Australia is preparing to burn – more fossil fuels

Australians are used to seeing messages with advice on preparing for bushfires and other extreme weather at this time of year.

“Amid the Christmas promotions, [we’re] seeing increased warnings about extreme heat and fires and how to cope and stay safe,” Belinda Noble, the founder of climate advocacy organisation Comms Declare, told media.

While there is nothing new about these kinds of public service announcements, the messages have taken on added meaning as the weather becomes more unpredictable and memories of severe bushfires three years ago linger.

“Australia desperately needs national public information campaigns to keep people safe,” Noble told media, stressing that similar campaigns were also needed on how to “reduce emissions and to combat lies about fossil fuels, renewables and climate science”.

Australia passed breakthrough climate laws in March this year, 10 months after a new centre-left Labor government under Prime Minister Anthony Albanese took office.

“In contrast to our last government,” the new government now “acknowledges that climate change is very real, is with us now and is worsening extreme weather and disasters,” Greg Mullins, the former commissioner of fire and rescue for the state of New South Wales told media.

But, Mullins added, it is “inexplicable that as they strive to reduce emissions, they undo all of their good work by continuing to approve new fossil fuel projects.”

Even as the Albanese government passed its new legislation in March, its annual Resource & Energy Major Project list included 116 new fossil fuel projects, “two more than at the end of 2021”, according to Canberra-based think tank the Australia Institute.

Combined, Australia’s oil and gas expansion plans are the eighth largest of any country, the advocacy organisation Oil Change International said recently.