What can we do

Today’s discussion is about what to do to reduce the carbon footprint.

Energy
The IPCC report (see links to the right) identifies the production of electricity as the primary target area for Green House Gas reduction; and running a close second the transport area. The reason that Howard won’t support the Kyoto Protocol is because he sees carbon trading schemes as hitting one of Australia’s biggest exports – coal. Despite this; Australia could be one of the leaders in this area. With low population density geosequestration (deep burial) of emissions are one of the obvious solutions for Australians to explore and export along with the energy source.

Shifting to sustainable power will also of course show a positive impact on the carbon pricing. This will in turn stimulate the alternative industry area to support these initiatives.

A carbon tax of A$20-$30 CO2 per tonne is the kind of incentive required to see 35% of energy coming from the renewables sector - such as solar, wind and wave energy. And it's a price industry can well afford to pay, according to the CSIRO Energy Futures Forum, with the Australian GDP continuing to thrive even if carbon pricing is introduced. In fact it will stimulate Australia capability in Solar and wave energy development. Areas where we have an abundance of places to explore. Wind energy I think is monopolised by the Europeans, so lets see some focus on these two areas in Australian development. In fact we should give incentives to early development - to the CSIRO or BP Solar (Sydney) – a very much going concern for that matter

Transport
From the transport area I have covered this subject a few days back. Car / Truck efficiency and fuel type are key; better biofuels and advanced electric and hybrid vehicles with improved batteries are important options to develop, and I’m sure if we had real leadership (remember my mention of this) in Australia we could get Toyota (already leaders in Hybrid) or GM or Ford to use Australia as a means to develop Hybrid and electric technology. (For Ford and GM Australia is that novel place somewhere down under – and its too far away to impact local markets, but it may be a way to have an each way bet on the future).

The humble car also generates lots of tyres per year. An Aussie called John Dobozy is one innovator we need. He runs Molectra Tyre Recycling. John has invented a new recycling technology for extracting lucrative materials from waste tyres, economically and environmentally. The process reclaims all of the components that make up a tyre cleanly and efficiently without waste, residue, or emissions whilst extracting various products for re-use. The process recycles one hundred percent of the tyre. John calls himself an ‘Innovation Architect’, and I know that he one of our thousands of potential Aussie innovations; given the right climate set from the government.

Agriculture
Again in Australia agriculture is capable of making significant contributions to climate mitigation and has already done so - by lowering emissions by 40% since 1990 levels, largely due to the ban on land clearing.

Emissions trading should be the major means of mitigation in agriculture, providing incentives for farmers to offset emissions by planting trees, or adapting greener practices. Farmers plant 20 million trees a year, which leaves any other tree planting program behind. But farmers can't be expected to take steps towards mitigation unless there are incentives to do so. Some individuals have had to pay a high price for the rest of the community to benefit.

One issue we have here is water. For instance there can be issues with water trading when combined with carbon credits, the other flag-bearer of mitigation efforts. If you wanted to turn pasture into forest (gaining carbon credits), it creates a decline in stream flow downstream (lowering your water trading capacity). This is where another couple of Australian innovations come to the fore.

I’m in Australia this week and I turned on the ABC tonight to see an invention called “Water Fresh”. Waterfresh is a mechanical water disinfection system, designed to kill pathogens. It is important because many country towns use traditional sewage treatment or septics as a means of treating effluent and grey water. Anthony (Tony) Dickson demonstrated tonight how he was inspired to create a new sewage treatment system when he was dining at a restaurant. As he sipped on a glass of water, he could smell and taste the chlorine and thought to himself, ‘surely we can do better than that’. He set about creating a water disinfection system that does not require large amounts of chemicals. The result is Waterfresh, a technology that can clean sewage to class A level and make drinking water without the use of free chlorine. This is innovation at work and linked with a tree planting program goes a long way to solve Australia’s water problems.

Focussing particuarly in the Agriculture region, just a short time ago again on the inventors program Dean Cameron demonstrated a thing he calls the The Biolytix Filter. It is a compact waste treatment system which converts raw sewage, wastewater and food waste into high quality irrigation water on site. So again another alternative. Eleven years ago, Dean was pained to see that existing waste treatment systems had foul smells, flies, and a regular need to be treated with chemicals, as well as a tendency to break down. Dean was convinced that nature had the answer, and the breakthrough came in his observations of forest litter decomposition. He found that the fastest and most efficent decomposition occurred not in the water, but on the riverbank. Dean carefully engineered the habitat needed for the complex food webs that thrive on the river edges, and the Biolytix “live wiggling” Filter system was born. Dean Cameron who is an ecologist. He is passionate about urban ecology, in particular designing and creating human habitats that integrate natural material and energy cycles. Dean wants to develop practical, replicable and affordable products for the 2.5 billion people worldwide who have inadequate housing, water, sanitation and nutrition.

John Howard’s answer to Australia’s water problems is praying. I say help yourself (or others) John! Get with the program and support Aussie innovation that can and will make a difference. John can stop praying and start acting; but as I say, we need a leader, and a leader he is not. He needs guys like Dean and Tony. So, get with the program John Howard and give attention (and impetus) to Dean Tony and the other Australian innovators!!