Climate change and security – Australia

Climate change and security – Australia

Government sources

Parliamentary sources

Analysis and commentary

Greenhouse cops needed on planetary beat, Anthony Bergin and Ross Allen, The Australian, 16  August 16, 2008.

Climate change could have wide-ranging implications and challenges for Australia’s police. New legal regimes are required to manage carbon markets and these will require compliance and enforcement. Compliance under the carbon pollution reduction scheme will involve liable entities monitoring and reporting emissions at least annually.
But we may have expectations of law enforcement agencies that they’re not in a position or resourced to deliver: large-scale fraud has proven to be resource intensive, particularly when the territory is uncharted. The possibility of a “green shoe” brigade emerging as the scheme begins can’t be discounted. The financial scale of emissions trading and the proposed future linkages to existing international carbon trading schemes suggests the AFP will need to explore what opportunities exist for criminal activity, particularly where emission trading intersects with world financial markets.

A South Seas Carbon Bubble: Australia and a Near-Pacific Regional Climate Pact, Peter Christoff, Austral Policy Forum 07-24A, 3 December 2007

Overview of Australia’s Energy Sector – Current Status and Plans of Future Development, Jim Falk, Asian Energy Security 2007, Nautilus Institute, November 2007.

Climate Change a Huge Security Problem: Keelty, Simon Lauder, ABC, 25 September 2007.

2007 Inaugural Ray Whitrod Oration, Mick Keelty, 24 September 2007.

Briefing note: Climate Change, Security and Infectious Disease: Dengue Fever in Southeast Asia and the Pacific – Richard Tanter, Nautilus Institute, 2 August 2007.

A change in climate for the Australian Defence Force, Anthony Bergin and Jacob Townsend, Special Report 7, Australian Strategic Policy Institute, July 2007.

Intelligence agency refuses to release climate change studies, ABC News Online, 23 May 2007

“The Office of National Assessments (ONA) says it has done several studies on climate change but to release them to the public would result in ‘dumbing’ them down. ONA director-general Peter Varghese has told a Senate hearing that in the past six months, five reports have been written on climate change – including one over-arching national assessment. Mr Varghese says the reports focus on the international politics of climate change, but they cannot be released to the public. ‘My very strong view is that for an organisation like ONA, to produce public versions of their assessments is the surest way of dumbing down our work,’ he said.”

Testimony of Mr Peter Varghese, Director, Office of National Assessments, Estimates, (Budget Estimates), Standing Committee on Finance and Public Administration, Senate, 22 May 2007

Climate Threat in Military’s Sights, Tom Allard, SMH, 17 May 2007.

Global Warning: Australia and the International Response to Climate Change, Robert McClelland, Asia Link, 17 May 2007

Climate change and Environmental Refugees, Bryan Furnass, Draft discussion paper for Doctors for the Environment Australia, May 2007

Speech to RUSI Conference, Air Chief Marshal Angus Houston, Chief of the Defence Force, Media Release CPA 70515/07 Department of Defence, 16 May 2007

Australian Foreign Policy and the Challenge of Climate Change. Hayley Stevenson.

The Power of Frames and Nondecisions in Australia’s Response to Global Climate Change, Hayley Stevenson, International Journal of Environmental, Cultural, Economic and Social Sustainability, Volume 3, Issue 5.

Climate Change and Security in Asia: Issues and Implications for Australia, Jon Barnett, Melbourne Asia Policy Papers, Number 9, March 2007

Heating up the planet : climate change and security, Alan Dupont and Graeme Pearman, Lowy Institute Paper 12, 2006.

Climate Change and Security in the South Pacific, ARC Discovery Grant, JR Barnett, 2004

See also

13 September 2008