A number of good news stories featured in this month’s session. The Anstow Eureka Prize for Innovative Technology has been awarded to a University of Adelaide team for research which suggests melting salt to store solar power could solve the big challenge of solar power – ie. the mismatch between peak sunlight hours and peak evening electricity use. Infratech’s new ‘solar raft’ technology, comprising solar panels that move with the sun allowing them to soak up more energy, has the added benefit of the cooling impact of water being available for use at higher temperatures when the efficiency of solar panels usually falls. Tim Flannery’s latest book ‘Atmosphere of Hope: Searching for solutions to the climate crisis’ advocates for new ‘third way technologies’ which may absorb greenhouse gases on a large scale such as seaweed farming; carbon negative cement; carbon negative plastic; and other new forms of carbon capture (The Age 15 Aug 2015). According to the CEO of the Australian Renewable Energy Agency ‘It’s difficult to overstate just how quickly things are moving in battery storage space’ and that ‘within months every major solar installer will also offer a storage product’ (The Age, 21 Aug 2015). We hear from a reliable source that our local provider Country Solar is talking of having the Tesla battery available soon. We also read a most informative and optimistic article describing ways in which forward looking policies in ‘Four Surprising Countries’ China, India, Brazil and Mexico, are giving hope for Climate Action (EcoWatch 14/8/2015).
We are continuing to monitor areas of concern. Will the Indian ocean temper the impact of the El Nino which has been predicted would otherwise have a ‘great Godzilla’ impact on Australia? How likely is extreme weather under global warming? Will legislation proposed by the Abbott government to change environment laws to reduce the rights of community groups to challenge development projects pass the senate cross benchers? How can the dominance of coal, particularly Victoria’s brown coal, be reduced in Australia? A country which visiting writer Naomi Klein suggests is like her country Canada, ‘founded on a powerful frontier mentality with an idea of limitless nature that can be endlessly extracted’… “In Canada I can’t tell where the oil industry ends and the government begins and in Australia the same is true when it comes to coal” (Guardian Australia 17 Aug 2015).
We are continuing to monitor areas of concern. Will the Indian ocean temper the impact of the El Nino which has been predicted would otherwise have a ‘great Godzilla’ impact on Australia? How likely is extreme weather under global warming? Will legislation proposed by the Abbott government to change environment laws to reduce the rights of community groups to challenge development projects pass the senate cross benchers? How can the dominance of coal, particularly Victoria’s brown coal, be reduced in Australia? A country which visiting writer Naomi Klein suggests is like her country Canada, ‘founded on a powerful frontier mentality with an idea of limitless nature that can be endlessly extracted’… “In Canada I can’t tell where the oil industry ends and the government begins and in Australia the same is true when it comes to coal” (Guardian Australia 17 Aug 2015).
