Australian Ski Fields under threat

Now, I don't know about you guys, but this report from theage.com.au is frightening.

No Australian ski season by 2100.

"So what, Heresy Dude. That's 92 years." Or, "So what, that's just Australia."

Let's take a step back here. Firstly, this doesn't just affect the Australian snow season. The global environment is a closed system with a lot of positive feedback that doesn't respect borders.

Down here in Australia, we're pretty marginal already given the nature of our precipitation events, the temperature of precipitation and our generally low alpine elevations. We're not the only ones though. Switzerland, Austria, Germany and others are next in the gun barrel. I don't know about you, but I want to see my kids skiing and boarding and experiencing the miracle of snow-sliding.

I'm seeing more and more daily reports of this nature.

Ok, some think this is rubbish. It's a conspiracy. Or, just a natural warming period.
More and more organisations - industry and NGO and GO (NASA for instance) alike - say we're having a devastating effect.

I have two issues with the conspiracy/skeptic theory.

1. What if that theory is wrong? What if human-induced warming is a reality, and we do nothing? I'd much rather do something and be wrong. What's the worst that can happen then? Investment in solar, geo-thermal, clean nuclear. New jobs. Less carbon-pollution. Less cars on road. More trees planted to offset carbon from flights whilst chasing the snow. Hmmm, doesn't seem so bad.

2. See the graph below [1] - you can see clear increases in temperature, with accelerated gradients as we industrialise (I mean, REALLY industrialise). Seems pretty clear-cut to us at Heresy. C02 levels have a lag in the environment, meaning


Now, with all this, it's really easy to feel helpless, however, grassroots programs and support for change is growing. You've got Protect Our Winters, 1% For the Planet concentrating on snow, and many, many others, driving grassroots awareness of this issue. Here at Heresy, we've joined 1% For the Planet and continue to put our money where our mouth is (we're at 4% of sales to 1% FTP program so far) on this issue.

So. Where do you stand? What will you do.

Money where our mouth is: that's how we roll.

[1] Giss, NASA - http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs/

Australia 5th Worst Environmental Footprint

As if the constant stream of news about the Earth isn't bad enough, along comes this WWF Report Rating Environmental Exploitation.

Frighteningly, have a look at the countries above Australia: the UAE, USA, Kuwait and Denmark. Esteemed company indeed (apologies to the Danes).

Tellingly, our cropping and agricultural practices use more water than any industry in the country (hello cotton).

Personally, I don't really have too many doubts anymore about climate change:

• C02 levels increasing YoY (Year on Year) since 1955
  
• Huge amounts of methane potentially released from Arctic Permafrost (creating a positive feedback loop)
  
• Arctic sea ice on the brink
  

Even farmers are convinced now. I don't know what the defensible position is for being a skeptic but it looks more and more shaky now.


"The current financial crisis, like all those before it, will pass but the threats presented by global warming will continue to grow if we do nothing," said Mr Bourne said.

"We must act now to reduce our emissions by 25 per cent by 2020, so that our children and grandchildren won't pay a grim cost for the waste of this generation as it continues to overdraw on the environment."


Please take the time to read this report, it makes sobering reading. It's times like these where it would be simple to sit back and throw your hands up in the air, but we are more determined than ever to bring about change; our 3degrees initiative is further strengthened by this.

So when you're buying "stuff", particularly in the snow industry, think about where your dollar is going. With Heresy joining 1% For the Planet, we're putting our money where our mouth is.

Stay tuned for a resource page we're building for this knowledge, so that you can arm yourself with this reading.

The WWF report is downloadable in pdf format here.

Sea Ice Levels

Those guys over at News Weekly make me mad. In their August 30 issue, they wrote an article implying that the Climate was Cooling. The way this article was written was intellectually dishonest, so much so, that I was compelled to write a response, which you can read below.

Sir,
regarding your cover story Aug 30, 2008, titled "Global Cooling?".

Regardless of the existence of AGW or non-AGW, your front cover illustration, and the implied conclusion of cooling, is misleading and potentially intellectually dishonest.

Despite the fact that this year in fact now looks like presenting the lowest Arctic sea ice levels for many years (and worse than last year's record low), you simply cannot take a 2 year sample and declare a trend, without considering previous years data. If I have a dataset of 20 (or 50, or whatever) years, showing a steady decline in a metric, year on year, but then have one year that increases, it is dishonest to now claim that the trend has finished, and even worse, has swung in the opposite direction, simply because of an non-trend datum point. This is analogous to claiming a reversal in share market trend from one data set - clearly erroneous statistically.

Further, I find your narrow concentration on sunspot activity - which many scientists agree has little effect on this GW cycle (and some think do have an effect) - also misleading as many other factors disprove your theory.

Although I concede your right to present quotes and facts that strengthen your desired position, it is also dishonest not include dissenting opinion in order to allow the reader to reach an opinion based on all the facts. For every climate change sceptic you present, I could probably present ten well credentialled CC supporters.

Whilst I acknowledge your alignment in such issues as generally being to the Right, surely such an important topic deserves balanced and considered discussion and scientific debate, without the use of such terms as "bandwagon" and so on. It is simple not right to focus solely on narrow presentation of facts that agree with your desired outcome - that is poor science.

Moreover, I think you would do well to consider the cost of the Iraq conflict and the mooted cost of the Wall St bailout (some US$700 billion and counting), and ask whether that money would be better spent in lifting many people out of entrenched poverty, rather than socialising the capital market's losses - I think linking the world's poor to the costs associated with lowering CO2 emissions is a long bow to draw, and also intellectually base. Emphasis on cheap fuel is also counter-productive to ensuring we have adequate oil for many years to come as well as reducing our use of fossil fuels to power today's society.

I think you also fail to consider the strong benefits in encouraging a low CO2 economy; innovation will blossom as companies find ways of meeting required standards, and new industry (and thus jobs) will spring up overnight. Your arguments are reminiscent of the US coal industry when forced to improve their emission standards - they cried foul claiming widespread job losses and business failure. Instead, as they were forced to innovate, their profitability increased and more jobs across the sector were created. Surely a positive outcome.

Yours,
Tim Marsh

Whether you agree with GW or AGW or not, clearly the article was misleading in its nature. Boy oh boy.

You can go read this article by The Daily Green or this one by Tree Hugger which both contain data and images from scientific organisations which clearly refute the News Weekly's assertions and implications.

How these people get away with this is maddening. As I say in the letter, regardless of whether you believe in AGW or not, from a scientific empirical basis, not to mention from a mathematics/statistics basis, their article was poor form.

3degrees fundraiser report

Our first 3degrees fundraiser was held on Saturday 13th Sept, with $500 being raised to abate around 17 tonnes of carbon.  We pulled this night together very quickly so we're pretty happy with the outcome.

The money has already gone to Greening Australia. 17 tonnes of carbon equates to:
- 5 return flights to Vancouver from Melbourne; or
- 8 return flights from Melbourne to Japan; or
- 8 return flights from New York to Zurich; or
- 68 return flights from London to Zurich
That's a lot of snow-bound flying sunk.

It was a super fun night, and a massive thank-you must go everyone who attended and donated money to the cause. Equally, thanks to PeaCe and the crew at Silverski/Oishii Go! for looking after us - thanks PeaCe, Wenzel, Easy/Ez (spelling, sorry!), Cass, Jaye, Whit etc.  The night could note have been a success without their support, so thanks guys!
Drawing the winner (Dan Marsh, Heresy/Tim M, PeaCe)

Robbie is stoked. He was riding one of our demo boards and really loved it, so was very, very happy to win this (though you can't really tell).

DJ Thomas the Terror - people were stoked Tom was back (see the photos, we cut up the dancefloor so hard we broke it).

Whitney Houston - it's how we rolled. Tim ("I will mind-freak you"), Nicola, Elyse, Tommy, Brett.


I only took a couple of photos as I was flat out running around doing stuff (not drinking, I swear), here are some I snapped from the weekend and night.

Tom (left) was our DJ for the night. He was awesome.  Brett is our Falls rep.  I saw him partying pretty hard.  Ah, the life of a Heresy rep, it's all sunshine and lollipops!

I think Brett made a bad joke here. Dude, that stunk! Tom is looking at me and (probably thinking); "Dude, did that just happen?"

Then I made an actual funny joke and everything was ok.

Here we are setting up. Dan from The Red Eyes is sussing something interesting out - perhaps the overly complicated raffle book. Stevie is rocking a pretty bright Heresy headband. I think he thought it was a 70s night. Maybe he was going for the best green outfit award. Close Stevie, but the red wrecked it.

Here we see a young lady who got herself tickets to everything and an anti whaling t-shirt describe the fish she caught the other day to Packy.

Packy once again gets his head (his mum would say it's lovely, but I remain unconvinced) in a photo.

Gary and Nathan are from WA. They had a tremendous time and my rabbit spotlight caught them busting some pretty awesome dance manoeuvres.

And (I think) this is Nicola from Falls cutting the rug up with some pretty rad style.