Aussie Climate Crusader Turns Wind Power Nimby

Anthony, I realise that to properly explain Bob Browns rise to political
power takes a lot of test, but I cannot shorten it. So you decide if its best in two parts, or even the possibility that some “”Wordsmith”” makes a full article of it.

This matter of Federal over Stat power made it all the way to the Australian High Court. I still cannot understand how the Judges finally ruled in favour of the Federal Government.

Michael.

——————————————————————————

Craig from OZ, July 16. sums it up well, but it goes back to a very minor matter, that is to the rest of us. that of Lake Pedder in Tasmania, it was a dam which created the lake or perhaps enlarged it.

Now Tasmania unlike the rest of Australia which is mostly flat, has lots of high mountains on its West side. It is a natural for Hydro electric power and a government body, the Tasmanian Hydro electric Commission had over the years brought the small population of Tasmania cheap and of course very realisable electricity. Which of course was very green.

Tasmania was apart from a few mines, a very rural community, and was thus Conservative in its politics. There was a lot of Federal Crown land on the island.

Bob Brown was a keen bushwalker and was concerned that Tasmania
reman a isolated bit of Greenery, unlike the mainland, especially the likes of NSW and Queensland.

Now just as with a recent proposal in NSW to raise a existing dam wall,
to reduce the flooding in the area, this is being opposed by the usual Green propaganda, that some small creature will be drowned, it was proposed to raise the Dam at Lake Pedder just a little to increase the power potential at a minimum cost.

Now up till then Bob Brown had never objected to Lake Pedder, as we
sensible folk already know, a Dam created Lake is just as nice as a natural one, and the wild life love them.

So what was he problem with Lake Pedder. While I think it may have
simply been a case in Brown’s thinking of a “Dam too far “”, officially it was because there was a tiny sandy beach which had formed and that would disappear as the water rose.

Now initially Browne supporters would have been few in number, just
fellow bushwalkers but events elsewhere changed all of that . World wide this was the time of the of the “”Hippy movement”, people who considered that the World owned them a living. But just as right now the Social security, i.e. the Dole, was not sufficient to cover the cost of such things as renting or worse buying a property.

Many moved to North Queensland, the tropics, and were happy at finding a beach not too far from a post office which they could use to collect their dole cheque. But a lot in Victoria, th Southern State, they moved to Tasmania and took up residence on Crown Land.

This was the time of the Hawke-Keating Labour Government, and Hawke knew that as Hippies always voted for whatever government would pay then for not working, so would always voted Labour. Thus he did not remove them from the Crown Land.

They cut down many trees and built some quite good houses,amd lived by their standards a good carefree life. So of course they were natural “Useful Idiaots”” just waiting for the likes of a Bob Brown to comer along.

The early Greens campaign about Lake Pedder failed, but the publicity from the Media encouraged Bob Brown and the next big event was about to happen. The Tasmanian Hydro got the go ahead from the Liberal (Conservative) government of Tasmania to commence the very big project of what became known as “The Gordon below Franklin”” scheme.

Now we had already had the giant sized Snowy Mountains scheme, plus the Victorian bit, the Kiewa scheme, both had been pre WW2 projects and it was with a largely ethnic work force, recent migrants , it was finally built.

It involved damming a previously wild and fast flowing river “”The Snowy” which headed to the East and into the sea, to be instead turned around to the West and via numerous Hydro electric turbines, finally into the inland river system of the Murray Darling , enabling vast irritation systems to be commenced.

Now while at the time it was considered to be a wonderful bit of engineering, later the Greens said that it was the death of the Snowy, a wild and natural river system. Just as of now the Greens wanted all things to stay the same, no progress.

So back to Tasmania in the 1980 tees, the Hippy time. The proposed Gordon below the Franklin rivers was a major undertaking, this was no small scale version of Lake Pedder, a far better comparison would be with the now completed Snowy scheme. ”The weather pattern over Australia is a West to East air movement, with a dip South in the winter and a rise to the North in the summer.

The high mountains to the wet of Tasmania collect all of this moisture, which then via the Gordon ends up in the sea. It was proposed to drill through the Mountains going East, then to Dam the Franklin and put all of its waters through the tulle to the East. On the way it would of course just as with the Snowy pass through many turbines and produce lots and lots of cheep electricity, so much that there would be the possibility ova a submarine cable, to export it to the State of Victoria to become a part of the Eastern States, plus South Australian grid system.

A added benefit would be irrigation of the central part of Tasmania, which while in comparison with the rest of Australia was well watered, was in fact a bit dry as it was in the “”Rain shadow”” of the Mountains to its West.

So lots of cheap electricity, the prospects of being the battery to mainland Australia , plus irrigation of the darkish centre of the Island. Whatever could possibly go wrong with such a good idea. . Now note, there was never any mention of Global warming plies CC all due to CO2, It was all about Tree hugging, back to nature semi Green types who liked things just the way it was, no changes needed, and certainly no mention about “”Saving the Planet”That all came later.
————————————————————————-

End of part one, Part two will cover how the Media changed everything, and that sniffing the Political breeze, of a darkening sky, PM Bob Hawke decided to use this matter as a election issue. He was facing defeat in his seat in Victoria, and needed a issue. But a big snag was that Tasmania was while he smallest State, it was still legally a State, thus the Federal Government could not tell them what to do., especially as it had a Liberal (Conservative) government.
How he got over that makes very interesting political history.

MJE VK5ELL

Hahaha, here we go again. You would need the brain of a sea sponge to think that Brown was being a nimby. It takes true integrity to put the welfare of the orange bellied parrot above ones lifetimes love of wind turbines.
And dont forget the yellow bellied skunk. And where did Turney plant all those kukri trees to offset his footprint when he proved that all the ice had melted in Antartica? Exacterly, STOP these particular wind turbines NOW

R e. my Part one and two on Bob Brown, I forgot to mention the big Media Event which really got the Green Ball rolling. The Dam workers turned up on the Gordon, and were met with a flotilla of small
“”Rubbie Duckies” boats. The Media had of course being told what was about to happen.

So the Greens tried to stop the worker, and the Police intervened.
fighting broke out and hundreds were arrested.

The Media was delighted and that was when it became a big election issue.

MJE VK5ELLi