In the wee hours of this morning, Liberal backbencher Craig Kelly continued his attack on Australians opposed to coal, opining it was a crime against their country.
Craig Kelly has been at the forefront of the Monash Forum’s push to boost coal’s image and see new coal-fired power stations built in Australia. The Forum’s hearts and minds campaign kicked off recently with an interesting “coal fact sheet” geared to promoting there are a bunch of coal fired power stations being built elsewhere.
Aside from some rubbery figures and missing the point that just because someone else in engaging in a particular pursuit it doesn’t necessarily mean you should too, it turned out the information on the fact sheet was drawn from a source that also stated coal power capacity is in a squeeze and the global coal fleet will begin to shrink if current trends continue.
Say what you like about Craig Kelly, but no-one can deny his commitment to his cause – these sorts of revelations are just water off a duck’s back. He rumbles on regardless.
Early this morning, Mr. Kelly seized on a report published on The Australian stating thermal coal exports jumped 20% in terms of value in 2017/18 and are expected to remain steady for the next year. However, it also said thermal coal exports would ease the following year.
Still, Mr. Kelly saw this as very good news and proving that thermal coal wasn’t in decline. Furthermore, he said anti-coal talk was treasonous.
“To demonise our nation’s one number export earner – that without we’d be unable to afford our world class hospitals, the National Disability Insurance Scheme, Aged care, etc, etc – is an act of treason.”
To oppose the use of an energy source that has wreaked so much havoc on the planet and human health when there are other cleaner and renewables sources available, and for that opposition to be called a crime against your country, is a bit rough. That Australia has been profiting handsomely from being a Typhoid Mary of sorts should provide pause for thought rather than just unabashed pride.
As chairman of the backbench environment and energy committee, Mr. Kelly should be aware that coal kills – and that’s a fact.
Tony Abbott’s Jaw- Dropper
Craig Kelly is by no means Robinson Crusoe when it comes to “did he really just say that” comments in relation to coal. Ex-Prime Minister and fellow Monash Forum member Tony Abbott apparently let fly with a ripper last week while being interviewed by Alan Jones.
As reported by RenewEconomy, Mr. Abbott is quoted as stating:
“We are damaging our economy in an attempt to save the planet in 100 years’ time, and I don’t think our children will thank us if we damage their future in order to make the world a bit colder for our grandchildren.”
Where to begin?
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Coal kills you say. Cars kill a helluva lot more than coal ever does. Maybe we should ban cars too. Coal power us essential for our future well being in energy terms. That is until we realise that modular nuclear power stations are a perfect fit for a geologically stable continent like Australia. We have vast areas of land . where nuclear waste could be safely stored underground. All the money we waste on renewables is bringing minimal help at huge cost. Time for Australia to get over this renewable fervour and use the huge advantages nature has given us.
Generally agree with Peter Birkett but when very well informed people like Elon Musk and Sanjeev Gupta begin serious transitioning to renewables then its time for governments to sit up and take notice. If we kept the notion of ‘there is no Planet B’ foremost in our thinking then we should be led to better decision-making on this time-critical issue.
No need to panic, I don’t think we are going to ban cars. In a western post-industrial developed economy the thought of banning cars where most people see them as mobility to help cover Australian distances is just too far fetched to be taken seriously. However I do think the fossil fuel-burning type is going to be more restricted as time goes on. There is some good news though as subsidies are slowly withdrawn from all technologies there will not be any economic imperative continuing with petrol and diesel vehicles. This will improve both cost of ownership and health returns, for most of us and also future generations.
Car’s kill? yep… for example, like when you stop suddenly and smash your head into the windscreen. Ok, so we should find ways to make things better, and we did by using airbags. Not perfect, but better!
Coal kills? yep… so using the same analogy, we should look for ways to make things better. Might not be perfect, but better. Why not look into wind power? Or solar? or thorium reactors?
I don’t really understand what people are so black and white on issues. Coal is good (provides energy, i love energy!), and at the same time coal is bad too (kills people, that’s sad!)
Why not just embrace that there are different paths, and see if some lead to better outcomes. Waiting for the ‘perfect’ solution means you never take any steps at all.
Might as well start walking…..
It would be interesting to know how many people the Australian feral parliament is killing, by allowing the burning of coal for electricity generation and other uses, and, by allowing the supplying of coal to be burnt, and, for how many deaths and injuries, the current and past members of the Australian feral parliament, have been responsible, through their involvement in the burning of coal, which is effectively, the indiscriminate use of chemical weapons against the human race and against the world.
And, when are the current and past members of the Australian feral parliament, going to be prosecuted, convicted, and, permanently imprisoned, for their crimes against humanity and against the environment?
Perhaps, the members of the feral parliament, past and present, should simply be captured, and, buried in wooden boxes, under about 60 feet of dirt. I believe that they call it carbon capture.
And, it could save the country from their looting.
Peter Troll Burko, i understand pollies get coal related bribes but what does a pleb like you get when you parrot “not even one term tonys” bs? All you get is high energy prices and nothing more. Lay off the murdoch press and educate yourself.
For mine Craig Kelly is half right in his comments linking coal burning or not to treason – he just has it the worng way around. At what point do you look at our LNP government’s active promotion of coal, and continual denigration of clean and cheaper alternatives – at the current costs in health, at the trillions of dollars of homes and infrastrucrue that are going to be drowned, at the huge proportion of global food production on low lying deltas that similarly will be drowned, at the untold misery of the coming hundreds of millions of climate refugees from drought and water wars, at the fact Australi is destroying it’s economic future by stubblonly sticking to the old technologies instead of becoming a world leading renewable energy super-power – at what point to do you look at all this betrayal and call it treason?