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25 Ways World-Leading Climate Criminal Australia Threatens
Planet And Invites Boycotts, Divestment & Sanctions (BDS)

By Dr Gideon Polya

 06 June, 2015
Countercurrents.org

Greedy, rich Australia is a world-leading climate criminal country that with 0.3% of world population is responsible  for 3% of global greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution and is politically overwhelmingly  committed to a derisory “5% off 2000 GHG pollution by 2020” and to  unlimited coal, gas and iron ore exports that will see Australia exceed by a factor of three (3) the whole world's terminal Carbon Budget that must not be exceeded if the world is to have a 75% chance of avoiding a catastrophic 2 degrees Centigrade temperature rise.

Indeed climate criminal Australia is disproportionately responsible for a worsening climate crisis in which it is increasingly unlikely that we will avoid  a global warming catastrophe  this century [1, 2]. However all decent people who care for their children, future  generations, Humanity and the Biosphere  are obliged to do everything they can to ensure that the future is “less bad”. For 25 reasons outlined below,  “doing everything they can”  may mean Green tariffs, International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutions, International Court of Justice (ICJ) litigations, and Boycotts, Divestment & Sanctions (BDS) against a  climate criminal Australia and similarly climate criminal countries like the US, Canada and Saudi Arabia.

To return to a safe planet for all peoples and all species we must achieve the following:

(a) Change of societal philosophy to one of scientific risk management and biological sustainability with complete cessation of species extinctions and zero tolerance for lying.

(b) Urgent reduction of atmospheric CO2 to a safe, pre-Industrial Revolution level of about 300 ppm CO2 as recommended by leading climate and biological scientists [3,4].  

(c)  Rapid switch to the best non-carbon and renewable energy (solar, wind, geothermal, wave, tide and hydro options that are currently roughly the same market price as coal burning-based power) and to energy efficiency, public transport, needs-based production, re-afforestation and return of carbon as biochar to soils coupled with correspondingly rapid cessation of fossil fuel burning, deforestation, methanogenic livestock production and population growth [5-8].

However Australia has an economy that is presently heavily dependent on coal, gas and iron exports and a climate criminal Australia is a world leader in (a) annual  per capita greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution [5, 9] and  (b) opposition to effective action on man-made climate change.

Outlined below are 25 ways in which climate criminal Australia is disproportionately contributing to a worsening climate emergency and a worsening climate genocide:

1. Australia backs Business As Usual (BAU). Australia has a bipartisan, Business As Usual, anti-science, neoliberal,  climate change inaction policy involving  Coalition Government and Labor Right-led Opposition (collectively  known as the Lib-Labs and having 80% electoral support compared to the Greens' 10%) support for  a derisory “5% off 2000 GHG pollution by 2020” coupled with unlimited coal, gas and iron ore exports. If the rest of the world adopted this climate inaction policy,  the world would be doomed to rapid escalation in global temperature, with consequent mass mortality and mass species extinction. In marked contrast, in a science-based consensus view, the Synthesis Report of the 2,500-delegate March 2009 Copenhagen Scientific Climate Change Conference stated of climate change inaction: “Inaction is inexcusable” [10] and a 2010 Open Letter by 255 members of the US National Academy of Sciences, including11 Nobel Laureates, stated: “Delay is not an option” [11].

2. Australia's annual per capita GHG pollution is 15 times greater than the world's.  Australia (population 24 million) generates greenhouse  gas (GHG) pollution of about 600 million tonnes  CO2-e (CO2 equivalent) Domestically and 1, 540 million tonnes  CO2-e via Exports of coal, gas and iron ore,  for a total Domestic plus Exported GHG pollution of 2,140 million tonnes  CO2-e (see section G, [5]). The world (population 7,300 million) generates 42,000 million tonnes CO2-e per year [12], this yielding an annual per capita GHG pollution of   42,000 million tonnes CO2-e per year/ 7,300 million persons = 5.8 tonnes CO2-e per person per year. Australia's  annual  per capita GHG pollution is  25 tonnes CO2-e per person per year Domestically (or 4.3 times that of the World) and 89 tonnes CO2-e per person per year Domestic plus Exported (or 15  times greater than the World's annual per capita GHG  pollution).

3. Australia's annual per capita GHG pollution is 99 times greater than Bangladesh's.  Collective, national responsibility for present pollution is  in direct proportion to per capita national pollution of the atmosphere with greenhouse gases (GHGs). Indeed, fundamental to any international agreement on national rights to pollute our one common atmosphere and ocean should be the belief that “all men are created equal”. However reality is otherwise: “annual per capita greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution” in units of “tonnes CO2-e per person per year” (2005-2008 data) is 0.9 (Bangladesh), 0.9 (Pakistan), 2.2 (India), less than 3 (many African and Island countries), 3.2 (the Developing World), 5.5 (China), 6.7 (the World), 11 (Europe), 16 (the Developed World), 27 (the US) and 25 (Australia in 2015; or 89 in 2015 if Australia's huge Exported CO2 pollution is included) [9, 13].  

4. Australia disproportionately contributes to a worsening climate genocide. Leading UK climate scientists Professor Kevin Anderson and Dr James Lovelock FRS have estimated that  only about 0.5 billion people may survive this century as a result of failure to requisitely deal with man-made global warming. Noting that the world population is expected to reach 9.5 billion by 2050 (UN Population Division), this dire estimate  translates to a climate genocide involving deaths of 10 billion people this century, this including roughly twice the present population of particular mainly non-European groups, specifically 6 billion under-5 year old infants, 3 billion Muslims in a terminal Muslim Holocaust, 2 billion Indians, 1.3 billion non-Arab Africans, 0.5 billion Bengalis, 0.3 billion Pakistanis and 0.3 billion Bangladeshis [9].

5. Australia finally exceeded its “fair share” of the world's terminal Carbon Budget in 2011.  In remorseless, greed-driven commitment to climate racism and climate criminality, Australia ignores top German climate change scientists who estimated in 2009 that the world must emit no more than 600 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) before 2050 if it is to have a 75% chance of avoiding a catastrophic 2 degree Centigrade temperature rise. Australia 's annual domestic plus exported greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution is so high that it exceeded its “fair share” of this terminal GHG pollution budget by mid-2011 and is now stealing the “entitlement” of  other countries to pollute the one common atmosphere and ocean of all nations [14].  Worse still, Australia 's bipartisan, Lib-Lab (Coalition Government  and Labor Opposition)  policy of unlimited gas, coal and iron ore exports means that it is committed to polluting the atmosphere with over 3 times the whole world's total terminal GHG pollution budget [15].

6. 10,000 Australians die annually from carbon burning pollutants. Australians dying each year from the effects of pollutants from vehicles, coal burning for electricity and other carbon burning total about 2,200, 4,600 and 2,800, respectively. Given Australia's annual Domestic GHG pollution of about 552 Mt CO2-e (2011) and given a "value of a statistical life" (VOSL) of $7.6 million per person  ($73 billion per year  for Australian carbon burning-related deaths) and $10 billion per year in fossil fuel subsidies, the minimum Carbon Price to cover carbon burning-derived deaths and carbon burning subsidies is  $7.6 million X 9,600 = $73 billion plus $10 billion = $83,000 million/552 Mt CO2-e =  or $150 per tonne CO2-e (A$555 per tonne C) as estimated in 2011, and as compared to the best political offer at present (from Labor) of an EU ETS-based $6 per tonne CO2-e [16].

7. Australia disproportionately contributes to global deaths from climate change and carbon burning. An estimated  0.4 million people die each year world-wide from climate change with a further 4.5 million dying from the effects of carbon burning pollutants  [17]. WHO reported that in 2012 around 7 million people died (one in eight of total annual global deaths)  as a result of air pollution exposure [18]. With 0.3% of world population and responsible  for 3% of global GHG pollution, Australia is an out-of-proportion contributor to global deaths from climate change and carbon burning pollutants.  

8. Australia is destroying the world's best forest carbon sinks. Instead of halting deforestation and implementing  massive re-afforestation, Australia continues to destroy SE Australian Eucalyptus regnans (mountain ash) forests that are the best forest carbon sinks in the world, with the carbon stored roughly equally in giant tree trunks and in the soil  [19-22].  

9. Australia burns forest waste instead of making biochar. Biochar  from anaerobic pyrolysis of   photosynthesis-derived biomass is simply charcoal or  carbon that is inert if buried underground away from oxygen and fire. The potential annual  biochar  production from present agricultural and forestry waste is 12 billion tonnes C as compared  to annual industrial GHG pollution  equivalent to 9 billion tonnes  C.  Instead of implementing  massive biochar production, Australia continues  massive burning of forest undergrowth to reduce fuel load before the summer (now spring and summer) bush fire  (forest fire) season [22].

10. Australia (0.3% of world population) is responsible for 2.1% of the world's Carbon Debt. Assuming a damage-related Carbon Price of  $150 per tonne CO2-e (Dr Chris Hope, 90-Nobel-Laureate University of Cambridge [6]) , the World  has a 1751-2015 Carbon Debt of $270 trillion (about 3 times the annual world GDP of $85 trillion)  that is increasing by about 64 Gt CO2-e/year  x ($150 /t CO2-e)  = $9.6 trillion/year or about $10 trillion each year.  Australia is a world-leading annual per capita  GHG polluter with a 1751-2015 Carbon Debt of $5.6 trillion (A$7.2 trillion) that is increasing at $300 billion (A$385 billion) per year. Thus Australia (population 24 million) with 0.34% of the world's population has 2.1% of the world's Carbon Debt. The Australian Carbon Debt will inescapably have to be paid by the young and future generations and for under-30 year old Australians is increasing at about $30,000 (A$38,500) per person per year, noting that the annual Australian per capita income is about $65,000 (A$83,000) [24-26].

11. Australia leads the world in species extinction. The species extinction rate is over 100-1,000 above normal  [27 ] and Australia  is a world leader in species extinction [28] with deforestation and man-made climate change contributing to this. Thus the habitat of the extremely endangered orange bellied  parrot includes Tasmanian forests subject to logging. The Great Barrier Reef is endangered by ocean warming and acidification effects of GHG pollution as well by adjacent agricultural  and coal mining  and shipping activity.

12. Australia is a world leader in climate change inaction. According  to the 2015 German Climate Watch Index, Australia ranks 61 out of 62 countries examined, with major oil producer Saudi Arabia ranking bottom at 62nd, and Australia “ranks very poor” in emissions level,  development of low emissions, renewable energy, energy efficiency and climate policy: “The new conservative Australian government has apparently made good on last year's announcement and reversed the climate policies previously in effect. As a result, the country lost a further 21 positions in the policy evaluation compared to last year, thus replacing Canada as the worst performing industrial country” [29].

13.  Australian Mainstream media malreportage exacerbates Australia's  effective climate change denialist position. Australia is a Plutocracy, Murdochracy, Lobbyocracy and Corporatocracy in which Big Money purchases people, politicians, parties, policies, public perception of reality and political power. About 70% of Australian major newspaper readership has been captured by the effective climate change denialist and often outright climate change denialist US Murdoch Empire (Western political king-maker Rupert Murdoch was an Australian but found it convenient to become an American) [30].

14. Australia under the effective climate change denialist Coalition is reversing climate change actions of its predecessors. According  to the 2015 German Climate Watch Index “The new conservative Australian government has apparently made good on last year's announcement and reversed the climate policies previously in effect. As a result, the country lost a further 21 positions in the policy evaluation compared to last year, thus replacing Canada as the worst performing industrial country” [29]. The effective climate change denialist , pro-coal, pro-gas, pro-fossil  fuels, anti-science, neoliberal  Coalition Government (aka the COALition) has reversed the timid advances of its Labor predecessors by:

(i) abolishing the expert, public-educating  Climate Commission (that now lives on as a privately-funded Australian Climate Council);

(ii) abolishing  the Carbon Tax (thereby putting a Price on Carbon Pollution of $0 per tonne CO2-e as compared to the expertly estimated, damage-related Carbon Price of $150 per tonne CO2-e) [23]);

(iii) abolishing the  Mining Tax, thereby benefiting some of the worst GHG polluters;

(iv) slashing funding for university  research and Cooperative Research Centres (CRCs)

(v) slashing funding for CSIRO (Australia's premier scientific research organization);

(vi) cutting the Renewable Energy  Target (RET) crucial for Australia's  renewable energy industry;

(vii) slashing funding  for the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (Arena) by $435 million;

(viii) cutting funding for the ABC (Australia's  equivalent of the UK BBC) and SBS (a multicultural  version  of the ABC), both being relatively well-informed and ethical in climate change reportage (unlike the bottom-of-the-barrel Murdoch media);

(ix) attempting to cut university funding by 20% (the universities are responsible for generating much of science-informed  progressive opinion), attempting to close the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (Arena; responsible for expertly informed investment in  renewable energy ), and attempting to abolish the Climate Change Authority, while conversely offering $4 million to fund a university centre at the University of Western Australia (UWA) linked to climate change inaction-promoting and climate change “contrarian” Dr Bjorn Lomborg (this move was blocked by strong protests from students and academic staff of  UWA).

15. The Australian Government flagrantly lies. Thus the climate criminal Coalition Government (with Labor support) has listed  burning forest  biomass for power as “renewable energy” whereas science says it is  certainly not.  Forest-derived biomass is a net CO2 polluting energy source, especially in SE Australian Eucalyptus regnans forests which have the highest carbon sequestration density of any forests in the world [19]. Accordingly, calling burning SE Australian forest waste for energy “renewable energy” is utterly false – and given the ready availability of expert, scientific advice on the matter, can also be seen as an outrageous  lie. Rational  risk  management   is crucial for societal security societal safety that  successively involves (a) accurate data, (b) scientific analysis, this involving the critical testing of potentially falsifiable hypotheses, and (c) informed systemic change to minimize risk [31] and is accordingly utterly derailed by official lies  e.g. flagrantly  false assertions that biomass burning is renewable energy.

16. Australia still hasn't given a pollution target to the UN. Australia has yet to offer a target for GHG pollution for the 2015  Paris Climate Change Conference. Indeed if and when  Australia offers a GHG pollution target it will surely be derisory.

17. Australia is a major exporter of sugar linked to biofuel genocide. About 80% of all sugar produced in Australia is exported as bulk raw sugar and Australia is the world's second largest raw sugar exporter. Brazil uses about half of its sugar production for ethanol  production and is the largest exporter of sugar and sugar-derived ethanol. Biofuel from sugar is not renewable energy and is associated with a huge Carbon Debt. Thus Fargione et al conclude: “Biofuels are a potential low-carbon energy source, but whether biofuels offer carbon savings depends on how they are produced. Converting rainforests, peatlands, savannas, or grasslands to produce food crop–based biofuels in Brazil, Southeast Asia, and the United States creates a “biofuel carbon debt” by releasing 17 to 420 times more CO2 than the annual greenhouse gas (GHG) reductions that these biofuels would provide by displacing fossil fuels”  [20]. Further,  “energy returned on energy invested” (EROEI) is the ratio of the amount of usable energy acquired from a particular energy resource to the amount of energy expended to obtain that energy resource and is 5 for sugar cane [32]. Further, biofuel from sugar and other plant-derived organics is basically obscene “food for fuel” in a world in which 1 billion people go hungry and 2 billion are malnourished [33].  Australia is variously involved in mandating a biofuel component for petrol and diesel fuel. In addition, the worsening   threat to the Australian  Great Barrier Reef comes not just from fossil fuel burning, coal mining, coal shipment and  port dredging, but also from run-off of sediment, fertilizer and other pollutants from sugar cane farms in Queensland. Of course sugar is bad and deadly in relation to human health  e.g. 17,000 Australians die from obesity each year [34]  and WHO staes that “As of 2000, the number of obese adults has increased to over 300 million [worldwide]. Contrary to conventional wisdom, the obesity epidemic is not restricted to industrialized societies; in developing countries, it is estimated that over 115 million people suffer from obesity-related problems” [35].

18. Australia is a major producer and exporter of natural gas. Australia ranks 10th in the world in natural gas exports [36] and has embarked on a massive program of farmland- and aquifer-despoiling fracking and conventional gas extraction in Eastern Australia, with all this flying in the face of the science which says that  “Gas is dirty energy” and that, depending upon the degree of gas leakage, gas burning for power can be dirtier  GHG-wise than coal burning [37]. Australia's world-leading coal exports are ultimately  associated after downstream combustion with GHG pollution of 57 million tonnes CO2-e annually (2015; section G [5]), which at a damage-related  Carbon Price of $150 per tonne CO2-e [23] corresponds to an annual increment in  Carbon Debt of  $8.6 billion [15].

19. Australia is a major miner and exporter  of coal.  Australia ranks 4th in the world in coal production [38]. Australia's world-leading coal exports are ultimately  associated after downstream combustion with GHG pollution of 951 million tonnes CO2-e annually (2015; section G [5]), which at a damage-related  Carbon Price of $150 per tonne CO2-e [23] corresponds to an annual increment in  Carbon Debt of  $143 billion [15].

20. Australia is a major miner and exporter of iron ore.  Processing of iron ore in  Carbon Economy to generate iron and steel  is associated with GHG pollution. Australia's world-leading coal exports of million tonnes annually (2015) is ultimately  associated downstream with GHG pollution of 533 million tonnes CO2-e, which at a damage-related  Carbon Price of $150 per tonne CO2-e [23] corresponds to an annual increment in  Carbon Debt of  $80 billion [15].

21. Australia is a major GHG polluter through methanogenic livestock production. World Bank analysts have carefully  re-assessed the impact of methanogenic livestock production on annual global GHG pollution (notably by considering a methane Global Warming Potential relative to CO2 of 72 on a 20-year time scale  as compared to 21 on a 100-year time scale) and have estimated that the world's annual  GHG pollution is actually 64 billion tonnes CO2-e rather than the previous estimate of 42 billion tonnes CO2-e – they estimate that the contribution of livestock production (including land clearance) is over 33 billion tonnes CO2-e annually  [12], this corresponding  to a Carbon Debt of $5 trillion each year if we assume a damage-related Carbon Price of $150 per tonne CO2-e [23]. According  to Meat and Livestock  Australia,  “Australia is one of the world's most efficient producers of cattle and the world's third largest exporter of beef. The off-farm meat value of Australia's beef industry is $12.75 billion… Australia produced around 2.5 million tonnes of beef and veal in 2013-14 … Australia produces 4% of the world's beef supply and is the third largest beef exporter” [38] and “ Australia is one of the world's leading producers of lamb and mutton, the largest exporter of mutton and live sheep, and second largest exporter of lamb. The Australian public are among the biggest consumers of lamb in the world. The off-farm meat value of the Australian sheepmeat industry is $4.2 billion… 474,267 tonnes of lamb and 227,891 tonnes of mutton were produced in 2013-14” [39]. If we assume that Australia is responsible for 4% of global cattle and sheep production then we can roughly estimate that Australia's contribution to global GHG pollution via livestock production is at least 1.32 billion tonnes CO2-e annually, this corresponding  to a Carbon Debt of $198 billion annually if we assume a damage-related Carbon Price of $150 per tonne CO2-e [23].   

22. Australia is a major exporter of uranium, the overall nuclear cycle being associated with major GHG pollution. According to the World Nuclear Association: “Australia's known uranium resources are the world's largest – 31% of the world total.  In 2014 Australia produced 5897 tonnes of U3O8 (5000 tU). It is the world's third-ranking producer, behind Kazakhstan and Canada. All production is exported” [40]. However in a Carbon Economy the overall nuclear cycle - from mining and processing  uranium oxide ore to eventual  safe disposal of radioactive waste and decommissioning of nuclear plants – is a major CO2 polluter. Thus physicist and energy expert Dr Mark Diesendorf (Institute of Environmental Studies at the University of New South Wales) re nuclear energy and associated CO2 pollution: “The nuclear industry has widely disseminated the false notion that nuclear energy emits no greenhouse gases. The truth is that every step (except reactor operation) in the long chain of processes that makes up the nuclear fuel “cycle” burns fossil fuels and hence emits CO2. The emitting steps are uranium mining, milling fuel fabrication, uranium enrichment, construction and decommissioning of the reactor, and waste management … The subsidy to nuclear power is almost as much as the full cost of wind power in Britain… Contrary to the claims of the nuclear industry, Van Leeuwen and Smith find that total CO2 emissions from the nuclear fuel chain based on low-grade uranium ore are comparable in magnitude with emissions from a gas-fired power station” [41].

23. Australia is an increasing producer of biodiesel. Australia is committed to biofuel including biodiesel [42]. However,  biofuel – whether biodiesel from canola or bioethanol from photosynthesis-derived sugar or  biomass -  is fundamentally  obscene and deadly “food for fuel” in a world in which 1 billion people go hungry and 2 billion are malnourished [33].  

24. Australia massively subsidizes fossil fuels. Australia provides  fossil fuel subsidies to the climate criminal  mining industry of about $4.5 billion each year via diesel fuel rebates, accelerated depreciation on exploration and accelerated depreciation of assets [43]. However these subsidies are dwarfed by the cost of 10,000 annual Australian deaths from carbon burning pollutants, which at a Value of a Statistical Life (VOSL) of $7.6 million per person amounts to a subsidy of carbon burning  of $76 billion per year [15]. Globally, subsidies for fossil fuels total over US$5 trillion annually [44].

25. Australian politicians and their corporate associates have made outrageously incorrect  statements that endanger public safety and indeed Australia's security, of which examples are provided below:

(i) Tony Abbott (now Prime Minister) on climate science: “The climate change argument is absolute crap” [45].

(ii) Tony Abbott as Prime Minister on coal:  “Coal is good for humanity" [46].

(iii) Numerous Labor Government figures have made utterly false statements to the effect that “Gas is clean energy” (it isn't and depending upon the degree of gas leakage, gas burning for power can be dirtier  GHG-wise than coal burning) [47, 48].

(iv) Morris Newman (non-scientist chairman of the Prime Minister's Business Advisory Council): “[Australia is] hostage to climate change madness”,  “If the world does indeed move into a cooling period, its citizens are ill-prepared”, and “What if the warmth the world has enjoyed for the past 50 years is the result of solar activity, not man-made CO2? The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and its acolytes pay scant attention to any science, however strong the empirical evidence, that may relegate human causes to a lesser status” [49].

Summary.

Australia has an economy that is presently heavily dependent on coal, gas and iron exports and a climate criminal Australia is a world leader in (a) annual  per capita greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution [5, 9] and  (b) opposition to effective action on man-made climate change [29].

The world is badly running out of time  to deal with man-made climate change – indeed many now say that it is very unlikely that the world will avoid a catastrophic 2 degrees Centigrade temperature rise [1, 2].

What  can decent people do to make things “less bad” for their children and future generations? Science-informed Australians will utterly reject the pro-coal, pro-gas, pro-fossil fuels, anti-science,  effective climate change denialist, climate criminal Lib-labs (Coalition and Labor Right), vote 1 Green and put the COALition last. However US lackey Australia is not alone in egregious climate criminality, with the US and its allies Canada and Saudi Arabia  also being notable  for disproportionate GHG pollution and climate change inaction [29].

Decent people around the world  must urgently respond to deadly climate change inaction by leading climate criminal countries,  like the US and its lackeys Canada and Australia, by (a) informing everyone they can, and (b) urging and applying Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) against all people, politicians, parties,  collectives, corporations and countries  disproportionately  complicit in the worsening climate emergency and in the worsening climate genocide.

References.

[1]. “Are we doomed?”: https://sites.google.com/site/300orgsite/are-we-doomed .

[2]. "Too late to avoid global warming catastrophe": https://sites.google.com/site/300orgsite/too-late-to-avoid-global-warming .

[3]. 300.org: . https://sites.google.com/site/300orgsite/300-org .

[4]. “300.org – return atmosphere CO2 to 300 ppm CO2”: https://sites.google.com/site/300orgsite/300-org---return-atmosphere-co2-to-300-ppm .

[5].  “2011 climate change course”: https://sites.google.com/site/300orgsite/2011-climate-change-course .

[6]. “Carbon Debt Carbon Credit”: https://sites.google.com/site/carbondebtcarboncredit/ .

[7]. “Cut carbon emissions 80% by 2020”: https://sites.google.com/site/cutcarbonemissions80by2020/ .

[8]. “100% renewable energy by 2020”: https://sites.google.com/site/100renewableenergyby2020/ .

[9]. “Climate Genocide”: https://sites.google.com/site/climategenocide/ .

[10]. Synthesis Report of the March 2009 Copenhagen Scientific Climate Change Conference: http://climatecongress.ku.dk/pdf/synthesisreport .

[11]. 2010 Open Letter by 255 members of the US National Academy of Sciences, “Open Letter: climate change and the integrity of science”, Guardian, 6 May 2010: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/may/06/climate-science-open-letter  .

[12]. Robert Goodland and Jeff Anfang. “Livestock and climate change. What if the key actors in climate change are … cows, pigs and chickens?”, World Watch, November/December 2009: http://www.worldwatch.org/files/pdf/Livestock%20and%20Climate%20Change.pdf .

[13].  “List of countries by greenhouse gas emissions per capita”: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_greenhouse_gas_emissions_per_capita .

[14]. “Carbon Debt Carbon Credit”: https://sites.google.com/site/carbondebtcarboncredit/ .

[15].  Gideon Polya, “Australia 's Huge Coal, Gas & Iron Ore Exports Threaten Planet”, Countercurrents, 15 May 2012: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya150512.htm .

[16].  “Australian carbon burning-related deaths and carbon burning subsidies => minimum Carbon Price of A$554 per tonne carbon (C) or A$151 per tonne CO2-e ”, Yarra Valley Climate Action Group: http://sites.google.com/site/yarravalleyclimateactiongroup/2011-carbon-burning .

[17]. DARA, “Climate Vulnerability Monitor. A guide to the cold calculus of a hot planet”, 2012, Executive Summary pp2-3: http://daraint.org/climate-vulnerability-monitor/climate-vulnerability-monitor-2012/ .  

[18].  WHO, “7 million premature deaths annually linked to air pollution”,  25 March 2014: http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2014/air-pollution/en/ .

[19].  Drs Heather Keith, Dr Brendan Mackey, and Dr. David Lindenmayer (ANU), “Re-evaluation of forest biomass carbon stocks and lessons from the world's most carbon-dense forests”, PNAS July 14, 2009 vol. 106 no. 28 11635-11640: http://www.pnas.org/content/106/28/11635.abstract?sid=c2645cfb-f32c-4e89-8323-5bf507db88a0  .

[20].  Joseph Fargione et al: “Land Clearing and the Biofuel Carbon Debt”, Science 29 February 2008, Vol. 319. no. 5867, pp. 1235 – 1238: http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/1152747  .

[21].   Timothy Searchinger et al: “Use of U.S. Croplands for Biofuels Increases Greenhouse Gases Through Emissions from Land-Use Change”, Science 29 February 2008, Vol. 319. no. 5867, pp. 1238 – 1240: http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/1151861  .

[22].   Gideon Polya, “Forest biomass-derived Biochar can profitably reduce global warming and bushfire risk”, Yarra Valley Climate Action Group: http://sites.google.com/site/yarravalleyclimateactiongroup/forest-biomass-derived-biochar-can-profitably-reduce-global-warming-and-bushfire-risk .

[23]. Dr Chris Hope, “How high should climate change taxes be?”, Working Paper Series, Judge Business School, University of Cambridge, 9.2011: http://www.jbs.cam.ac.uk/media/assets/wp1109.pdf .

[24]. “Climate Justice & Intergenerational Equity”: https://sites.google.com/site/300orgsite/climate-justice .

[25]. “Stop climate crime”: https://sites.google.com/site/300orgsite/stop-climate-crime .

[26]. Gideon Polya, “2015 A-to-Z  alphabetical list of actions and advocacies for climate change activists”,  Countercurrents, 14 January, 2015: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya140115.htm .

[27]. Phillip Levin, Donald Levin, “The real biodiversity crisis”, American Scientist, January-February 2002: http://www.americanscientist.org/issues/pub/the-real-biodiversity-crisis .

[28]. Frances Pike, “Australia: world leader in deforestation and species extinction”, Independent Australia, 3 June 2015: https://independentaustralia.net/environment/environment-display/australian-logging-and-the-end-of-species,7788  .

[29]. German Climate Watch Index 2015: https://germanwatch.org/en/download/10407.pdf .

[30]. “Boycott Murdoch Media”: https://sites.google.com/site/boycottmurdochmedia/ .

[31].  “Gideon Polya”: https://sites.google.com/site/drgideonpolya/home .

[32]. “Energy returned on energy invested”, Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_returned_on_energy_invested .

[33]. “Biofuel genocide”: https://sites.google.com/site/biofuelgenocide/home .

[34]. Gideon Polya, “Australian State Terrorism -  Zero Australian Terrorism Deaths, 1 Million Preventable Australian Deaths & 10 Million Muslims Killed By US Alliance Since 9-11”,  Countercurrents, 23 September, 2014: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya230914.htm .

[35]. WHO, “Controlling the global obesity epidemic”: http://www.who.int/nutrition/topics/obesity/en/ .

[36]. “Natural  gas – exports”, Index Mundi: http://www.indexmundi.com/g/r.aspx?c=as&v=138 .

[37]. “Gas is not clean energy”: https://sites.google.com/site/gasisnotcleanenergy/ .

[38]. “Coal statistics”, World Coal Association: http://www.worldcoal.org/resources/coal-statistics/ .

[39]. Meat and Livestock Australia, “Cattle”: http://www.mla.com.au/Cattle-sheep-and-goat-industries/Industry-overview/Cattle .

[40]. Meat and Livestock Australia, “Sheep”: http://www.mla.com.au/Cattle-sheep-and-goat-industries/Industry-overview/Sheep .

[41].  Mark Diesendorf, “Behind Howard's dangerous nuclear push”, Green Left Weekly: https://www.greenleft.org.au/node/34973 .

[42]. Australian Greens, “Ending fossil fuel subsidies to the mining industry”: https://greens.org.au/sites/greens.org.au/files/ending_fossil_fuel_subsidies.pdf .

[43]. “Biofuel in Australia”, Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biofuel_in_Australia .

[44]. James Plested, “The global fossil fuel subsidy scam”, Red Flag, 26 May 2015.

[45]. Charlotte Meredith, :”Tony Abbott: top ten quotes from Australia's new prime minister”, Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/09/07/tony-abbott-australia-quo_n_3885263.html .

[46]. ABC News, “”Coal is good for humanity”, Prime Minister Tony Abbott says at $3.9 bn Queensland mine opening”, 13 October 2014: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-10-13/coal-is-good-for-humanity-pm-tony-abbott-says/5810244 .

[47]. Gideon Polya, “Correcting the Australian Government – natural gas is NOT clean energy”, Open Forum, 8 February 2010: http://www.openforum.com.au/natural-gas-not-clean .

[48]. Gideon Polya, “Australia Absurdly Declares Methane Burning Clean And Renewable”, Countercurrents, 26 August, 2009: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya160809.htm

[49]. Oliver Milman, “Tony Abbott adviser warns of threat of “global cooling””, Guardian, 14 August 2014: http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/aug/14/tony-abbott-adviser-warns-of-threat-of-global-cooling .

Dr Gideon Polya has been teaching science students at a major Australian university for 4 decades. He published some 130 works in a 5 decade scientific career, most recently a huge pharmacological reference text "Biochemical Targets of Plant Bioactive Compounds" (CRC Press/Taylor & Francis, New York & London , 2003). He has published “Body Count. Global avoidable mortality since 1950” (G.M. Polya, Melbourne, 2007: http://globalbodycount.blogspot.com/ ); see also his contributions “Australian complicity in Iraq mass mortality” in “Lies, Deep Fries & Statistics” (edited by Robyn Williams, ABC Books, Sydney, 2007: http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/ockhamsrazor/australian-complicity-in-iraq-mass-mortality/3369002#transcript ) and “Ongoing Palestinian Genocide” in “The Plight of the Palestinians (edited by William Cook, Palgrave Macmillan, London, 2010: http://mwcnews.net/focus/analysis/4047-the-plight-of-the-palestinians.html ). He has published a revised and updated 2008 version of his 1998 book “Jane Austen and the Black Hole of British History” (see: http://janeaustenand.blogspot.com/ ) as biofuel-, globalization- and climate-driven global food price increases threaten a greater famine catastrophe than the man-made famine in British-ruled India that killed 6-7 million Indians in the “forgotten” World War 2 Bengal Famine (see recent BBC broadcast involving Dr Polya, Economics Nobel Laureate Professor Amartya Sen and others: http://www.open.edu/openlearn/history-the-arts/history/social-economic-history/listen-the-bengal-famine ). When words fail one can say it in pictures - for images of Gideon Polya's huge paintings for the Planet, Peace, Mother and Child see: http://sites.google.com/site/artforpeaceplanetmotherchild/ and http://www.flickr.com/photos/gideonpolya/

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