Today I have invited Alistair Wood to write a guest post about the River Murray. Alastair is a local resident at Victor Harbour in South Australia and his article reflects the frustration of many people who live along and near the River.

The idea of a community driven plan for the River is a good one.

Alastair and I would love your thoughts.

“I attended the Murray-Darling Basin Authority meeting at Goolwa on Feb 2^nd and it was a total and utter waste of time. Scheduled to last for only two hours, it wasted the first forty five minutes on total trivia – nothing of substance was produced. I left.

The crisis that is the MDB needs action now. The River Murray is rapidly dying from its mouth upwards and twenty of the Basin’s twenty three rivers are listed as being in poor or very poor health. The time for endless consultation, discussion, review and debate is long gone. There is a wartime-like urgency for the MDBA to show leadership and take immediate action to address the long term causes of this crisis – gross over extraction of the Basin’s water, colossal losses associated with 13,000 kms of open channels, outdated, inefficient irrigation practices and dysfunctional/ non existent metering.

But the MDBA does nothing; its priorities are all wrong. It ignores these urgent causes and instead busies itself with trivial ‘community’ meetings that have all the urgency and relevance of a senior citizen’s tea party. It hides behind an endless, comatose bureaucratic process and puts its faith in a ‘Basin Plan’, a de facto code for continuing delay. A convenient escape clause that allows the authority to continue to avoid the hard decisions that are decades overdue. As a distraction, it puts forward obscure projects that address obscure problems and the Rudd government throws vast amounts of money at them, hoping they will go away. But they don’t and large portions of this money disappear into the black hole of bureaucracy, leaving little for the rivers.

The cold reality facing the Basin Plan is that it will be subjected to the same labyrinthine bureaucratic process and years will pass before actual results appear along our rivers, likely to be as late as 2014. These are critical years that our rivers cannot afford to lose.

And the reason for this appalling 40 yr paralysis?

Political parties operate entirely through a prism of self-interest. The Rudd government is paranoid that the solutions required will prove so unpopular they will be unelectable for a decade. So they put their narrow interests first, and nothing is done.

And the answer?

The communities of the Basin must bypass the politicians and bureaucrats and seize the initiative. They must become leaders and visionaries and take control of the Basin’s problems, leaving the politicians follow in their wake.

To do this they must produce a simple plan of action that can be adopted Basin-wide. When it has sufficient support, it should be taken to Canberra. If both major parties approved, the longstanding political paralysis and odium that has prevented progress for 40 years would be removed. Politicians would be relieved from the onerous task of finding solutions to the Basin’s problems. And the communities, the people who know the most about the rivers, would be free to forge ahead with their own remedies.”

Written by Alastair Wood, 8 February 2010

Corey, thanks for posting a link to the Gibbons et al paper on  linking science to policy makers. The suggestions by Gibbons et al are spot on. Policy makers operate in short time frames and must take into account much more information than just that of science. For example, people often say “why doesn’t someone just fix the Murray Darling Basin”? We know that the science says that the ecological systems need more water. But policy makers are not just getting information from ecologists. They are also getting information from rural psychologists telling them that there is widespread depression and even suicides. Economists tell them that whole economies are collapsing. Political advisers are telling them that local communities need to be appeased. Local, regional and global industries are lobbying hard to survive. Media players may emphasise certain problems that shift community perceptions and make it difficult to get community support for certain actions.

The reason we have a political process is to try to balance all of this information and all of these needs. You will never be able to model it perfectly and come up with THE right answer. We live in a political system where all ideas are contestable, even ideas based on very sound science. This is a good thing. Whenever communities have vested all knowledge and power in a few people – disaster has always ensued.

If scientists want to be influential in this world, they must be:

1. Very honest about what the science says. As we can see from the climate change debate, it does not help the cause of putting across a credible message on science when the results are exaggerated to try and build support for a particular cause. Let the truth tell its own story. In the end civilisations rise and fall on the political process. There is not much you can do to change that. Go along for the ride.

2. Very vocal about what the science says, but more circumspect about what the response should be. Scientists can appear arrogant when they presume that they know the right response. It is important to suggest policy responses and explain what you think the implications are of different approaches, but stick to your knitting and talk about what you know about most of all – the science.

3. Tell your story. People love stories, which is why singing contests, sport, soap operas and crime shows are more popular than shows about science. If you want to reach more people, put a story around what you are trying to say. Corey’s blog-post on  how frogs were disappearing because of the global appetite for frogs legs went viral because it was a interesting story. And the science message got out as a result. Some scientists  complain to me that this is “spin”. True, but not in the sense that you are trying to deceive someone, just that you are trying to get them interested. You are showing respect to your audience by “spinning” the message in an interesting way.

4. I need to hear it at least seven times before I’ve heard it. Putting out one media release, or one article or one presentation and thinking that you’ve done the job of communicating is delusional. Good communicators get their message out lots of times in lots of different ways. When your audience has heard the message so many times they are getting sick of it, (think Kevin Rudd and “working families” or Tony Abbot and “great big Labor tax”) they have finally heard it.

5. Maintain patience and pressure. It is sometimes frustrating that no action occurs even when you think it is obvious that it should. Don’t burn your bridges by taking it out on policy makers in government. You may need to work with them for many years to come, and they are likely to get more powerful over time, not less.  But on the other hand, don’t let up the pressure. Maintain a professional tone to your discussions and presentations in the media. In the end, you will mostly be respected if you keep telling the story about the science. And policy makers can be just as frustrated as you about the lack of action as you are, even if they are not allowed to show it.

I’ll finish this post with a quote from Machievelli, one of the great thinkers on political science, said that “… nothing is more difficult than to introduce a new order. Because the innovator has for enemies all those who have done well under the old conditions and lukewarm defenders in those who may do well under the new…”

True

Written by Paul Dalby on 2 February 2010

This talk by Prof Peter Smailes from the University of Adelaide was given at the SAMDB NRM Science Forum on 12th October 2009.  In the presentation, Peter gives some sobering demographic statistical information on the structure of rural communities in South Australia, their population trends and how they interact socially. He paints a picture of an aging, declining population who are socially isolated and get most of their information from within their community. This has important implications for innovation, sustainability and economic development in the majority of SA’s rural communities. We know what a devastating impact isolation has on the process of innovation. If economic growth is dependent largely on population growth and improvements in productivity, this information by Prof Smailes suggests long term economic decline is likely to be the norm across most of rural SA unless these patterns of demographics and social interaction can be changed.

Written by Paul Dalby on 19 October 2009

Frank Wyatt from Enterprising Partnerships has been pushing me to think about transdisciplinary research as he has been helping the Wine2030 Research Cluster a the University of Adelaide refine its business strategy. I like having these discussions with Frank, partly because we come at these issues from different perspectives.  Being of the X-generation I am naturally cynical, and so have a deep suspicion of the re-badging of old terms to look like something new and important (eg. ‘Program Logic’ in environmental management), or a fixation with new ways of doing things at the expense of common sense (eg. a fixation by science managers on ‘collaboration’, instead of ‘outcomes’). Nevertheless, I agree with Frank that science managers need to keep encouraging researchers to look beyond their traditional areas of specialty to discover and invent new ideas and understanding.

I see researchers becoming more interested in working across disciplines, working collaboratively and solving real world problems, but not for the sake of it, to discover new things and do things previously unimaginable. They still work alone and on narrow fields of intense specialty, because break-throughs are found there also. If trans-disciplinary research is going to become more widely adopted, it needs to demonstrate its value, and there need to be tools individuals can pick up to quickly adopt their current expertise to new problem solving processes.

Mike Seyfang’s blog on design, thinking and science describes nicely how transdisciplinary science is a substantially difference science than traditional science collaboration. It requires new skills. In a podcast linked to on Mike’s blog, Tamath Rainsford argues that for transdisciplinary science to succeed, we need  “specialising generalists”, people who know enough about a discipline to add value to discussions across a number of discipline areas (eg. Wayne Meyer from University of Adelaide can debate eloquently with economics, agronomists, modellers and soil scientists).  She also argues that we need to train scientists with new tools  so that they can more effectively participate in transdisciplinary research, such as soft operations research, systems thinking, heuristics, philosophy, working in teams, communication, risk management, decision making processes.

I have seen scientists training their students in these tools for the last 5-10 years, and the number who are is growing. Hugh Possingham, now at the University of Queensland, trains his students in these tools, as well as games theory. His research group is one of the most successful ecological research teams in Australia.

Mike list some common themes that emerge from his reading and thinking on transdisciplinary research. Mikes learnings are in italic, followed by my comments in normal txt:

• Play – a key ingredient in emergent behaviour, playing around with stuff leads to interesting possibilities and great questions. Who resources this stuff? The challenge fopr me is that I need to grow the business. Play must lead to tangible results reasonably soon, or must not distract (too much) from going to where the resources are
• Expand – pure reductionist thinking and methods have served us well in the scientific method and will continue to do so. While we are busy learning more and more about less and less, we should take time out to expand our horizons from time to time. Agree, but again, who is encouraging, rewarding and resourcing? Is this why large research programs are successful over small, short term projects. They give people the opportunity to experiment and play?
  
• Work at the boundaries – one of the key tenets of Transdisciplinarity is to step outside the comfort zone of a single discipline, go beyond collaboration with other disciplines by working at the boundaries. Warning: will expose one to risk and possibly the need to develop new language. (worth it). I’ve seen some of the most exciting ideas for research invented around a table when two specialists meet for the first time. It is beautiful to watch.
• Embrace Risk – learn to fail cheaply and often. You have described my life.
• Open Co-operation – pass it forward, share. The best minds do this. They are not afraid to give ideas away. Because they know they have too many for one lifetime to resolve.
• Swim up-stream and be counter-cultural. I’m not sure this relates to trans-disciplinary science, but it makes old rebels like Mike and I feel smug saying it.
• Trans-disciplinary does not replace traditional research – is an added component. Let’s be careful about telling over-worked, under-paid scientists that they need to throw away their old models and adopt our new great ideas on how they should be doing research. These are new tools to add to the researchers amoury, along with statistics, gell blocks and coffee.
• Speed the Process of Innovation through prototypes, enabling more breakthrough. I have been slow on the uptake on this. I have been resistant to the idea of investing development funds on research, but perhaps if targeted cleverly, will lead to good returns in terms of new business.

Would love to read responses to these thoughts.

Written by Paul Dalby on 1 October 2009

Mike Seyfang blog’s his excitement that an original video made available under Creative Commons was picked up by Adelaide Now. His post made me think about our view of information and communication. In the age of newspapers, television and radio, information was consumable and disposable and communication was about writing. New media in particular changes our relationship with information – it is now something that stays around, being re-viewed, re-mixed and re-interpreted – it talks back to us. My experience in putting information online as video, audio and text, is that the reader base builds over time, as does the conversation. This means that information I put up a year ago, can bring me new connections and opportunities a year later – as Mike has found.

This makes me think more carefully about the purpose of putting information online. What is “news” and what is “content”. In fact, if I make information available in the way Mike is suggesting, “news” is “content”, so must be carefully constructed so that it makes sense as consumable news and as long term content that has value years from now.

Barry Brook’s blog “Brave New Climate” is a case in point. It is a mix of news and content, but the news remains of interest in the context of the rest of the blog-posts. Over time, he has build up a valuable library of content, and his army of readers and commenters grows at an ever increasing rate.

It also reminds me that communication is about listening as well as talking/writing. By seeing Adelaide Now re-interpret Mike’s original videos, he gets to listen to how others perceive his original content. Too often organisations lock their material down making it difficult for others to re-interpret. Does this mean they are not interested in listening?

Written by Paul Dalby on 17 September 2009

Darren Willis from Natural Logic presents the Adaptive Flows Management Framework developed for the Upper South East Salinity and Flood Management Program. Darren presented this at the Living Laboratories workshop on developing a research prospectus for the Fleurieu Swamps in South Australia. A copy of the Powerpoint presentation can be downloaded here. More information on the workshop can be found here.

Written by Paul Dalby on 16 September 2009

On this blog, there have been a number of posts about the plight of the Coorong, a terminal estuarine system at the end of the Murray River along the coast of South Australia.

In July 2007, I posted a link to presentations by Professor David Paton at the University of Adelaide on the “Death of the Coorong“.  David Paton, the leading expert on the Coorong, described the horrible decline of birds, plants, fish and invertebrates in the Coorong system, as a result of years of man-made and natural drought conditions. It should be noted that 90% of waterbirds in the Murray Darling Basin used to live in the Lower Lakes and Coorong. David Paton said the result of continued inaction is likely to be the extinction of some species in the Coorong, and perhaps the compete extinction of the Fairy Tern globally. His student, Dan Rogers presented research on waterbirds in the Coorong in November 2007.  Dan argued for an integrated management system to support policy decisions on managing the Coorong.

In May 2008, I pointed to a series of videos available for download from Catalyst describing the problems of acid sulphate soils and low flows in the Coorong and Lower Lakes. In one of the videos, Mike Young from the University of Adelaide, proposes a different water sharing model for the River Murray that would give the environment a larger share of the water in the system at low flows. In March 2008, I had interviewed Mike Young on the challenges facing the River Murray system and he proposed two key steps to create a “Future-proofed Murray Darling Basin“

1. Replace the current entitlement and allocation regime with a robust one that can be confidently explained as one that will work no matter what the climate scenarios in the future

2. Implement the resultant change in a just a fair manner.

This has not happened yet, and given the pace of reform nationally, is unlikely to happen for some time yet, if at all. This is a complex problem, and it is difficult to trade off the needs of different users of water in the River system, especially when you are not always sure who really needs what water and when.

In a piece of positive news, a recent study by scientists on the Coorong have identified an important number – 300GL. This is the amount of water that needs to flow out at the end of the Murray River to maintain the health of the River. This number is based on an impressive, interdisciplinary and integrated research program called CLLAMMecology, but it gives a simple piece of advice to government. You need 300GL of water flowing out the bottom of the River to maintain the health of the Coorong. The Coorong is a Ramsar wetland, and government has a responsibility to the global community to protect this habitat which supports bird populations that migrate to countries across the northern hemisphere. I suspect 300GL of water out of the bottom of the system will deliver a whole range of other environmental benefits upstream as well. 300GL would be 2% of diversions in an ‘average’ year, and 5% of diversions in years more typical of the last five. Setting such a target would meet Mike Young’s principle of  “entitlement and allocation regime…that can be confidently explained ….that will work no matter what the climate scenarios in the future “.

You can download podcasts and videos from the CLLAMMecology study presentations here.

You can register for the Litfuse feed on your i-tunes or mp3 player: http://feeds.litfuse.com.au/litfuse

Written by Paul Dalby on 22 July 2009

The Clever Green Conference & Showcase, 15 and 16 February 2010, has been announced by the South Australian Government. The intention of the Conference is to Showcase green technologies, market opportunities and innovation for environmental sustainabilit.

If you are interested in connecting to researchers and innovators in cleantech industries such as renewable energy, recycled materials, water treatment and energy efficiency, you can register to participate in the Linkfest session of the Conference, by contacting me on paul@pauldalby.com

If you are interested in attending and / or would like to receive updates on this event, please register your details online at: www.southaustralia.biz/clevergreen
For more information, please contact 08 8303 2498 or  DTEDCleverGreen@state.sa.gov.au

Written by Paul Dalby on 15 July 2009

The Victorian Government has just released a report “Inquiry into Improving Access to Victorian Public Sector Information and Data“.

The terms of rerference for the inquiry were to

“consider and report to Parliament on the potential application of open content and open source licensing to Victorian Government information”, in particular:

“report on the potential economic benefits and costs to Victoria of maximising access to and use of Government information for
commercial and/or non-commercial purposes….consider whether the use of open source and open content licensing models, including Creative Commons, would enhance the discovery, access and use of Government information… report on the use of information and communication technology to support discovery, access and use of Government information …identify likely risks, impediments and restrictions to open content and open source licensing of Government information”

The Committee has proposed three key recommendations for access to and re-use of Government information.

1) that the Victorian Government develop an Information Management Framework … The default position of the framework should be that all information produced by Victorian Government departments from now on be made available at no or marginal cost.

2) that the Victorian Government make use of the Creative Commons licensing model … for up to 85 per cent of government information and data…. Remaining Victorian Government PSI should either not be released, or released under licences tailored specifically for restricted materials.

3) that the Victorian Government establish an on-line directory, where the public can search for and obtain information… held by the Victorian Government. …people will be able to download information and data directly, or make contact with people in the Victorian Government to discuss access conditions.

The Victoria Government has been a bit of a leader is putting its government data in an online environment, with initiatives such as the Victorian Water Resources Data Warehouse and Victorian Resources Online.

The Federal Government is also getting interested in what can be loosely called “Open Government”, in my view thanks to the terrific effort that Kate Lundy is doing to raise the issues and encourage the debate. The Government has recently announced a taskforce to explore Open Government. There is a small amount of funding available from this taskforce:

“The taskforce won’t just be dishing out advice, but will be distributing funds from a $2.45 million pool to support the development of web 2.0 tools and applications which enable engagement between the government and community or support use of government information. The grants will either be in the form of funding for pilots and projects or in the form of prizes for innovative applications…. Those hoping to obtain funds don’t apply directly, but participate in competitions seeking ideas and designs for consideration.”

Government data belongs to the community and citizens in my view, and like the Victorian Government, I believe “The default position… should be that all information produced…. from now on be made available at no or marginal cost”

Written by Paul Dalby on 24 June 2009

This is a blog-post based on an article about ‘water neutrality’ in the journal Conservation Letters.  The article references the term water neutrality as an idea proposed at the World Summit on Sustainable Development in 2002.  The concept is similar to the idea of carbon credits in that it seeks to create a cap on resource use. If someone takes water out of the system, they should take steps to make sure water is put back into the system from another source. Private water users balance their water account through both demand- and supply-side interventions.

The paper describes a scheme in South Africa which sets out to harness private sector investment in water security, “by allowing investors to balance quantitatively their water account based on sound scientific rationale.”

A three-step process is established:

1. reviewing water usage,

2. implementing a reduction strategy,

3. replenish of water to hydrological systems.

In South Africa, private water users can invest in removing weedy plants in the watershed that have a high water demand. By removing these weeds, private water users can “put back” water into the system that is  equivalent to their own water usage. Such a model opens up other clever ideas and will create a market for people who might sell water that they have been able to ‘create’ to those who wish to expand their water use. The trial presents an operational model for the promotion of a water-neutral market in South Africa.

In Australia, rural water users can trade water licenses across a 1 million km2  in the Murray Darling Basin, albeit in an environment where too many water licenses were handed out in the first place. Farmers trade water between each other. As water becomes scarce, some farmers are willing to pay a higher price for water, which attracts other farmers to sell or lease their water. Water trade also occurs between the city and the rural areas – that is, water utilities in the city are able to buy water licenses from farmers further back up the catchment. Another way water is sourced from the watershed is to shut down wetlands – removing their water so that the wetland system dies out, replaced by a terrestrial ecosystem. All of these decisions are made centrally by government and water utilities. Could Australia set up a system that allowed individuals and entrepreneurs to both find water savings and sell them, not just in the watershed, but in cities themselves? Professor Mike Young, Executive Director of the Environment Institute at the University of Adelaide has suggested the concept of water neutrality for cities using a different set of language to describe the same thing – a cap on water use in urban areas.

The water neutrality concept could be expanded to allow individual companies, local councils, and government agencies to find new water sources and trade them back into the system. This would require the water network to be opened up to third party suppliers who may be able to supply water from water recycling schemes, local, small scale desalination plants and rainwater harvesting (with quality assurance and the core infrastructure provided by government for an access fee).

In an environment where we have reached the limit of the water resource for human consumption in many areas across the globe, we need to create new institutional frameworks to allow economic growth to continue under conditions of resource constraint. The water neutrality concept, or establishing a cap on net water extractions from a watershed, is an example of a policy setting that allows us to protect our resource base, but encourages everyone to find better and more efficient ways of utilising the available resource.

Written by Paul Dalby on 21 June 2009

I’m resyndicating a blog post by Tim Kelly on Barry Brook’s “Brave New Climate” blog about Australia’s renewable energy policy. To quote the gist of Tim’s point:

“From June 9, 2009 when a householder is seduced into signing across Solar Credits associated with their small scale Solar, Wind or Hydro generation schemes, they will continue to reduce their emissions yet for every deemed megawatt hour (MWh) created, they will displace 5 MWh of accredited Renewable Energy already required under Australian Law. They will be causing a net 4 MWh to be continued to be produced from fossil fuel sources and therefore will cause more greenhouse gas emissions and do more harm to the environment than doing nothing.”

This is the sort of outcome only a cross-agency government committee can come up with. There is enormous goodwill in the Australian population to contribute to lowering carbon emissions. The current policy is either cynically taking advantage of that goodwill, or the committee has become so bound up in the complex issues it has to address, that it has invented a camel when it meant to invent a horse.

A different approach would be to replace the GST with a carbon tax. This could be cost neutral to the Australian economy (in terms of net tax collected – there would obviously be significant costs in shifting policies over), would not unfairly disadvantage our exporters (no carbon tax on exports) and would encourage Australians to buy and manufacture low carbon products. Over time, one would expect that the economy would shift to a lower carbon economy – which would mean the price of carbon would have to rise to maintain the taxation base to the government. There is some brief discussion about this idea here and here.

Written by Paul Dalby on 14 June 2009

The Australian Bureau of Statistics has just released results from a survey of agricultural land management practices undertaken in 2007/08.

54% of Australia’s total land area was managed by agricultural businesses – Tasmania the smallest  (23%)  Queensland the largest (82%). Grazing land accounted for 87% of land managed by agricultural businesses, 8% for cropping and 2% was set aside for conservation.

The most common land management practices undertaken were surface water management (74%), application of fertiliser (62%) and monitoring ground cover in paddocks (54%).

66% of all agricultural businesses reported having native vegetation on their properties, more than half reported rivers or creeks and wetlands were reported by 10% of all agricultural businesses. About half of all agricultural businesses that had such ecological assets on their property reported that they were protecting them.

Nationally 17 million hectares was prepared using zero-till compared with 9 million hectares prepared using one or more cultivation passes. Of all agricultural businesses managing crop residue, the main crop residue management practices undertaken were to leave stubble intact (43%), removal of crop residue by baling or heavy grazing (34%) and ploughing crop residue into the soil (33%). These management practices were used on 90% of all land managed for crop residue in 2007-08.

Of agricultural businesses grazing livestock on crops or pasture, 69% monitor the amount of ground cover in paddocks and 57% of these have established a minimum ground cover level target. By far the most common method undertaken by agricultural businesses for monitoring ground cover was visual estimates, with 96% reporting using this method. This proportion was generally reflected in all states except the Northern Territory where 17% reported using photo monitoring standards (comparison with photos of known ground cover levels) to monitor ground cover.

Is the glass half full or half empty?

On the one hand, this survey does suggest the billions of dollars spent on natural resource management and engagement of farmers in conservation has has an impact, but there are still half of all agricultural businesses in Australia who do not see that protecting ecological assets is part of their business and a similar proportion who are leaving their soils at risk to erosion. While I could not find a comparable earlier survey by the ABS, when I think back to the 1980’s, this survey suggests that there has been a major shift towards improvements in agricultural land management practices. However, there is still plenty of room for improvement. Failure to protect natural resources now such as soil, native vegetation and water will disadvantage the ability of future generations to enjoy the productive benefits of Australia’s agricultural lands.

Do we need to invent a “Landcare” for the 21st Century that picks up the other 50% of landholders and taps into the latest in science and technology? Is the current dry period across southern Australia an impediment to change, or a catalyst?

Written by Paul Dalby on 12 June 2009

Many people have been asking for the video from the launch of the Environment Institute at the University of Adelaide.

Written by Paul Dalby on 6 June 2009

Thanks so much to Robyn Williams for speaking at the Environment Insitute Launch last night. Professor Williams is an eloquant speaker and just quietly has some interesting theories on where laywers come from. Also thanks to The Hon Jay Weatherill, Minister for Environment and Heritage in South Australia for launching the Institute, and Mark Butler MP, Federal Member for Port Adelaide who is an obvious candidate for Parliamentary Secretary for Climate Change.

#environmentinst

Written by Paul Dalby on 5 June 2009

Steve Collin’s blog post expands on the article I pointed to recently from Lavartus Prodeo on the use of Web 2.0 by politicians and government (Thanks to Penny Sharpe for pointing me to both articles). Steve makes the same point I made in response to the Lavartus Prodeo blog post, which is that the real opportunity for social networking in a democracy is to link the public servants to the public.  My particular beef is about making government data available freely online, both in raw form, and interpreted from the view of government. But there is so much more that could be achieved, so much more richness in terms of conservation and interaction. I’d be very keen to hear from people in the public service about their views on this.

Written by Paul Dalby on 26 May 2009

I enjoyed reading this well researched Climate Progress blog post regarding the proposed Clean Energy Bank  in the US.

“Last week House Energy and Commerce members approved by 51-6 an amendment to the Waxman-Markey bill offered by Rep. John Dingell (D-MI) to create a clean energy bank .  As Greenwire explained, the amendment would “create an autonomous Clean Energy Deployment Administration (CEDA) within the Energy Department” that would “provide a suite of financing options, including direct loans, letters of credit, loan guarantees, insurance products and others” for “energy production, transmission, storage and other areas that could reduce greenhouse gases, diversify energy supplies and save energy.”

At the same time as investment in clean technology increases around the world, investment in oil exploration is falling,which may lead to another oil price spike in the medium term.

“…Oil firms must work doubly hard to replace declining fields and to increase output. Yet the oil industry is short of equipment and manpower, thanks to underinvestment in the 1980s and 1990s, when prices were low. As soon as the world economy starts growing again, the theory runs, demand for oil will once again outstrip the industry’s ability to supply it. In other words, the global recession has only interrupted the “supercycle” of which many analysts used to speak, during which the normal boom-and-bust cycle of oil and other commodities would give way to a protracted period of high prices, as ever-growing demand from emerging markets swallowed everything the extractive industries could produce.”

Where does this leave Australia? Weak and vulnerable in my view. The recent Federal Budget was analysed by Professor Barry Brook from the Environment Institute at the University of Adelaide. There is little cheer in the budget for entrepreneurs in the clean energy game according to Barry’s analysis, particularly in relation to the flawed design and inadequate targets of the CPRS. And Australia is an economy heavily reliant on energy. It’s a big place with relatively few people, extreme climates, and all of our capaital cities will be reliant on energy-hungry desalination for their water supplies. We are rich in coal, but produce only 60% of our oil consumption, so we rely on imported oil and petroleum products. A spike in energy prices will result in pressure on Australia’s economy, and leave us reliant on imported technology to meet renewable energy targets and needs, much like we rely on imported desalination technology.

I would add a note of optimism. The changes to the research and development (R&D) tax credit scheme will “double the level of assistance currently available to small companies and remove the cap on the amount of R&D expenditure subject to a tax credit. Large companies with more than $20 million annual turnover will receive a 40% R&D tax credit instead of tax deductions, which is a 10% net – benefit – one third higher than the current regime.  Small companies will receive a 45% R&D tax credit, which amounts to a 15% benefit – twice the current level.  Small companies with tax losses will be able to ‘cash out’ their R&D credit when they file their income tax return.”

As a modest investor in commercial R&D myself, this is a great incentive, and one that the Rudd government should be applauded for. Let’s hope it stimulates Australian businesses and entrepreneurs to invest in clean energy. More targeted approaches, such as a national feed in tariff, and a redesigned CPRS system along the lines suggested by Professor Brook would be even better. An increase in oil price would be a much more economically damaging driver of investment by Australian researchers and entrepreneurs in clean energy solutions. A Clean Energy Bank for Australia would be visionary.

Written by Paul Dalby on 24 May 2009

Responding to Trev’s comment in the Larvatus Prodeo blog, what you have described is about politicking, which is valuable in its own right. What I am interested in is allowing the same sort of interaction between public servants and the broader community in policy development. I think in New Zealand, the new Police Act was developed through a public wiki. But from what I can work out, In Australia politicians are making use of social media because they get benefit from it, but are blocking public servant access to it. As someone who would like to contribute from the outside to policy development, I am frustrated that government agencies cannot interact with the outside world except through the government’s media office. This is stifling the flow of ideas and information, and limiting democratic input into policy development. Most government departments block all social networking tools. This is such a shame, but seems to be driven from the desperate need by the politicians to control their message.

Was made aware of these websites by tweets from the Whitehouse.

http://www.data.gov/

http://www.whitehouse.gov/open/innovations/

President Obama is the first world leader to really ‘get’ the power of online social networks. These initiatives aim to put government data online (that’s right, ‘other’ people will be able to download it and ‘misinterpret’ it ), and champions more open, accountable and transparent government using the web as a tool.

I’m thinking of emigrating.

Written by Paul Dalby on 22 May 2009

Corey Bradshaw from the Environment Institute at the University of Adelaide in Australia writes about how climate change is getting all the attention while biodiversity conservation does not.

Biologists like Corey should know that the selection pressure for being able to respond to immediate scary, dangerous things has been much more powerful than the selection pressure for being able to see well into the distance and respond to dangers that will effect populations down the track. Our DNA just isn’t up to the task. A few outliers and individuals who get pleasure and/or income directly from biodiversity conservation might really care, but the general huddled masses who vote people in and out of government do not so much. We might donate money or sign petitions, but we rarely vote governments in and out of power based on their biodiversity conservation policies. We also rarely choose NOT to buy something because of that companies impact on biodiversity (except dolphins and tuna – I give you that). This is not true for climate change. It was not an issue globally until there were heat waves in Europe, unseasonal hurricanes in the US and a long, long dry period in Australia. It is a direct impact that got people scared. The fickle populations who could not give two hoots about climate change the year before voted governments out of power because they were soft of climate change, and now you can buy carbon neutral beer! Seriously – a beverage MADE with carbon dioxide!!

It is not government who are the problem. It is us. Our brain is too interested in the immediate problems of how to survive, get sex and not be bored. Genetic engineering is required if you want lots of interest in biodiversity conservation. Or we need the bees to die out to show us the direct impact of no free services.

Written by Paul Dalby on 20 May 2009

This is a recording from the Indigenous Water Planning Workshop held in Adelaide in February 2009 hosted by the National Water Commission.

The powerpoint slides can be viewed along with the audio recording here:

The presentation describes the intentions of the National Water Initiative for water planning to involve Indigenous people in water planning, and how well or otherwise the states are delivering these intentions. Like many areas of involving Indigenous people in water and natural resources management, success is patchy, and they are an interest group who are often left out of the decision making processes. The states of New South Wales and the Northern Territory seem to be doing the best in terms of involving Indigenous people in water planning, and in South Australia and Western Australia, there seems to be very little involvement at a state level.

Written by Paul Dalby on 20 May 2009

I had the great pleasure of attending the launch of Writing Scientific Research Articles: Strategies and Steps, on 1 May 2009 in the Lirra Lirra Cafe on the Waite Campus. The book has been a labour of love for Margaret Cargill and Patrick O’Connor who have spent many years travelling internationally to give training courses on writing scientific text.

Mike Brookes, Margaret Cargill and Patrick O'Connor at the launch

The speakers at the launch in order are Professor Mike Brooks, Deputy Vice Chancellor (Research) at the University of Adelaide, Margaret Cargill and Patrick O’Connor.

You can buy a copy of the book at amazon.com

Written by Paul Dalby on 4 May 2009

Professor Wayne Meyer from the Environment Institute at the University of Adelaide, recently presented a new research program in the University of Adelaide – Landscape Science. It includes an excellent summary of the Natural Resource Management (NRM) governance and delivery structures in Australia and South Australia. Wayne makes a strong case for undertaking integrated landscape science (studying how all the bits of the landscape interact) to develop decision support tools that can be used to assess the cumulative impact of decisions by individuals and government on the landscape.

Written by Paul Dalby on 23 April 2009

The University of Adelaide proposes to develop a part (63ha) of Glenthorne Farm (208ha) in the southern suburbs of Adelaide to establish a Trust Fund to support research and on-ground works for decades to deliver a 100-year restoration project across the Mt Lofty region (in all 150,000ha of agricultural land need to be transformed back to native habitat etc). This is a key initiative addressing the state government’s ‘no species loss’ philosophy. Around 30 staff would be employed, more than half would be research staff. It will benefit terrestrial, freshwater and marine systems (reducing runoff from land) etc. See www.adelaide.edu.au/woodland-recovery/ if you want more details on the University’s proposal.

At present there is a push by two local groups backed by the local media to prevent housing on the Farm. If you support the university’s woodland recovery initiative then please see the web pages below and vote yes to the question proposed. This poll is all about creating a perception that no-one wants the housing or the Woodland Recovery Initiative and its outcome may sway politicians to reject the University’s proposal.

Select “yes” on the Guardian Messenger’s online poll (just under the main headline section) to support the Woodland Recovery Initiative for Glenthorne.

http://guardian-messenger.whereilive.com.au/

Written by Paul Dalby on 22 March 2009

I recently gave an interview to the media outlet “Global Atlanta” on a visit to the United States I made for ICE WaRM. In the interview I talked about how Australia has learned from hard lessons as a result of rapid shifts in climatic conditions, probably as a result of global warming. There are some excellent lessons to be learned for other countries who are at risk from drying and warming – the southern states of the United States of America in particular.

The full article is available at: http://www.globalatlanta.com/article/17131/

Written by Paul Dalby on 3 February 2009

This article from The Australian highlights an important issue about the neutrality of science in policy debates. It can be tempting for scientists to act like politicians and journalists – by spinning all information they come across to reinforce their point of view. I’m not saying Professor Kingsford from ANU necessarily did this by the way – The Australian publishes some woefully biased, anti-science journalism and this could be another example. Nevertheless, on first reading it is not a good look, and perhaps more care should have been taken in the interpretation of the information.

The one strength science has in environmental debates is its neutrality. If scientific input into policy debates becomes based on things other than a dispassionate analysis of data and information, it simply reverts to political debate and loses its special status. It reverts to being just another form of opinion.

We should value, cherish and continue to demand neutrality in scientific interpretation. While the science comunity may be frustrated by the sometimes outrageous twisting of facts, deliberate misinterpretation, or even straight out lying, by journalists and politicians, in the long run, scientists will have the greatest influence in policy debates if they are seen as being scrupulously dispassionate in their scientific interpretation in scientific reports.

Written by Paul Dalby on 12 January 2009