I presume you have been informed but Leonie contacted channel 7 and they did a story on this. But according to Leonie they are no longer continuing the sponsorship and the campaign is misleading the public who are specifically attending the petrol station, thinking they are paying more for petrol, but thinking its ok as it is going towards a worthwhile thing. Has this changed? I understand Brett no longer manages the premise and this is why the sponsorship ceased.

Someone famously said insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results every time. Trying to continue business-as-usual with uranium is pure insanity.

The car is soon to be dead, except for the very wealthy and powerful. Get over it.

And the nuke option does not reduce GH gas production. The proponents of nuclear power never mention the amount of finite fossil fuel (the stuff we are running out of) that is needed during the mining and processing of uranium, the construction and maintenance of nuclear facilities and the return of these facilities to benign conditions post their useful economic energy generation period. In fact, no nuclear electrical power generating facility has ever been successfully shut down having it’s waste being rendered as “safe” for the thousands of years that it remains toxic to humans and other species. “Successful shutdown” is just too expensive, both fiscally and energetically. Our kids will have to deal with this massive problem that we keep putting off.

The nuke option does not reduce GH gas production. And uranium, similar to the fossil fuels, is finite.

And I doubt whether the remote mining machinery that is necessary for the extraction of uranium will continue to be available for too much longer. Already, the massive tyres on the mining dump trucks are becoming very scarce/expensive. Rio Tinto in Oz will not buy new machines unless the suppler guarantees tyres. Currently the waiting time for delivery is about a year for some dump trucks.

Whether we like it or not, whether we plan for it or not, we will all have to face a massive drop in lifestyle as we run out of finite fossil fuel (coal, oil and gas). Perhaps this won’t be so bad. Cuba faced their own “Peak Oil” at the beginning of the 1990s and they made it despite the additional problem of the trade embargo that was imposed by the USA many years beforehand. They lost about 50% of their oil imports most of which used to come from the USSR before it collapsed and about 80% of their food imports. Cubans lost an average of about 10kg in weight during this difficult period. Maybe this would be a positive for we Aussie fatties.

Despite these difficulties the Cubans still have a higher literacy rate and superior health care than their northern neighbour the USA. They export educators to the rest of the world and their food producers are the highest paid members of their communities. Public transport or low energy transport (bicycles) are a grudgingly accepted way of life.

We could learn from the Cubans if only our leaders would accept that we have a problem and attempt to address it.

Ha! Doubt it. There are no votes in promoting altruism.

Many excellent supply alternatives are available within the draft SEQ water strategy framework. However, the major flaw is it assumes that the proposed Traveston Crossing Dam and Wyaralong Dam are approved and no alternative strategies are given for when approvals are not granted. This is a huge oversight and does not give the people of SEQ an opportunity to comment fully on all possible strategies.

There are other alternative strategies to inter basin water transfer and damming the Mary River that are more cost effective, more reliable and more sustainable. In the draft, there also is no inclusion of maintenance or decommissioning considerations of pipes and dams, or what water will cost the consumer.

Inter-basin transfer of water should be an option of last resort, only to be considered after all less risk-prone options have been fully implemented. This is in keeping with current international understanding of ecologically sustainable water development referred to the 2007 International Declaration on Environmental Flows (“the Brisbane Declaration”) and the WWF 2007 paper on Inter Basin transfers.

So the water supply debate is heating up and so are the Climate Change concerns. In what is shaping up to be the biggest event yet in the campaign to Save the Mary River, the GetUp Climate Torch will travel the length of the river from the source to Hervey Bay via the River Heads between 5-7 September.

Join with us in these GetUp events to save our Mary River and send our messages to Canberra with the Climate Torch. There’s something for everyone from walking, running, canoeing, swimming, music, food and camping. Don’t miss this opportunity to visit the proposed dam wall site, the beautiful Mary River, the Great Sandy Straits and the past mistakes of Paradise Dam. Meet with the people the whole length of the river that the proposal to dam the Mary River at Traveston Crossing is impacting on. Go online to register at http://www.savethemaryriver.com

Keep up the good work!