Great Barrier Reef undergoing mass bleaching event

Hoagy is back! Professor Hoegh-Guldberg is once again being an alarmist. He went silent for a few years when his own research showed the reef to be very resilient against damage. But he seems to like attention

Less excitable people below, however, give a more positive and much less alarming picture

The Great Barrier Reef has been hit by its fifth mass coral bleaching event in the past eight years. That event has led experts to ask whether Australia's environmental icon has reached a tipping point.

One of the world's leading coral authorities, Ove Hoegh-Guldberg from the University of Queensland, is worried it has.

"I know that's shocking … but that's the type of system we're working with at the moment," Professor Hoegh-Guldberg told 730.

The chief scientist for the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority (GBRMPA), Roger Beeden, believes such a call is premature.

"Right now, what we've got is a system is that is actually bouncing back from particular events," he said

But he does concede the repeated mass bleachings are taking a toll. "There is no doubt that these events are a clear alarm signal that we all need to be acting on climate change," he said.

The GBRMPA declared a mass bleaching event was underway in Australia last week but how it effects the reef remains to be seen.

"We won't know how significant that is until it plays out, and that's going to play out probably over the next six to eight weeks," Dr Beeden said.

The worst affected areas appear to be in the southern region of the reef.

And when 7.30 showed Professor Hoegh-Guldberg video and images taken recently by the media company, the Undertow, he was alarmed. "I think it's devastating," he said.

"This is an advanced bleaching event and I think a lot of coral is going to die.

"Not only are the branching corals bleaching, which are the sensitive ones, but the bommies, really large long-lived corals are also bleaching severely.

"And these bommies have been around for 200 years, so the fact that they're dying under these conditions should set off the alarm."

Not all bleached coral dies – some of the severely bleached coral from a 2016 event in the north of the reef has survived.

"For those areas that were affected by coral bleaching you can see some recovery in some places. Other places there's no recovery and you can see that full spectrum of things," Professor Hoegh-Guldberg said.

He says that while it's vital to ensure reefs remain resilient through programs such as improving water quality, repeated bleaching events make recovery harder each time.

"What we do know is that if you increase the events that damage coral and you don't give them enough time to recover, you end up losing coral," he said.

"We've seen bleaching come and go, and what we're seeing here in this 12 to 18 months is that we will see the tipping point exceeded and the system crash."

"As to what that means exactly in terms of species and how that will play out, the ebbs and flows, we don't fully know," Dr Beeden said.

"It's certainly clear from the global science that we're putting pressure on reefs."

But the GBRMPA chief scientist also says the Great Barrier Reef has shown remarkable resilience.

"Given enough time, and a lack of other pressures, coral reefs in the Great Barrier Reef are still able to bounce back from these kind of events."

A 2022 survey by the Australian Institute for Maritime Science showed coral cover across the Great Barrier Reef was at its highest level since it began records 37 years earlier.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-03-14/great-barrier-reef-mass-bleaching-coral-devastated/103588726

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"Four Pillars of Civilization" Under Attack

Recently, Tucker Carlson did a video about the elite “anti-human death-cult” that’s using “climate change” to reverse the industrial revolution. Returning us to an age where abject poverty — even famine — was a daily reality, while freedom was a distant memory.

During the 15 minute interview, Michael Shellenberger said something that bears comment, that “The pillars of civilization are cheap energy, meritocracy, Law and Order, and free speech. And all four of those pillars are currently under attack.”

This strikes me as a solid list of some of the most important load-bearing walls of civilization that are currently under coordinated attack by the left. And if these pillars go the world we know will be gone.

So how exactly are these pillars holding us up?

The list breaks into two hunks: pillars that maintain prosperity — cheap energy, meritocracy. And pillars that are more fundamental, holding up both prosperity and freedom.

Of course, the two are related; historically, prosperous people demand and mobilize for freedom. Starving people do not.

Cheap Energy

Starting with the prosperity, cheap energy literally transformed mankind. The burning of coal in the 18th century enabled the industrial revolution. Which transformed the world from millennia of survival-level stagnation to a world where every generation has a hard time imagining what life was like for their parents, let alone their grandparents.

Indeed, if you teleported a Roman peasant into 16th century Italy, life would be familiar. The legal system, the property rights regime, how people spent their days. School, career, retirement would all be familiar.

In both eras, almost everybody lived on a farm. Some were artisans, a rare few became intellectuals, artists, or philosophers.

There were minor inventions here and there — better plows, new methods of drying fish. But progress was counted in decades — even centuries.

Now teleport that same 16th century Italian peasant to today and it’s almost unimaginable. According to a YouGov poll, the most popular careers in America right now are Youtuber, musician, artist, actress, and professional gamer.

Meritocracy

Meritocracy is an even more fundamental requirement than cheap energy. Because if we aren’t choosing by quality then institutions fail, and our modern prosperity is built on complex organizations. There are companies alone that employ millions, to say nothing of interconnected institutions like legal communities or the academia-science nexus.

These complex organizations enable complex machines. For example, a single Boeing 747 contains 6 million individual parts which all must function in perfect harmony. Those 6 million parts are produced by tens of millions of people in hundreds of thousands of companies all over the world.

All of this, too, must function in perfect harmony for the individual parts to work.

Now multiply that times everything we use — the refrigerated supply chains that keep food from spoiling on the way from the farm, the electricity or water systems that keep cholera out of the water supply. All of this must work perfectly, millions of parts and tens of millions of people.

Law and Order

Aside from the injustice of innocent men condemned and criminals running free to victimize the innocent, from an economic perspective losing law and order crushes prosperity even more thoroughly than losing meritocracy.

This is for two reasons: the obvious risk of government tyranny, and how a perverted or non-functional legal system crushes incentives to build and create.

After all, if a man doesn’t know what behavior will be punished, or whether his property and even freedom is secure, he won’t invest in the future. Why spend decades building if it can be snatched away. If losing meritocracy guts institutions, losing law and order prevents them existing at all.

We know this today because history is full of failed or corrupted legal systems. Indeed, there are failed countries even today, such as parts of Somalia or Congo. All live on the edge of starvation. Men live for today, grab what they can, devil take the hindmost.

Free Speech

Finally, the most important: Free Speech.

Economically, free speech serves two essential functions: diagnosis and repair. Together, it’s a form of insurance against policies that would collapse the rest of it.

After all, if we can’t communicate, we either can’t see problems coming, or we might blame the wrong thing. We might see there’s not enough food, but we don’t know why. The government might tell us its global warming, or greedy business, or the ever-popular saboteurs.

We become the frog in the boiling pot who’s fast asleep.

Worse, without free speech we have no way to organize and fix it. Historically, elites are small and their victims are many, but elites typically hold an organizational advantage — standing armies, back-room cabals. Without free speech the many cannot organize against a predatory few.

We become the frog who’s paralyzed.

What’s Coming Next

In the grand scheme of history, we’ve only just begun to unravel our civilization. I’d date the start to the Progressive era a century ago, when totalitarian socialism gained the upper hand by making a devil’s bargain with liberal democracy: give us control and we will let you sit on the throne.

Over that century, the totalitarians have advanced in fits and starts, each time pushed back as free speech rallied the victims. So it was after World War I, after the Depression, and in the 1960’s reaction against government authority. Each time the totalitarians broke it, and the masses rejected them.

I think we’re entering another major offensive from the totalitarians, which I’d date to 2016 when Brexit and Donald Trump convinced the totalitarians they’re losing. They reacted as they always do, by over-reaching for control. And, like past offenses, they are going for the pillars. The load-bearing walls holding up civilization.

These next couple years will be critical: Will they consolidate their gains and enter a new era of totalitarianism, perhaps as bad as 1300’s absolutism in Europe. Or, once again, will free speech allow us to diagnose and correct the threats in time. This time fortified by the internet — by the very fact you can still read this article.

https://cornwallalliance.org/2024/02/four-pillars-of-civilization-under-attack/

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U.S. Seeks to Boost Nuclear Power After Decades of InertiaAustralia: Battery Storage Plans Fan Community Bushfire Fears

A northeast Victorian community is fighting plans to build battery storage in an area of extreme bushfire risk, as the state government closes one avenue of appeal.

Mint Renewables and Trina Solar plan to build two battery energy storage systems (BESS) near the Dederang terminal station in the Kiewa Valley.

“It’s just ridiculous,” Dederang’s Sharon McEvoy, who owns farmland next to the proposed sites, told AAP.

“It’s north-facing, and backs right up next to the bush ... surrounded by bushfire management overlays.”

Ms. McEvoy led a community meeting, as more than 200 frustrated residents of Dederang and nearby communities filled the recreation reserve hall and spilled out onto the deck and foyer.

“We know the fire risk,” she told the crowd on March 14.

Battery fires can burn for several days and release toxic and flammable gasses, as seen in 2021’s four-day fire at the Tesla Big Battery site near Geelong, west of Melbourne.

“We care about the environment, the waterways, and the land where we live and work,” said Ms. McEvoy, while fighting back tears.

“The government is sacrificing the wellbeing of rural communities.”

The meeting came hours after the Victorian government announced plans to fast track new renewables projects, including stripping the ability of third parties to appeal planning decisions in the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (VCAT).

“Once the reforms come into effect, new permit applications for batteries can be considered under this new accelerated pathway,” a spokeswoman for the department transport and planning told AAP.

“Our accelerated pathway for renewables projects will help deliver cheaper and cleaner energy to Victorian households sooner.”

The department has not yet received permit applications for either of the Dederang battery storage projects, and applications made from April 1 can be considered for fast tracking.

The state government maintained community voices would continue to be protected, despite the curtailing of VCAT access.

“Third party objections will still have a place in the approvals process, but this change prevents time-consuming and repeated delays that hold these projects back for years,” the Victorian government said on March 14.

Nationals senator Bridget McKenzie said the issue went far beyond a state planning issue.

“What is happening to your community is happening right across the country,” Senator McKenzie told the crowd.

“We’re all on the journey to net zero, but we need to share the burden.”

Both Chinese-owned Trina Solar and Mint, owned by Infratil and the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation, opted not to attend the meeting.

“We are updating our design and developing mitigation measures to ensure the project is well-informed by local knowledge,” Mint said in a statement.

“We will continue to be open and responsive to questions and constructive feedback.”

Ovens Valley state MP Tim McCurdy said residents should direct their concerns to Victoria’s minister for planning, Sonya Kilkenny.

“We’re not anti-renewables, we just want communication,” Mr. McCurdy told the crowd.

“We want to know what’s going on.”

https://www.theepochtimes.com/world/battery-storage-plans-fan-community-bushfire-fears-5607927

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My other blogs. Main ones below

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM )

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs

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