CANBERRA
40%

While uncertainty is still raging up on the hill over who will form a national government, our own local government has today taken an immense and important step that will blaze like a shining beacon to the rest of our nation. Today, Simon Corbell, our local minister for Environment and Climate Change, introduced to the legislative assembly a 40 percent target for CO₂ emissions reduction by 2020!

This is a huge win for all the people of Canberra who worked so hard to bring this about. But more than that, it is a win for the children of Canberra. From today on, they can look forward to living on a healthier planet in a vibrant city reaping the benefits of a green economy. They can look forward to being able to bring their own children up in a city that lead the way in tackling the great moral challenge of our time.

Today the people of Canberra can hold their heads up high and know that we are blazing a trail for the rest of our vast and wonderful nation to follow.

Today is indeed a day to love our city, to love our future and to love 40 percent less CO₂.

An update from the Assembly…

The Environment and Climate Change committee at the Assembly has just tabled the final Climate Change targets report.

In doing so, Zed Seselja, Leader of the Liberals spoke to the report. He indicated that he doesn’t support a 40% target, but that the Liberals do have a Bill on the table for a 30% target. He effectively confirmed Liberal Party support for that position by saying that while 30% would be a very challenging target, it was a “sensible approach”.

The ACT Greens MLAs position remains 40% by 2020 off a 1990 baseline.

The Government will table their in the Assembly bill on Thursday morning, so expect to see their 2020 target annoucement on the front page of Thursday’s Canberra Times.

This coming Wednesday (18th of August) the ANU will be playing host to the Canberra Sustainable Careers Expo and the ♥ 40% campaign will be hosting an awareness raising stall. If you’d like to help out on the stall or just learn more about how a 40 percent target could drive Canberra’s green economy, please come and visit us on Wednesday. Similarly, if you would like a stylish ♥ 40%  T-Shirt, they will be for sale on the day (alternatively you can arrange to buy a T-shirt at any time by emailing info@love40percent.org).

The expo will be held between 12 and 4pm in the Sports Hall at the ANU.

Three interesting events are coming up in the next week:

First up is a knitting get-together at The Front Cafe in Lyneham this Sunday from 2pm to 4pm. If you’ve been wanting to get involved in the knitting/crocheting/crafting come along to this with your needles, wool and ideas. Also be sure to join our knitting Google group to discuss ideas. If you have squares or hearts  that you’ve made and you can’t make it this Sunday then remember you can drop them off at the Conservation Council. We are planning to do our first yarnbombing in a bit over a week so you will soon start seeing love 40% hearts popping up around Civic and the various town centres.

Next is the ‘Vote Climate’ forum being organised by our friends at Climate Action Canberra on the 11th of August from 5:30 at The Canberra Club, 45 West Row, Civic. It will be a great opportunity to ask our Federal politicians what they are doing to help Canberra go for 40 percent.

Finally, on Sunday the 15th our friends at the Conservation Council have organised the annual Walk Against Warming which will start at 12.30pm at Questicon.

With so much happening in Canberra in the next week, this only goes to show, once again, that there is clearly a deep concern in our community about climate change and that ordinary Canberrans support ambitious local action.

It is so easy for any discussion of climate change to get lost in numbers so we thought we might take the time to put some of the numbers that get thrown about into a human perspective.

16,000,000,000,000 watts This is the amount of fossil fuel powered energy humans consume each year. That’s about a third of the energy that is released each year by plate tectonics, the geological process that moves continents around the globe and creates mountains!

28,000,000,000 tonnes This is the amount of CO₂ that is released globally each year. That’s enough to cover the entire surface of Australia to a depth of 2 metres!

300,000,000,000,000 watts This is the amount that the world’s oceans are heating by each year due to human induced climate change. That’s the same heat as would be released by detonating 5 Hiroshima sized nuclear bombs every second of every day for an entire year.

$8 The estimated cost per week per household that a new report from the University of Melbourne says would be required to transform the entire Australian electricity production system to renewable energy by 2020. That’s two to three cups of coffee per household per week or a mere 3 percent of Australia’s GDP.

40 percent This is the emission reduction target that the ACT legislative assembly’s own inquiry suggested could be achieved in the ACT at zero net cost. In the ACT we can’t remodel the Australian electricity generation system by ourselves, but we can still be leaders. We can show the rest of Australia that serious action on climate change is possible. We can light the way for the rest of Australia to follow.

Climate change is a real and serious problem. But real and serious solutions do exist. Working together we can solve our climate crisis. But the time to act is now.

The ACT cabinet is on the very cusp of deciding what target it will introduce into the Legislative Assembly. We need to write, phone, fax and email them to tell them that any target less than 40 percent is aiming too low. To make this easier and to help you engage with your elected representatives we have created a page that provides instructions on contacting your representatives and tips on letter writing.

And pens aren’t the only weapon you can pick up to fight climate change. After the unfortunate illness of our ‘knit against climate change’ organiser put all things woollen on the back-burner for a while, they are starting to gain momentum again. Two knit-ins have been held at Tilley’s and some real progress is being made. To get involved join our knitting Google group here.

Finally, the statistics in this post were all taken from the new Zero Carbon Australia report. It makes fascinating reading if you have the time.

If there was any doubt beforehand about the commitment of average Canberrans to ambitious action on climate change, that doubt has been well and truly squashed by the amazing turn out to last Thursday’s forum. We owe a huge thank you and congratulations to everybody who came along and a massive apology to those who were turned away because there was simply no more room to fit anyone else in. Luckily for those who missed the forum, a video of it will be posted here shortly.

Many encouraging signs were given by our MLAs on the day. Zed Seselja reaffirmed the Liberals commitment to a target of at least 30%. Shane Rattenbury reaffirmed the Green’s commitment to a target of at least 40%. And Simon Corbell said that Labor would introduce an “ambitious” target, though he refused to speculate on a specific number. Even more importantly, the forum provided a space for ordinary Canberrans to give voice to their concerns about climate change and their desire to be part of the solution.

The forum has given our campaign a huge momentum boost and a raised public profile due to significant media coverage. It is vital that we each build on this by continuing to write to our elected representatives, especially those in the ALP and the Liberal Party.

The following are the promotional video that was shown on the day as well as some photos of the forum. Special thanks go to SilverSun Pictures and Enviro Friendly Products as well as Simon, Zed and Shane for participating and the ABC’s Sarina Locke for moderating.

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