Nature and Society
August - September 2007

Mark Diesendorf book launch

On 27 June 2007 NSF hosted the Canberra launch of Mark Diesendorf’s new book Greenhouse Solutions with Sustainable Energy. Mark himself and Dr Hugh Saddler of Energy Strategies spoke at the launch. This is the first book, Mark told us, that he had written as the sole author and it distills decades of experience, learning and thought in a careful, yet broad view of the range of associated topics.

Mark spoke about renewable energy, pointing out that the science and the technologies were ready for political and commercial will to provide them with a level playing field.

He focused on the role of renewable technology in reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, warning us that the prognosis for the planet was worse than official accounts (including the 2007 IPCC reports) indicate, particularly the rate of acceleration through complex, interacting positive feedbacks. This led him to call for serious short-term targets as well as long-term ones. Mark’s longer term target is for a reduction in GHG by 80% on 1990 levels by 2050. His shorter term targets begin for 2010.

He reminded us that only one of the main political parties has committed to a long-term target, but neither of them would propose shorter-term, intermediate targets before the coming general election.

He had recently completed a study for Greenpeace showing how Australia could reduce its emissions by 30% by 2020. This is not easy to do and requires massive and prompt action on energy, transport and agriculture and also requires an effective population policy for Australia.

Mark reminded us of the argument by politicians (and others who are unwilling to change) who tell us that Australia’s GHG emissions are only 1.5% of the global total so we can make no significant global impact and, therefore, it is futile even to begin. He said that this perspective shows a remarkable lack of political understanding by politicians. He said the argument for Australian action is not so much about absolute emissions; it is about a two rich developed countries holding up the global Kyoto process. China, India and others will look to what the US and countries like Australia (we are the world’s biggest per capita emitter of GHGs) do before they will make significant changes.

The present Australian government’s climate change policy is centred on burning coal to produce electricity with the capture and burial of CO2. The government’s name for this is ‘clean coal’, but this is just a marketing term, and we must not be seduced by the marketing term and must understand that there is no such thing as ‘clean coal’. He did not object to research on capture and burial, but agreed with a recent MIT report (The Future of Coal) which said the technology – if it works - would not be commercially implemented globally before 2025 and would not match renewables until 2045.

Mark said he supported the burial of CO2, particularly that produced in the process of natural gas extraction off Australia’s NW Shelf. This will enable gas to play a valuable role in the transition from coal to renewables.

Nuclear power is the other preferred option of the politicians. Recently nuclear power has been repackaged as ‘clean and green’ – but this, too, is merely marketing. Their message is that there is a new generation of nuclear power technologies; the truth is that nuclear power technologies are fundamentally those introduced in the 1970s. He told us that the inevitable associated problems of nuclear proliferation (which is now a greater problem as is shown by the number of countries which have used civil nuclear power facilities to begin arming themselves with nuclear weapons), high cost, waste treatment, disposal and terrorism had not been resolved. He said that terrorism was now a greater risk than in the 1970s and scoffed at high-tech safeguards to prevent aircraft crashing into facilities, when all that would be required would be a few armed terrorists with technical know-how to cause mayhem.

Even if a nuclear power station were to be built in Australia, the minimum time it would take to produce electricity would be 15 years.

He reported on work he has been doing with Gavin Mudd from Monash on the decline in the grade of uranium ore. There are a few decades of rich uranium ore. Beyond that, the fossil fuel inputs required to recover and process the ore rise steeply. Even now, to get a kilogram of yellowcake, some ten tonnes of rock has to be shifted, crushed and transported to disposal sites.

Mark described the anti-windpower lobbying, much of which originates in the UK from the group ‘Country Guardian’. The vice-president of this group is Bernard Ingham, once Margaret Thatcher’s press secretary, and now secretary of the ‘Friends of Nuclear Power’. Mark was critical of the misinformation being spread by Country Guardian which is picked up uncritically by people in other countries including Australia.

Mark also addressed reliability of windpower compared with coal power for ‘baseload’ power. He explained that wind farms would be dispersed across the country and that the electricity generated is far more sustained and could be supplemented by gas turbines which can go from stationary to full capacity in nine minutes. Gas turbines could be biofuelled.

Mark reminded us that moving to renewables required a period of transition. Natural gas should see us through this transition, but because we are exporting so much of our reserves, our gas supplies will be exhausted this century.

Mark then went on to review the different renewable energy sources, all of which can play their part in a mix: bio-electricity, wind power, solar electricity, solar thermal, geo-thermal, energy-efficiency. These are described in detail in his book, together with discussions of the associated externalities and a transition program.

Report by Keith Thomas