Meh.
I’m not surprised, but I’m disappointed.
To go through with building a coal mine in Australia of all places, now of all times?
Of course 1.500 jobs directly connected with the mine and 7.000 jobs indirectly connected with the mine are important. But what about its impact on the local and regional environment, and on everyone and everything living there? Even disregarding the current catastrophe in Australia, the anticipated effects especially on water management in this area seem rather terrible.
And what about the
mine’s impact on climate change? About its consequences for health,
lives, and livelihood of millions of people?
The current fires in Australia are
connected with global climate change. There are models dating back ten
years that predict climate and weather situations that fuel this type of
fires as a result of climate change. That’s not wild ravings of climate
change fanatics, that’s science.
And then Siemens and
Australian politicians bizarrely claim that the coal from that mine is
needed to improve the lives of poor people in India. The sarcasm of
those arguments is actually painful.
(Wild guess, but if that’s
really what this is all about, taking the 18 million for that coal mine
contract and investing them directly in India, in renewable energy,
clean water, and in local sustainable projects would be much more
beneficial. And who knows, in the end there might even be profit. But of
course not as much as that coal mine promises to yield…)
Communism and socialism may have failed, but capitalism in its current form will kill us all.
