Re: Qantas sticking to charging passengers for carbon tax
You forget to mention that Australia has a much bigger emission and GDP per capita (though China still is one of the major polluters)
A worldwide policy ... can you suggest how to achieve it? If it can't be done globally, perhaps if everyone ignored the issue maybe it'll just disappear.
Australia will have a minor impact. But hey everyone has to do their bit right?
If everyone person had the mentality that they are just one person in a world of billions so could do as much environmentally unethical things as they pleased ... well ...
Having a look into some actual numbers on the pollution (remember what people used to worry about in the 1970s before the impending ice age came up?) rather than carbon dioxide (not a pollutant under any scientific definition btw) incrementally produced by China since 2009 is revealing.
Also is the fact that western companies have been shifting "expensive" industry into China for over two decades now. Why expensive? Well the treatment of the by-products (carcinogens etc) is expensive in any OECD and some transitioning countries but not in China curiously enough.
Take the inventor of Soy sauce, Ajinomoto - a truly obnoxious chemical process that produces several different carcinogens as waste products (now you know why it tastes so good!). They moved their main plant to China over a decade ago. The capital equipment, inputs etc all top quality (Japanese, German equipment) so no cost saving there. It is not a labour intensive process (no major cost saving there to justify JPYBillions cost). The land was cheap (confiscated from local farmers if Western NGOs can be believed - as has happened numerous times since btw) but the clincher is they "allegedly" discharge the untreated by-products by the millions of litres straight into the river. Curiously enough in the region up to 30km downstream the incidence of rare cancers such as thyroid, liver and brain are reportedly between 100 to 300x higher than anywhere else in the world.
That was the initial findings published around 2002/3 before the Western NGO had its accreditation rescinded by China and kicked out of the country. Subsequently the main road into the village where the plant is located has had a check point ever since. Hence why the analysis only got to 30km downstream.
Long way round to say - Carbon Scheme in Aust is making a few investment bankers, consultants and future consultants (ex-Fed & State Politicians soon looking for jobs- was that why they wanted Bob in Canberra to give out-placement advice?) significantly richer, creating new Depts in the public service and forecasting losses of $750m on the $10bn Green Fund (Budget papers). Well Treasury has a good track record of never foreseeing falls in GDP, let alone a recession in its history. Their ability to forecast "losses" is nearly as good.
China is pulling in as much coal as they can trans-ship. Internally their river network and train system (freight) cannot shift the coal internally in the amounts required so they are taking inferior coal (brown...) from whoever such as India. Similarly with iron ore (what Australian producers would not even report to the ASX) from India.
The pollution from the coal fired power stations (adding more each year than virtually exist in Australia) was so bad in 2002/3 (yes before their economy really took off) that the early form work for the Olympics had to be replaced as the steel was corroding faster than it could be covered. Who'd guessed it - someone tried to pass off slightly lower grade steel in the construction but cut the alloy too much.
Due to the pollution 70% of the ground water is estimated to be unusable for agriculture - forget about drinking. So the North/South and West/East canals and pipelines have been built (and still are) to bring the relatively clean water from the west to the polluted east.
Have a guess how many coal power stations were required to power the pumping of the water?
Vicious circle this pollution - but our Carbon tax (consultant get rich quick) will solve the problems like our energy intensive desalination plants solve the water problem.
Enjoy the Soy Sauce!
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San-J® Soy Sauces - AJINOMOTO[/h]www.ajiusafood.com/products/san-j-specialty-
sauces/san-j.aspx
