Camorra in Naples

[Greg Boyles]

Is anyone from Australia and did you watch the Four Corners report in the Comorra of Naples?

 

It seems that the Italian government went on grandiose crusade of urban renewal, creating high rise appartment complexes that were supposed to house Italy's growing population and create vibrant high density communities.

 

But it appears they have all become degraded high rise slums where the outcastes of Italian society are warehoused and that are the head quateres of all the Comorra familes.

 

Does the former Italian vision sound familiar to anyone from the Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane?

[JohnB]

I didn't see the show. (Haven't really watched TV in years now)

 

But yes, it sounds very familiar. Can anything more clearly demonstrate that governments and their "Expert advisors" have very little idea of what the population need and want in their communities?

 

It's like Gillards "building program". Some schools are short on AV equipment, textbooks, pens and paper, but they have a shiny new hall. (That cost 3 times what it should have.)

[Greg Boyles]

I didn't see the show. (Haven't really watched TV in years now)

 

But yes, it sounds very familiar. Can anything more clearly demonstrate that governments and their "Expert advisors" have very little idea of what the population need and want in their communities?

 

It's like Gillards "building program". Some schools are short on AV equipment, textbooks, pens and paper, but they have a shiny new hall. (That cost 3 times what it should have.)

 

 

Oh let us not pretend that Gillard is any better than Abbott on this. Both of them, or at least the parties they represent, are equally gung ho for endless population growth to supply big business with slave labour and clients.

 

Nor are the greens any better - they see limitless humanitarian immigration as adding to our culture.

Edited August 9, 2011 by Greg Boyles

[JohnB]

Gillard is the PM not Abbott, so what's your point?

 

Besides, this land can support many more than we have. We exported over 200,000 tonnes of beef and veal last year. We export Thor only knows how many million tonnes of grain, we even export half our milk production. (That was a surprise)

 

We have masses of land and enough uranium to power us until the sun goes red. And if we built dams rather than letting it run out to sea, we would have heaps of water. We are in danger is not being able to support ourselves or a larger population.

[Greg Boyles]

Gillard is the PM not Abbott, so what's your point?

 

Besides, this land can support many more than we have. We exported over 200,000 tonnes of beef and veal last year. We export Thor only knows how many million tonnes of grain, we even export half our milk production. (That was a surprise)

Well I disagree with you on that. That 200,000 tonnes of beef comes at considerable environmental cost on this ecologically fragile continent - dry land salinity, weed infestation, biodiverity loss,.....

 

Compared to other countries of a similar size but geologically younger and more fertile, our grain production is very low. And it is only possible through massive use of fertiliser that is expected to decline due to peak oil.

 

And if we do expand our population so that all our surplus food is consumed locally, what about those third world countries that are critically dependant on our food exports????

 

We have masses of land and enough uranium to power us until the sun goes red. And if we built dams rather than letting it run out to sea, we would have heaps of water. We are in danger is not being able to support ourselves or a larger population.

 

If the river are prevented from running out to see then you will reduce or eliminate our already meagre fisheries. They are dependant on the nutrients that rivers dump into the ocean.

 

Nothing personal , but clearly you are not all that ecologically literate and have not properly thought your position through.

[JohnB]

And if we do expand our population so that all our surplus food is consumed locally, what about those third world countries that are critically dependant on our food exports????

 

You mean like America, Europe and Russia? We export something like 80% of our grain harvest so to consume all our grain we would need a population of 100 million or so. It ain't going to happen. 40 million maybe, sometime, perhaps, but that is about it. It's not going to happen soon anyway.

 

If the river are prevented from running out to see then you will reduce or eliminate our already meagre fisheries. They are dependant on the nutrients that rivers dump into the ocean.

 

Meagre fisheries? 240,000 tonnes per year is meagre? http://adl.brs.gov.au/data/warehouse/pe_abare99014411/ii_aust_fisheries.pdf I wouldn't call that meagre at all. Similarly many of our fishing areas are quite some distance from the coast, it is highly unlikely that any nutrients from rivers make it that far out. (At least in sufficient quantities to have a meaningful effect)

 

Compared to other countries of a similar size but geologically younger and more fertile, our grain production is very low.

 

I wouldn't say "very low", especially for such a dry country. Ausgrain puts the yield as varying, but with most states running at 2 tonnes/hectare, Tasmania is higher running at around 4 depending on weather. This means an average of about 30 bushels/acre as the yanks measure it, going up to 60 for Tassie. US wheat production is around 42 bushels/acre. So we are less than the US, but in no way can it be called "very low".

 

Nothing personal , but clearly you are not all that ecologically literate and have not properly thought your position through.

 

If you mean that I don't believe every unfounded view espoused to me, I guess I am. The thing that you ar forgetting is that dams don't stop the water flowing to the ocean, they simply divert it through the towns and cities first, it still finishes up in the oceans. In the process, all the nasty pesticides, etc are removed from the water before it gets to the sea. The thing is that ideologically based assertions require neither an indepth knowledge of a field, nor deep thought to refute.

[Greg Boyles]

You mean like America, Europe and Russia? We export something like 80% of our grain harvest so to consume all our grain we would need a population of 100 million or so. It ain't going to happen. 40 million maybe, sometime, perhaps, but that is about it. It's not going to happen soon anyway.

 

Australia also exports a significant amount of grain to third world countries. And with the global population expected to peak at at least 9 billion, third world countries are going to be even more dependant on any surplus that we can produce.

 

Meagre fisheries? 240,000 tonnes per year is meagre? http://adl.brs.gov.a...t_fisheries.pdf I wouldn't call that meagre at all. Similarly many of our fishing areas are quite some distance from the coast, it is highly unlikely that any nutrients from rivers make it that far out. (At least in sufficient quantities to have a meaningful effect)

By world standards our coastal fisheries are meagre and that is primarily due to our low rainfall, scant run off from our rivers and low nutrient levels in our soils that results in low nutrient levels in that run-off.

 

I wouldn't say "very low", especially for such a dry country. Ausgrain puts the yield as varying, but with most states running at 2 tonnes/hectare, Tasmania is higher running at around 4 depending on weather. This means an average of about 30 bushels/acre as the yanks measure it, going up to 60 for Tassie. US wheat production is around 42 bushels/acre. So we are less than the US, but in no way can it be called "very low".

 

And as I said that production is only possible due to the heavy use of unsustainable fertilisers and it cannot and will not be sustained indefinitely. Sooner or later fertilisers will run out due to peak oil and farmers will not be able to sustain those sorts of yields based on the natural productivity of our soils. Regular droughts bankrupt many farmer and they are expected to grow longer and more frequent due to global warming.

 

 

If you mean that I don't believe every unfounded view espoused to me, I guess I am.

 

It is not an unfounded view John. It is a view expressed by Tim Flannery and many other respected environmental scientists in Australia.

 

The thing that you ar forgetting is that dams don't stop the water flowing to the ocean, they simply divert it through the towns and cities first, it still finishes up in the oceans. In the process, all the nasty pesticides, etc are removed from the water before it gets to the sea. The thing is that ideologically based assertions require neither an indepth knowledge of a field, nor deep thought to refute.

Rubbish! That defies common sense. The fertiliser and pesticide load in the water clearly increases as it it gets closer to the sea, due to multiple users of the water eaching adding their bit to the water they use that then returns to the river, and this has been demonstrated by many scientists on many occassions.

 

Salinity of river water demonstrably increases as the river gets closer to the sea. Or is your contention that the salination problems in the Murray River, due to irrigation schemes, is all a fallacy?

[JohnB]

Australia also exports a significant amount of grain to third world countries. And with the global population expected to peak at at least 9 billion, third world countries are going to be even more dependant on any surplus that we can produce.

 

Well here's an idea. Let's help them to improve their economies and agriculture and they won't be as dependent on our grain.

 

By world standards our coastal fisheries are meagre and that is primarily due to our low rainfall, scant run off from our rivers and low nutrient levels in our soils that results in low nutrient levels in that run-off.

 

Part right at best, if you delete the word "primarily". There are three reasons that Australian fishing grounds are less productive. One reason is the lower nutrients in the run off, another is the lack of any decent upwelling and the third are the main east and west coast currents which bring the nutrient poor waters from the tropics down south. (DAFF) Now since the 5% of the oceans that have decent upwellings provide 25% of the worlds annual catch, it would appear that these are far more important than anything else. About the best that can be said is "If you don't have an upwelling, and your coasts are fed by nutrient poor currents, then you'd better hope for good run off."

 

We do what we can with what we have, aiming for economic profitability and sustainability. (And we export a lot of fish as well.) I'll certainly grant that in the future one of our big problems could be preventing others who have overfished and destroyed their own fisheries from pillaging ours. That battle has already started in the northern waters.

 

And as I said that production is only possible due to the heavy use of unsustainable fertilisers and it cannot and will not be sustained indefinitely. Sooner or later fertilisers will run out due to peak oil and farmers will not be able to sustain those sorts of yields based on the natural productivity of our soils. Regular droughts bankrupt many farmer and they are expected to grow longer and more frequent due to global warming.

 

You are ignoring the improved yields and drought resistence of the GM modified grains. Whether this will be enough is still up for argument I would guess, but the factor is there. And expected by who? CSIRO? Their last long range forecast got the south of Perth right, the predictions for the rest of the country were wrong. But we get warnings of more drought and more rain, gotta love people that take a bet each way. Do people have no memory? Back in the 70s we had kids running inside screaming because they had never seen water fall from the sky. 6 and 7 year olds who had never seen rain.

 

But let's try a bit of logic. If an increase in temps is going to lead to more "extreme" weather events, then presumably the .8 degrees that we've had would have led to an increase in those events. Has there been an increase? No. Through the media we tend to notice extreme events more and due to people building on floodplains or coastal areas where cyclones tend to cross the coast the damage bill goes up, but extreme events aren't more common. How about a nice logical reason why temp rise will cause more extreme events in the future when it hasn't in the past.

No upward trends in the occurrence of extreme floods in central Europe.

TRENDS IN EXTREME DAILY RAINFALL AND TEMPERATURE IN SOUTHEAST ASIA AND THE SOUTH PACIFIC: 19611998.

Long-Term Trends in Extreme Precipitation Events over the Conterminous United States and Canada.

 

On a regional scale you would perhaps agree that a cyclone is an "extreme weather event"? In another thread I counted the cyclones in the Australian region as listed by the BOM.

 

The figures for annual cyclones in the Australian region are;

1970:1

1971:4

1972:4

1973:15

1974:13

1975:10

1976:16

1977:13

1978:8

1979:13

1980:19

1981:12

1982:12

1983:14

1984:17

1985:14

1986:14

1987:7

1988:6

1989:13

1990:13

1991:9

1992:10

1993:8

1994:11

1995:9

1996:16

1997:10

1998:11

1999:11

2000:11

2001:9

2002:8

2003:9

2004:10

2005:10

2006:11

2007:9

2008:8

2009:9

2010:9

 

The period 1976-1986 only had one year with less than 12 cyclones yet since 1991 there has only been one year with more than 12. Cyclones are decreasing in our little corner of the planet.

 

It is not an unfounded view John. It is a view expressed by Tim Flannery and many other respected environmental scientists in Australia.

 

Tim Flannery? Tim the "Sydney is going to run out of water" and "droughts may become permanent" Flannery? Tim the "Perth may become the first ghost town of the 21st Century" Flannery? Tim the "Brisbane and Melbourne both urgently require desal plants" Flannery? (The Brisbane one being in mothballs and the Melbourne one unfinished due to prolonged rain.) Tim the "sea level rise could cover an 8 story building, but I'm buying a beachfront property" Flannery? Tim the "There are islands in the Torres Strait that are already being evacuated and are feeling the impacts" Flannery? (Funny how nobody can actually find an island being evacuated, isn't it?)

 

How can someone whose every prediction and warning has been wrong possibly be called "respected"? How many times does he have to be wrong before people realise he's full of it? I'm sure his change of support from nuclear to geothermal has absolutely nothing to do with his being a paid consultant to a geothermal company that he not only has shares in but has already recieved some $90 million in government funding. Does nobody understand the concept of "Conflict of Interest"? The guy who is advising the government on who should get grants has shares in a company that has already recieved money and is expected to get even more, and this isn't at all fishy?

 

Rubbish! That defies common sense. The fertiliser and pesticide load in the water clearly increases as it it gets closer to the sea, due to multiple users of the water eaching adding their bit to the water they use that then returns to the river, and this has been demonstrated by many scientists on many occassions.

 

Salinity of river water demonstrably increases as the river gets closer to the sea. Or is your contention that the salination problems in the Murray River, due to irrigation schemes, is all a fallacy?

 

It doesn't defy common sense. When water is dammed and diverted for drinking, the pesticides, etc are filtered out, hence the water coming out of the town system is lower in those things than the "normal" river water. Think of it this way. Let's say the "normal" amount of those pollutants was 10ppm. If we divert half the water for drinking then the pollutants in that water are removed. When the towns wastewater is released back into the system it will dilute the pollutants remaining in the river. I have 10 litres of water at 10ppm, I then take 5 litres and remove the pollutants, I then pour the clean water back into the original container. The resulting concentration is 5 ppm.

 

Note I'm talking about towns and not farms, concerning farms what you say is correct.

 

Regarding salinity in the Murray-Darling we have a two part problem. Land use change is causing a rise in salinity, but it's not magic. The salt was already there as the Murray-Darling Basin is an old sea bottom, the land is simply full of salt.

 

(As an aside I spent quite some time in Mildura as a kid. Back then they were using a straight "pour the water between the vine rows" irrigation. I was amazed that even after 100 years of this sort of irrigation there was salt crusted between the grape vines every time they watered. It was like a thin crusting of white ice, you could actually pick it up.)

 

So the Murray is a true "Catch 22" situation. If we keep the dams and weirs we increase the salinity and will have to fight it. Recent programs show we aren't doing too bad and salinity is decreasing in the region. The problem is almost certainly going to get worse in the future. However, without the dams and weirs, there won't be a river.

 

This is the Murray with dams and weirs at Ravenswood in 2010 before the drought broke.

 

This is the Murray without dams and weirs at Ravenswood in 1915 before the drought broke.

 

(I've always wondered, where do the Murray Cod go when the river dries up? I mean it's a fresh water, not salt water fish, so they can't go into the ocean and a couple of pools and billabongs wouldn't hold enough for thier numbers to replentish as quickly as they do. How the hell did they survive?)

 

Obviously we need to find some sort of happy medium. Something that allows for the fullest use of the land consistent with the best health of the river. And carefully noting that the "natural" state is decidedly not a river in good health.

Edited August 10, 2011 by JohnB

[Greg Boyles]

John it is far to early to say that climate change is definitely increasing the number of sever weather events and its is similarly far to early for you to conclude that climate change is having no effect at all.

 

And as for town use of water reducing pollutants........

 

 

What about the paint residues, detergents, heavy metals, dioxins,....... that are added to the tap water before it runs into the sewerage system and then back into the river system further down stream?????????

 

What about the excess fertiliser and animal manure that gets added to the mains water that then runs back into the rivers?

 

Septic tanks?

 

Forgotten about all those have you?

 

Not all towns, citiies and regions have or can afford first class sewerage treatment systems. Many just do the primary treatment and then dump it in the local water ways..

 

And I believe that Sydney, or was it Brisbane, came very close to running out of water but was saved at the eleventh hour when the drought broke. A near miss is not evidence of incompetence John. Merely evidence of luck on the part of those who where the subject of the prediction.

Edited August 10, 2011 by Greg Boyles

[JohnB]

Greg, we did come close, sort of. The dams were down to 19% or thereabouts.

 

Why do you think that was? Because of the drought? Or because the population went from 2 million to 4 million people and we didn't build any more dams for drinking water? Taking a problem caused by lack of infrastructure planning as evidence for climate change is a pretty poor showing.

 

If the dams that were planned had actully been built, then there wouldn't have been a problem, the floods earlier this year would have been less too.

 

Note that the operators of Wivenhoe relied on the "no further rainfall" models of the Flannery camp and failed to release water from the dam as the operators manual required. This led to too much water being held and the emergency release that raised the level of the Ipswich and Brisbane floods.

 

A near miss is not evidence of incompetence John.

 

No, but following the advice and having a disaster ensue is.

[Greg Boyles]

Greg, we did come close, sort of. The dams were down to 19% or thereabouts.

 

Why do you think that was? Because of the drought? Or because the population went from 2 million to 4 million people and we didn't build any more dams for drinking water? Taking a problem caused by lack of infrastructure planning as evidence for climate change is a pretty poor showing.

 

If the dams that were planned had actully been built, then there wouldn't have been a problem, the floods earlier this year would have been less too.

 

Note that the operators of Wivenhoe relied on the "no further rainfall" models of the Flannery camp and failed to release water from the dam as the operators manual required. This led to too much water being held and the emergency release that raised the level of the Ipswich and Brisbane floods.

 

 

 

No, but following the advice and having a disaster ensue is.

 

 

OK so the QLD government builds another 10 dams and the QLD population continues to grow.

 

At some point QLD will again run out of fresh water for its population.

 

What then JohnB?

 

Build another 10 dams, and then another 10 and then 10 desalination plants??????

 

At what point do you propose that it end and that we stabilise the QLD population?

[JohnB]

I'm willing to let the population stabilise at the level it stabilises at.

 

You're the one that keeps going on about limits. What figure do you think? Rather than some vague hand waving about "sustainability" or that population might become "unsustainable" at some obscure point in the future, how about you put some figures up?

 

(It would help if you could provide some sort of reliable proof as to why the figure is correct.)

 

The 4 million we have is quite sustainable, but presumably 10 billion would not be. What is your limit and why?

[Greg Boyles]

I'm willing to let the population stabilise at the level it stabilises at.

 

You're the one that keeps going on about limits. What figure do you think? Rather than some vague hand waving about "sustainability" or that population might become "unsustainable" at some obscure point in the future, how about you put some figures up?

 

(It would help if you could provide some sort of reliable proof as to why the figure is correct.)

 

The 4 million we have is quite sustainable, but presumably 10 billion would not be. What is your limit and why?

 

 

The population will NOT stabilise so long as you keep providing additional water. That is nature of all animal species - they will ALWAYS expand their population to take up available resources. And then they crash when those resources fall below levels necessary to sustain that population.

 

Human beings collectively as a species are like all other animal species - they have little or no awareness of long term future and do npt plan their affair in the event of possible or probable resource shortages.

 

We have a very simple solution in Australia!

 

Simply slash the immigration level to levels required for zero net population growth.

 

The demand for residential property in QLD will plummet and there wioll be no need to build any further dams.

 

Of course the building sector will be up in arms to see their cash flow destroyed.

 

But then who the f cares about it - it's interests are not inline with the long term interests of this nation!

 

They can all go and retrain and get jobs that are actually useful for the long term future of Australia.

 

As for Australia's long term sustainable population limits.......

 

Tim Flannery has quoted a figure of 12 million. I would guestimate it is some where between 12 million and 20 million.

 

But until a proper SCIENTIFIC (not economic) enquiry is carried we will never know what the figure is.

Edited August 14, 2011 by Greg Boyles

[JohnB]

Simply slash the immigration level to levels required for zero net population growth.

 

The demand for residential property in QLD will plummet and there wioll be no need to build any further dams.

 

Hmmm, a bit unconstitutional, but I suppose we could close the borders to New South Welshmen and Victorians. You see Greg, it isn't the foreign immigrants that drove up the housing prices, it was the cashed up Victorians who decided not to pay $500k for a 2 bedroom "Workers Cottage", so they came up here and blew out our market. House prices have trebled in the last 10 years in my area and virtually all the money is coming from south of the border.

 

Where do you think all those extra people came from? Overseas? They came from the south. As was true 30 years ago and is still true today "Southerners spend the first 50 years of their lives bagging Queensland and the last 20 living here."

 

That is where your argument falls down. Even if we cut foreign immigration to zero, it wouldn't effect movement between the States. Qld needs infrastructure because of all the other Australians that like to live here. The only way to prevent the need for new infrastructure is to close the borders to interstate migration.

 

Edit to add. Who cares what Flannery thinks? As I've shown elsewhere the guy has an incredible record of being wrong.

Edited August 14, 2011 by JohnB

[Greg Boyles]

Hmmm, a bit unconstitutional, but I suppose we could close the borders to New South Welshmen and Victorians. You see Greg, it isn't the foreign immigrants that drove up the housing prices, it was the cashed up Victorians who decided not to pay $500k for a 2 bedroom "Workers Cottage", so they came up here and blew out our market. House prices have trebled in the last 10 years in my area and virtually all the money is coming from south of the border.

 

Where do you think all those extra people came from? Overseas? They came from the south. As was true 30 years ago and is still true today "Southerners spend the first 50 years of their lives bagging Queensland and the last 20 living here."

 

That is where your argument falls down. Even if we cut foreign immigration to zero, it wouldn't effect movement between the States. Qld needs infrastructure because of all the other Australians that like to live here. The only way to prevent the need for new infrastructure is to close the borders to interstate migration.

 

Edit to add. Who cares what Flannery thinks? As I've shown elsewhere the guy has an incredible record of being wrong.

 

Closing the borders......attacking a straw man gain.

 

In Australia at least there is absolutley no need to close our national borders.

 

Zero net population growth does not necessarily equal zero immigration.

 

An annual immigration intake of around 50,000 in the absence of baby bonuses etc would most likely mean that Australia would be in zero net population growth. With the aging population and expected increased death rate we could probably bump up are immigration intake for a few decades.

 

As in Melbourne the vast majority of new home buyers are overseas students that have gained permanent residency. Perhaps in SE QLD a proportion of them are retirees and those whose employment is related to the mines up there.

 

Restriction on mining companies getting skilled immigrants would also mean that mining activity would be reduced and some of the resources left in the ground for future generations.

 

Besides if property prices and the cost of living remains high in QLD, and there is reduced mining activity and jobs, then people will be less likely to want to live there. Problem solved without closing state borders.

 

And Tim Flannery was Australian of the Year so your opinion of him is rather irrelevant!

Edited August 14, 2011 by Greg Boyles

[JohnB]

Closing the borders......attacking a straw man gain.

 

In Australia at least there is absolutley no need to close our national borders.

 

Not a strawman Greg. The point is that interstate immigration drove up our population. Reducing our national immigration to whatever level will have little effect on interstate immigration. Short of closing the borders, how do you suggest we stop the Victorians moving to Queensland? I wasn't talking about National borders, I was talking about the one at Tweed Heads.

 

As in Melbourne the vast majority of new home buyers are overseas students that have gained permanent residency.

 

Can you provide some evidence of this? According to the ABS the demographics haven't changed all that much. The average age of a first home buyer was 33 in 2005-6 compared to 32 in 1995-6. Similarly, according to Domain, while only 50% of the buyers are "Australian Born" in the 3000 area (65% for Melbourne in general), 66% of the 3000 buyers and 73% of the Melbourne buyers are working and not attending Uni etc. I can't your "vast majority" in any figures I can find.

 

The 20-39 agegroup were 47% of buyers which makes it pretty normal compared to the ABS figures. If your assertion was correct there should be a higher than usual number in this bracket in Melbourne.

 

Restriction on mining companies getting skilled immigrants would also mean that mining activity would be reduced and some of the resources left in the ground for future generations.

 

Besides if property prices and the cost of living remains high in QLD, and there is reduced mining activity and jobs, then people will be less likely to want to live there. Problem solved without closing state borders.

 

I thought that you were a "Climate Change Believer"? Isn't the whole point to leave the stuff in the ground, not for "future generations" but "forever"? Or do you think it's wrong for us to mine coal now but it will be okay for "future generations" to do it?

 

Reduced mining activity and reduced jobs mean a reduced economy. This is generally called a "recession", if it gets really bad it's called a "Depression". This is your answer? Trash the economy so that nobody wants to come here any more?

 

And Tim Flannery was Australian of the Year so your opinion of him is rather irrelevant!

 

Big whoop. You seem to be far too impressed by awards and letters over substance. The award is political, like Times "Man of the Year". Don't get me wrong, I fully grant him credit for his outstanding work in zoology, but his views on climate are waaaaay too coloured by his religion. And Gaia worship is a religion.

 

To give yet another example of his off the planet thinking, are you ready for the sky to change colour? Back in 2008 he said we would need to perhaps add sulphur to jet fuel to dim the planet and that

"We need to be ready to start doing it in perhaps five years time if we fail to achieve what we're trying to achieve."

 

Well, it's 2011, three years have passed and I can't see that he's achieved what he was trying to achieve. Only 2 years left to use "the last resort that we have, it's the last barrier to a climate collapse."

 

Tell me Greg, do you believe that we are two years away from "climate collapse"? Or do you think he's blowing smoke? (Again)