Paperbark is a monthly e-update of NQCC activities, campaigns, news and events.

Welcome to this month’s issue of Paperbark. We’d like to welcome a new staffer to the NQCC community – Jacob Miller. In the role of community campaigner, Jacob will be organising some big events coming up this year, producing media and written content on our site and improving NQCC’s community outreach. Welcome Jacob!

In this issue: Proposed funding cuts to ARENA – ACF loses court case to Adani – Queenslands climate change action policy – Toxic lead dust from Townsville port – Burdekin Dry Tropics Regional NRM published – Interactive sea level rise modelling launched – Upcoming events – General notices.

Guest post by Charlie McColl, NQCC’s representative on the Port Stakeholders Working Group.

New data coming from updated monitoring equipment at the Townsville waterfront appears to confirm long-held community concern about heavy metal pollution being carried in dust emanating from the state-owned Port of Townsville. As long ago as 2010 a Queensland Government report concluded that:

While compliance with EPP (Air) objectives was maintained at all times, the monitoring program identified that dust emissions from Townsville Port activities did contribute to ambient levels of Total Suspended Particles [TSP], lead, copper, zinc, arsenic and cadmium, and to lead deposition, at the closest monitoring site, Coast Guard. Measurable contributions of these pollutants from Townsville Port activities at monitoring sites located further from the Port were only observed for lead. 

Queensland Health has concluded that the total exposure to lead from inhalation and ingestion of dust in the residential community areas near the Townsville Port is highly unlikely to be associated with any known adverse health effects.

Welcome to the July edition of Paperbark! At the time of writing, the dust is still settling from the Federal Election. We know that the Liberal National coalition will continue, the seat of Herbert is still undecided, and it will be weeks before the final make-up of the Senate is confirmed. In this issue: Election wrap – Plastic Free July – Coal Dust – Butterfly trip to Maggie – Citizen science bird study

Election Wrap-Up

The future for climate campaigning at a Federal politics level is uncertain. Although some of the worst blockers in the last Parliament have exited, many voters rejected the major parties and voted for populist minor parties, such as Pauline Hanson’s One Nation.

This is not good news for action on climate change. A Parliament under the influence of right-wing climate action blockers, puppeteered by the coal and gas industry, is going to make the fight for climate justice much more difficult.

In this issue: Welcome back; Feeling the heat; NQCC News in brief; Carmichael Mine; Contaminated dust deposition; Water issues; A GLOBAL agreement on climate change – Paris December 2015; Divestment – Westpac commitment, Market Forces ‘Burned’ Report; improved SuperSwitch; Decarbonisation – Inspiration for Action; Earth Hour; Townsville Against Live Export; Turning clicktivists into real-world activists; Diary Dates.

Welcome back
It seems crazy to be wishing people a happy new year when we are over a 10th of the way through 2016 – but we do hope that the year ahead will be a good one for you and yours.

Paperbark is a monthly e-letter of current NQCC activities, campaigns, news and events

The Paris agreement

The people marched, leaders and the world’s powerful converged on Paris, and an agreement was reached. Better than past outcomes? Definitely. Sufficient to address the problem? Unfortunately not.

As George Monbiot wrote in the Guardian, ‘… the Paris agreement is full of soft facts: promises that can slip or unravel. Until governments undertake to keep fossil fuels in the ground, they will continue to undermine the agreement they have just made.’

Charlie McColl and Wendy Tubman represent NQCC on the Port Stakeholder Working Group (PSWG) formed following findings of high levels of heavy metals in urban spaces in proximity to the Townsville Port.

Overall, NQCC is pleased to report that the Port Stakeholders Working Group is functioning well.

Key reportings from the October 2015 meeting of the PSWG are: