otaika Valley Hall tomorrow night!
A fully laden logging truck tears up the road like thousands of cars. And when they keep rolling over around the corner, locals get very nervous and upset for themselves and their kids.
Climate Change Change Pt 1: What are we waiting for?
Before government spending cuts there was The Riot for Austerity, a grass roots Climate Change movement that showed how it was possible for ordinary people to change and significantly reduce their carbon emissions without someone forcing them to.
Maybe stop dropping it…
…the hot potato – stop dropping it. Maybe grow the fuck up and react intelligently to the blindingly obvious.
NRT: This is what happens if you don’t have a plan
I/S at No Right Turn on the renewables target and futility of targets without plans.
The solar surcharge
Profit gouging or genuine need?
Global elite plan their escape from “pleb masses”
So, Key has now come out and revealed to us how afraid the global oligarch class (and their well paid professional enablers) are. They appear to have no plans to reverse their activites to make things better for us.
Don’t extend polluting Huntly power station!
Power companies are trying to back out of the previously announced commitment to shut down the fossil fueled power plants at Huntly.
the Global Death Economy
A new edition of “Confessions of an Economic Hitman” has been released. It makes it clear that we are in the grip of a global “Death Economy” and a collective embrace of ‘Thanatos’, the death instinct.
Syria escalating
Turkey has started shelling the US backed Kurdish forces that are fighting against ISIS. What could go wrong?
The great big list of John Key’s big fat lies (UPDATED)
How many more lies will John Key tell today in his so-called State of the Nation address? Virtual chocolate fish to whomever guesses the closest number.
The unexpected oil crisis
The world is currently facing a problem that even a few years ago was unthinkable. Oil is cheap and demand has dropped out of the market. What are the geopolitical implications of this?