[LINK] Tony pulls it off!

[stephen at melbpc.org.au]

Interesting and informative discussions .. 

> However, the energy source is still Coal polluting power stations ..

Indeed, Marg .. and in fact, "Hazelwood Power Station, in the Latrobe 
Valley, Victoria, is a brown coal fueled base-load power station .. of 
1,600 megawatt capacity, and supplies up to 25% of Victoria's base load 
electricity. The station was listed as the *least carbon efficient power 
station in the world* in a 2005 report by WWF Australia.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hazelwood_Power_Station,_Victoria

Hence, we have, for example: http://www.switchoffhazelwood.org


However, Linkers might like to 'sign' this e-petition: (no names needed)

http://www.showyourvote.org  (eg, already 17 have signed from Bendigo :)

"An online platform developed by an Australian Googler in his "20 per 
cent time" has been adopted by the United Nations to show world leaders 
the extent of global support for climate change action at this month's 
summit in Copenhagen.

Google Australia's "innovationist", Justin Baird, developed the Show Your 
Vote platform after meeting US environmental campaigner Al Gore earlier 
this year and helping develop the web presence of the highly successful 
Earth Hour campaign.

His platform includes a virtual ballot box that can be embedded into any 
website allowing people to register their support for sealing a fair and 
effective climate deal at the UN climate summit in Copenhagen, which runs 
for two weeks from Monday.

A Google Map embedded into the tool lets users zoom in and out to view 
the number of votes by country, state, city and even postcode. A "learn" 
tab includes the company's visualisations, using Google Earth, of the 
potential impacts of climate change.

Baird, who travelled to Germany to present Show Your Vote to the UNFCCC, 
says that, by the end of the week, he hopes the number of votes collected 
by his tool will be enough to convince world leaders that a binding 
agreement to combat climate change is necessary.

"With the COP15 the issue for me was, well, what we really need to do is 
show the largest public support possible to world leaders," he said in a 
phone interview.

"It's great for people to change their light bulbs and use water saving 
shower heads but that's just not going to cut it. It's not going to make 
the changes that we need."

Baird, who will attend the COP15, is encouraging businesses as small 
as "Joe's scuba shop up in Townsville" to embed Show Your Vote on their 
websites. Since the platform is hosted on Google's servers, all the votes 
from around the world are aggregated and tallied in real time.

"The most important thing that we can do right now, regardless of what's 
happening in local politics, is to make sure when world leaders come 
together they see that people want action on this issue," he said.

http://www.theage.com.au/technology/technology-news/aussie-googler-hits-
the-world-stage-for-climate-change-20091202-k54f.html

--

Cheers,
Stephen