Labor attempts to close anti-vaccination loophole

TBA

9 News, 2 April 2017:

Parents who oppose vaccinations on conscientious grounds will no longer be allowed to enrol their children at New South Wales child care centres under legislation to be introduced by the state opposition.

Labor leader Luke Foley announced the policy today and said the legislation, set to be introduced this week, would plug the loophole which had allowed specialist anti-vaccination child care centres to be set up.

The changes will not affect children who can't be vaccinated because of a medical condition such as a specialised cancer treatment.

“We need to be encouraging vaccinations not discouraging them," Mr Foley said in a statement.

"Vaccinations are the only way to protect against serious diseases like polio, mumps, whooping cough, meningococcal, diphtheria and tetanus."

Mr Foley said his plan would also cover family day care operations.

The announcement comes after an unvaccinated NSW girl was diagnosed with tetanus earlier this month.

It is believed the seven-year-old picked up the disease through an open wound on her foot while playing in the garden of her home in the state’s north.

The case prompted renewed debate in the north coast region, which has some of the lowest immunisation rates in Australia.

The Daily Telegraph, 1 April 2017:

A five-week-old baby boy is fighting for life after a catastrophic brain haemorrhage followed his parents decision to decline a routine vitamin K shot given to all newborns.

The baby, from northern NSW, presented to Lismore base hospital last week with bleeding on the brain before being transferred to Lady Cilento Children’s Hospital in Brisbane where he remains in a very serious condition. If he survives, he will likely be severely disabled.

Vitamin K is the new battleground of the anti-vaccination movement which has been scaring thousands of parents into rejecting the shot — a safe injection which has saved hundreds of children dying of Newborn Haemorrhagic Disease.

The Sunday Telegraph is today calling on the Federal Government to add the vitamin K injection to the National Immunisation Program (NIP) and tie it to Commonwealth family payments.

Australia at the sharp end of global warming

“Australians endured another intense summer, with more than 200 record-breaking extreme weather events driven by climate change” [Climate Council, 7 March 2017]

World Weather Attribution (WWA), media release, March 2017:

Extreme Heat:

A look at the recent record high temperatures in Australia

New South Wales, located in southeastern Australia, just experienced its hottest summer on record (Figure 1). Temperature records across the central and the eastern parts of Australia were broken, leading the Australian Bureau of Meteorology to issue a Special Climate Statement on the exceptional heat. For example, January 2017 saw the highest monthly mean temperatures on record for the cities of Sydney and Brisbane, and the highest daytime temperatures on record for Canberra. Overall, Australia experienced its 12th hottest summer on record.

There were three distinct heat waves in southeast Australia during January and February, with the highest temperatures recorded from February 9th to the 12th. For much of the country, the heat peaked on the weekend of February 11th and 12th, when many places hit upwards of 113°F (45°C). The 2016-2017 heatwaves broke long-standing records in central New South Wales that were originally set back in January of 1939 (Figure 2).

The WWA team and colleagues from the University of New South Wales conducted a rapid attribution analysis to see how climate change factored into the exceptionally warm summer (December to February) of 2016-2017. The team also looked at the hottest three-day average February temperatures in Canberra and Sydney.

 Figure 1: New South Wales, located in southeastern Australia, reported its hottest summer (Dec. 2016 – Feb. 2017) on record while the northwestern part of Australia reported cooler than average temperatures. Map shows temperature deciles. Source: Australian Bureau of Meteorology

Figure 2: Time series (1910-2016) of summer mean temperature anomalies for New South Wales. The 2016-2017 heatwaves broke long-standing records in central New South Wales that were originally set back in January of 1939. Source: Australian Bureau of Meteorology

Regional Level: New South Wales

The New South Wales record hot summer can be linked directly to climate change. Two different methods were used to reach this conclusion. First, drawing from a previously published analysis using coupled model simulations, we see that average summer temperatures like those seen during 2016-2017 are now at least 50 times more likely in the current climate than in the past, before global warming began. The team also performed an analysis based on the observational series from ACORN-SAT. This approach is similar to previous analyses used for record heat in the Arctic in 2016 and Central England in 2014. Comparing the likelihood of this record in the climate of today compared with the climate of around 1910 (before global warming had a big impact on our climate system and when reliable observations are available), the team again found at least a 50-fold increase in the likelihood of this hot summer.

The team then looked at the maximum summer temperature for New South Wales (see graphic below). Based on climate model simulations (weather@home and CMIP5) and observational data analysis (ACORN-SAT), maximum summer temperatures like those seen during 2016-2017 are now at least 10 times more likely in the current climate than in the past, before global warming began. In the past, a summer as hot as 2016-2017 was a roughly 1 in 500-year event. Today, climate change has increased the odds to roughly 1 in 50 years — a 10-fold increase in frequency. In the future, a summer as hot as this past summer in New South Wales is likely to happen roughly once every five years. In addition, climate change has increased the intensity of an exceptionally hot summer like this by roughly 1ºC (1.8°F). In the future, the intensity increases by roughly 2°C (3.6°F).

Local Level: Canberra and Sydney Heatwaves

The team also looked at the local scale to see if a climate change role could be measured in the heat waves that hit Canberra (population ~380,000) and Sydney (population ~4.9 million). Climate has much larger variability at the city level compared to a big area like New South Wales. This can make it more difficult to see the influence of climate change within the overall noise of the weather system.

In Canberra, temperatures hit 96.8oF (36°C) on February 9th and 104oF (40oC) on both February 10th and 11th. Using the weather@home model and ACORN-SAT observations, we analyzed three-day average maximum temperature. Both the observational data and the climate model simulations show that climate change increased the likelihood of the kind of extreme three-day heat observed in Canberra. The weather@home results point to at least a 50 percent increase in the chance of a heatwave like that.

For Sydney, a coastal city, the effect of climate change on this heat wave is less clear. Observations show that climate change increased the chance of such a heat wave occurring, but the high year-to-year variability makes identifying a clear human influence more difficult.

The Future

The heat seen this past summer across parts of Australia is still rare in our current climate. However, if greenhouse gas emissions are not dramatically reduced, intense summer heat will become the norm in the future.

For Further Information Contact:

Andrew King (University of Melbourne): andrew.king@unimelb.edu.au

Sarah Kirkpatrick (University of New South Wales): sarah.kirkpatrick@unsw.edu.au

David Karoly (University of Melbourne): dkaroly@unimelb.edu.au

Geert Jan van Oldenborgh (KNMI): persvoorlichting@knmi.nl (press office)

*****ENDS*****

Excerpts from The Climate Council’s Angry Summer 2016/17: Climate Change Supercharging Extreme Weather report released on 7 March 2017:

In just 90 days, more than 205 records were broken around Australia.

The state-wide mean temperature in summer was the hottest for New South Wales since records began, with temperatures 2.57°C above average.

Sydney had its hottest summer on record with a mean temperature 2.8°C above average.

Brisbane had its hottest summer on record in terms of mean temperature at 26.8°C, equivalent to 1.7°C above average.

Canberra had its hottest summer on record in terms of daytime temperatures and recorded temperatures of at least 35°C on 18 days, already far higher than what is projected for 2030 (12 days).

Adelaide experienced its hottest Christmas day in 70 years at 41.3°C.

Moree in regional New South Wales experienced 54 consecutive days of temperatures 35°C or above, a record for the state.

Perth had its highest summer total rainfall on record of 192.8 mm.......

The impacts of the last Angry Summer of 2013/14 cost the Australian economy approximately $8 billion through absenteeism and a reduction in work productivity. The economic impact from the 2016/17 Angry Summer has not yet been quantified.

The Australia State of the Environment (SoE) 2016 Overview was tabled in the Australian Parliament on 7 March 2017.

Global Warming: the Red Herring strikes again!

One of the Clarence Valley’s arch-denialists is once more on the anti-climate science campaign trail…..

Letter to the Editor, The Daily Examiner, 10 February 2017, p.11:

Old heat

Browsing through past newspaper articles brought up this reminder of just how hot it's been in years gone by.

The 1896 February 3 edition of the Kalgoorlie Miner carried this article titled: Heat in NSW: A record of the extreme heat which has prevailed in the West during the last month has been supplied to the government by the Manager of Gundabook estate on the Darling river.

The record shows that from January 1-25 the thermometer ranged from 112deg. to 123deg. in the shade, during the first week from 118 to 124: during the second week from 118 to 128 and during the third week the thermometer once went to 129 degrees: All these readings are in Farenheit and when converted to Celcius range from 44.44deg. to 47.77deg to 50.55 deg to 51.11 deg, 53.55 deg, and 53.88 deg. the highest reading.

Now that was a heat wave that occurred without the assistance of the much maligned industrial revolution.

Fred Perring, Halfway Creek

As usual Mr. Perring doesn’t do his homework.

The Industrial Revolution began around the mid-1700s and over a century later (in the year cited by Perring) the effects of greenhouse gases on global atmosphere and ground temperature, as well as the possibility of fossil fuels being a source of carbon dioxide were already being discussed in the scientific community.

The following is a snapshot of a paper by Nobel Prize winner Svante August Arrhenius published in April 1896:

Royal Society of Chemistry, retrieved 11 February 2017

The paper in its entirety can be read here.

The 'Archie Bunker' of Clarence Valley has offered his head for public washing again...

The ‘Archie Bunker’ of Clarence Valley John Ibbotson has offered his head for public washing again…..

Letter to the Editor, The Daily Examiner, 2 February 2017, page 9:

No science to it aka Climate sceptic's howlers insult to mainstream science

A good general knowledge implies knowing a fair bit about a wide range of subjects but it can also mean not knowing enough about anything specific in order to become to become an authority. John Ibbotson and climate science is a classic example.

Because of his lack of knowledge John's letters have a tendency to contain scientifically indefensible howlers.

From the many, an Ibbotson clanger highlights reel would include (and I paraphrase):

1. "CO2 is a harmless, benign compound!"

2. "Ocean acidification is impossible because sea water is alkaline!"

3. "Velocity ratio for a wind turbine is an absurdity!" and so on.

No doubt with some prompting, John's grasp of climate science has improved over time, but it still begs the question: is it too easy to believe you are absolutely correct when you don't, won't or can't understand the basic science which would show that you are just simply wrong?

The kindest thing that can be said about John's letters on climate is that his offerings on other topics (apart from maybe being too frequent), are more or less based on fact.

In his latest climate letter (DEX Jan 1) John quite graciously confirms that the last two decades for the planet have been abnormally warm but he will be most disappointed to learn that contrary to his assertion I am decidedly of any colour other than green.

In fact I am just a very average DEX reader who is more than willing to defend mainstream science from unjustified denigration by self-indulgent sceptic opportunists such as John Ibbotson, the esteemed Viv Forbes and others.

Ted Strong, Seelands

In 1947 the Atomic Clock was set at 7 minutes to midnight & by 2016 the clock stood at 3 minutes to midnight - Donald Trump's presidency has moved its hands to 2 minutes 30 seconds

Six days after Donald John Trump was sworn in as the 45^th President of the United States of America the Atomic Doomsday Clock moved closer to Armageddon.

Image found at Business Insider Australia

It is two and a half minutes to midnight

2017 Doomsday Clock Statement

Science and Security Board

Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists

Editor, John Mecklin

This year marks the 70th anniversary of the Doomsday Clock, a graphic that appeared on the first cover of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists as it transitioned from a six-page, black-and-white newsletter to a full-fledged magazine. For its first cover, the editors sought an image that represented a seriousness of purpose and an urgent call for action. The Clock, and the countdown to midnight that it implied, fit the bill perfectly. The Doomsday Clock, as it came to be called, has served as a globally recognized arbiter of the planet’s health and safety ever since.

Each year, the setting of the Doomsday Clock galvanizes a global debate about whether the planet is safer or more dangerous today than it was last year, and at key moments in recent history. Our founders would not be surprised to learn that the threats to the planet that the Science and Security Board now considers have expanded since 1947. In fact, the Bulletin’s first editor, Eugene Rabinowitch, noted that one of the purposes of the Bulletin was to respond and offer solutions to the “Pandora’s box of modern science,” recognizing the speed at which technological advancement was occurring, and the demanding questions it would present.

In 1947 there was one technology with the potential to destroy the planet, and that was nuclear power. Today, rising temperatures, resulting from the industrial-scale burning of fossil fuels, will change life on Earth as we know it, potentially destroying or displacing it from significant portions of the world, unless action is taken today, and in the immediate future. Future technological innovation in biology, artificial intelligence, and the cyber realm may pose similar global challenges. The knotty problems that innovations in these fields may present are not yet fully realized, but the Bulletin’s Science and Security Board tends to them with a watchful eye.

This year’s Clock deliberations felt more urgent than usual. On the big topics that concern the board, world leaders made too little progress in the face of continuing turbulence. In addition to the existential threats posed by nuclear weapons and climate change, new global realities emerged, as trusted sources of information came under attack, fake news was on the rise, and words were used in cavalier and often reckless ways. As if to prove that words matter and fake news is dangerous, Pakistan’s foreign minister issued a blustery statement, a tweet actually, flexing Pakistan’s nuclear muscle—in response to a fabricated “news” story about Israel. Today’s complex global environment is in need of deliberate and considered policy responses. It is ever more important that senior leaders across the globe calm rather than stoke tensions that could lead to war, either by accident or miscalculation.

I once again commend the board for approaching its task with the seriousness it deserves. Bulletin Editor-in-Chief John Mecklin did a remarkable job pulling together this document and reflecting the in-depth views and opinions of the board. Considerable thanks goes to our supporters including the Carnegie Corporation of New York, MacArthur Foundation, Ploughshares Fund, David Weinberg and Jerry Newton, as well as valued supporters across the year.

I hope the debate engendered by the 2017 setting of the Clock raises the level of conversation, promotes calls to action, and helps citizens around the world hold their leaders responsible for delivering a safer and healthier planet.

Rachel Bronson, PhD

Executive Director and Publisher

26 January, 2017

Chicago, IL

It is two and a half minutes to midnight

Editor’s note: Founded in 1945 by University of Chicago scientists who had helped develop the first atomic weapons in the Manhattan Project, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists created the Doomsday Clock two years later, using the imagery of apocalypse (midnight) and the contemporary idiom of nuclear explosion (countdown to zero) to convey threats to humanity and the planet. The decision to move (or to leave in place) the minute hand of the Doomsday Clock is made every year by the Bulletin’s Science and Security Board in consultation with its Board of Sponsors, which includes 15 Nobel laureates. The Clock has become a universally recognized indicator of the world’s vulnerability to catastrophe from nuclear weapons, climate change, and new technologies emerging in other domains. A printable PDF of this statement, complete with the executive director’s statement and Science and Security Board biographies, is available here.

To: Leaders and citizens of the world

Re: It is 30 seconds closer to midnight

Date: January 26, 2017

Over the course of 2016, the global security landscape darkened as the international community failed to come effectively to grips with humanity’s most pressing existential threats, nuclear weapons and climate change.

The United States and Russia—which together possess more than 90 percent of the world’s nuclear weapons—remained at odds in a variety of theaters, from Syria to Ukraine to the borders of NATO; both countries continued wide-ranging modernizations of their nuclear forces, and serious arms control negotiations were nowhere to be seen. North Korea conducted its fourth and fifth underground nuclear tests and gave every indication it would continue to develop nuclear weapons delivery capabilities. Threats of nuclear warfare hung in the background as Pakistan and India faced each other warily across the Line of Control in Kashmir after militants attacked two Indian army bases.

The climate change outlook was somewhat less dismal—but only somewhat. In the wake of the landmark Paris climate accord, the nations of the world have taken some actions to combat climate change, and global carbon dioxide emissions were essentially flat in 2016, compared to the previous year. Still, they have not yet started to decrease; the world continues to warm. Keeping future temperatures at less-than-catastrophic levels requires reductions in greenhouse gas emissions far beyond those agreed to in Paris—yet little appetite for additional cuts was in evidence at the November climate conference in Marrakech.

This already-threatening world situation was the backdrop for a rise in strident nationalism worldwide in 2016, including in a US presidential campaign during which the eventual victor, Donald Trump, made disturbing comments about the use and proliferation of nuclear weapons and expressed disbelief in the overwhelming scientific consensus on climate change.

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists Science and Security Board takes a broad and international view of existential threats to humanity, focusing on long-term trends. Because of that perspective, the statements of a single person—particularly one not yet in office—have not historically influenced the board’s decision on the setting of the Doomsday Clock.

But wavering public confidence in the democratic institutions required to deal with major world threats do affect the board’s decisions. And this year, events surrounding the US presidential campaign—including cyber offensives and deception campaigns apparently directed by the Russian government and aimed at disrupting the US election—have brought American democracy and Russian intentions into question and thereby made the world more dangerous than was the case a year ago.

For these reasons, the Science and Security Board of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists has decided to move the minute hand of the Doomsday Clock 30 seconds closer to catastrophe. It is now two minutes and 30 seconds to midnight.

The board’s decision to move the clock less than a full minute—something it has never before done—reflects a simple reality: As this statement is issued, Donald Trump has been the US president only a matter of days. Many of his cabinet nominations are not yet confirmed by the Senate or installed in government, and he has had little time to take official action.

Just the same, words matter, and President Trump has had plenty to say over the last year. Both his statements and his actions as president-elect have broken with historical precedent in unsettling ways. He has made ill-considered comments about expanding the US nuclear arsenal. He has shown a troubling propensity to discount or outright reject expert advice related to international security, including the conclusions of intelligence experts. And his nominees to head the Energy Department and the Environmental Protection Agency dispute the basics of climate science.

In short, even though he has just now taken office, the president’s intemperate statements, lack of openness to expert advice, and questionable cabinet nominations have already made a bad international security situation worse.

Last year, and the year before, we warned that world leaders were failing to act with the speed and on the scale required to protect citizens from the extreme danger posed by climate change and nuclear war. During the past year, the need for leadership only intensified—yet inaction and brinksmanship have continued, endangering every person, everywhere on Earth.

Who will lead humanity away from global disaster?

The full transcript can be found at http://thebulletin.org/sites/default/files/Final%202017%20Clock%20Statement.pdf.

Donald Trump apprised of the facts regarding Iran's nuclear capability in 2017

As 20 January 2017 inexorably approaches a letter to Donald Trump from thirty-seven scientists and engineers was made public:

2 January 2017

Dear President-Elect Trump;

On August 9, 2015 a group of scientists and engineers with understanding of the physics and technology of nuclear power and of nuclear weapons sent an open letter to President Obama about the Iran Deal, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). We characterized the JCPOA as “an innovative agreement, with much more stringent constraints than any previously negotiated non-proliferation framework.”

Eleven months after “implementation day” we write to provide our assessment of the current status of the JCPOA. As agreed, Iran has deactivated and put into storage under International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) seal about 2/3 of its centrifuges, and it has exported more than 95% of its stockpile of low-enriched uranium—a springboard to weapon-usable highly enriched uranium. Iran no longer produces uranium with enrichment near 20%, as it did before the interim Joint Plan of Action (JPOA), but is restricted to 3.67% enrichment. As a result of the reduced centrifuge capacity and the elimination of the large stock of partially enriched uranium, the breakout time for Iran to produce enough highly enriched uranium for a nuclear weapon has increased to many months, from just a few weeks during the time that the JPOA was under negotiation. IAEA inspectors now have the right to daily access at Iran’s enrichment plant at Natanz, and monitoring devices there make continuous on-line enrichment measurements. We are confident that no surprise breakout at this facility is possible.

The large “calandria” or reactor vessel for Iran’s heavy-water reactor has been rendered inoperable, and Iran’s stockpile of heavy water has been reduced to 130 metric tons and capped at that level. The overage of 0.1 tons recently reported by the IAEA, of no strategic significance, was remedied by export of 11 tons as verified by the IAEA. The redesign of the reactor will ensure that its plutonium production will be about 10% of that from the original design, and, when construction is complete and the reactor has begun operation, the fuel that has generated plutonium will be removed from Iran. These steps eliminate the means for Iran to produce plutonium, the alternative material for nuclear weapons.

Furthermore, Iran has agreed to an enhanced version of the procedures of the “Additional Protocol” to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which gives IAEA inspectors access to, inter alia, centrifuge manufacturing, R&D and storage sites, and uranium mines, as well as any suspect potential clandestine uranium enrichment facilities.

In sum, the JCPOA has dramatically reduced the risk that Iran could suddenly produce significant quantities of nuclear-weapon materials. This has lowered the pressure felt by Iran’s neighbors to develop their own nuclear weapons options and none has announced a new dual-use nuclear program of its own.

In the near term it will be necessary to maintain vigilance using the verification procedures in place. As we noted in our previous letter, if Iran decides to increase its enrichment capacity as allowed by the JCPOA after about ten years, enhanced verification measures would be desirable and consistent with Iran’s commitment in the JCPOA to implement certified modern verification procedures in line with internationally accepted IAEA practice. Multinational participation in what is currently a purely national program for producing power reactor fuel may also be a desirable means to enhance transparency.

The JCPOA does not take any options off the table for you or any future president. Indeed it makes it much easier for you to know if and when Iran heads for a bomb. It provides both time and legitimacy for an effective response.

Our technical judgment is that the multilateral JCPOA provides a strong bulwark against an Iranian nuclear-weapons program. We urge you to preserve this critical U.S. strategic asset.

Sincerely,

Richard L. Garwin, IBM Fellow Emeritus Robert J. Goldston, Princeton University

Siegfried S. Hecker, Stanford University

Martin Hellman, Stanford University

Rush D. Holt, American Association for the Advancement of Science R. Scott Kemp, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Frank von Hippel, Princeton University

_______________________________________________________________________

Also signed by:

John F. Ahearne, Member, National Academy of Engineering

Philip W. Anderson, Professor Emeritus, Princeton University

Lewis M. Branscomb, Professor Emeritus, University of California at San Diego

Christopher Chyba, Princeton University

Leon N. Cooper, Brown University

Pierce S. Corden, Former Director, Office of International Security Negotiations,

Bureau of Arms Control, Department of State

John M. Cornwall, Professor of Physics and Astronomy, UCLA

Philip E. Coyle, Former Associate Director for National Security and

International Affairs, White House Office of Science and Technology Policy

Sidney D. Drell, Stanford University

Freeman Dyson, Professor Emeritus, Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton

Harold A. Feiveson, Program on Science and Global Security, Princeton University

Charles D. Ferguson, Federation of American Scientists

Michael E. Fisher, Emeritus, Cornell University and the University of Maryland

Jerome I. Friedman, Nobel Prize in physics 1990

Victor Gilinsky, Former Member of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission

Howard Georgi, Mallinckrodt Professor of Physics, Harvard University

Sheldon L. Glashow, Higgins Professor of Physics Emeritus, Harvard University,

Arthur Metcalf Professor of Science and Mathematics, Boston University

Lisbeth Gronlund, Union of Concerned Scientists

David Gross, Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics, UCSB

Gregory Loew, Emeritus Stanford/SLAC Professor

Allison M Macfarlane, George Washington University

Richard A. Meserve, President Emeritus, Carnegie Institution for Science

Marvin Miller, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

C. Kumar N. Patel, Professor Emeritus, Dept of Physics and Astonomy, UCLA

John Parmentola, Former Senior VP General Atomics and Former Director for Research

And Laboratory Management U.S. Army

Malvin A. Ruderman, Columbia University

Burton Richter, Stanford University

Myriam Sarachik, City College of New York, CUNY

Roy F. Schwitters, The University of Texas at Austin

David Wright, Union of Concerned Scientists

(Affiliations for identification only)

While we were away.....

Some of the issues and comment which caught my attention while the blog was on annual holiday.

* THE NSW Environment Protection Authority (EPA) is investigating several trucks that were not sealed correctly before transporting waste that potentially contained asbestos.

The EPA has been closely monitoring the remediation of the former South Grafton Sewage Treatment Plant by Clarence Valley Council, in response to a number of concerns raised by the community.

Adam Gilligan, Regional Director North, said a recent inspection observed trucks leaving the site with incorrectly sealed loads. The same contractors currently under investigation are also under investigation for similar issues in the Tweed area.

"I want to make it clear that, to date, Clarence Valley Council have taken appropriate steps in managing the environmental aspects of the remediation project.”

"However, the improper transport of waste potentially containing asbestos is a serious issue that warranted swift action to prevent a recurrence.”

See: http://www.dailyexaminer.com.au/news/epa-investigates-super-depot-waste-transport/3126001/

* Scientists in the U.S., aided by colleagues in Canada and elsewhere, are moving quickly to preserve climate data stored on government computer servers out of concern that the Trump administration might remove or dismantle the records. A “guerrilla archiving” event will be held at the University of Toronto this weekend to catalog U.S. government climate and environmental data. Other researchers from the University of California to the University of Pennsylvania are responding to calls on Twitter and the Internet to preserve data on everything from rising seas to wildfires. The actions come as President-elect Donald Trump has appointed climate change skeptics to all his top environment and energy posts. Though there has been no mention yet of removing publicly available data, “it’s not unreasonable to think that they would want to take down the very data that they dispute,” said Michael Halpern of the Union of Concerned Scientists.

See: http://e360.yale.edu/digest/fearing_trump_scientists_rush_to_preserve_key_climate_data_sets/4862/

* In a report sent to Planning Minister Rob Stokes, just before the latest approval, the NSW National Parks Association (NPA) estimated 29-40 million litres a day of water were entering the coal mines in and around the Illawarra Special Areas, including Dendrobium. (See map below of the Wongawilli (lower mines) and Dendrobium coal mines (upper set) sprawling between the Avon and Cordeaux Reservoirs.)

According to the NPA, the mid-range estimate is equivalent to about 10 per cent of the total daily supply taken from the Avon, Cataract, Cordeaux, and Woronora reservoirs.

"It's important to note that there is currently no reliable means of knowing how much of this water would have otherwise gone into the storage reservoirs", Peter Turner, NPA mining projects officer, said.

Those estimates, though, may be conservative because they don't include inflows that are adding to water bodies accumulating within the mines, Dr Turner said. 

"There doesn't appear to be any reporting or auditing of  water pooling in either the current or the old mines within and around the Illawarra Special Areas," he said. "It's not clear whether the Dendrobium and adjacent Wongawilli mines are staying within their water licence limits." 
See: http://www.smh.com.au/environment/outrageous-coal-mine-gets-expansion-nod-despite-secret-incomplete-studies-20161222-gtgz4d.html

@LennaLeprena @Loud_Lass @NannanBay @deniseshrivell @MGliksmanMDPhD @leftocentre Merry Xmas Boys & Girls. pic.twitter.com/EKmqXP0jaW

— Freda Nurks (@fredanurks) December 24, 2016

* If there is one unforeseen advantage of Donald Trump's election to the seat of the US presidency, it is the fevered goodwill that has flowed into the coffers of progressive, anti-Trump, causes since.

Since the Republican nominee's election win on November 8, nonprofit organisations in the US - such as pro-choice charity Planned Parenthood - have seen a massive upsurge in donations. In the build-up to Christmas, the wave of generosity only strengthened as disappointed voters did their best to counter the President elect's dismaying policies around civil rights, including immigration and women's reproductive rights.

See: http://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/news-and-views/news-features/planned-parenthood-has-seen-donations-skyrocket-in-wake-of-donald-trumps-win-20161227-gtidny.html

* The Turnbull government insists most pensioners will be better off under changes in the New Year, as Newspoll analysis shows older voters are turning against the Coalition.

The analysis of 8508 voters in surveys taken for The Australian from October to December reveals a seven-percentage-point plunge in the primary vote for the Coalition among voters over 50 since the July 2 election.

Support for the government in the largest voting demographic has fallen from 49.9 per cent to 43 per cent.

Two-thirds of the lost vote has shifted to Labor and one-third to independents and minor parties.

The dip has come as the government faces criticism over an overhaul of superannuation taxes, changes to the pension assets test and aged care reforms.

See: http://www.news.com.au/national/breaking-news/newspoll-shows-govt-losing-older-voters/news-story/8ae0cacf85fc3de5136f3a284e37a0cc

* Bill McLennan, the Australian statistician from 1995 to 2000, argues that this census is “the most significant invasion of privacy ever perpetrated” by the ABS. But it is far more than that. It is an unparalleled resource — crying out to be stolen — for our adversaries to use against us in cyber and other conflicts.

Imagine if China or Russia had a copy of this information. They would know, or easily could deduce, the names, ranks and military base of every member of our armed forces, from a general to a Digger. Indeed this would be a trivial piece of big data analytics.

Similarly, they could deduce the details of every intelligence officer, every public servant, every politician, every chief executive, every union official, every doctor, nurse and teacher, and on and on.

But it would be worse than just that because this personal data provides a highly reliable framework on which to hang other data — information that is stolen from credit card companies, telcos, retailers and so forth — to build comprehensive pictures of every individual’s strengths and weaknesses.

Such knowledge gives a strategic edge to an adversary in any conflict where information warfare plays a significant role.

It turbocharges an adversary’s information warfare capacity, particularly in the not-war-not-peace cyber conflicts that are the 21st century’s version of the Cold War.

Two obvious questions arise.

Could our adversaries steal the census? The answer to this must be yes. We know it is possible for cyber intelligence agencies to infiltrate highly protected computer systems unobserved, then locate, copy and export data, again unobserved, and then leave the system, covering their tracks as they go.

We know from US congressional public hearings that Russia and China have these capabilities.

Essentially we know that no computer system is invulnerable to determined and sophisticated attackers, despite what their owners may say. And remember that we are talking about the ABS here, with its ageing computer system, demonstrably poor cybersecurity and a clearly slack, lazy, cosy relationship with its IT vendors.

The second question is this: are our adversaries stealing the census? We have to assume that they have at least considered it.

When the idea of electronically linking names and addresses to census data was first announced a few years ago, it is easy to imagine that both Russia and China would have counted their blessings — no one else does this, only us mugs in Australia.

They immediately could have begun to reconnoitre the ABS’s computer systems while preparing to inject useful pieces of sleeper software to assist in later operations.

Beijing, as it has done in many cases in other countries, also may have considered trying to suborn or persuade ethnic Chinese employees or contractors to assist in this process.

In the cat-and-mouse game of cyber espionage and counterespionage, we have to assume that our adversaries could do these things undetected.

So it’s highly plausible that Russia and China, or both, are stealthily stealing your census — and getting away with it. I’d give it better than even money because each of these powers has the motivation, capability, opportunity and, most important, intent.

See: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/opinion/census-cost-us-dearly-enemies-have-our-number/news-story/6072da324862e743e6b7cd806b82fdb6 

* Donald Trump's assault on trade is escalating. First the foes were China and Mexico. Now it is the world.

The Trump transition team has mooted an import tariff of 10 per cent across the board, doubling down on earlier talk of a 5 per cent tax. Such thinking is of a different character to Mr Trump's campaign rhetoric, which mostly hinted at trade sanctions to force concessions.

A catch-all tariff is a change of belief systems. It overthrows the free trade order that has been upheld and policed by Washington since the 1940s.

Congress cannot stop Mr Trump imposing his will by "executive action" under existing US law. The president may impose tariffs of up to 15 per cent for 150 days without having to demonstrate any damage. All he has to do is utter the words "macroeconomic imbalances", or invoke "national security", and he can do what he wants.

The thrust is becoming all too clear. Mr Trump's choice of leader of the White House National Trade Council is a virulent Sinophobe. Without wishing to caricature Peter Navarro, there is a relentless consistency to his work: The Coming China Wars, Death by China: Confronting the Dragon, and Crouching Tiger: What China's Militarism Means for the World.

See: http://www.smh.com.au/business/world-business/trumps-trade-policies-become-more-shocking-by-the-day-20161228-gtj3zd.html

23 December 2016

* A 27-year-old Sudanese refugee held on Manus Island has died following “a fall and seizure” inside the Australian-run detention centre.

It is understood the man, who had reportedly been unwell for several months, collapsed and suffered head injuries inside the detention centre on Friday. He was then evacuated to Royal Brisbane and Women’s hospital, where he died on Saturday.

The Guardian understands the man’s name was Faysal Ishak Ahmed. He was born in Khartoum in June 1989 and had been held on Manus since October 2013.

A source on Manus told Guardian Australia that Ahmed had been sick for more than six months and other detainees had alerted the organisation responsible for care on the island, International Health and Medical Services (IHMS), to his sitaution.

“Last night he collapsed in Oscar prison and injured his head seriously,” the source said. “It was not the first time that he had fainted. A few days ago the refugees wrote a complaint against IHMS about his situation.”

According to the Refugee Action Coalition, the letter was signed by more than 60 refugees on Manus last week.

They said he had suffered numerous blackouts and collapses over the past several months.

“Faysal is yet another casualty of the systematic neglect that characterises Manus Island and offshore detention,” said Ian Rintoul, spokesman for the Refugee Action Coalition.

A media statement from the Department of Immigration and Border Protection confirmed the death of the 27-year-old man from “a fall and seizure” at the detention centre.

“The department is not aware of any suspicious circumstances surrounding the death and expresses its sympathies to his family and friends,” it said. “The death will be reported to the Queensland coroner. No further comment will be made at this time.”

See: https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2016/dec/24/sudanese-refugee-dies-in-brisbane-hospital-after-medivac-from-manus

* DECEMBER 10-11: NSW Government planning minister Paul Toole knocks back a request from the Clarence Valley Council to fund work on its $13.5 million super depot in South Grafton with an internal loan. The council planned to use money from its water fund to cover a cash flow shortfall while the council sold off assets to raise money for the depot work.

DECEMBER 12: Brooms Head Caravan Park long-time visitors and residents are up in arms over proposed changes to the park. Clarence Valley Council has released a concept design report for the caravan park with an estimated $7.91m worth of changes, including improved amenities, a revised road layout, more cabins and a phasing out of traditional user camping sites.

DECEMBER 13: With the finishing line in sight for the re-vamped Harwood Slipway, owners Harwood Marine announce they have 18 jobs worth around $10 million on the books waiting to get started. Company managing director Ross Roberts says the slipway should re-open some time in January.

DECEMBER 14: A private motocross track on a property has created division among property owners and neighbours on Tallawudjah Creek Rd, near Glenreagh. It also split opinion on Clarence Valley Council, with Mayor Jim Simmons' casting vote needed to give the clearance for the track to go ahead.

DECEMBER 15: Some Ulmarra residents fear a Clarence Valley Council resolution which will almost certainly mean the village's community pool will close at the end of the swimming season, will mean children will swim in the Clarence River, where bull sharks have been caught.

DECEMBER 16: There is fury among South Grafton residents near the Grafton District Golf Club at a council decision which could allow the sub-division of two former holes on the course into 16 building lots. The residents had agreed to a development of nine one-acre lots and were angry the golf club changed this to 16. The council voted to accept 16 lots, but wants layout changes to alleviate residents' concerns.

DECEMBER 17-18: Chaos around the Clarence Valley as a car crashes into the Joy Noodle store in South Grafton, a man is arrested after allegedly threatening a family with a gun near Buccarumbi and a man is allegedly stabbed in the knee with scissors during the theft of his vehicle in Yamba.

DECEMBER 19: The Daily Examiner launches its Give Don't Grieve campaign urging people to take road safety seriously in response to the rising road toll in the State.

DECEMBER 20: Seventy-two tabs of what is believed to be LSD were seized during a weekend drug dog operation on the Lower River. It was one of three significant busts made by police, as they took the animals through a number of licensed premises, parks and public places around Yamba and Maclean.

DECEMBER 21: A single mother of three, Stevie Martin, thanks lady luck after a single pine tree in the front yard of her house in Ellandgrove between South Grafton and Coutts Crossing, saves her house from major damage.

A savage storm that ripped through the area ripped the roof off a neighbour's house and sent it hurtling toward her house until the tree blocked it.

DECEMBER 22: The international media comments on the seeming reluctance of the Australian judicial system to bring the men charged over the death of Maclean woman Lynette Daley to court.

A report in the New York Post, picked up by media across the USA, says racism in Australian society is behind it.

DECEMBER 23: Police say the body of a teenager girl discovered near Yamba is believed to be missing Grafton girl Emma Powell.

The body of the 16-year-old was found in a reserve with the family car and dog which went missing with her.

The dog, Indie, was taken into safety by rangers.

DECEMBER 24: The Mororo Rd turn off from the Pacific Highway has been turned into a death trap by the works to upgrade the highway say residents. The RMS is about to release the results of a safety audit of the contentious area.

DECEMBER 26: The NSW Environment Protection Authority is investigating several trucks that were not sealed correctly before transporting waste that potentially contained asbestos.

The authority has been closely monitoring the remediation of the former South Grafton sewage Treatment Plant by Clarence Valley Council.

DECEMBER 27: A Grafton man is pulled from the surf on Wooli Beach, but dies of cardiac arrest after trying to rescue to young family members.

DECEMBER 28: Details emerge of the death of 60-year-old Grafton man Geoffrey Blackadder, who died while trying to save two young family members on Wooli Beach on Boxing Day.

DECEMBER 29: Clarence Valley beaches are packed as holiday makers enjoy hot weather. But lifeguards warn there can be challenging conditions which swimmers need to be wary of.

DECEMBER 30: The death of a 12-year-old boy in a car crash on the Pacific Highway at Tyndale prompts a warning that more deaths will happen on the notorious blackspot before the highway upgrade is complete.

DECEMBER 31: News emerges the boy who died in the crash at Tyndale is a relation of Australian media icon Ita Buttrose.

See: The Daily Examiner, 31 December 2016, p.6

* In 2016, Bob Brown and Jessica Hoyt were arrested for peacefully protesting against logging at Lapoinya in NW Tasmania.

They were charged under Tasmania’s harsh new ‘anti-protest’ laws. With huge fines and prison sentences, these laws attack the right to peaceful protest, a cornerstone of our democracy. 

Governments across Australia are now copying these laws, to crush dissent on environmental, social, cultural and Indigenous issues.  

These laws must be stopped now to protect everyone's right to peaceful protest. 

Bob Brown has launched action in the High Court of Australia to overturn these draconian laws, so that Australians remain free to take a stand on important issues we all care about. 

Jessica Hoyt, who grew up in Lapoinya, now a neurosurgery nurse in Hobart, has joined Bob in the High Court action. 

This case is a huge undertaking, with an enormous financial cost. 

But we cannot allow these laws to take hold, strangling our democratic rights.  

Stand with Bob and Jessica, and make a pledge today to strike down these undemocratic laws, once and for all.  

With potential legal costs of $250,000 or more, we are aiming to crowd fund at least $100,000 towards the legal costs that Bob Brown and Jessica Hoyt could face.

See: https://pozible.com/project/stand-with-bob-brown

* A north coast environment group has lashed the Environment Protection Authority, which has issued NSW Forestry Corporation with not one cent in fines despite proof the corporation flouted its compliance obligations while felling trees at Cherry Tree State Forest, near Casino.

North East Forest Alliance (NEFA) co-ordinator and audit-author Dailan Pugh said that the EPA have identified 66 instances of non-compliance with logging laws, ‘though this belies the fact that a single ‘non-compliance’ can represent hundreds of actual breaches.’

‘From the EPA’s figures, some 325 ancient hollow-bearing trees were illegally logged, though the EPA only count this as one act of non-compliance,’ Mr Pugh said.

‘While this is the most comprehensive investigation of our complaints that the EPA have yet undertaken, they still failed to investigate numerous complaints, For example we identified that 26 vulnerable Onion Cedars had an illegal road constructed within their buffers, but the EPA only checked eight of them. Similarly of the 11 poorly drained and eroding tracks we reported the EPA only checked nine.

‘There were also numerous offences relating to koalas, yellow-bellied gliders and black-striped wallabies that the EPA confirmed but claim they couldn’t legally prove.

‘We have been finding similar breaches in all the audits we have been undertaking, year after year after year.

‘Yet the EPA’s only response is to issue 47 more “official cautions” and require yet more ‘action plans’. These pathetic responses have been proven to be useless. The Forestry Corporation continue to deny they do anything wrong and continue to go on illegally logging.

‘The EPA are still yet to complete their investigations into eight cases of illegal roading and logging of the Endangered Ecological Community Lowland Rainforest, and hundreds of cases of the Forestry Corporation recklessly damaging retained hollow-bearing trees.

‘They say that these serious offences are subject to an ongoing investigation. We can only hope that next time the punishment will match the crime’ Mr Pugh said.

See: http://www.echo.net.au/2016/12/epas-official-cautions-confirm-pathetic-status-nefa/

* Debit cards have been returned to dozens of Aboriginal people in outback South Australia, after a local store owner drained almost $1 million from their bank accounts.
It follows a landmark Federal Court ruling last month, which found the trader guilty of unconscionable conduct.
Community groups hope it sends a message to others taking advantage of customers in remote areas.

See: http://www.abc.net.au/am/content/2016/s4596675.htm