Past Programs
Climate Change - 2005
Drought - the Red Marauder
10/12/2005
One of the less controversial decisions the Federal government made this week was to continue to provide drought aid to many regions across the country.
To one observer of the Australian condition, this will come as a very, very familiar story.
He is the historian Michael McKernan, and he has just published a study of the role of drought in Australian history. Drought is a constant in our life, he finds, but it seems to come as a surprise every time.
Permafrost and the Troposphere
20/08/2005
A couple of highly significant studies came out last week that could shift our understanding of global warming. Research from Russia revealed that an area of Siberian permafrost spanning one million hectares is beginning to melt for the first time since the Ice Age 11,000 years ago. A million hectares of permafrost covers an area the size of France and Germany combined. So if it melts, what impact would that have on the climate?
And the other big news was in the troposphere, where new findings could quash the arguments of the climate sceptics.
With climatologist Dr Graeme Pearman.
Bioenergy and Oil Mallees
06/08/2005
We don't usually associate trees with electricity. But in Narrogin in Western Australia a 10 million dollar integrated wood processing plant is about to start business.
It's all part of the solution to dryland salinity which threatens to engulf thirty per cent of the wheat belt. Already farmers have planted more than 20 million mallee trees which will be crushed and burned in the Narrogin plant to produce electricity, activated carbon and eucalyptus oil.
These hardy eucalypts resprout when cut and the trunks and branches will be harvested regularly.
Natural Advantage
18/06/2005
The Natural Advantage of Nations: Business Opportunities, Innovation and Governance in the 21st Century is an outstanding book about developing a sustainable economy and society. Packed full of international and local innovations and solutions, it has contributions from more than 50 authorities in the field. The book was put together by The Natural Edge Project, a think tank of young Australian engineers and scientists. We speak with the book's co-editor, Michael Smith.
New Technologies for coal and solar power
21/05/2005
In spite of everything, our energy consumption continues to grow - fuelled at the moment by our fascination with air conditioners. And at the moment more energy consumption mostly means more coal-fired power stations.
The challenge now is how to burn coal as cleanly as possible, in a way that reduces the carbon emissions. New technologies are making that a possibility.
In the area of alternative energy, such as solar, new technologies are also starting to come on line which will make them more likely to be commercially viable.
Tropical Cyclones
19/03/2005
After people in the Top End of Australia had a nerve-racking week waiting for category 5 Cyclone Ingrid to hit, we look at some of the unusual cyclonic activity in our region in the last year. We speak with John McBride from the Bureau of Meteorology Research Centre.
Ozone Hole
26/02/2005
Professor Sherwood Rowland, who was awarded the Nobel prize for discovering the hole in the ozone layer, gives a progress report on CFCs and ozone, as well as the science behind the greenhouse effect.
Kyoto Protocol, the business case for and against
12/02/2005
The Kyoto Protocol on Global Warming comes into force this Wednesday. Australia and the United States are the only developed countries which remain outside the protocol. Some in the business industry say that will exclude us from a lot of international trade in the future, and we won't be able get compensation for the expense of reducing greenhouse emissions. Others say that the protocol is flawed because it is not a global treaty and will not reduce emissions by more than 1 per cent anyway.
