Viv Forbes

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.)

Time for Truth-Telling in Glasgow

For 26 long years the UN and their tame media have promoted their expensive annual climate carnivals. This month they will flock to Glasgow for COP 26 but they will not arrive on Shetland ponies, penny farthings or sailing boats--hydro-carbon energy will get most of them there and keep them warm and well fed. These jamborees are designed to spread climate lies and green energy propaganda.

Weather, Climate and Model Madness

Weather or climate? It pays to know the difference before we slaughter our economy on the climate alarm altar. “Weather” describes atmospheric conditions at any location – temperature, humidity, clouds precipitation and winds. Every place has its own weather which depends on the time of day, the season, the latitude, local topography and the surface temperature of the nearest ocean.

All Trees, Grass and Cows are Green

Growing trees need three essentials – radiant energy from the sun, CO2 and rain from the atmosphere, including nutrients and minerals from the soil. Climate alarmists correctly claim that burning forest products in thermal power stations is "net-zero emissions" because burning the wood just puts the same CO2 back into the atmosphere.  Identical reasoning applies to grazing cattle. 

Real Meat is Green - it Eats Grass

The Green Wreckers who destroyed Australia's cheap reliable electricity are now targeting our cattle industry. They use fake science and false advertising to threaten our right to produce and consume real meat. This stupidity relies on a totally false argument that grazing animals cause global warming by releasing carbon dioxide and methane to the atmosphere.

Forests need Foresters

Green extremists plan to convert Australia into “tree heaven”. They will bully this through, no matter what the cost. Huge areas of forest are already converted to “locked-up-land” – national parks, world heritage areas, Kyoto protected trees, remnant vegetation, aboriginal reserves, wildlife habitat and corridors etc. Many lock-ups are so large and so poorly managed that they have become extreme bushfire hazards and a refuge for wild dogs, cats, goats, camels, pigs, lantana, groundsel and other weeds and pests. Now Australia faces a shortage of timber for farms, industry, homes and furniture. While our vast forests lie idle or burnt, we import timber.

Hydrogen Hype and Hurdles

Green Hydrogen is the latest “energy” fad from the global warming warriors. It is mainly hot air. Hydrogen will NEVER be a source of energy. Unlike coal, oil or natural gas, hydrogen rarely occurs naturally – it must be manufactured, and that process consumes far more energy than the hydrogen “fuel” can recover. And the heat content of natural gas is over three times that of hydrogen.

The Blackout Agenda

Solar power fails every day from sunset to sunrise as well as during rain, hail, snow or dust storms. No matter how much land we smother in subsidised solar panels, they will still fail. Wind power fails often and unpredictably, sometimes for days, especially in quiet cold winter weather. It also shuts down during cyclones, heavy winds or icy conditions. No matter how many hills we uglify with their subsidised roads, transmission lines and bird-slicers, they will still fail.

The Green Virus is Spreading - Lock it Down

The Biden-Boris green virus which infects most of the west has become a danger to Australia. PM Scott Morrison has promised one billion dollars for “hydrogen, CCUS (carbon capture usage or storage), batteries and critical minerals-- all to achieve “net zero”. NOT ONE of these green dreams will produce one light-bulb of new energy – all will consume massive amounts of energy and money.

Flood Plains are for Floods

Natural flood plains form where floods spread silt and mud in river valleys. Being flat, fertile, picturesque and usually supplied with surface and underground water, they attract farms, orchards and gardens. These are inevitably followed by roads, houses and businesses. Despite all the planners with their rules, the pressure of people plus a bit of corruption has always resulted in population clustering on fertile flood plains and deltas beside scenic rivers. There is no point trying to stop or reverse this tide of history but those who choose to build on flood plains must bear the costs of the occasional flood.