Michael Green

Writer and producer

Teaming up and powering down

In Community development, Environment, The Age on

First published in The Age

Too hard for the politicians? In one  town unlikely allies are fighting climate change and winning.

SO FAR, the carbon trading debate has been cast as a battle between greedy businesses on one side and rabid greenies on the other. That’s not how it works in Castlemaine.

There, under the Maine’s Power scheme, the four major employers in the region have quietly teamed up with the local sustainability group and CSIRO to slash their ecological footprints. The employers are committed to cutting their greenhouse emissions by 30 per cent by 2010 (from 2006 levels) and working towards zero net emissions by 2020.

Together, the big four – Don KRC, Flowserve, Victoria Carpets and Mount Alexander Hospital – consume about half the shire’s electricity and natural gas. “They also employ about 2000 people and without them, our economy would collapse,” says Dean Bridgfoot, co-ordinator at Mount Alexander Sustainability Group.

MASG founded the project 18 months ago, launching it in February 2008. “We went to (the employers) and said, ‘You’re crucial to the town and we want you to stay here. We’re also concerned about climate change and we want to take action,’ ” Bridgfoot says.

He stressed their common goals and the businesses were receptive. “It was important that they could see that we were going to listen, be respectful and take their position seriously.”

The project is part of CSIRO’s Sustainable Communities Initiative, which promotes regional action through partnerships between business, government and local groups.

But Maine’s Power isn’t just about greening the town. With higher electricity prices on the way, the project also aims to secure the region’s electricity supply and the future of local industry.

The Mount Alexander shire relies on manufacturing for much of its employment, but it’s a long way from the power generators. Nearly one-fifth of its power is lost in transmission from the Latrobe Valley. The project began with a study of energy use and needs at each site. Then, CSIRO’s experts analysed technology options for the facilities, from solar panels and wind turbines to onsite gas-powered cogeneration (which makes both heat and electricity).

Soon, the scientists will hand over the final report and it will be time for action. The four employers must decide what investment they’ll make.

“What’s good for the environment is usually good for business,” says Bill Youl, manager at Don KRC. “We’ve approached it that way.” The smallgoods manufacturer is the biggest employer in the shire, making up to 1000 tonnes of hams, salamis, sausages and bacon every week.

“It’s an industry that has environmental impacts,” Youl admits, “but it also does a lot for the local community, in terms of employment. We’re keen to make sure we have a sustainable business.”

Don KRC is planning to expand its Castlemaine operations after closing factories in Altona and Spearwood in Western Australia. The company will double production but anticipates that its water use will barely increase. Power-wise, CSIRO’s research suggests that gas-fired cogeneration could satisfy the firm’s electricity and heat needs, while slicing its CO2 emissions.

CSIRO’s expertise has been crucial to the scheme’s success so far. “We’ve had some really eminent people looking through our factory,” Youl says. “It helps you be confident about decisions when you know you’ve got the best in the world giving you advice.”

For Victoria Carpets, the research has shown that cogeneration would be the cheapest strategy for cutting emissions. The regional spinning mill produces wool and wool-blend yarns to supply its Dandenong factory. Mill manager Tony Breslin enthuses about the co-operative process but admits the company has recently become hesitant about its next step.

New carpet is a deferrable expense and since the financial downturn, sales have fallen. That will make any eco investment harder to make. “These last four to five months have created a fair degree of uncertainty,” Breslin says.

The Mount Alexander Shire council will be hoping they decide to go ahead with it. The Maine’s Power project is a key plank of the council’s ambitious green goal – in 2006 it committed to cutting the region’s carbon footprint by 30 per cent by 2010 (from 2000 levels) and to plan for carbon neutrality by 2020.

“It’s a big ship to turn around,” says new Mayor Philip Schier. They’re challenging targets, but there is strong local support. The sustainability group boasts more than 800 members. “It’s an exciting community to be involved with, particularly because the major industries are willing to take it on,” Schier says.

Partly, the council’s policy is about self-preservation – by pursuing early climate change action, the community will adapt ahead of the pack. But it also offers a model for other regions and levels of government. “It’s got to be a local, regional, national and global approach,” Schier says. “Unless you get in there and start tackling it, you are only forever going to be saying it’s somebody else’s problem.”

At Don KRC, cutting emissions isn’t just a sacrifice for the greater good. “It sends the right messages and it makes monetary sense as well,” says Youl. “In the future, companies will see sustainability as one of their key business planks and not something you bolt on the side to keep the community happy. It’s really about what’s good for your business.”

Mount Alexander Sustainability Group, CSIRO

Life saving

In Social justice, The Big Issue on

First published in The Big Issue

Peter Singer, philosopher and surfer, does not believe in retail therapy. In fact, he wants people to give more away. Even in tough economic times, he argues, people can afford to help those less fortunate than themselves.

It’s scorching hot. Peter Singer, philosopher, is sitting in a jumbled cafe-cum-general store in Anglesea, on Victoria’s Great Ocean Road. He’s wearing red board shorts, a beach t-shirt and a cheap digital watch. “Diogenes the Cynic was supposed to have lived in a barrel, otherwise naked,” he quips. “I’m closer to that than a business suit, which is what some American philosophers wear.” The 62-year-old, one of the world’s most influential thinkers, took up long-board surfing five years ago. He is relaxed and cordial, and speaks with unwavering logical control. “There’s a lot of unnecessary suffering in the world,” says Singer, leaning forward in his chair. “I’d like to do something to reduce it.”

That’s the matter-of-fact motivation driving Singer’s work. In a career spanning four decades and 25 books, the Australian-born philosopher, academic and author has confronted issues ranging from animal liberation and euthanasia to the ethics of day-to-day life. “I guess I enjoy a good argument,” he continues, wryly. “People always said, even when I was a kid, that I liked to argue.”

In his latest book, The Life You Can Save, he argues that the rich – and, on a global scale, that means almost all Australians – are morally obliged to give more aid to end extreme poverty overseas. Nearly 27,000 children die every day from preventable diseases and more than 1.4 billion people are living on less than US$1.25 per day.

Singer wants to change our understanding of what it means for people in affluent countries to lead an ethical life. “Most of us are absolutely certain that we wouldn’t hesitate to save a drowning child, and that we would do it at considerable cost to ourselves,” he writes. “Yet while thousands of children die each day, we spend money on things we take for granted and would hardly miss if they were not there. Is that wrong?” Singer’s answer – set out in a clear and compelling manner in his book – is an unequivocal ‘yes’. This is a book that deserves close attention: it has the potential to change lives.

The Life You Can Save is an extended reprise of an argument made in one of Singer’s first published essays, ‘Famine, Affluence and Morality’, written in the early 70s when he was just 25. In that essay, and again now, he argues that people should give money to aid agencies because, by doing so, it is possible to prevent death and suffering without giving up anything nearly as important.

That might not sound controversial. But Singer maintains that when people choose not to donate, and instead spent their money on other items, they are implicitly valuing those items more highly than the lives of the poor.

For Singer, the ethically justifiable action is to give money away to the point where, by giving any more, you would cause as much suffering to yourself as you would relieve by your gift. At the least, spending on luxury goods or exotic holidays is morally wrong.

In the new book, he softens this position by also offering readers a less demanding standard of giving: most people, he argues, should give 5% of annual income (more for the very rich, on a sliding scale). “It’s an attempt to get away from the idea that you have to live so that everything you do is costed against what it could do to save a life of another,” he explains. He maintains that this standard, if widely adopted, would be sufficient to end world poverty.

As well as its ethical slap, the book offers a close factual analysis of global poverty, affluence and the ins-and-outs of aid. Singer examines the reasons why we do and don’t give, rebuts common objections to giving and sets out its likely benefits.

Beachgoers come and go from the café; the cash register rattles. Against this backdrop, extreme poverty seems a far-flung concern. And Singer is wary of the potential for domestic economic worries to further undermine aid for the world’s poorest. But he is encouraged to see more discussion of ethics in public life. With a rack of glossy magazines at his left shoulder, he says: “I think maybe the recession does make us take stock of where we are and what we really need, and [also] makes us think about values in a more fundamental way.”

Since 1999, he has split his time between Australia and the US, where he teaches at Princeton University in New Jersey. He gives a third of his income to charity and says he lives a very comfortable and enjoyable life. “I’ve improved over the years, but I know that there’s still a lot more I could be giving.”

He wants to create a public culture of charitable giving. Citing evidence that people are more willing to give if they know others are too, he encourages his readers to tell friends and family about what they donate. The sweetener to his story is that, far from diminishing your wellbeing, giving money away can make you happier. Both age-old wisdom and recent neurological studies link giving with fulfilment. “You can make a difference and it will make your life better as well,” Singer says. “I really think that’s true.”

The life you can save

Book review: Forecast, by Stephan Faris

In The Big Issue on

Four stars

Climate change is our children’s children’s problem, right? Think again, says Stephan Faris. It’s already upon us, and it hurts.

The globetrotting American journalist’s book details the pressing problems of our warming planet. From genocide in Darfur and malaria in Brazil, to immigration in Europe and hurricanes in Florida, Faris visits the places most prone to climate-induced pain and suffering.

For comfortable greenies, perhaps the most surprising case study will be southern England, where a far-right, anti-immigration party is garnering support by linking nationalism with environmentalism. Faris argues it’s a sign of the selfish politics to come.

This is an interesting, readable and often alarming book. Given the magnitude of the crisis, Faris is at his best when assessing the catastrophic suffering in Darfur and potential for resource wars in south Asia – and not when cataloguing, at length, the incomparably more mundane concerns of US grape growers. 

Despite that, Faris offers a compelling summary of the political, social and humanitarian strife both underway and poised to strike. And he doesn’t spare us our moral responsibility for the dying – after all, it’s rich-country emissions that have done it. 

The green payoff

In Architecture and building, Environment, The Age on

First published in The Sunday Age, Domain

New figures show that making your house more environmentally friendly does indeed increase its value.

IT’S official – higher energy star ratings mean higher sale prices. Research released in December by federal Environment Minister Peter Garrett provides hard proof that the real estate market now values eco-efficiency.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) studied sale prices and star ratings in the ACT and found that for a house worth $365 000, increasing the rating by half a star would add, on average, nearly $4500 to its price.

For homeowners, the new evidence is just one more motivation to take up government rebates for household makeovers – from modest shower roses to grand solar panels. And this year, there’s a suite of extra regulations and incentives to get you thinking eco-smart.

Tony Arnel, Victoria’s Building Commissioner and the chair of the Green Building Council of Australia, says research is piling up – from the United Nations Environment Program and consultants McKinseys, among others – showing that aggressive investment in reconditioning our buildings would have a lush green payoff, even in the short term.

“The building sector, including housing, has been identified as being able to quickly reduce greenhouse gas emissions at least cost,” he says. “We’re having an economic recession but interest in sustainable built environments won’t waver. It will continue to accelerate in 2009. We’re seeing a whole new industry based on water- and energy-saving technologies.”

The insulation trade is running hot. As a part of its anti-recession spending, the federal government will pay for ceiling insulation (up to $1600) in homes that currently don’t have any. It has also increased the rebate for solar hot water systems (now $1600) and the rebate helping landlords insulate their rental properties (now $1000).

The federal government’s Green Loans scheme is also set to start mid-year. It will offer around 200 000 households a free sustainability assessment and then, access to a low-interest loan of up to $10 000 to put the recommendations in place.

While the details aren’t yet finalised, to be eligible for the loan, a household must earn less than $250 000 a year. The government estimates that the scheme will inspire $2 billion of environmentally smart investment.

Here in the wilting garden state, the government’s Victorian Energy Efficiency Target (VEET) kicked off on January 1. It requires that the energy retailers encourage customers to install efficiency measures. Overall, the VEET aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions enough to make 675 000 houses carbon neutral for a year. With nearly all our electricity coming from high-polluting brown coal, any cut in usage will be good news for the atmosphere.

Governments aren’t the only ones encouraging us to spend green – the private sector is also beginning to rally. The credit union mecu now offers an ‘Eco Pause’ option on its home loans, where borrowers can stop their repayments for three months, or pay half rates for six months, if they spruce up their abode with enviro-friendly features. The credit union also provides discounted interest ‘goGreen’ personal loans to pay for home efficiency improvements.

That’s all good news for Lyn Beinat. With her husband Maurice, she runs ecoMaster, a home energy audit and retrofitting business with 20 staff. EcoMaster assesses the thermal, energy and water performance of buildings. It prepares detailed, costed action plans and has an installation crew that will put the recommendations into place.

The couple’s experience overhauling their own house prompted them to start the business. Years ago, they returned to Australia after a stint in the UK and moved into a very cold house in Mount Macedon. “Our kids used to cry in the morning, ‘Can we go back to England Mummy? It was warmer over there,’” Ms Beinat laughs. “You know there’s something wrong with your house when your kids think that!”

With lots of hard work, they cut their electricity use by 80 per cent and at the same time, raised their winter temperatures from an average of 14 degrees to about 21. “You can have a real win-win out of fixing up your home. Our house is rated six star now,” Ms Beinat says. “It was rated one star when we started, and we’ve done it for less than the cost of stamp duty.”

While the energy audit industry is about to take off, Ms Beinat says business hasn’t been easy. Many people haven’t seen the value of spending money on home efficiency. Energy and water prices may be on the rise, but they are still low enough that some retrofitting measures, especially the more expensive ones like solar panels or double-glazing, take years before they pay for themselves.

“People certainly don’t get a return on investment from new carpets, but they still buy them,” Ms Beinat says. “So why do we only apply an economic filter to ceiling insulation or changing to low energy lights?”

In any case, with her own experience in mind, she argues that retrofitting is one of the few things a homeowner can do to give increased comfort as well as a monetary benefit, in the form of lower bills.

The evidence that better star ratings mean higher house prices adds even more kick to her claims. The ABS research was conducted in the ACT where, since 1999, homeowners have been required to declare their house’s energy efficiency rating when they advertise it for sale. The rules were brought in to provide extra information for consumers.

According to the Federal Environment Department (DEWHA), the scheme helps buyers understand what they’re getting and improves the efficiency of real estate valuations. It also pushes owners to retrofit their homes. The study shows that the cost of adding stars will often be far lower than the extra payoff when it comes to selling.

DEWHA is now working with the states to develop a mandatory disclosure scheme that would apply nationwide, and may include houses up for lease as well as those for sale. 

The low-energy way to beat the heat

HARRY Blutstein and Carol Lawson moved into their Northcote townhouse in early 2007. It didn’t take long to realise something wasn’t quite right. “It got very, very hot,” Mr Blutstein says.

The neat brick townhouse has three levels, including an attic study where Mr Blutstein works. It was always a very comfortable house, the couple says – so long as they kept the cooling running constantly on warm days.  Even worse for their bills, the in-built heating and cooling system was all or nothing. It couldn’t be set to control just one floor.

“This house was architect designed,” Mr Blutstein says. “It was built about 12 years ago, but you almost couldn’t have done a worse job in terms of making it less environmental. So we decided we needed professional advice.”

Although Mr Blutstein works in the sustainability field, he didn’t have the hands-on building know-how to assess the problems and fix them. “Neither of us are handy people,” says Dr Lawson, a GP. “Neither of us does more than the most basic things around the house. It was a big plus to get good practical advice and then have the work done under the one hat.”

They hired ecoMaster to assess their home and recommend steps to cut their energy use. The first step (and the cheapest, at about $300) was draught proofing. The crew installed flip-down draught stoppers and foam seals on doors as well as timber beading around architraves. “In everything we did, that was the best,” Mr Blutstein says. He was surprised to learn just how leaky most homes are – ecoMaster estimates that draughts account for a quarter of all winter heat losses.

Next, they swapped two-dozen halogen downlights with low-energy replacements and put in heavy window drapes on windows that didn’t have them. They installed a 2500-litre water tank for their courtyard garden and switched the old electric hot water service for a super efficient heat pump system.

They also fitted a large external blind to shade the west-facing rooms from the hot afternoon sun. To cool the sweltering attic study, ecoMaster added insulation and recommended a sky window for the south roof face and blinds on north and west windows.

Mr Blutstein estimates that all up, they’ve spent about $10 000 and halved their electricity use. “We could have been comfortable the inefficient way, always heating and cooling the whole house,” he says. “But now we’re getting a much better result for the environment.”

 

The money pit

In Community development, The Big Issue on

First published in The Big Issue

Sometimes city people must leave town to turn their fortunes around, especially as the economy sags. But in Roxby Downs in remote South Australia, Michael Green discovers that mining isn’t the answer for everyone.

As the sun rises on yet another flawless blue sky, Nick Sageman prepares for work. He swings into his 4WD for the 10-minute drive, at 110 kilometres an hour, through the desert to Olympic Dam, BHP Billiton’s massive copper, uranium, gold and silver mine south of Lake Eyre.

A little more than a year ago, the sandy-haired 32-year-old and his partner lived in inner-city Melbourne; now they live in remote northern South Australia, in Roxby Downs. “We couldn’t see any way of being able to build anything unless we could earn heaps more money – which sounds really selfish and it’s not just about money – but for us, we just got tired of living like uni students,” he says. “We’d done it for too long.”

They joined a modern-day gold rush. These days it isn’t about striking it lucky on your own, but rather, about banking a high salary from a minerals corporation. Australians, renowned for living in the east and facing the sea, have begun to turn inwards to get ahead.

In May, the peak mining body, the Minerals Council of Australia, released research predicting a 90,000-strong increase in employment in the industry by 2020. Two months earlier, the Minister for Defence, Joel Fitzgibbon claimed mining companies were stealing the nation’s submariners, following a newspaper report that the navy could only properly crew three of its six Collins-class subs. Since then, however, the global financial crisis has changed many things – not least attitudes to work. It has been suggested that careers in the defence forces now have more appeal to many people. And even if we are recession-bound, a mining job remains a lavish prospect for a worker.

Besides, the canaries are still singing. “There’s good money and plenty of work around so no one thinks much about it,” says Tom Beever, the local Family and Youth Officer in Roxby Downs. “People would know about [the financial crisis] from what they read but there’s no real concern.”

Amid sand dunes five barren hours north of Adelaide, Roxby Downs is full of people from somewhere else. The town recently celebrated its 20th birthday. It was officially opened on 5 November 1988, created by Western Mining Corporation to service the then-new Olympic Dam mine.

Despite its arid setting, Roxby is the land of plenty. With neat streets, perma-blue skies and one boss for all, the town feels like a desert echo of the 1998 Jim Carrey movie The Truman Show. According to the local council, its winding suburban streets and modest weatherboard homes shape the most affluent postcode in the state. In 2006, the median individual weekly income was $1103, more than double the national average.

During the day, the small shopping strip fills with young women pushing their prams. The town boasts a young population and one of the highest birth rates in the nation. Of the 4500 residents, only 150 are aged over 55. Yet, the strangest fact of all is that Roxby is the only town in South Australia without water restrictions. Its sports fields grow lush and green courtesy of the free-flow pumped from the Great Artesian Basin, via a desalination plant at the mine.

For Scott Sauerwald, the desert has been a rich pasture, despite the initial shock. The 42-year-old arrived in town from Adelaide in 1999. “I’d been [working] in an office, in collar and tie, and went to working in a smelter,” he says. “It was a molten metal environment, hot work. After a week I thought, ‘Oh my god what have I done. I wonder if my boss will take me back?’”

Gradually, however, he became accustomed to the physical exertion. Within two months, his wife, Lisa, and two primary school-age children joined him. Part of the attraction was a quieter, safer lifestyle for his kids. “That,” he says, “and chasing money. The wages were definitely better here.” His income leapt overnight by $17 000. Now, adults working full time in the mining industry earn over $100 000, on average.

These days, Sauerwald works in occupational health and safety at the site. Lisa has worked on and off at the mine too. He says couples can “make mini-fortunes” and become financially secure 10 years earlier than they would in the city. He’s seen the benefits on his own bank balance. “If we’d stayed in Adelaide it would have been a grind, a week-to-week existence, whereas here, you don’t worry about the bills that are coming in. Every few years, people can upgrade cars and that material side of things. There’s always that buffer.”

But Sauerwald acknowledges that not everything is perfect. “The big issue here is accommodation.” With high wages, few houses and new fortune seekers arriving everyday, real estate and rental prices are spiralling. BHP Billiton, the mine’s owner since 2005, is planning a huge expansion of operations and a more than doubling of the operational workforce to over 8000. While it’s good news for job seekers, the development will strain local housing and services. “If you can get accommodation here you are laughing, if you can’t, it’s that extra struggle,” Sauerwald says.

Accommodation is not the only problem. The transient nature of the population has some unusual consequences. Although the town has a cemetery, nobody is buried there. “That talks about Roxby, you know,” says Beever. “Not only does no one come from Roxby, but no one identifies themselves with Roxby. They come to chase the big dream of working outback making big money, but there’s been a lot of people leave here shattered because it just didn’t work out.”

As the community counsellor, Beever is exposed to the sadder side of residents’ dreams. “It’s not an easy place to work. Sure, people make a lot of money here, but I don’t know anyone who doesn’t earn what they get. They are a long way from where they come from,” he says.

For many people, a bigger wage just means more spending money, not more savings. Muscle cars and expensive 4WDs cruise the quiet streets at 50 kilometres an hour. One former resident comments on Roxby’s high level of drinking and gambling. Beever agrees: “Even though we’re the highest income in the state, we’ve got one of the highest [rates of] credit card abuse in the state as well. Some people are here because they have to be, because they’re up to the neck in debt.”

For Sageman and his partner, so far, the move is paying off. His wage has surpassed their expectations. “I was looking in the Australian the other day and there were jobs going as a lecturer or a zoologist with postgraduate qualifications. I’m a storeman out there and I’m on about 90 grand. It’s just insane, and that’s totally unqualified.”

The couple are determined not to fall into the spending trap. “I’ve made all those mistakes before,” Sageman says. They plan to return to the city in a few years. “We won’t leave here without some form of security, whether that’s a house, or a block of land,” he says. “We know it won’t always be like this. When we do go back to the city, I’m not going to be able to earn anywhere near as much money. But at least we’ll be able to buy into the market.”

Sometimes, they miss the city life. “Our interests aren’t really the interests of your average person here, I guess, in that we’re not into cars and motorbikes and shooting and things like that,” Sageman says. “We still feel a bit of an odd couple out but there’s more people like us moving up here everyday.”

When they get the chance, they drive out beyond the mine, along the dirt road that leads to the famous Oodnadatta track where the old Ghan railway follows one side and Lake Eyre, the other. Coming over a low rise, the land opens up wide, flat and red to the horizon. It’s the sort of landscape where you can see what’s coming at you, and make plans for the future. From here, it’s Wall Street that seems remote.

The job seeker

Andrea Morris lost her job in Adelaide real estate, and six days later, arrived in Roxby Downs looking for work in the mine. “I just decided, ‘Right if I’m going to do it, lets do it.’” The 50-year-old has just moved in with her daughter and her daughter’s partner, who were already living in the local caravan park. “I could be doing cleaning or something for six months before I get a job at the mines. You just take your chances.”

The ex-mine worker

Engineer Rachael Wauchope left Brisbane for Roxby Downs, and stayed five years. Her career bloomed. She liked living in a close-knit community and being surrounded by the beauty of the desert. “Emus walked through town. One even stuck its head through our front door and had a look around our lounge room,” she says. “I loved my job and had some good friends there. The money was great… but eventually the isolation and the lack of cultural activities got to me.”

The leaver

“My sister was up here and she said it was a good place to make money,” says Brian McKay, a landscape gardener in his early twenties. But things didn’t work out as expected for the Melbourne man; the dollars have come and gone. “I was bored out of my brain so I went out and bought a motorbike. Alcohol also drains his budget. Time to move on again.