Essay by Eric Worrall
If you want to understand how Australia got into its current mess, read the open letter quoted in this article.
Open Letter to Australia
OIL WARS THREATEN OUR SECURITY
Climate change deepen the danger
Australia’s dependence on fossil fuels is a critical economic and security vulnerability. Major confl icts in Ukraine and in the Middle East — including the Suez crisis, two Arab-Israeli wars, and the Iran-Iraq war — have all caused energy supply and economic shocks.
Today, Australia is particularly exposed. Our heavy reliance on imported oil, and gas prices now tied to global markets, mean higher costs for Australian households and businesses.
Any sustained closure of the Strait of Hormuz shipping route interrupts the global petrol and diesel supply, and the petrochemical feedstocks essential for fertiliser production, apparel manufacturing, copper and nickel mining, microchip production and much else. The consequences are rising food prices, higher transport costs and potentially severe economic disruption.
At the same time, climate change, driven by fossil fuel use and subsidies, is increasing instability and conflict.
Food shortages, water stress and extreme heat have already contributed to social breakdown across the Middle East and North Africa, including Syria and the Arab Spring. As global warming intensifies, competition for water, food and resources including oil will further increase the risks of insecurity and war. And the conflict themselves add to climate change with increased military and reconstruction emissions.
These risks are connected. Continuing fossil fuel dependence, let alone the government’s current support for expansion, intensifi es climate change, creating a growing threat to Australia’s economic and national security.
We call on the Australian Government to accelerate the transition to clean, domestic energy. Rapidly expanding renewable energy — including wind, solar, batteries, hydro and renewable fuels produced in Australia — and electrifying our transport system with home-grown energy will strengthen Australia’s security, reduce exposure to global energy shocks and help limit the escalating risks driven by climate change.
Protecting Australians by accelerating the renewable energy rollout is now a security priority.
Sincerely,
ADMIRAL CHRIS BARRIE AC
Former Chief, Australian Defence Force (Retd)AIR VICE-MARSHAL JOHN BLACKBURN AO
Deputy Chief, Royal Australian Air Force (Retd)COLONEL NEIL GREET
Colonel, Australian Army (Retd)CHERYL DURRANT
Former Director of Preparedness & Mobilisation,
Australian Department of DefenceMAJOR MICHAEL THOMAS
Australian Army (Retd)IAN DUNLOP
Former Chair of the Australian Coal AssociationJANE HOLLAWAY
Former Systems Analyst, Australian Department of DefenceLIEUTENANT COLONEL DECHLAN ELLIS
Australian Army (Retd)Authorised by the Australian Security Leaders Climate Group I aslcg.org
BRIGADIER MICHAEL BOND CSC & BAR
Australian Army (Retd)PROF. MATT MCDONALD
School of Political Science & International Studies,
University of QueenslandCOMMODORE DREW MCKINNIE
Royal Australian Navy (Retd)JASON LUGH BROWN FSYL
Former Senior Executive Service Defence & Attorney General’s DepartmentCAPTAIN PADDY HODGMAN
Royal Australian Navy (Retd)GROUP CAPTAIN ANNE BORZYCKI
Royal Australian Air Force (Retd)DR PETER LAYTON
Associate Fellow, Royal United Services InstituteMICHAEL COPAGE
Director CoTerran, Former Head of ASPI’s
Climate and Security Policy CentreDR ALBERT PALAZZO
Adjunct Professor UNSW Canberra & former
Director of War Studies in the Department of DefenceCOMMODORE VINCE DI PIETRO AM, CSC
Royal Australian Navy (Retd)ANASTASIA KAPETAS
Source: https://www.aslcg.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/ASLCG_OpenLetter.pdf
National Security Asset Strategist
Some of what is said in this letter I agree with. Australia is deeply vulnerable to geopolitical disruption to trade, because we are utterly dependent on imported energy.
But the proposed solution, transitioning to renewables, is not working and will never be feasible.
Take electric long haul trucks. Not battery powered toys, like the kind of cheap Chinese EVs climate activists drive, I’m talking about real freight transport.
Every attempt to introduce electric trucks has ultimately failed, for the simple reason that batteries are not energy dense enough to provide acceptable range, and recharge times kill the economics of long distance haulage.
California abandons diesel truck ban and 3 other clean-air rules before Trump is sworn in
BY ALEJANDRO LAZO JANUARY 14, 2025
IN SUMMARY
Because Trump is unlikely to approve them, California has no choice but to abandon its groundbreaking rules for zero-emission trucks and cleaner loco…
California has decided to abandon its groundbreaking regulations phasing out diesel trucks and requiring cleaner locomotives because the incoming Trump administration is unlikely to allow the state to implement them.
State officials have long considered the rules regulating diesel vehicles essential to cleaning up California’s severe air pollution and combating climate change.
…Trucking companies had already sued the state to stop the measure, saying electric and hydrogen big rigs are not practical for long-haul uses and that it would destroy the state’s economy.
“The California Trucking Association has consistently stated the Advanced Clean Fleets Rule was unachievable,” Eric Sauer, chief executive of the association, said in a statement. He said the industry would work with the state air board and EPA “to further reduce emissions in a technologically feasible and cost-effective manner. that preserves our State and the Nation’s critical supply chain.”
…
Read more: https://calmatters.org/environment/2025/01/trump-california-withdraws-diesel-clean-air-rules/
The Californian administration could have fought President Trump’s rollback, if there was support from the trucking industry. But the trucking industry fought the new rule, because they couldn’t see a viable path to operating a haulage business with electric trucks.
In my opinion, claiming the rules were repealed because of Trump was just an excuse to cancel rules which had already proven to be unworkable.
Farming is another area electric has failed to deliver. There is a Netherlands company, EOX Tractors, which is pushing autonomous electric farm machinery to Aussie farmers. But their 30KW engine is attached to a 150KWh battery, which only provides 5 hours of operation in perfect conditions, likely less in real world conditions. Though the marketing material suggests an additional battery pack can be attached. Good enough for a hobby farm, or perhaps a small plot size market garden near a major city, and possibly useful in the kind of small, highly subsidised and heavily regulated farms the Netherlands currently operates, but its difficult to see how such machines could deliver value in Australian conditions.
The tractors used on large Australian farms top out at >600KW, and need to be used well over 12 hours per day during work intensive periods, such as emergency harvesting after an unexpected weather event threatens to destroy the crop value, and the entire field turns into a muddy bog. There would not be a lot of solar power to recharge the batteries, when the sky blackens and heavy rainfall threatens to drown the crops.
Aussie Miners are experimenting with electric, and this is one of the few areas where electric vehicles might work in some cases. Because of the high cost of transporting fuel to remote locations, and the high value of some ores, some mining companies would be able to afford as many lithium battery packs and solar panels as were required to keep their equipment running 24×7. But time will tell whether battery powered equipment prevails in the mining industry.
The solution Australia needs to implement is to copy President Trump’s domestic energy agenda, to secure Australian domestic fossil fuel supplies and manufacturing industry, to insulate us from geopolitical shocks. Even if there isn’t enough oil, which I doubt, converting coal, gas and heavy tars into gasoline and diesel is child’s play in modern refineries. China operates substantial synthetic coal to fuel plants, using syngas indirect conversion.
My point is the renewable transition isn’t working, and aside from a few specialised sectors, cannot be made to work with any foreseeable technology. But so long as influential Australian establishment leaders like the climate zealots who signed the open letter keep pushing impossible solutions like net zero, using their substantial political influence to paralyse efforts to correct our energy failures, Australia will continue to be stuck in energy limbo, and will continue to be vulnerable to supply shocks and external energy crisis.
“Renewables” will not work, period.
Aussie security “experts” are either clueless idiots or lying propagandists.
You would have a hard time convincing me that they cannot be both.
What if we Australians, instead of listening to this nonsense, instead exploited our petroleum and gas resources, for our own benefit? Our need for fuel imports would be greatly reduced, saving us billions of dollars annually. We wouldn’t need so many wind turbines and solar panels, and could instead produce locally many products which we now import. And our negligible impact on the world’s climate could be ignored!
Well?
I’m sorry, but I don’t understand your reply. Also, I left out exploiting our coal and uranium resources, which we flog off to the rest of the world, without using them ourselves! This is like shooting ourselves in the feet with howitzers!
Definitely clueless idiots. They are all seriously infected.
There are wasps that infect ants to manipulate the ants behaviour.
Do you think climate activists have their own insect? could explain a lot.
🤣
bats in the belfry and a bug up their A** sums em up
Completely untrue. Switching to renewables almost certainly means switching to CCP infrastructure which means Bejing holding the reins of Australia’s power. Similarly, switching from ICEVs to EVs – mostly produced by CCP China, means Australians voluntarily bugging and tracking themselves, with this data uploaded to the CCP.
It’s a great move if you want to turn Australia into a CCP satrapy, but if you want a strong independent Australia …
Eric, you’re ruining my fantasy that all Australians are upbeat and attractive. If you need to post photos like the one at the head of this piece, please consider adding a few shots from, say, a local beach or playing field for balance.
Only the ”elite” and lots of useful idiots. About 50% of the population in other words.
Challenge accepted :-).
thanks…now I need eyebleach!
That sounds reasonable for uninformed people. But what they are pitching is unproven, expensive grid solutions while exporting fossil fuels, metals, and other raw materials to faster growing economies. That’s what happens when lobbyists fully control the politicos.
Those clowns reek of sanctimoniousness. Every one of them could probably afford after their grifting to live in Monaco or a Gold Coast someplace. They don’t really need a country.
So, I take the link to the open letter, and I see the sub-title is “Climate change deepen the danger.” Now, Aussies aren’t the best grammarians in the world, but even they must see that there’s a missing “s.” This is a joke.
Yes, indeed a joke, but in China, North Korea, Cuba, etc., the signatory would be disappear and quick. No funny.
Yep, and that “s” could go either on ‘change’ or on ‘deepens’.
And King Canute demanded the tide stop. Some things are still impossible.
Feynman: “Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts”. This probably does not apply to “military science”.
or the oxymoron – “military intelligence”
But Canute was using that as an example of the limits to his power as king. Those folks apparently do not realize that.
Transition? There is no transition. Addition only and that’s a fools game. Add all you want and reliable backup is still needed unless you don’t want 24X7X365 energy.
All economies require raw materials, labor, power and investment to succeed in delivering any product.
When you cripple efficiency for any of them for whatever reason, you cripple the economy.
Fact of life.
You can’t dance while standing on your head, so why would you try?
Approaching the climax of the US-Israel war against Shiite fanatics ruling Iran.
Venezuelan compares to Kharg Island. Just as the Cuban house of cards collapsed with the US capture of the Venezuelan oil fields so too China’s house of cards will collapse after US marines capture and occupy Kharg Island. Kharg Island, Iran’s primary oil export terminal, critical for the country’s economy. It handles a significant portion of Iran’s oil exports, making it central to both domestic revenue and international trade partnerships. Approximately 90% of the oil refined and sold by Iran is exported to China through Kharg Island.
This relationship underscores China’s role as a major player in the Iranian oil market, providing Iran with a vital economic lifeline amid sanctions and trade restrictions imposed by the West. Just as Communist Castro Cuba will most likely become a US protectorate territory like Puerto Rico. In similar fashion should US Marines capture Kharg Island, this will terminate the US/Israeli War against Iran.
Iranians themselves must choose their own government. But loss of Kharg Island will cripple the Iranian economy like as Cubans experienced when Us Troops captured the President Maduro of Venezuela in one day. The collapse of Venezuela’s anti-US government directly impacted the economy of Cuba. Just as the collapse of the Shiite fanatic government of Iran will directly impact the economy of China.
It should be noted that the Kharg Island terminal was developed by Amoco in the 1960’s and seized by Iran’s revolutionary guard in 1979. Amoco did receive some compensation for it in a 1990 settlement.
Interesting times.
IMHO, the obvious overall US/Israel war-plan is to bomb Iran back into a economic/cultural status equivalent to the mid-1800’s. That is, allow it to have the post-war, residual infrastructure needed to feed the population and provide the basic minimums for populace sanitation, health care, transportation, electrification, transportation, and communication . . . but to otherwise eliminate Iran’s internal capability to manufacture anything like ballistic missiles, advance electronics, and nuclear weapons for at least the next 20 years. A keep part of this strategy will be eliminating Iran’s capability to export oil that it can sell on the international markets to get the funds for its rebuilding post-war (reference recent Kharg Island attacks).
In such a case, it will matter little if the post-war “leadership” in Iran is religious-dominant or military-dominant. They will become a “basket case” among nations.
Sure, Iran will consider getting “aid” from China and Russia in terms of military arms, but without income to pay for such, the largess from those corrupt nations probably won’t last all that long, especially if the USA and Israel take actions to end such long-term “assistance” to Iran.
I have to believe that the market for Russian, and especially Chinese military hardware has now been greatly diminished. Anyway, I never liked those mullahs.
Whether it be mullahs or ayatollahs, the religious “leadership” in Iran is still forced to accommodate the Iran military infrastructure to have any semblance of being “in control” of the country.
Obviously, those “religious” leaders have no problem with Iran, as a nation, devolvolvimg to a less-than-third-world national status.
So sad . . . but that’s what you get when putting religious ideology ahead of practical living in a modern, civilized world.
They must surely understand just how vulnerable they are to the USAF. Kharg Island is like a fusible plug for the Iranian economy.
Re: “to bomb Iran back into a economic/cultural status equivalent to the mid-1800’s”
What is your estimate for Iran’s economic/cultural status in 2024?
Thank you for asking.
Answer: since Iran possesses tactical ballistic missiles and is currently using such, the ability to refine nuclear material, and the ability to produce and export large quantities of oil, I would have placed them pre-current-war as being a “first-world nation” economically.
As to rating them on a cultural basis, I dare not go there.
There are factors that Make China different than Cuba.
Why are they so worried about a fossil crisis when they’ve got enough coal and uranium to last for an eternity.
They have recently refused to use coal and have for decades refused to use nuclear power. I’d say let them eat cake but I do not know where that would come from with no farming.
Tony Seba and others are promoting synthetic food.
https://tonyseba.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/RethinkXFoodandAgricultureReport.pdf
The same Tony Seba who predicted that by 2026 there would be no production of petrol vehicles? Not a convincing track record. I thought these idiots learned their lesson about making falsifiable predictions.
How can so many high ranking people be so ignorant of technical facts. Australia refuses nuclear power and now they refuse fossil power as well. There is nothing left but wood, in the few places on that large continent where wood grows, for a while.
Now that I am quite old I am confident of something I only suspected when I was younger. People who gain high rank often advance for no better reason than already being highly ranked. They are like those people who are famous for nothing but being famous.
So true.
Sounds like the “Peter Principle” in action.
It’s very fortunate that Australia does not have a border in common with a narco state.
Tell me how you expect to renewable your way out of that. If you can’t then anything else you say is unlikely to be very clever.
an Accelerated Renewable Transition
Is not a great idea….
Britain is a ‘sitting duck’ in the face of drone attacks because Ed Miliband’s wind farms interfere with radar-based defensive domes, senior defence sources have claimed.
Part of the reason for the Government’s hesitation is said to be such a defence system would require the scaling back of Mr Miliband’s wind farm programme, which a source suggested ‘presents a major obstacle for anti-missile systems because of the impact they have on the radar needed to guide them’.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15646693/ed-milibands-wind-farms-cripple-uk-iron-dome-systems.html
Yet another green negative on top of all the others.
Awful lot of “retired” and “former” in that list of signatories. Good thing they are no longer on the playing field.
Yes, that would be reason for everyone to “be afraid, be very afraid”.
(even more so than we have reason to already be 🙁 )
Follow the money. More likely than not, each one of these former military is still on the playing field as a paid consultant to the Australian government. Which means they either tow the current regime’s climate line or they don’t get to keep their post-retirement consulting jobs.
I think that you meant to type “toe the current regime’s climate line.”
So, nobody on this group has ever held a results-accountable job in any real-world capacity?
I see.
I guess that makes them all highly qualified to chime in on how Australia’s national energy needs, both industrial and domestic, should be satisfied.
Good grief! I am gobsmacked by the overall ignorance of those that signed the “Open Letter to Australia” that is referenced in the above article. In particular, I take note of this claim: “Our heavy reliance on imported oil, and gas prices now tied to global markets, mean higher costs for Australian households and businesses.”
To wit:
The USA is a current net exporter of oil, a status it has maintained since 2020. Yet, it is still suffering the same prices increases from the escalating price-per-barrel of oil, because crude oil is commonly known to be a fungible, international commodity. In the USA we suffer the same price increases that are imposed on net-oil-importing countries.
Australia: don’t expect that your status vis-a-vis having to import oil gives you any special status or cause for sympathy in today’s current world events.
As for the sophomoric statement that “At the same time, climate change, driven by fossil fuel use and subsidies, is increasing instability and conflict”, please provide one—just one will suffice—credible scientific paper or report that documents such.
Perhaps not surprising, gasoline and diesel are less expensive even now in several red U.S. states than prices were in Australian before the Iran war began.
It is the existence of too many government parasites that ruin affordability for the average productive citizen.
The economy is jam-packed with non-governmental parasites as well.
More mindless drivel from bootlickers on the government payroll.
No wonder Australian defence capabilities have gone down the gurgler with senior defence and security personnel waging a war on climate instead of addressing real threats.
Australia’s energy dependency is UN imposed. The three UN stooges Sleezy, Blackout and Wrong have made the dependency worse with Australia spending hundreds of billions on useless bird mincers and next to useless solar panels and batteries rather than building coal fired generators and exploring to extend oil and gas reserves.
It is beyond moronic for defence officials to be pushing for wind and solar. How are all the wind and solar powered aircraft doping in the current US-Iran conflict. Or Russian Ukraine conflict.
The UN stooges in Australia have been very effective in government corridors at both State and Federal level.
Vote One nation to regain sovereignty and kick out all the UN globalist stooges.
I have been voting One Nation and will continue to do so. F**k the lot of them.
I’ve not heard that Australia has tons of fresh water to waste on routine solar panel cleaning. How will the vast solar farms keep up with the demand if they’re not running at peak efficiency?
Our heavy reliance on imported
oil, and gas pricesChinese wind generators and solar panels now tied toglobal marketsthe whims of the CCP who use trade as a blackmail tool, mean higher costs for Australian households and businesses. – Fixed itAustralia has become a net importer of many everyday items, primarily from China.
Should the Taiwan situation devolve into a full-on conflict, there will not be much export to Oz from the CCP that our current federal government like to kow-tow to (“Chinese Premier Li Qiang referred to him [Albanese] as a “handsome boy”).
We call on the Australian Government to accelerate the transition to
clean, domestic energyeconomic, environmental and social disaster.
Admiral Barrie was a valued member of the ADF for many years. I don’t know how to say this in any other way, but I notice that he has had this obsession with NetZero for a long time.
Australia has huge uranium reserves. It’s also surrounded by ocean from which uranium could be economically extracted, providing a limitless supply. So, greenies, build nuclear power plants. You don’t have any. It’s the only way to have grid-scale, reliable electricity to power all those electric cars that will be needed to reduce your dependence on foreign oil. If you’re actually serious about it. Because increasing electricity generation from intermittent solar and wind isn’t a viable solution. It’s okay for supplementary power, but it can’t replace your coal and natural gas plants. Nuclear power is your only, clean, green, reliable option.
If these retired military people are so convinced that wind and solar are the solution to Australia’s immediate energy security needs, they should be advocating that the government declare a national energy security emergency.
The government should immediately nationalize the power grid; it should institute a government-funded crash program to achieve 90% wind and solar generation by 2035; and it should institute a nationwide system of gasoline and diesel rationing.
If these retired Australian military aren’t doing this, then for whatever reasons they might have, they are just talking the government climate line in order to keep favor with the current regime.