Heatwave Hell in Melbourne - And Afterwards

Pic: Koshy Koshy

Last week, Melbourne endured four days of temperatures over 40 degrees Celsius, including three days over 42, and two days at virtually 44 degrees.

Adelaide fared even worse: 42.1 on Monday, 45.1 on Tuesday, 43.7 on Wednesday and 44.2 on the Thursday. On that day Roseworthy, north of Adelaide, was the hottest place in South Australia, with the maximum temperature reaching 46.4.

I wasn’t expecting to write a blog entry primly entitled ‘How I felt after the heat wave’, especially as I’ve just had a whinge about the difficulties of being green and anxious. But then a couple of friends talked about being depressed and tired once the weather had changed so I decided to make a few speculations about it.

It was a week when things got a bit too sci-fi for my liking. The level of heat was something I felt I hadn’t experienced before, but apparently things got this bad back in February 2009, culminating in Black Saturday, when the temperature reached 46.4 in Melbourne. (As you can see these extremes are turning me into a climate nerd!)

It seems there is something we lack when we think and talk about temperature. We don’t have the words to describe the spiritual and emotional effects of extended heat. We know that the very young and the elderly die in heatwaves, as do numerous small animals – bats, possums, birds – and in the worst hours we fancy we experience something of what they must have gone through, but we can’t possibly.

Nor are we able, as a society, to communally memorialise the heat. We commemorate the bushfires of course, and the terrible loss of life and home, as we should. But somehow the communal bruising of extended extreme weather doesn’t get memorialised.

Perhaps we should have some kind of public art work that can be added to over the years, recording the highest temperatures for each summer with accompanying statistics and stories. Some of those stories would be funny but some of them would be tragic – losing grandparents and young babies to heat stroke for example. More than double the number of people died of the heat in the week before Black Saturday (374) than died in the fires (173).

Maybe the lack of a vocabulary for this type of stress is why some people try to go on as if nothing has changed – there were still joggers on my street early in the the mornings of the hottest days. Routines are comforting touchstones in uncertain times, but it's important to adapt and bend. A friend of mine rode his bike to the local shopping centre for breakfast, but he rode slowly, and found it less tiring than walking would have been.  

Suffering the heat

With extreme heat and cold, it’s not, in a first world country, just about the temperature. It’s what battling the temperature, and the practical effects of the extreme weather, takes out of you physically and emotionally.

If your body is overheated for a long period of time, it’s a low-key, extended suffering. It’s exhausting in a way that is difficult to describe. I imagine that battling with extreme cold has similarly debilitating effects.

But why the mental effects, the lingering ennui and depression? Although there is a robust public discussion about the heat, with plenty of warnings and advice about how to cope with it, there is no advice on how to cope with the fears it engenders. Perhaps being very hot for a long period provokes ancient, preverbal terrors. There’s also the strange sense of anticlimax that we experience when the temperature drops suddenly, and we are expected to go back to normal straight away.

Yet it’s fundamentally wrong for the body to be this overheated and it feels that way. It took me three days to get over the physical effects of the heat. In those days I paced myself well and got everything done that I needed to. And there were small breaks, too, during the ordeal, like the Wednesday morning at quarter to six when I opened the front door and the morning air was cool and welcoming so I walked a couple of blocks and it was the most beautiful reprieve. To feel alive in the world and able to move freely without being overheated.

But by the last day I’d had it. I escaped the house at about 3, drove myself to Camberwell library, picturing the waiting beanbags, which no one usually uses – imagining myself on one of them. And when I got there, sure enough there were a couple of empty beanbags. On one side of me, a young man had fallen asleep. On the other, a young couple sat close and chatting quietly. An almost full bottle of spring water on the ground beside them. Forgot. The. Water. Damn. At Ashburton library two days earlier, the staff had put out a jug of water and plastic cups – a great idea. Camberwell library hadn’t done that so the utter joy of the beanbag was marred a bit by thirst, but it was manageable.

Anyway, the end of the ordeal was in sight, and came earlier than expected. On the way home from the library the temperature started to drop – by about 10 degrees Celsius in an hour. That was enough to provide immediate relief and then the full cooling came a few hours later.

It was a sobering glimpse into a future dominated by catastrophic climate change. When I was growing up, it was a big deal (and kind of exciting) for the temperature to reach 100 degreees Fahrenheit, which is ‘only’ 37.7 degrees Celsius. A few months ago the Bureau of Meteorology made an announcement – that the climate of Australia had changed, and that there was no point in looking at climate records to forecast the future. I try to imagine what would have happened if those four days had stretched to five, or six, or more.

In the future, will there be a number of days every year when certain places will be simply uninhabitable? I imagine there could be evacuations. Or instead will there be public places set aside with airconditioning for people to huddle in?

When it came to bushfires – which usually get worse when the cold change hits because the winds fan the flames – my state got off lightly. There was no repeat of Black Saturday. This was a huge relief, although in Victoria alone, the Grampians blaze burned for 52,000 hectares, one person was killed, about 4000 sheep lost their lives, and 27 houses and about 60 other buildings were lost. Terrible, but it could have been so much worse.

So – a huge impost on the body and spirit that probably translates into a huge dive in productivity across the state. I feel as if I’ve gone through some ritual ordeal. And yet in twenty years' time I won’t be boasting to my great-nieces and nephews about how I lived through the Great Heatwave of 2014 – what they will have to put up with in future heatwaves will make last week look like a pleasant spring interlude!

If you enjoyed this blog entry, please share using the social media buttons below.

Tweet

Help End Puppy Farm Cruelty (Content warning: upsetting image & descriptions of animal welfare conditions)

Dogs and cats are sensitive, intelligent animals who feel pain, extreme temperatures, hunger and fear just like humans. Yet in Victoria’s puppy and kitten farms they exist in conditions we wouldn't condone for the most ruthless criminals. This is not the behaviour of a civilised society.

The Victorian Coalition government went to the last election promising drastic improvements to the laws governing puppy farms. But the government’s revised Code of Practice for the Operation of Breeding and Rearing Businesses actually reduces animal welfare standards.

If it becomes law it will lead to horrific conditions and appalling situations for dogs as well as cats. The RSPCA’s verdict is damning: ‘this code legalises some of the abhorrent conditions and practices regularly seen by our Inspectors at puppy factories’. (Ironically, Victoria’s premier, Dr Denis Napthine, is a veterinarian by profession.)

Recommendations in the revised code include the following: 

• If litters of puppies are included, the ratio of carers to animals could be as little as 1:500 outside business hours.
• Maximum litter numbers for females will be increased while males will have no maximum number.
• There will be no maximum breeding age or period that an animal could be bred from, so these animals could potentially spend their entire lifetime confined to farms.
• There will be no requirement to regulate temperatures, that is, to provide cooling and heating.
• The recommendations allow for ‘any method’ of euthanasia as long as it is ‘humane’, but ‘humane’ isn’t defined. In theory methods of death could include shooting or bashing, causing incredible suffering.
• Breeding between second-generation related animals will be acceptable.
• Tethering is allowed (except for some categories of breeding females). RSPCA Victoria advises against tethering.
• The code will allow working dogs to be housed in small raised pens with wire floors.
• Breeders, rather than vets, will be able to declare an animal fit for sale. Not only do breeders lack the appropriate qualifications to do this, but this may also mean that neither the animal nor the buyer will be protected from post-sale welfare or return issues.

The campaign for animal welfare standards in breeding farms is being spearheaded by RSPCA Victoria – more background can be found here.

The government is calling for feedback on the revised Code of Practice, and the deadline is 9 am on Wednesday 14 August.

I’ve created a campaign on this issue through GetUp! Please sign the petition and demand that the Victorian Minister for Agriculture, Peter Walsh, include in the code of practice the minimum animal welfare standards recommended by the RSPCA. (It would be great if you could sign before 14 August, but the campaign will continue after this date.)

Please also share the petition on Facebook and Twitter.

You can also write to the Minister directly and to the Premier, Dr Denis Napthine.

Ultimately puppy and kitten farms should be abolished, and this is the aim of the Oscar’s Law campaign (and RSPCA Victoria). I completely agree with this aim, and would like to see the selling of dogs and cats through pet shops become illegal.

But this is a humanitarian emergency: in the meantime breeding dogs and cats must be legally protected by meaningful animal welfare standards. The Victorian Government must stop giving breeders carte blanche to mistreat these animals, and shoulder their responsibility for the welfare of animals in Victoria.

Please share this far and wide using the social media buttons below.

Tweet

Get off your high horse, John Brumby

My political side has got the better of me again, and I'm shamelessly turning this blog entry into a very early electoral forum. I’m so incensed with the behaviour of John Brumby, Victoria’s state premier, that I’m using this entry to urge everyone in the state to vote him out at the next election, in November 2010.

The man has simply got to go.

There is something about state premiers and ministers in this country that is on the nose. After having been in power for a while, it goes to their heads and they forget that they are the servants of the people, not their masters.

Of course this happens at the federal level, with John Howard’s WorkChoices debacle and the embarrassing loss of his Bennelong electorate both being textbook examples. But in Canberra it happens under a huge array of scrutinising eyes and pens. With journalism almost guttered in this country, there are simply not the media resources to hold state politicians to account (unless you live in NSW, because that’s where the ABC news shown on the ABC HD channel comes from!).

I am ashamed to admit that part of my passion for getting rid of Brumby is not his policies (although I hate them), but the mean, triumphant glint in his eye when he announces the next disastrous decision that will destroy an area of unspoilt beauty, gutter a local community, entrench the power of a corrupt multinational and lead to decades-long environmental degradation.

The man’s hooked on power. It’s become a drug to him.

And he’s slowly killing the city and state that I love.

In this blog entry I’m going to summarise what I consider one of the main sins of the Brumby government, and briefly list the rest.

Plumbing the depths: proposed desalination plant
It's common knowledge now that Victoria is running out of water. As I write, our dams are only 26.8 per cent full. Something clearly needs to be done. The government has developed a Water Plan to secure the state's water supply, but the main option it has chosen to redress the problem -- a desalination plant -- is expensive and environmentally destructive, and has far higher emissions than the alternatives.

These alternatives include dual flush cisterns, government-subsidised rainwater tanks, storm water capture, and recycling of non-potable water (click here for more information about them). But it also needs to be said that part of the problem is some Melburnians' excessive use of water. On 27 February, for example, Melburnians were still using an average of 186 litres per person per day, higher than the government's voluntary target of 155 litres per day. Any new infrastructure will increase the cost of water, which means that those using little water are effectively paying for those who squander it.

The plant the state government is planning to build will be a seawater reverse osmosis (SWRO) desalination plant at Wonthaggi on the Bass Coast. This will take the form of a public–private partnership and will be responsible for one-third of the state’s water supply. If built, the proposed desalination plant will be the second-largest in the world.

According to Watershed Victoria, a group that opposes the government’s Water Plan and especially the plant, desalination is ‘expensive, provides few long-term jobs, has huge climate implications and creates [an] effluent outfall to the marine environment’.

If the plant operates at full capacity, its carbon emissions will comprise up to 2% of Victoria’s electricity use. The government has promised to offset these emissions but, as Watershed asserts, this will mean that ‘a huge chunk of Victoria’s renewable energy will just be covering new (and excessive) emissions’, so that renewable energy won’t be available to reduce existing carbon emissions. Moreover, the plant will be churning out ‘8000 litres of toxic effluent per second … just 1 km off the now pristine Williamson’s Beach’.

But there will be worse consequences if the plant goes ahead. As Watershed warns, there will be absolutely no incentive to develop ‘sustainable water policy’ over the crucial next few decades. The corporate body running the plant will only be interested in profit. Not only will it have no interest in other infrastructure to harvest and recycle existing water, but it could work against these things happening. In effect, it will be dictating Victoria’s water policy for decades to come!

It’s important to understand just how anti-democratic that is. It’s a similar principle to building a private prison and expecting the company running it to be interested in rehabilitation of prisoners, when such a policy would ultimately go against its business interests. The incentive will be to produce water, and charge the government for it, whether or not the water is needed. As recently as 11 July, The Age reported that the Brumby Government had already instructed Melbourne’s water officials to ‘run the new desalination plant at full capacity, irrespective of rainfall’.

This brings us to the issue of cost. Kenneth Davidson, writing in The Age, has explained his belief that the government’s stake in such a private public partnership would be more expensive than if it bore all the cost of a significant alternative – water recycling! Indeed, the government won’t release figures showing the contrary, which suggests the possibility that policy is not being decided on the basis of value for money for taxpayers, but, put simply, government corruption.

Any private ownership of such a plant spells disaster for water-saving and other methods of capture. However, the two companies bidding to build the plant – Veolia (Connex, who recently lost the contract to run Melbourne’s railways) and Degremont/Suez – seem particularly sinister. Both these bidders have extremely disturbing corporate records, as Davidson has warned.

I urge Victorian readers to write to Brumby and your local state politicians about the proposed desalination plant. The deal is yet to be signed, and once the corrupt multinationals that will run this carbon-creating monster are in, they’re in for decades.

Click here for more information about Watershed Victoria, why the plant’s a terrible idea, what the alternatives are, who to write to, and what to tell them.

Other John Brumby sins
Here are just a few of my other concerns about Brumby and his corrupt, incompetent ministers:

* The appalling state of public transport in Victoria – the Public Transport Users Association has useful info about this, while this Age article deals with some of the problems on trams

* A ridiculously expensive price tag for a proposed new rail link

* Using the global financial crisis as an excuse for ignoring local democracy and planning laws to fast track developments

* Refusing to create an anti-corruption commission (what are they frightened of?)

* Inappropriate, anti-competitive development at the already huge Chadstone Shopping Centre

* And who could forget the futile, expensive channel-deepening project, the removal of the ban on genetically modified canola, and the ridiculous north-south pipeline?

Why not vote Green?
I’m not a member of the Greens but I am a long-time Greens voter and supporter. Most people who don’t vote Green have little idea of the policies of this party. Instead they believe the outright lies that both the ALP and the Liberals have spread about the Greens in the name of fear mongering. In fact, this party is the only one that follows the mainstream science on climate change in terms of the degree of carbon cuts they call for. They’re not some wacky fringe group, they’re simply following the science.

Rather than being only concerned with the environment, the Greens have policies on a wide range of issues. The Greens are totally open about their policies, contrary to what some anti-Greens propaganda before elections has suggested. If you’d like to know more about Greens policies, visit the website and click on the ‘Party and Policy’ tab.

You may end up thinking that in many ways the Greens resemble the Democrats, although they have broader aims. (I personally think they should change their name to something like ‘Social Democrats’ to express this broad approach, but that’s another story.)

Remember that when you vote Green, your second preferences (eg Liberal or Labor) count as one vote if the Greens candidate is unsuccessful – so your vote is never wasted!

Thinking of voting Liberal to punish Brumby? The reality is they are likely to be as bad, if not worse, than Labor.

Bring back the garden state!
This is what Victoria used to be called. Previous premier Steve Bracks seemed to be committed to a ‘clean and green Victoria’ but I think that if he hadn’t retired he would have gone the same way as Brumby, perhaps with a tad less smugness. It’s tragic to see government policy so distorted by the demands of the market. We need politicians who will govern for all Victorians, not just big companies.

So get active, get writing, find out more and start telling Brumby where to go, and think about how you’ll vote at the next state election. If you’re a Victorian with a vote, the future of the state is your hands.

Tweet