Posted on 11/21/2014 8:08:30 PM PST by Aussiebabe
BARACK Obama won an Olympic gold medal for schmoozing in Brisbane last weekend.
Along the way, the US president exposed the opponents of coal seam gas in Queensland as utter hypocrites.
With China, the US is of course the worst polluter on the planet.
Yet the shale boom sweeping across America is unlocking oceans of underground gas, a cleaner energy gradually replacing coal in US power stations.
Obama knows gas is good. Gas drives his emissions reduction pact with China.
However, the Greenies who swooned over Obama for his environmental crusade are the same snarling, left-of-centre bigots backing sinister groups like Lock the Gate in attempting to sabotage the fledgling gas industry here.
In a week dominated by news about the $7 billion Adani coal deal the importance of gas to our state cannot be overstated.
Gas royalties will deliver rivers of gold to the Queensland treasury as it fights to restore the AAA credit rating trashed by the previous government.
A significant milestone looms. And it may change everything.
In three weeks the first ever shipment of liquid natural gas sourced entirely from coal seam gas will be shipped to Asia by QGC.
It’s not just a Queensland first, it’s a world first.
And, surprise, surprise, the gas drawn from beneath our cattle pastures may end up in China.
It will be traded on the open market in Asia so the destination remains unclear.
Following Obama’s visit the irony that the Queensland gas is destined for China has not been lost on certain Queensland Cabinet ministers.
While the President discourteously attacked his host’s environmental credentials, our gas will eventually assist cutting emissions globally.
Australia’s gas exports are set to increase from about 20 billion cubic metres in 2012 to 114 billion cubic metres by 2040 as global demand is forecast to grow more than any other fuel source. So says the International Energy Agency.
And while many newspaper columnists were gushing about Obama’s speech and his green advice to Tony Abbott, they neglected to report America’s own disgusting record on carbon dioxide.
Why reporters ignored this part of the story is a bit of a mystery to me.
Suffice to say that the media craves celebrity and is often blinded by it. And Obama was certainly a celebrity whose light shone brightly that day.
At the risk of offending the Obama-love media, it has to be said our environmental record is cleaner than his.
So how dare Obama lecture us?
The US didn’t sign the 1997 Kyoto agreement. Nevertheless it pledged to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 7 per cent. Instead they soared.
Now we learn that over two decades from 1990 to 2010, US emissions grew by 53 times the actual growth of emissions in Australia.
I’m glad Environment Minister Greg Hunt pointed this out. He also revealed China’s sorry record.
In the same two decades China’s emissions soared from 3.4 billion tonnes to 9.8 billion tonnes. This is the fastest growth in emissions in human history, Hunt said.
“The increase in Chinese emissions was 640 times, or 64,000 per cent, greater than any change in Australia. Over the same period, Chinese coal consumption increased at the greatest rate in human history.”
Of course Australia’s footprint is insignificant compared to the superpowers and we shouldn’t beat ourselves up about it. In 1990, according to Hunt’s office, Australia produced 580 million tonnes of carbon, the US 5.38 billion tonnes and China 3.356 billion tonnes.
By 2010, Australia’s emissions had barely increased, to 590 million tonnes. The US, on the other hand, registered a substantial increase to 5.923 billion tonnes and China to a staggering 9.769 billion tonnes.
By 2020, if Australia meets its target, it will produce 555 million tonnes while the US will produce 5.144 billion tonnes and China a truly astonishing 12.4 billion tonnes.
Nevertheless Obama’s deal with China, greeted with rapturous approval by the media, deserves closer scrutiny.
He’s just as rude and disrespectful to most Americans.
Barry is an International embarrassment. You’d think that after everyone is on to his gimmick of surrounding himself with well paid ivy-league crackpots that fabricate data to further their own agendas that he would at least refrain from his going on about his “global warming” fantasies. Not content with irritating Americans, he’s now alienating our International friends.
You have to understand that our megalomaniacal president fancies himself Emperor of the Planet.
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