SMH 21/10/14 Scaremongering an attack on our standard of living....

SMH 21/10/14 Scaremongering an attack on our standard of living. by Peter Reith

It is in the national interest that both Labor and the Coalition confront the greenies' campaign against the coal industry and more widely, the use of fossil fuels. The campaign to close down the associated jobs and investments that come with the resources sector must not go unanswered.

As for Bill Shorten, he will eventually realise that the political reality is he can't go on attacking the resources sector with another carbon tax(however described), nor remain attached like a limpet to the greens.

Apart from a kamikaze policy at the next election, his only options are to await international consensus(highly unlikely) or more convincing science. In the meantime, the Australian public will not agree to have their living standards slashed as a result of a greens campaign.

The fossil fuel debate has long needed many more champions. Weak state governments, particularly in NSW and Victoria, are a good example of what happens when governments are frightened to govern. As soon as these governments allowed a political vacuum to be created in the gas sector, it was rapidly filled by green activists, who are usually more socialist than the Labor party and are more interested in politics than the environment. In Victoria, bans on exploration for gas have been used with no good reason, at the expense of the revitalisation of Eastern Victoria. In NSW, the failure to confront the greenies is on track to cost jobs and economic dislocation, especially in manufacturing.

The facts are that the greens are absurdly impractical and seem completely divorced from the reality of Australia's situation. Coal and uranium make up the bulk of exported energy materials, so anyone who advocates stopping coal and uranium exports needs to first explain how we are going to make up for the lost export income. Otherwise they are arguing for a drop in living standards, and,apart from a few greenies,most people would think that's a crazy idea.

The biggest share of energy use in our economy is manufacturing, which uses 34 percent as at 2010-11, even though manufacturing is decreasing. Anyone who tells you we need to use less energy should tell you what happens to the jobs in manufacturing when the power is cut. Unemployment has been rising already, so no one in their right mind wants to deliberately close down jobs. And if the greens say renewables are a substitute, they are fooling you because renewables are more expensive and higher input costs can only undermine competitiveness.

And of course, most of the renewable energy supply comes from renewable fuel products and hydroelectricity , although the share of wind and solar has been increasing. Wind is an expensive source of electricity because, in part it is not reliable. The result is that natural gas is used to fill the wind gaps, yet greenies don't like natural gas. It's bizarre that greenies oppose using natural gas when natural gas reduces emissions by half. It is also odd that the green movement opposes fracking for natural gas but supports hot fracture rock geothermal technology; in other words fracking! My conclusion is that the greenies are mainly political activists uninterested in the environment except to use it as a cover for their political agenda.

The truth is that fracking and drilling and coal and natural gas have long provided cheap and convenient energy and should not be discarded without knowing what can economically replace existing energy sources. Coal and gas are safe products and we should be using them as much as possible. The coal industry alone provides about 200,000 jobs and brings in billions of dollars to our economy to underscore living standards. The gas industry already provides massive benefits and will boost national income even more when the big new industry based in Gladestone gets under way soon.

In some ways, Australians have had it so good for so long now that some people think we can get away with cutting off our noses to spite our collective faces. In these circumstances, the politicians need to be in the debate, not watching from the outside. The recent decisions of an Anglican General Synod to encourage divestment of all fossil fuels from church investments and a similar decision by the Australian National University are examples of naivety and ignorance, just the sort of easy targets for a political scare campaign.

All of which means we need politicians to provide strong leadership and factual information to counter the misleading and scaremonging of the greens. And don't get too excited about fusion technology being the answer all our energy issues-fusion needs a lot of electricity to get it going and the technology would be very expensive. Coal and natural gas will be with us for a long time yet.