The Sustainable Hour no 377

In The Tunnel on 25 August 2021, our first guest is the independent Member of Parliament for the federal seat of Warringah, Zali Steggall.

Zali, who calls herself a voice for the middle, replaced Tony Abbott in a once Liberal stronghold in Sydney at the last election. She did this with a very carefully carried out community organised election campaign. Today in The Sustainable Hour, we learn about this campaign, which she is urging other electorates to try, in an attempt to stifle power from the major parties whose policies of voting along party lines are holding us back as a nation and making us a mockery on the world stage, particularly when it comes to our lack of action on climate.

The opening statement on Zali’s website gives insight into her values: “My team and I are passionate about finding solutions through innovation and collaboration. We are focused on being champions for integrity in government and being an independent voice for Warringah”.

To address the climate emergency, Zali has introduced a Climate Bill into Federal Parliament. It failed at the first attempt. She intends to keep putting it up till the weight of evidence means that it becomes an election issue. And so that during the election period, campaigners will be able to hold each candidate accountable for how they voted on Zali’s Climate Bill. → You can find out more about Zali’s Climate Change Bill at www.climateactnow.com.au and about Zali’s political and personal initiatives at www.zalisteggall.com.au.

Local resident Robert Patterson has taken up a very keen interest in Zali’s bill. We learn what he’s been doing to support her bill over the last 12 months and why he has decided to ramp that up in September with a mass mailout to federal politicians.

→ You can find out more about Robert’s letter campaign here: www.massmailoutforclimate.org. We urge all our listeners to support Robert in this! Send a letter to Canberra before 30th of September.   

Colin Mockett‘s Global Outlook this week starts with Australian scientists challenging the IPCC global warming report, but not in the expected Aussie way. They’re saying the UN-backed report underestimated the likelihood of major weather events in the Pacific. Their paper says figures indicate the frequency of El Nino events with extreme rainfall impacts will double from one event per 20 years to one every decade. 

In light of last week’s topic on Geelong’s proposal to burn waste for energy, we then zoom to London where the UK Government announced that eight companies have been shortlisted to receive a share of £20 million to develop a process that will turn waste into jet fuel. They would  convert waste alcohol, carbon from the atmosphere, sewage and household waste into jet fuel on a commercial scale. If successful, this would deal with two huge problems we currently face: emissions from jet fuel and carbon in our atmosphere. 

At the weekend Greenland saw rain at the highest point of its ice sheet for the first time, ever. Usually the place is below-zero year round, it only snows. This, and the wildfires on the French Riviera – rated the worst in centuries – show that...