Simply reckless

This could go viral but is ‘Ziggy Switkowski’ a pseudonym for climate change denier Lord Monkton?

Writing for that bastion of fair and balanced environmental reporting, The Australian, (HERE) his views are just as wildly bonkers as the esteemed Lord of the Realm when it comes to climate change. And just as embarrassing.

First up, Mr Switkowski says carbon dioxide is not a pollutant, telling us sternly to respect the science. Then, by paragraph 10, he writes that “Today… CO2 has become a pollutant”.

Er, hello? Overheating Earth to Ziggy Stardust. This is precisely why carbon dioxide is called a pollutant. In fact, this is precisely why it is a pollutant.

It is obviously perfectly possible for naturally occurring substances – such as marine salt, radioactivity, sound, light – to pollute the environment if, through human action, they occur in such a concentration to cause a disturbance.

Therefore, it is entirely logical and right to term carbon dioxide a pollutant. Humans are emitting so much that it is poisoning our planet – not just through global warming but also causing acidification of the seas.

The fact he answers his own entirely unnecessary opening question, (Why do we allow our political leaders and the commentariat to refer to carbon dioxide as a pollutant instead of a greenhouse gas?), doesn’t stop him ploughing relentlessly onwards.

I’ll happily answer the series of subsequent entirely pointless and futile questions he poses.

“Why are smelters where aluminium is refined labelled as dirty polluters?” Er, because they often, if not usually, are… dirty polluters. Assuming Mr Switkowski has heard of Google and the Interweb, a cursory search reveals reams of information about aluminium smelter pollution.

In Tasmania, where I live, there have been numerous reports and occurrences of pollution arising from the several smelting factories here, including several incidences of heavy metals seeping into the waterways and adversely affecting people who live nearby.

“Do we label pharmaceutical companies as drug dealers because some of their pain killers are made from heroin?” Well, Big Pharma hardly has a pristine reputation. ‘Pharmageddon’ is the neologism used to describe the epidemic of prescription drug addiction currently sweeping the US and identified by the White House as a serious problem.

“Is my granddaughter an environmental vandal because she “contaminates” eight nappies a day destined for landfill? Who dares call babies polluters?” No, she is not a deliberate polluter – but I dare call her parents polluters. They could use biodegradable or even old-school cloth nappies. About 800 million nappies are dumped in landfill sites ever year, and that’s just in Australia.

“If your energy hungry plasma television is bigger than mine, are you a polluter?” Er, yes. Duh! Why do you think, for example, California has actually led the world in banning high-energy consuming TVs? TVs account for about 10 per cent of US electricity bills and the California government estimates that increasing the uptake of energy-efficient TVs would save Californians about $8billion in electricity bills – not to mention the reduction of carbon dioxide pollution – over a decade.

Mr Switkowski then bravely suggests the best antidote for climate change is geo-engineering: “Eventually, technology will arrive to remove greenhouse gas from the atmosphere”. Will it? Eventually? Good thing there’s no rush!

His implication that there’s no point acting against climate change because others will keep polluting is simply reckless. It’s like saying there’s no point having laws because people still commit crime. The progressive and responsible carbon tax is about Australia doing the right thing and it’s about it future-proofing our economy. Where we lead, others will follow – but we will have the leader’s advantage.

I don’t want to be rude but, as its Chancellor, Mr Switkowski doesn’t seem the best advert for RMIT’s intellectual rigour.

The problem with discredited and lazy Greenwash stuff like this is that it just gets used by deniers like Monkton and his ilk.

The question Mr Switkowski should have asked is, ‘Why are so many political leaders and the commentariat allowed to continue polluting the environment with their discredited and sloppy environmental bigotry?’

Tom de Kadt is an environmental activist in and around Hobart

• Turnbull takes shot at climate change deniers:

Former Liberal leader Malcolm Turnbull has urged his party to stop listening to climate change deniers, calling on members to defend the science of climate change and pledge to reduce Australia’s emissions.

Mr Turnbull lost the leadership to current Opposition Leader Tony Abbott over the issue of climate change.

Delivering the Virginia Chadwick memorial lecture in Sydney last night, he said a war was being waged on scientists by “those opposed to taking action to cut emissions, many because it does not suit their own financial interests”.

He said those parties currently attacking the Labor Party for its carbon tax would also attack the Coalition if it tried to implement its plan to reduce emissions.

“If we form a government and then seek to meet that 5 per cent target [by 2020] through purchases of carbon offsets from farmers and payments to polluting industry to cut their emissions, the opponents of the science of climate change will be criticising that expenditure as pointless and wasteful with as much vehemence as they are currently denouncing Julia Gillard’s carbon tax,” he said.

Mr Turnbull said parties with vested interests were trying to muddy the waters on climate science to prolong the export of coal, comparing their actions to tobacco companies discrediting the connection between smoking and lung cancer.

And he said Australia’s dependence on coal meant it should spend much more on carbon capture technology.

“Many would say no country has a greater vested interest in clean coal,” he said.

He also rejected the view Australia should wait for China and India to act, saying Australia’s emissions were much higher per capita.

Mr Abbott said recently that Australia’s emissions reduction target, backed by both sides of politics, was “crazy” because it would be overwhelmed pollution increases in China.

But Mr Turnbull said Chinese emissions were one-fifth of Australia’s and India’s were less than one-tenth.

“Our regular references to their [India and China’s] emissions and ‘Why should we do anything until the Chinese and the Indians do something’ – they find those references incredibly galling,” he said.

“How incredibly embarrassing statements like that are when you actually confront representatives of those countries.”