Evidence

If you want to see evidence for global warming you need to see this 4 Corners Program on the Arctic.

http://www.abc.net.au/4corners/special_eds/20080804/arctic/default.htm

Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday to Dad. Sorry I haven't called I'm a bit slack at the moment

Monbiot Again

I have to say that George Monbiot is one of my favourite column writers. The wit and dry humour in his columns are truly fantastic. Also I often agree with the message of his articles. His recent article for the Guardian on the 8th of July really was excellent. I have reproduced it below for my small readership.

A small note though. I am not against fishing or fishers. I have a great respect for both I do think that we need less fishers and more sustainable catches though (in Most fisheries). I eat fish not on a regular basis but more as a treat, so I would not be against higher fish prices if this meant less fishers and more sustainable practices. I think that our worlds fish stocks need to be conserved and that currently most of them are not. This is a failure of both Governments and fishing industries worldwide, not individual fishers.

By George Monbiot. Published in the Guardian 8th July 2008.

All over the world, protesters are engaged in a heroic battle with reality. They block roads, picket fuel depots, throw missiles and turn over cars in an effort to hold it at bay. The oil is running out and governments, they insist, must do something about it. When they’ve sorted it out, what about the fact that the days are getting shorter? What do we pay our taxes for?

The latest people to join these surreal protests are the world’s fishermen. They are on strike in Italy, Spain, Portugal, France and Japan and demonstrating in scores of maritime countries. Last month in Brussels they threw rocks and flares at the police, who have been conspiring with the world’s sedimentary basins to keep the price of oil high. The fishermen warn that if something isn’t done to help them, thousands could be forced to scrap their boats and hang up their nets. It’s an appalling prospect, which we should greet with heartfelt indifference.

Just as the oil price now seems to be all that stands between us and runaway climate change, it is also the only factor which offers a glimmer of hope to the world’s marine ecosystems. No East Asian government was prepared to conserve the stocks of tuna; now one-third of the tuna boats in Japan, China, Taiwan and South Korea will stay in dock for the next few months because they can’t afford to sail(1). The unsustainable quotas set on the US Pacific seaboard won’t be met this year, because the price of oil is rising faster than the price of fish(2). The indefinite strike called by Spanish fishermen is the best news European fisheries have had for years. Beam trawlermen – who trash the seafloor and scoop up a massive bycatch of unwanted species - warn that their industry could collapse within a year(3). Hurray to that too.

It would, of course, be better for everyone if these unsustainable practices could be shut down gently without the need for a crisis or the loss of jobs, but this seems to be more than human nature can bear. The European Union has a programme for taking fishing boats out of service – the tonnage of the European fleet has fallen by 5% since 1999(4) - but the decline in boats is too slow to overtake the decline in stocks. Every year the EU, like every other fishery authority, tries to accommodate its surplus boats by setting quotas higher than those proposed by its scientific advisers, and every year the population of several species is pressed a little closer to extinction.

The fishermen make two demands, which are taken up by politicians in coastal regions all over the world: they must be allowed to destroy their own livelihoods, and the rest of us should pay for it. Over seven years, European taxpayers will be giving this industry E3.8bn(5). Some of this money is used to take boats out of service and to find other jobs for fishermen, but the rest is used to equip boats with new engines and new gear, to keep them on the water, to modernise ports and landing sites and to promote and market the catch. Except for the funds used to re-train fishermen or help them into early retirement, there is no justification for this spending. At least farmers can argue – often falsely – that they are the “stewards of the countryside”. But what possible argument is there for keeping more fishermen afloat than the fish population can bear?

The EU says its spending will reduce fishing pressure and help fishermen adopt greener methods. In reality, it is delaying the decline of the industry and allowing it to defy ecological limits for as long as possible. If the member states want to protect the ecosystem, it’s a good deal cheaper to legislate than to pay. Our fishing policies, like those of almost all maritime nations, are a perfect parable of commercial stupidity and short-termism, helping an industry to destroy its long-term prospects for the sake of immediate profit.

But the fishermen only demand more. The headline on this week’s Fishing News is “Thanks for Nothing!”, bemoaning the British government’s refusal to follow France, Spain and Italy in handing out fuel subsidies(6). But why the heck should it? The Scottish fishing secretary, Richard Lochhead, demands that the government in Westminster “open the purse strings”. He also insists that new money is “not tied to decommissioning”: in other words no more boats should be taken off the water(7). Is this really a service to the industry, or only to its most short-sighted members?

I have a leaked copy of the draft proposal that European states will discuss on Thursday(8). It’s a disaster. Some of the boats which, under existing agreements, will be scrapped and turned into artificial reefs, permanently reducing the size of the fleet, can now be replaced with smaller vessels. The EU will pay costs and salaries for crews stranded by the fuel crisis, so that they stay in business and can start fishing again when the price falls. Member states will be able to shell out more money (E100,000 per boat instead of E30,000) without breaking state aid rules. They can hand out new grants for replacing old equipment with more fuel-efficient gear. The proposal seems to be aimed at ensuring that the industry collapses through lack of fish rather than lack of fuel. The fishermen won’t go down without taking the ecosystem with them.

What makes the draft document so dumb is that in some regions, especially in British waters, the industry is just beginning to turn. While French, Spanish and Italian fishermen clamour for a resumption of bluefin tuna fishing(9), knowing that if they are allowed to fish now, this will be the last season ever, around the UK it has begun to dawn on some fishermen that there might be an association between the survival of the fish and the survival of the fishing. Prompted by Young’s seafood and some of the supermarkets, who in turn have been harried by environmental groups, some of the biggest British fisheries have applied for eco-labels from the Marine Stewardship Council, which sets standards for how fish are caught(10). Fishermen around the UK also seem to be taking the law more seriously, and at last to be showing some interest in obscure issues such as spawning grounds and juvenile fish (which, believe it or not, turn out to have a connection to future fish stocks). By ensuring that far too many boats, and far too many desperate fishermen, stay on the water, and that the remaining quotas are stretched too thinly, the EU will slow down or even reverse the greening of the industry.

Why is this issue so hard to resolve? Why does every representative of a fishing region believe he must defend his constituents’ right to ensure that their children have nothing to inherit? Why do the leaders of the fishermen’s associations feel the need always to denounce the scientists who say that fish stocks decline if they are hit too hard? If this is a microcosm of how human beings engage with the environment, the prospect for humanity is not a happy one.

www.monbiot.com

References:

1. Tom Seaman, July 2008. Global supply of sushi tuna to plummet on soaring fuel prices. Intrafish, Vol 6, Issue 7.

2. Steve Quinn, 29th June 2008. Time to jump ship? Almost, say commercial fishermen. The Associated Press.

3. James Meikle, 23rd May 2008. Fish prices may rise by up to 50%. The Guardian.

4. European Union, 2008. Evolution of the fleet’s number of vessels, tonnage and engine power. http://ec.europa.eu/fisheries/fleetstatistics/index.cfm?lng=en

5. European Commission, 2006. The European Fisheries Fund 2007-2013. http://ec.europa.eu/fisheries/publications/FEP_EN.pdf

6. Fishing News, 4th July 2008.

7. No author given, 4th July 2008. ‘Open the Purse Strings’ – Lochhead. Fishing News.

8. The Council of the European Union, 2008. Proposal for a Council Regulation instituting a temporary specific action aiming to promote the restructuring of the European fisheries fleets affected by the economic crisis.

9. Agence France Press, 17th June 2008. EU rejects calls to drop planned tuna fishing ban.

10. Severin Carrell, 26th March 2008. British seas turning green, says watchdog. The Guardian.

Water Car

I would like to dispel a myth for the readers of these humble pages. There is no such thing as a car that runs on water unless your talking amphibious vehicles. You cannot burn water and you cannot oxidise it to produce energy. You can run a car on Hydrogen such as BMW’s Hydrogen burning Car (I think it’s the 7 series).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen
http://www.bmwgroup.com/cleanenergy/ http://www.wired.com/cars/energy/news/2006/11/72100 http://www.spiegel.de/international/spiegel/0,1518,448648,00.html

The exhaust gas from burning Hydrogen is water. Combine 2 Hydrogen atoms and 1 Oxygen atom and you get 1 molecule of water. There are two main ways that the energy from converting Hydrogen and Oxygen to water is used. One is through a fuel cell which uses this reaction to create electricity and the other is to use it in a internal combustion engine. The second option is almost like burning LPG in a car. You just need different internal bits in the car to stop corrosion by high temperature water.

There are websites out there that purport to let you run your car on water. You will not be able to convert your car to run on water. If you inject water and only water into the cylinder of your car instead of petrol/diesel you will not be able to produce any power. Most of the systems seem to be a small container of water that is electrolysed (split) into its component atoms of Hydrogen and Oxygen. Then these are injected into the cylinder and burnt to form water. Then big problem here is that it takes more energy to split the water into Hydrogen and Oxygen than you get back by burning it and producing water. This is because of the second law of Thermodynamics. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermodynamics. The second law of Thermodynamics is a basic law of the universe Suns, black holes everything in the universe abides by this rule. So if you put a kilo of water in and get a kilo of water out mass is conserved so energy must be reduced, necessitating an input of energy other than the water. If you could affect mass to energy transfer (such as in matter anti-matter collisions) you would produce enough energy from a kilo of water to power a car for several lifetime. Unfortunately we don’t have this technology yet (or in the foreseeable future).

Latest report from the Nomads

I am writing this from Exmouth. Today we are having a bit of a chill-out day, because the next few days we are going to be covering a bit of territory. I thought I would write a synopsis of our travels so far.

We are having a wonderful trip. The weather has treated us very well. Coming across the Nullarbor it was relatively mild, with a bit of rain around. From Norseman, we went down to Esperance for a week, then to Albany for a week. Thought Albany was a great spot. When I say that to W. Australians, they say it is too cold. Mind you it has a latitude about the same as Nowra! From Albany we visited Denmark, Walpole, etc seeing some of the big forests of karri and tingle, and climbed Bluff Knoll in the magnificent Stirling Ranges.

I have a cousin in Mandurah, and we went up and spent a week and a half with them, during which time we took the bus out to Kalgoorlie, and came back on the Prospector train. Bernie did the mine tour at the Mining Hall of Fame, which was fabulous. I checked out all the exhibits above ground. Lots of beautiful old pubs in Kalgoorlie, all prospering by the look of things.

After Mandurah, we went back down to the south-west, Margaret River, up and down the coast from Cape to Cape (there is a great 135km walk there - not that we did it), out to Manjimup, Pemberton, etc. - more forests of jarrah, tuart, marri.

Then up to Perth. (I'm afraid this is a bit of a Readers Digest version - there's just so much to see). Did some of the tourist things - beautiful Kings Park of course. Not wildflower time, but still lots of fabulous banksias flowering; the Perth mint; exploring the beaches and the city; out to Rottnest - a beautiful place, but bathed in sadness at the thought of all those aboriginal men who were imprisoned there over a period of 66 years. From Perth, up to New Norcia, Dongara, Geraldton, and then to wonderful Kalbarri - one of the highlights of the trip so far for Bernie. Beautiful town at the mouth of the Murchison River, and then the wonderful gorges of the Murchison R in Kalbarri NP. From there to Monkey Mia, and the dolphins. I was impressed the way the DEC (Dept. of Envir. and Conserv.) officers supervise the feeding - no touching or interfering with the dolphins, all very well managed and only small amounts of appropriate food in the morning so that they still have to obtain their own food in the wild.

Then Carnarvon - excellent .growers markets on Sat. morning. Evidently Carnarvon supplies 70% of WA's fruit/veg. This week, Coral Bay and Exmouth. The Ningaloo Reef is very close to land at Coral Bay, so we could go in from the beach and snorkel over the coral. Also did a couple of trips out to the reef to see sea turtles and dugongs. A big highlight of this area is swimming with whale sharks, which are majestic creatures. The cost of these trips is a bit beyond our budget, however. The boats go to the outer reef, and they use spotter planes to find the whale sharks.

Our plans from here - Onslow, Karratha, Port Hedland, then down to Tom Price and Karajini NP (can't wait), back to Port Hedland, then Eighty Mile Beach, Broome, Derby, Fitzroy Crossing, Halls Creek, Bungle Bungles, Kununurra and then on into the NT and Katherine. Then we will truly have been "around Australia". To date on this trip we have travelled about eleven thousand kilometres in the car (that does not include the Kalgoorlie trip as we used public transport). We still have at least that much to go!

Petrol, Diesel, Fuel…………Lets say Oil

It’s a substance that everyone seems to be addicted to. All the signs are there. We all need our fix at least once a week. We feel better when we have it and we get grumpy when it’s taken away from us. This is what is happening now, fuel prices are rising and people are getting cranky as their supply, their ‘fix’ is costing too much. There are calls at the moment, lead by the federal opposition, for a reduction in the fuel excise or getting rid of the GST on fuel (http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/05/26/2255420.htm).

I as much as anyone see and feel the pain that the high fuel prices bring. I earn a below average wage and I have a home loan. This makes me one of the least well off people around. Fuel prices don’t just cost you at the bowser they also lead into the increase in food and other basic necessities. Min and I (although I have to say Min more than me) also run a car.

Given all of the things above some might be surprised to hear me say that reducing the fuel excise or getting rid of the GST on fuel is the stupidest idea that I’ve heard in a while. I would say that the money could be better spent, but I would disagree with the fuel excise reduction.

Why would he say this you ask (even if you haven’t asked I’m going to tell you)? Well the government isn’t at fault for the higher prices. We probably in the middle of peak oil (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_oil) and we are now seeing the effects of an oil supply that cannot keep up with the hugely increasing demand. The developing world is now starting to use oil in a similar fashion to the most developed countries. I’m going to say it now even thought it’s in the news every day and it blamed for so many things. China, China China China. The oil demand of China is looking to be double that of the US by 2030 (http://www.salon.com/tech/htww/2008/05/22/wall_street_journal_peak_oil/). It’s a text book case of supply and demand (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supply_and_demand). If supply stays the same and demand increases, the price will go up. The Australian government has no control over the world oil market and no real way to influence the price of crude in Australia. The general trend will see a continuing increase in the price of fuel this is unavoidable. The government could decrease the fuel excise and the price will rise. So they decrease the fuel excise again, surprise surprise the price of fuel will rise again. By the end of next year the price of fuel would still be at $1.70 a litre even though the fuel excise would be 0.

A much better way of moving forward is to use the current fuel excise moneys to move Australia away from its dependence on Crude oil. We need to stage an intervention. Invest more in public transport. Move public transport away from petrol/Diesel to Gas and Electricity. Promote Biofuels such as Syngas from Agricultural byproducts (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syngas), Biodiesel from the Fisher Tropsch Process (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fischer-Tropsch_process) and Ethanol/Butanol from Cellulose digestion. None of these ideas could completely replace oil and none of them are really ready for the market yet. In a few years with some investment from the government these products could completely move Australia away from using Crude Oil. We could then develop these alternatives into large export markets. The World population has a huge appetite for Energy. That is all these products are.

There is another benefit of the products that I’ve suggested. The first is that none of them use food crops. All of them can use Products that are currently thrown away from current Agricultural processes. For Example the Straw from the Wheat plant is spat out the back of the harvester and left to rot on the ground or burnt. This straw could be bailed and fed into a Cellulose digester (http://www.iogen.ca/) to produce Ethanol or Butanol. Due to these products not using food crops and increasing deforestation. They will decrease the Greenhouse gas output of Australia. Especially Syngas production. Syngas is one of the few Carbon Negative energy production systems. It also produces Charcoal which is excellent as an additive to soils for increasing production and locking away carbon (http://www.abc.net.au/catalyst/stories/s2012892.htm).

I know its painful guys but there is nothing to do except use less fuel and try alternatives. I want to say this again PRICES WILL CONTINUE TO GO UP WHATEVER THE GOVERNMENT DOES. Stop complaining to the government about the high price of fuel as they can’t do anything anyway. Start demanding that they do some thing to help us stop using this addictive substance altogether.

The other thing that we could all do is, next time your grabbing your key to leave the house consider taking a pushbike instead.

Happy Birthday

Well Happy Birthday to Mum.

I hope you are having a wonderful time and I'll see you and give you some thing when you come and visit me up here in the sunny north.

L

Whereabouts of the Nomads

I hope everyone noticed I left out the Grey part of the normal phrasing of the title.

Well Mum and Bernie are travelling again. Lost in the wilds of Western Australia. Every now and then I get an Update with a couple of Photos. So here is the Latest.

Hi everyone,
We head off to Geraldton today from Port Denison. Will spend a couple of days in Geraldton - take Clarissa out tonight to a nice seafood restaurant for her birthday - then go on to Kalbarri National Park on the Murchison River. From all accounts that is a fabulous place to visit.
We had a rest day yesterday - just reading and lying about!
Hope you are all well.

Talk to you soon.
Bernie

Good to see they are well despite being lost in the "wilds" of Geraldton. Will keep you all as up dated as I can.

L.

OC1 Race

Well it's been a week or so since the OC1 race I had at the last regatta. It was a tougher paddle than I thought it'd be. For starters there was a strong wind warning and there was about 1.5m of chop all across the bay. Also My canoe is what's known as a small volume boat ie. it doesn't provide a great deal of extra buoyancy for floatation. This means that in a race where waves are a significant factor my canoe was behaving more like a submarine than a canoe. At one point I was completely underwater, a wave hit and went straight over me rather than my canoe going over the top. The extra drag from all of the water in on and around the canoe means that I didn't go very fast.

To be fair It's not all the Canoes fault, I haven't been out in big conditions like that and practised so I couldn't get the best out of my canoe. I still think there are two factor than would help me go fast though. A Large Volume boat like the Bladerunner canoes and more training for me.

After these things are sorted then I'll be unstoppable I'll, not come second last like this time. Oh well.

I am looking forward to the next race though which will be Hammo. A 250m sprint and an 8km Marathon.

Perth forthe Travellers

We're in Perth at the moment. Went out to Rottnest today. You would love it out there.

Bernie