Viv Forbes

The Plague of Green Elephants

Legend says that if you displeased the King of Siam, he would give you a white elephant. These rare and protected elephants were incredibly expensive to keep. So a “White Elephant” came to mean a possession that is useless, troublesome, expensive to maintain and difficult to dispose of - like a Sacred Cow, but much bigger. Today the deluded rulers of the Western world are gifting us and future generations with plagues of Green Elephants – useless, expensive, protected, green rubbish.

Forty New Bills

Forty New Bills, Builder Generations outvoted by the Spoiled Brat generations – the Baby Boomers, the Millenniums, Blockade Australia and the Thunbergs

Volcanoes, Oceans and Weather

Despite Green/ABC propaganda, recent Australian floods were not caused by coal, cattle or cars. Weather is driven by winds; solar energy powers the winds and draws moisture for them from the oceans. These eternal natural rain-making processes have been aided recently by two extra factors.  Firstly a big La Nina weather event in the Pacific Ocean has left warmer water closer to Australia.  Secondly, there is increased underwater volcanism in this region as evidenced by the volcanic eruptions near Vanuatu. 

The Target on Australia’s Back

Congratulations to Ted Dwyer in “Spectator Australia” (25/6/22) for asking why Australia has bet-the-house on the US/NATO adventurism in Ukraine. There are few innocent parties in Ukraine today - an undeclared civil war has been simmering for this whole century. Since the Mongol destruction of Kiev in 1240, almost everyone has invaded Ukraine – its flat fertile lands and mineral resources attract plunderers. Russia has a long memory of invaders from the west including Napoleon, the Austrians, the Poles, the Swedes and Hitler’s Nazis.

Leading the Green Lemmings

Australia’s new ALP/Green/Teal government has a Zero Emissions plan, putting them on track to be world leader of the Green Lemmings. John Kerry of USA was a strong contender to win the Green Lemming race. But he was given a stiff handicap by UN organisers because America has access to coal, oil, gas, hydro and nuclear power, plus cross-border pipelines and power lines. Biden is trying to close these loopholes.

Renewable Energy or Reliable  Energy--but Not Both

Australia’s new ALP Government has gigantic green energy plans to be funded by electricity consumers and taxpayers.  They promise (with a straight face) that Australia’s electricity will be 82% renewable by 2030. They predict 43% reduction in emissions and “on track for net zero by 2050”. They threaten to litter the landscape with 400 community batteries, 85 solar banks and a $20B expansion of the electricity grid. This gigantic “green” electricity plan will need at least 150 million Chinese solar panels covering outback kingdoms of land, plus thousands of bird-slicing metal-hungry wind turbines, plus never-ending roads and powerlines – not friendly to grass or trees and with no room for native birds, bees, bats or marsupials - not green at all. 

Australia’s Great Green Gamble

Green millionaires and other left-wing activists supported slick campaigns promoting a gaggle of well-off women who won 6 seats in the leafy-green suburbs. Being rich blue-bloods with dark green policies they adopted Teal-coloured uniforms. Dark Greens also grabbed some inner city electorates. The Liberal-National “conservatives” got their lowest vote for over 70 years, losing control of parliament. The left-wing ALP also got their lowest vote for over 70 years but won a slim majority in the lower house of federal Parliament.

Hydrogen – the Magic Rainbow Gas

If you believe in the tooth fairy, or vote Green, you probably believe that hydrogen is the magic rainbow gas that will banish global warming, replace wicked hydro-carbons in electricity generation, fuel tomorrow’s trucks, planes and heavy equipment, and earn unlimited export income. There is one big problem – unlike coal, oil and gas, there are no hidden pools of hydrogen we can tap. Every bit of hydrogen has to be manufactured from water or hydrocarbons using huge amounts of energy.

The Bottomless Black Hole in the Great Barrier Reef

In 2012 Malcolm Turnbull snitched $440 million from taxpayers to "save the Great Barrier Reef". In 2022 Scott Morrison promised to pour another billion into the Barrier Reef Black Hole. Then last week Anthony Albanese promised another $220 million "to save the reef from yellow-crazy ants".

Build More Dams

Since the days of Joseph in ancient Egypt, droughts have periodically rationed water and food supplies for humans and wildlife. Sensible peoples store water, but it is about 40 years since Australians built a big dam – young Aussie engineers have no damn experience. Even beavers build dams and weirs to provide long-term wetlands and food supplies along rivers. Dams also moderate floods downstream. Foolish children and Green politicians think that floods are caused by carbon dioxide, but farmers know that it is La Nina that brings flooding rains to Eastern Australia.

Old Reliable Coal

For days now in SE Queensland, it has been cloudy, rainy and largely windless. No sun electrifies the solar panels, intermittent winds play with the prayer wheels, and backup batteries are going flat. For a while on some afternoons, wind and solar produce a trickle of power. Gas and hydro try to help, but none of these can bear the whole power supply load. But even on these gloomy days, our electric lights, fridge, stove, battery chargers and water pumps work. And down in the city (even on still nights) trains, traffic lights, fuel pumps, cold stores, hospitals and lifts keep working.

How I will Vote, and Why

The Liberals cannot be trusted to control Australia without adult supervision. But to replace them with an ALP/Green/ABC/Teal government would be a disaster. So voters must ensure that Liberals can form the next government, providing they have mature overseers. Voters must ensure there are new sensible people holding the balance of power in Australian parliaments. We need people who understand that:

Power not Poverty

"The past was green and fuzzy - the future is black and ominous." -- Richard Sebrof

The green fairy-tale is over. Even the green cheer squad in the bureaucracy and the media can sense the change. The sudden end was signalled by rolling columns of Russian tanks, quickly followed by surging prices for oil, gas, coal, wheat and barley.

Stop these Fuelish Policies

"God was on the side of the nation that had the oil." --Prof. Wakimura, Tokyo Imperial University Russia is one of the world's largest producers of petroleum, natural gas, and coal. In Europe, despite decades of taxes on hydrocarbons, subsidies for green energy and net zero plans, hydrocarbons still supply 70% of EU energy. And Russia supplies the lion's share of this: 40% of EU gas, over 25% of their crude oil and nearly half of their coal comes from Russia. Russia is also a big exporter of energy-dependent metals such as iron, steel and aluminium, and is the world's third biggest producer of gold, the money for troubled times.

Greenism Destroying Australia’s Ancient Grasslands

It’s the season for green-money showers in Australia – the Coral Community just got one billion dollars of green bribes from PM Morrison (this after $141M from PM Turnbull just over 3 years ago). Koalas got $50M from Morrison whilst the Queensland Government bought a huge grazing property to be converted into a national park. And of course the Green Broadcasting Commission got an extra $3.3Billion over 3 years to promote their green agenda.

Whirling Triffids are now Invading our Seashores

"I saw them now with a disgust that they had never roused in me before. Horrible alien things which some of us had somehow created, and which the rest of us, in our careless greed, had cultured all over the world. One could not even blame nature for them." -- Bill Masen, in “The Day of the Triffids” Wind turbines need a huge area to generate significant electricity. An area the size of Wales would need to be covered in wind turbines just to meet one sixth of UK’s daily energy needs.

The Electric Highway – A Fuelish Policy

Scott Morrison has had another green brainwave – spend a zillion dollars to build Australia’s electric/hydrogen highway. Naturally this Fuelish Policy will be supported and accelerated by the Greens/ALP coalition. They all need to study the history of transport in Australia.

More Trees, Less Grass, No Food

Trying to bury carbon dioxide deep underground is another fashionable green fantasy. It consumes big dollars for taxpayer subsidies but coal and gas producers will love it as it wastes energy and will increase demand for reliable energy. Artificial carbon capture is an unnecessary waste--the grasslands, forests, crops and continental shelf of Australia sequester far more carbon dioxide than Australia emits from all energy, transport, agriculture and mining sources.

The Last COP-Out

For 26 futile years, the net-zero maniacs have wasted fuel, energy and taxpayer’s money to bite the hands that provide their food, energy, welfare and public sector jobs. Led by EU and AUKUS dreamers, they destroy reliable energy from coal, oil, nuclear, gas and hydro while forcing us to subsidize net-negative dreams like solar, wind, wave-power, CCUS, hot rocks, pumped hydro and hydrogen. All such speculative ventures should be funded by speculators, not taxpayers.

PM Morrison should take some Aussie Coal to Chilly Glasgow

The Saltbush Club, Australia's defenders of coal, cattle and cars, says that PM Morrison should not attend COP26 unless he also takes some high-energy Australian black coal to show the energy-starved Europeans the best source of stored solar energy. (In 2017, Scott Morrison took a lump of black coal into the Australian Parliament to show those members wearing green goggles what a real solar energy storage battery looked like.)