marklynas.orgAustralia encourages oil drilling on Great Barrier Reef 28 June 04
Yes, you read it right. The bonkers Howard government, in addition to being in Bush-style denial about global warming, is actually expanding tax incentives to drilling companies who may wish to conduct oil exploration in the far reaches of the reef. A spill would of course devastate the coral, and emissions from the burned carbon will also, er, devastate the coral. Bleaching events are becoming ever-more frequent, as I discovered when I visited the Barrier Reef two years ago.
Comments
Vicki Falde
July 1st, 2004 at 02:48 AM
Anything the environment-policy-challenged Howard administration does would surprise me-
unless they were to get as active about saving the planet as Europe is! (yeah, right) With scientists estimating the Reef will be pretty much gone by mid-century, I guess they figure they’d better find another way to profit by it! It’s all about money and world economy, of course, not world preservation. Hope they spend trillions drilling and find NOTHING down there! The backlash might actually drive Howard and the conservatives out of power-pity about how high the cost must be before people wake up.Tara
July 15th, 2004 at 01:19 AM
I’m waiting for the moment in the future when an Australian government perversely uses the fact that the reef is being killed off by global warming to justify exploration for that diminishing and valuable resource oil.