"LNG = clean energy" Greenhouse Gas Untruth makes the Australian Apartheid Labor Party Unfit to Govern

The extreme right wing, pro-war, pro-coal, human rights-abusing, spin-driven Australian Labor Government has repeatedly declared that it is instituting an “education revolution”.

However a key element of the teaching and learning process called “education” is correct information (I must note here that this is my 5th decade of teaching science students at a leading Australian university and that, unlike most of my colleagues, I have a postgraduate qualification in teaching in Higher Education, in addition to my first degree and PhD).

And, of course, it is unthinkable that a teacher or indeed anyone else connected with education would deliberately and knowingly misinform students.

However the Australian Labor Government is indeed misinforming Australia, including children and students, about all kinds of matters in a process of spin-driven untruth through ignorance, commission or omission.

Numerous examples of untruths being foisted on the Australian public and indeed the World by the Australian Government can be offered but a simple, unambiguous case is as follows.

The pro-fossil fuel Australian Government Ministers have repeatedly declared the untruth that burning ‘liquid natural gas” (mostly methane, CH4, and related hydrocarbons) is “clean energy”, as compared to burning “coal” (i.e. carbon, C, plus contaminants), which is “dirty” in terms of greenhouse gas (GHG) CO2 pollution. The following selection of quotations amply establishes the case.

1. Australian Trade Minister Simon Crean on 29 February 2008 re Woodside-CPC Corporation Taiwan LNG Deal: “The LNG Supply Agreement has the potential to bring revenues in the order of $35 billion to $45 billion into Australia, equal to the largest-ever single trade deal in Australia’s history. The future for Australia’s energy sector is an exciting one. We have a reputation as a secure and reliable supplier of clean energy on competitive, market terms. Demand for LNG imports from the major markets of North Asia is expected to increase from over 90 million tonnes in 2006 to 140 million tonnes by 2020.” [1]

2. Australian Resources and Energy Minister Martin Ferguson (being interviewed re the A$50 billion (US$41 billion) LNG export deal with China and a $25 billion LNG export deal with India ): "LNG is part of a movement to low emissions fuel economy because it is clean energy… But it’s also important to India and China that we also go forward on the climate change challenge" [2].

3. Australian Trade Minister Simon Crean (being interviewed re the A$50 billion (US$41 billion) LNG deal with China and a $25 billion LNG export deal with India ): “But it is the great deal from China in terms of a clean-energy source... We’re not just selling the gas, we’re also selling the [carbon capture and storage] technology.” [2].

4. Australian Trade Minister Simon Crean (being interviewed re the A$50 billion (US$41 billion) LNG deal with China ): “ Well, time will tell in terms of what impact on the GDP. I think that what we’ve got to look at is the revenue stream - $40 billion over the next 20 years. But there are other aspects of this too, Kellie, which I think are really important. Clearly Australia is now being seen as a global player by China , for gas, clean fuel. This development is also the largest single CO2 storage, so carbon sequestration. It’s not just export of the gas, it’s export of the technology, and obviously if China wants long-term supply from Australia, it’s going to have enormous knock-on ramifications for other countries in the region that also have to secure their energy resource going forward….Australia also has gas reserves on the east coast, methane gas. So Australia positioning itself as a global supplier of clean energy to the world, I think is not just important in terms of this specific initiative, but going forward the opportunities that can be made from it.” [3].

5. The Renewable Energy Target (RET) Bill passed by the Australian Parliament (August 2009) sets a target of “20% renewable by 2020” and measures this by allotting 1 Renewable Energy Certificate (REC) per 1 MWh (megawatt hour = million watt hour) of renewable electricity generated and put into the grid. However what can be regarded as renewable energy (clean energy) under the legislation includes a number of clearly non-renewable components, most notoriously “Phantom renewable energy” or “fake accountant’s renewable energy” (whereby 5 RECs are issued for every 1 MWh of solar or wind electricity put into the power grid) and natural gas (methane) e.g. Coal (C ) -, oil ( (CH2)n) - or gas (CH4) -based electricity for electric hot water (clearly non-renewable energy), gas (CH4) -based or other carbon (C)-based electricity for solar hot water (clearly non-renewable energy), methane gas (CH4) from coal seams (clearly non-renewable energy), and methane gas (CH4) from land-fill (clearly non-renewable energy). [4].

6. Australian Minister of Trade Simon Crean, in an interview with Linda Mottram of Radio Australia about an offer of US$ 500 million loan to support a LNG (Liquid Natural Gas) project in Papua New Guinea, stated: “We hope that the revenues that come from this will mean going into the future, they won’t require the same dependence on aid from Australia to keep going. It’s also important that Australia encourages cleaner energy sources. LNG energy is one of those clean energy sources. Australia is a huge participant in that area. It’s in our interests to develop the region as a reliable energy supplier to the world.” [5].

7. Hailing Gorgon’s 41 billion US supply contract with PetroChina, the largest trade deal in Australian history, Resources Minister Martin Ferguson said: "This unprecedented export deal confirms Australia’s importance as a global energy superpower supplying vital clean energy resources and technologies to China and our other Asia-Pacific trading partners." [7].

8. Australian PM Kevin Rudd quoted by iStock analyst, 10 September 2009: “The Australian subsidiary of energy giant Chevron Corp. has secured two deals to export up to A$70 billion (US$60 billion) worth of liquid natural gas to Japan for the next 25 years, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd told Parliament on Thursday…Rudd lauded the deals, saying they will "generate economic growth, jobs and prosperity for (Australia) for decades to come" He added Japan has been a "foundation investor" in Australia’s LNG industry since its inception 25 years ago. "Throughout the Asia Pacific, Australian LNG will be increasingly important as a reliable, secure, clean energy source to power continued economic growth," Rudd said.” [8].

9. Climate Change Minister Penny Wong, transcript of doorstop interview, Canberra CSIRO Black Mountain, 2009:
“JOURNALIST: Minister, how can you justify including the methane coal gas in the RET [Renewable Energy Target] ?
WONG: Well look, this is a measure which is recognising that methane is a gas that contributes to climate change, recognising that there are firms who were early movers under the Greenhouse Gas Abatement Scheme in New South Wales. We have moved to include it, recognising it’s not a renewable energy source but there are environmental benefits to including it for a specified period and for existing projects to assist, to continue to protect employment in those areas. We have said this will be above the 20 per cent target so we are not going to be eating into the amount of renewable energy investment in Australia.
JOURNALIST: Couldn’t you have created a separate mechanism to deal with it though? Why did it have to be included in the RET legislation?
WONG: Well, people always want another set of regulations and another set of mechanisms. We think this is the simplest, cleanest way to deal with an issue [i.e. classifying an admittedly non-renewable energy source and major greenhouse gas source as a renewable energy source] , there is environmental benefit and we preserved the integrity of our renewable energy investment by ensuring that this is above the 20 per cent target so I think a good result all round.” [9].

10. Federal Environment Minister Peter Garrett in giving the go-ahead to the multibillion-dollar Gorgon LNG project on Barrow Island, which is situated off the north-west coast of Australia: “ I don’t believe that there will be unacceptable impacts”. [10].

According to the Sydney Morning Herald, “The overall Barrow Basin gas project is estimated to be worth $300 billion in total gas sales, with $200 billion in already existing commitments. This month, ExxonMobil agreed to sell Chinese state-owned company PetroChina 2.25 million tonnes of liquefied natural gas from Gorgon - worth an estimated $50 billion over 20 years - the biggest resources deal in Australia’s history. The Gorgon gas plant on Barrow Island was first approved under the Howard government in 2007, but was returned for further environmental assessment in 2008 when Chevron decided to expand the project.” [10]

Accordingly one can calculate that 2.25 million tonnes LNG /$50 billion) x $300 billion total sales = 13.5 million tonnes LNG = 13.5 tonnes CH4 x 2.8 tonnes CO2/tonne CH4 = 37.8 million tonnes CO2 (for context, Australia’s huge and disproportionate “annual LNG and coal exports” adduced from projection from US Energy Information Administration data, was 502.7 million tonnes CO2 in 2008 – yet the Minister Garrett says of just this one particular major carbon-polluting project in Australia, one of the World’s worst annual per capita GHG polluters:. “ I don’t believe that there will be unacceptable impacts.” [11].

However high school chemistry tells us otherwise: LNG (mostly methane, CH4) is NOT "clean energy” – indeed on a weight basis it is twice (2 times) as dirty as brown coal in generating CO2 on combustion.

Complete combustion of both LNG (CH4) and coal (C) yields carbon dioxide (CO2) thus:
CH4 + 2 O2 -> CO2 + 2 H2O and C + O2 -> CO2.

Now the atomic weight of carbon (C) is 12, and the molecular weights of methane (CH4) and carbon dioxide (CO2) are 16 and 44, respectively (the atomic weights of C, O and H being about 12, 16 and 1, respectively).

Accordingly, burning 16 tonnes of CH4 yields 44 tonnes CO2 (i.e. burning 1 tonne of LNG yields 2.8 tonnes CO2) and burning 12 tonnes of C yields 44 tonnes of CO2 (i.e. burning 1 tonne of coal – assuming it to be 100% carbon – yields 3.7 tonnes of CO2).

Now the Labor politicians and their apologists might then cry that by “clean” they actually mean “cleaner” – but this represents in turn an utterly unacceptable perversion of semantics and the English language (it is rather like saying that Adolph Hitler was “nice”, rather than “nicer” than otherwise thought, because he supposedly liked dogs).

However burning LNG can be simply shown to be not even “cleaner” than burning brown coal. Thus brown coal (that is burned to produce most of the electricity in Victoria, Australia) has a water (H2O) content of about 65% and thus burning 1 tonne of brown coal would yield 0.35 x 3.7 = 1.3 tonnes of CO2, or about 46% of that produced by burning 1 tonne of LNG (2.8 tonnes of CO2).

I have informed members of Australian Labor Government but they have not responded to my urgent complaints and a quick check of the Internet reveals that they are still purveying the gross untruth that “LNG is clean energy”.

Rational risk management (that, for example, has made aviation exceptionally safe), successively involves (a) reportage of accurate data, (b) scientific analysis (science involving the critical testing of potentially falsifiable hypotheses) and (c) systemic change to minimize risk, including improving the risk management system itself.

Unfortunately and all too commonly, rational risk management is perverted by substitution of (a) lying, untruth, obfuscation, intimidation and censorship, (b) anti-science spin involving the selective use of asserted facts to support a partisan position), and (c) “business as usual” (BAU) retention of the flawed established system coupled with “blame and shame” that counterproductively and indeed dangerously inhibits requisite reportage.

Numerous examples can be given of the greed- and spin-driven perversion of rational risk management by the utterly incompetent Australian Labor Government.

However this simple case of the blatant untruth of “LNG as clean energy” has proven so far to be quite resistant to sensible, informed complaint.

The spin-driven Australian Labor Government has indeed embarked on an “education revolution” – it is effectively asserting in this and many other matters that “truth” equates to “politically convenient perception”.

Thus the Australian Labor Government’s repeated mantra that “we are tackling climate change” is an outrageous falsehood, as is the very name “Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme” because it can be shown from US Energy Information Agency data that the clearly stated Australian Labor Government ETS policies will actually increase Australia’s Domestic plus Exported greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution by 19-31% on the 2000 value by 2020 and by about 73% on the 2000 value by 2050. [11].

We live in a dangerous world and to minimize risk we must apply well-established rational risk management protocols, with accurate reportage being a crucial element. Notwithstanding its endless politically correct rhetoric about the seriousness of climate change, in practice the Australian Labor Government continues to effectively ignore the Elephant in the Room that is the worsening Climate Emergency.

In the worsening Climate Crisis and Climate Emergency untruth, whether by commission or omission, is utterly unacceptable.

Just as we get the advice of top medical specialists in the face of life-threatening disease, so we should seriously consider the advice of top climate scientists and climate economists in the face of the worsening climate emergency.

Joseph Stiglitz (2001 Economics Nobel Laureate) has slammed the Carbon Trading ETS approach (as exampled by the CPRS of the Australian Labor Government) as empirically unsuccessful and advocates revenue neutral Carbon Taxes and also Carbon Tariffs to speed effective action on man-made global warming. [12].

Professor Stiglitz: “The “minimally” fair allocation to the developing countries requires equal emission rights per capita…Perhaps it is time to try another approach: a commitment by each country to raise the price of emissions (whether through a carbon tax or emissions caps) to an agreed level, say, $80 per ton. Countries could use the revenues as an alternative to other taxes - it makes much more sense to tax bad things than good things.” [11].

In relation to key, expert-advocated climate change policies of (1) No ETS; (2) Direct Action on renewables and like measures ASAP; and (3) Carbon Taxes (Carbon Cost Recovery), the Australian Greens score 3/3; the Australian Conservative Coalition scores 2/3; and the anti-science, pro-coal Labor Government scores 0/3.

Continuing, blatant, Orwellian untruth by the Australian Labor Government make it unfit to govern. Indeed rational risk management analysis strongly suggests to this long-time supporter of the Australian Labor Party that we should all “Put Labor Last” in the 2010 elections for the sake of our children, grandchildren and the Planet.

The Australian Labor Government has also betrayed decent Australian Labor voters over war and racism. The Australian Labor Party was traditionally opposed to US Asian wars but now supports them; it was opposed to environmental devastation, but now supports it; and was opposed to racism but now supports racism towards the Indigenous people people of Australia, Occupied Palestine, Occupied Iraq and Occupied Afghanistan.

On 8 January 2010 I sent a detailed Formal Complaint to the International Criminal Court (ICC) over various US Alliance involvements in ongoing genocidal atrocities against Palestinians, Iraqis, Afghans, Muslims, and Australian Aboriginals, and against the Developing World in general through the worsening Biofuel Genocide and Climate Genocide. [13].

The Australian Labor Party has offensively supported the continuing race-based exclusion of Australian Northern Territory Indigenous Australians from the protection of the 1975 Racial Discrimination Act and accordingly deserves to be re-named throughout the World as the Apartheid Labor Party ruling an Apartheid Australia.

This is an election year in Apartheid Australia and we have a preferential voting system. You cannot vote simply for your #1 choice - you must indicate all your preferences from top to bottom.

Accordingly, a compelling moral position for decent anti-racist, pro-Humanity, pro-Biosphere Australians is summarized by the acronym APPALL: Australian People Put Apartheid Labor Last.

[1]. Simon Crean “Government welcomes Woodside-CPC Corporation Taiwan LNG Deal”. Minister Simon Crean’s official website: http://www.trademinister.gov.au/rel... ).

[2]. Simon Crean & Martin Ferguson quoted by SBS World News, “Energy top of agenda after landmark deal“, 19 August 2009: http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/... .

[3]. Simon Crean, Transcript, “Interview with Kellie Connolly, National Nine News; subject: $50 billion gas deal with China ”, Minister Simon Crean website, 18 August 2009: http://www.trademinister.gov.au/tra... .

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

[5]. Simon Crean, “Interview - Linda Mottram of Radio Australia”, Minister Simon Crean website, 9 December 2009: http://www.trademinister.gov.au/tra... .

[6]. Gideon Polya, “Post-Copenhagen Australia will increase its per capita Domestic plus Exported GHG pollution”, Yarra Valley Climate Action Group: http://sites.google.com/site/yarrav... ).

[7]. Martin Ferguson, quoted by Neil Sands, “LNG boom to make Australia :Middle East” of gas”, The Age, 30 August 2009: http://news.theage.com.au/breaking-... .

[8]. Kevin Rudd quoted by iStockAnalyst, “Chevron Australia signs A$70 Bil. LNG export deal with Japan”, 10 September 2009: http://www.istockanalyst.com/articl... .

[9]. Penny Wong, interviewed by Get Farming, Transcript of interview, 2009: http://www.getfarming.com.au/pages/... .

[10]. Peter Garrett interview, Tom Arrup, “Garrett announces environmental approval for $50b Gordon project”, Sydney Morning Herald, 26 August 2009: http://www.smh.com.au/environment/g... .

[11]. Gideon Polya, “Post-Copenhagen Australia will INCREASE its per capita Domestic plus Exported GHG pollution”, Yarra Valley Climate Action Group: http://sites.google.com/site/yarrav... .

[12]. Joseph Stiglitz, “Joseph E. Stiglitz: Overcoming the Copenhagen failure”, The Cap Times, 7 January 2010: http://host.madison.com/ct/news/opi... .

[13]. Gideon Polya, “Complaint to ICC re US Alliance Palestinian, Iraqi, Afghan, Muslim, Aboriginal, Biofuel
And Climate Genocides”, Countercurrents, 9 January 2010: http://www.countercurrents.org/poly... ).