Take care of the planet, but let’s not neglect ourselves

Many Australians have just experienced an unusually hot and dry summer, this much is true.

Although the blisteringly hot weather is over, the garden is parched, and in our area at least, rain is needed. Many Australians have just experienced an unusually hot and dry summer, this much is true.

According to an ABC news report detailing Bureau of Meteorology data, last January was our hottest ever month on record, apparently, going all the way back to 1910. This followed the hottest December on record too.

At the same time, for large areas of the country — excluding north Queensland — there was less than 20 per cent of the normal rainfall.

In South Australia, for the first time since 1957, the BOM recorded zero rainfall for the month in the Adelaide CBD, and in recent weeks, bushfires raged across dry Victoria. Indeed, the smoke haze is still with us, settled in like a dinner party guest who just won’t leave.

“Are you weather obsessed?” asks the ABC website. If so, they run a Facebook page for people who find themselves with nothing to do but obsess over weather.

There, you can absorb statistics to your heart’s content. You can terrify yourself and others with doomsday predictions of climate hell. When considering the suffering imminent though, one must have a scapegoat, someone to blame.

What does the weather have to do with Coal Mining? Absolutely nothing, extremely little, or absolutely everything, depending on who you ask.

Ask all the little schoolchildren who just went “on strike” for a day about coal mining, and its importance to this country. Then, when you want a grown-up view of the world, have a look at the data and be grateful. Be bloody grateful. Without coal, we would be in serious strife.

There is a noisy cohort out there, of keyboard activists, the type of people who love to demonise coal. In their eyes, the mining of coal is destroying the planet, and it must be immediately stopped — in this country at least — at all costs.

Adani must be stopped because if it goes ahead, then next summer will absolutely be hotter and drier, and this will continue until very soon we will all combust in a spontaneous, fiery Armageddon.

We are all familiar with these types, surely. In Melbourne, they inhabit the inner city, in high-density suburbs like North Melbourne, and Fitzroy. Here, barely a tree or a blade of grass lives well, but naff, idiotic signs saying things like “I love forests” are plastered on graffiti-covered concrete walls. I love forests too — this is what I think when I see them. In fact, I love forests so much I live in one; yet I support the mining of coal, of course I do, how could I not? So much we have depends on it.

The topic of coal attracts political opinion like moths to a flame. If you are a left winger, you must hate coal. Those on the right must love it. This is all so ignorant, bizarre and destructive. Such ideology is the enemy of the average person — the vast majority simply want to live in a society that functions, where life is reasonable, good jobs are available, and where on hot days, the air conditioning can be turned on, without guilt.

Sure, let’s be kind to the planet, let’s explore new forms of energy, and plan for change. But all this while, let’s not cut our own throats.

In 2018, the industry provided around 50,000 jobs, and another 120,000 indirect jobs resulted.

Mining jobs are well paid; these are hardly the minimum-wage “junk jobs” the union movement loves to complain about.

Then there is the money for the rest of us; great big buckets of money tipping into public coffers. For all workers not employed directly or indirectly by mining — your next tax cut? This will come to you by courtesy of coal.

In 2018 we exported coal worth $22.6 billion, and (steelmaking) coal worth $37.8bn. The Australian coal industry paid more than $5bn in royalties in 2017-18, including $3.7bn in Queensland, $1.7bn in NSW and $70 million in Victoria.

Love it, hate it, or be agnostic if you wish, but at least be aware: the economy continues to rely on coal as a source of income, as well as affordable, reliable electricity.

And the summer just ending, the one that doesn’t want to end? During that summer, according to the Australian Energy Market Operator, coal-fired power generation kept households and businesses running.

AEMO noted “the NEM coal generation fleet recorded its fourth-highest summer availability for the past 10 years” and that over the most recent summer, coal-fired power generation produced more than 76 per cent of large-scale power generation in the National Electricity Market, with the next highest being gas at just under 10 per cent.

Coal’s dominance as a reliable source of energy over summer was even clearer in NSW, where 89 per cent of power came from coal. In Queensland it was 85 per cent and Victoria 82 per cent.

Globally, Australian coal is in demand for both energy and steel-making. Its high-energy, low-ash characteristics ideally match the requirements for the HELE coal-fired power plants being built throughout Asia, while our high-grade metallurgical coals are among the best in the world for modern steel-making.

Australian coal can also reduce emissions when compared to lower-quality coal from other exporters. Supplier reliability, proximity to key markets and good infrastructure availability puts Australia in a strong position to take advantage of growing demand from existing customers such as Japan, China, Taiwan and Korea, as well as newer buyers such as Vietnam, the Philippines and Thailand.

The truth is, coal mining in Australia is a sophisticated and hi-tech activity. More sophisticated than the mentally stunted political activists who oppose it.

Continuous improvements in mining technology, occupational health and safety and environmental performance have ensured that Australia is an efficient and reliable producer of high-quality thermal and metallurgical coals for the international market.

If only the average Australian was as highly regarded as our coal, the reputation of our nation would be much enhanced.