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A Note on Social Mobility and Neoliberal Plutocracy

December 15, 2019

The Argument

It is a common argument that social mobility, if present, could undermine plutocracy, or any other form of domination. However, social mobility is quite complicated, and that it ‘can‘ undermine some forms of domination, does not mean it always will, or that it can undermine plutocracy in other than rare circumstances; perhaps of the collapse of that plutocracy (say through, ecological change driven by the plutocracy, which is unable to find a way around the problem without facing the possibility of its decline).

By suggesting research questions in this topic, I am not trying to imply that other people have not done the research, simply trying to get a beginning perspective on what we would need to investigate an important issue and come to a conclusion. Other people might well do a better job.

There are at least four patterns of social mobility.

  • a) The regular rise of fortunate and talented individuals from the apparent bottom to the visible top. Modern, post world war II, US examples might inclcude Bill Clinton, or George Soros.
  • b) The regular rise of groups from bottom to visible top. This is usually confined to particular skills and celebrity rather than to power. Modern, post WWII US examples, might include black sports-people, rap stars, or white rock/pop stars. This can pretty much leave the power structures unchanged. To make this clear, we may need to rigorously distinguish between a cultural elite and a power elite, as they are not necessarily the same.
  • c) The abililty of people to rise from the bottom into the realms of real and largely invisible power, to what is in contemporary plutocracy often called the “0.1%” (even though one in a thousand is still a gross magnification of their numbers). As this mode of life is heavily protected, and does not allow much research, this ability to move is hard to measure. Having an income in the top 5% or even 1% may not cut it when there are truly massive imbalances in wealth and power. In contemporary society it is possible to have an income well beyond the dreams of ordinary people, and still not be in the wealth and power elites.
  • d) When the groups forming the elite change and bring new ideas, and abilities to face the problems of society in general. This is what I have called the Toynbee cycle, and usually involves a change in social organisation, technological organisation, or a revolution provoked by the collapse of established social functioning. This kind of dynamics implies that the more that society remains neoliberal in orientation, the less chance there is of this change occuring without collapse.

Merged into this there is what we might call:

  • a) The amount of general mobility. How common is it for people and groups to ascend or descend?
  • b) The degree of mobility. The levels of change (ascent and descent) which can be experienced by people and groups.
  • c) The ways that mobility is socially allocated. Is it commoner in some parts of the hierarchy than others? Do those near the top find it easier to ascend, or those near the bottom? Are people in the lower groups finding life more precarious, or less free, with less opportunities over time?
  • d) Is the difference in peoples’ placement in the hierarchy becoming greater or lesser over time? For instance are the people at the top getting relatively more and more wealthy than those at the bottom, or less and less wealthy with respect to those at the bottom who are ‘catching up’?
  • e) Is the hierarchy intensifying and being reinforced over time, irrespective of the degree and amount of mobility?

Mobility: Normality or Change?

Mobility can either: a) undermine; b) not effect, or; c) reinforce the social hierarchy and/or its patterns, standard ideas, ‘class interests’ and drives.

All societies have some degree of social mobility, even caste and feudal societies, especially at the middle and lower levels of the hierarchy. So the existence of social mobility, in itself, is not necessarily a threat to organisations of power or the team-ups of established wealth. But it could be. We need to find the circumstances in which it does make a challenge.

The patterns of hierarchy can be preserved in many ways, despite mobility. People can move up the hierarchies and then work, or team up and work, to prevent other people rising in similar ways, so there is less threat to them and others in their position from those currently ‘beneath’ them (mobility upwards, implies the possibility of their mobility downwards). People can change their interests, culture etc, to match that already accepted in their new milieu to hide their comparatively ‘common’ beginings. They can sever contacts and loyalties with previous people they knew for the same reasons. They can even attempt to outdo the more established people in their application of existing elite conventions and culture, intensifying the pathologies of the ruling groups. On the other hand, while their rise can appear dramatic, socially mobile people may never penetrate the upper hierarchies which remain largely unchanged, and whose favour they may have to court, if they know its importance, or ever get to meet them.

I’d propose, and its a comparative research project, that the more unified the basis of power the more this preservation happens, because people need to get on in their new class, build new relationships and pass social tests to maintain their new position.

However, when there are varieties of power there can be change. For example, in post Tudor UK you had the intermarriage and combining of the mercantile and aristocratic classes, and royal promotion (later State promotion) of talented outsiders, which changed all classes to a degree, but eventually the power of wealth won out over the power of land ownership, because land could only be owned with wealth – the traditional aristocracy and its values declined.

If social power is based in a single primary factor (such as wealth), then it is probable that the highest families will grossly outweigh the next levels in society, and seek to confine influence to themselves, and confine the sources of power to themselves. If the basis of power is wealth then, if they hire good advisors, they do not even need to know much about the sources of power (land, energy, business, communication media, technological structures etc) they own or control, they just use wealth to accumulate more wealth and more power. Even if they loose half their fortune through bad decisions, they may still control more wealth and property than 99% of the people, and they have connections to help them through ‘hard’ times, by not only giving them new projects, but changing market legislation to give them subsidies or a boost.

Even with high social mobility, if the conventions and interests of the rising factions are the same as the established factions, nothing alters. Communism remains communism, aristocracy remains aristocracy, theocracy remains theocracy, plutocracy remains plutocracy. The systems may even become more intense, as the newcomers demonstrate their firm adherence to the old principles.

Post World War II mobility in the West

After World War II up until the 80s, State provided education was a major path enabling social mobility – people could move from manual labour into admininstrative, scientific, technical, educational and business jobs without necessarily belonging to the old boys network. They still largely depended on jobs, with all the submission that meant, but they were much freer and more prosperous than previously. The UK and US working class Renaissance and political ferment of the late 50s, 60s and early 70s seems to have largely grown out of this availability of education and the resultant weakening of the old class barriers.

This mobility seems to have been seen as a massive threat to, and disrution of, the established capitalist/military arrangement of power and privilege, and had to be stopped. Hence the promotion of the neoliberal counter-revolution and the death of the generally participatory and enabling State. The rising working class may have formed a new cultural or even bureaucratic elite, but they were only precariously a power elite.

The education path now seems to have run out. Graduates no longer automatically get high paid work without class based connections. Money has poured into the Elite schools again, so that members of the elite can keep the educational advantage, and build connections to keep them in employment and power – and the fees have usually risen in an attempt to keep lower-class people without contacts out.

But these patterns of change need empirical investigation.

The research project needed

The big research questions here are:

1) Has social mobility increased or decreased after the 80s in capitalist societies? One theory is that social mobility should increase along with talk of “free markets”, and one is that it should decrease. Personally I would expect that it would either stay much the same or decrease. Certainly what I have read suggests general mobility, and degree of mobility has declined after 1980 in comparison to the post WWII period.

2) What are good rates of social mobility, and what are normal, or poor rates of social mobility? Without this kind of knowledge people can claim their society has a high rate of social mobility when comparitivly it does not. What ‘everyone’ thinks mobility is like, is often different from the reality, especially when it is a selling point used to justify hierarchies and make them seem good.

2a) In relatively egalitarian societies social mobility may not be particularly marked, as the difference between high and low is not that great. Nevertheless, influential people may change and influence not remain stable within groups of families.

It may only be needful for justifiers of the hierarchy to talk of social mobility when people are actively excluded from power, and while power and wealth supposedly express a meritocracy.

3) Are people’s chidren more or less likely to shift upwards, and to what extent?

4) What is the social mobility which is relevant? Mobility downwards and mobility upwards. Is moving upwards within in a quintile social mobility, or moving between quintiles, or are we talking about the likelihood of moving up into the stratospheric wealth realms of the “0.1%” from the middle quintile? If for instance the 01.% remain relatively stable over generations, coming from a specific set of families and they keep acccumulating most of the wealth, can we say there is effective social mobility, even if there is a reasonable rate of crossing from one quintile into a higher one?

There may be little to no circulation of power elites, even if there is circulaton elsewhere in society. People may rise from poverty to hip-hop stardom without vaguely challenging the plutocracy, or even through celebrating signs of wealth as signs of success and virtue. Again what we are measuring needs to be clear.

5) To what extent does social mobiity affect power and the treatment of those who rise? The most visible socially mobile figures of power in the US have been the Clintons and the Obamas and they faced massive attacks, resistance and portrayls of their power and wealth as illegitimate, suggesting the ease of cultivating a succesful political hostility towards social mobility when it crosses established powers of wealth. Whereas the Bushs and Trump seem face relatively little hostility because of their born privilege. Indeed one can be frequently be told that Trump’s wealth is a mark of his intelligence and aptitude, whether it was inherited or not, while the wealth the Clintons earned is evidence of their corruption and evil.

6) Does social mobility, in a particular country or social system, reinforce, challenge, undermine or not affect the patterns of power? And over how long a history are we looking at?

7) Do the ideas and techniques used to rule remain similar, or change radically? Do the “social and cultural patterns of society” stay similar or alter?

To reiterate, whether or not social mobility can undermine plutocracy is a complicated question, and may need considerable research. However, it would seem a priori unlikely.

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Problems of Transition 06: Climate Change and Failing US ‘infrastructure’

November 8, 2019

The US is an example of the general case. Infrastructure tends to be failing, and climate change makes this worse. The costs and effects of failing infrastructure could make transition to a more resilient ‘sustainable’ society, even more difficult.

The first thing to understand is that US infrastructure (which includes roads, bridges, dams, airports, sea ports, drinking water, power lines, pipelines, waste storage, inland waterways, levees etc) is falling apart at the moment. The American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) has been pointing this out for years.

In their most recent “report card”, issued in 2017, the ASCE estimated that the US needs to spend about $4.5 trillion by 2025 to fix the problem. They say this is a serious problem, requiring serious spending, and it is not going to get better ‘naturally’. As no one is getting ready to spend anything like that, the situation will continue to get worse, more costly to fix, and harder to fix. Patch up jobs merely mask the problem.

What climate change adds to this situation, is that it appears to be bringing more extreme weather events. This puts more pressure on infrastructure.

For example, dams and levees will have to survive more frequent, rapid and severe flooding and storm surges. Such storms are also likely to affect drinking water (also affected by mining and fracking, and possible lowered testing standards as money is taken away from Government based Environmental supervision). Storms in other countries such as Australia (I’m not a US resident, so I’m not up to date with US events) have already caused blackouts, through knocking down power lines; the more decayed the infrastructure, the more they will be knocked down. Roads and bridges also tend to get swept away by severe events. Research has already shown that gas pipelines are leaking badly – oil pipelines breaks are more visible and thus tend to get fixed – but more severe storms will increase both the rate of leakage and possible fire danger.

Rising sea levels, which now appear locked in as Antarctica starts to melt, will affect ports, and anything built on low lying land. This often includes oil refineries, and major cities that have grown around ports. Storms and storm surges are likely to increase along US coasts, especially down south as we seem to be seeing already in the Gulf of Mexico, and off-Florida. Whether people have been lucky so far, or whether the storms will generally avoid the coastline we will see with time. Relatively, small increases in water levels can drastically increase the damage from storm surges on low lying land, or up waste water pipes that dump into the sea.

Increased heat and drought, in some parts of the country, will increase wildfires, and we seem to have already seen this in California and in many other parts of the world – again Australia leads the way. Droughts also bring threats to food supplies and farm profitability. This can be compounded by privatized water supplies, which take water from rivers and deliver it to wealthy businesses – not all infrastructure is necessarily beneficial to everyone. Humans do not work well in runs of extreme heat (anything over 40 degrees centigrade), especially if they are already not well, and this will put extra strain on hospitals, not to mention families and incomes.

Changes in permafrost conditions in the Northern US, may weaken foundations, leading to built item collapse….

Furthermore, most of the US’s infrastructure (and everyone else’s) has been designed with the assumption that climate will remain stable. It is not designed for resilience under changing weather conditions. Even if it had been designed with this change in mind, it is extremely hard to predict what local conditions will become – climate is a complex system, and while we can predict trends we cannot predict specific events.

The US Fourth National Climate Assessment suggests that the US government “must act aggressively to adapt to current impacts and mitigate future catastrophes…to avoid substantial damages to the U.S. economy, environment, and human health and well-being over the coming decades” and “climate change is expected to cause substantial losses to infrastructure and property and impede the rate of economic growth over this century.”

It is highly probable that increasing destructive stresses on failing infrastructure will have harmful results.

The most obvious result is massive economic disruption, and disruption of transmission of vital supplies, such as water, food and energy. Modern Western cities are not designed to be self-sustaining; if they are cut off from supplies then living conditions will rapidly become difficult for most people. Places like Cuba where cities have been built around much smaller supplies of petrol, and less elaborate infrastructure, may be more resilient, but they are likely to be greatly affected by weather. Effects will not be uniform.

However, the cost of repairing this extra damage will add to the cost of repairing infrastructure in general, and add to financial stress and debt in government.

The extra cost of repair will probably take money away from transition to a more resilient, less polluting system. It could perhaps inspire such changes, as the old system falls down, but that depends on whether established power relations actively strive to stop transition and demand more of what their wealth has been built around. Current political behavior, does not suggest optimism.

Insurance companies are getting worried, and it will be getting harder to insure property in particular locations, and infrastructure is part of what makes a location, and adds to, or diminishes its vulnerability. “Insurers have warned that climate change could make cover for ordinary people unaffordable after the world’s largest reinsurance firm blamed global warming for $24bn (£18bn) of losses in the Californian wildfires”. This will increase the precariousness of life, for ordinary people, and add to their difficulties of making ends meet, especially under the likely new normality of extreme weather events.

You might want to see whether your own costs are increasing, or your local area is becoming uninsurable.

There is another form of ‘infrastructure’ which is often ignored in discussions of failing infrastructure. This is the natural ecology. The natural ecology provides many services we need vitally, but do not notice because they have been provided freely of human action (even if some of them have been charged for). These services include: oxygen supply, waste removal, drinkable water, food supply, and so on. Continual pollution, poisoning and destruction of this infrastructure in the name of development and profit, diminishes the ability of the natural infrastructure to deliver its services, which adds further stress to social life, and increases the likelihood of extra costs and disaster.

Climate change is a consequence of the destruction of this wider infrastructure, and adds to the destruction in a positive feedback loop. Again, the situation will not get better by itself.

Conclusion

Infrastructure (both human-built and natural) is falling apart in the first place, and not designed to face the added climate stresses we are all facing. It is likely to slowly crash, and the results of the crash may not be protected, or coverable, by insurance.

Refusing to consider the problem, which is what most governments are doing, because of the costs, will not make it better. Declining tax revenues (largely because of corporate tax evasion, taking profits overseas, and tax cuts for the wealthy) do not make dealing with the problem easier.

On the other hand, some governments seem to be actively trying to make the situation worse, by lessening restrictions on ecologically damaging behavior by corporations, and encouraging fossil fuel use and pollution.

Those governments are not acting in your best interests whether you ‘believe’ in climate change or not. Political action is required for survival.

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Predictions of Energy Change

September 16, 2019

This is my somewhat harsher version of the beginning of a coauthored and forthcoming book chapter. I particularly thank Tom Morton of UTS for much of the data and inspiration for what follows.

There is a lot of discussion as to whether or not the world has reached “peak demand” for fossil fuels as an energy source. Burning fossil fuels generates greenhouse gases and greenhouse gases are generating climate change. This is not the only ecological crisis we face, but it is the one with the largest acknowledgement.

Large players in the fossil fuel industry seem eager to imply that world demand for coal and other fossil fuels are declining, but there is little evidence to imply that an energy transition to renewables is coming with the kind of speed we need.

For example, The BHP group states that coal will:

progressively lose competitiveness to renewables on a new build basis in the developed world and in China. In our view, the cross over point should have occurred in these major markets by the end of next decade on a conservative estimate. However, coal power is expected to retain competitiveness in India, where the coal fleet is only around 10 years old on average, and other populous, low income emerging markets, for a much longer time.

(Italics added)

BP are more optimistic still, stating that “renewables are the largest source of energy growth, gaining at an unprecedented rate” and “are set to penetrate the global energy system more quickly than any fuel previously in history.”

ExxonMobil describes a more complicated picture. While they suggest that coal use “likely peaked” in 2013 (p. 29), they suggest the immediate energy “switch” will be to gas (p. 33), which continues greenhouse gas emissions, if at a lesser rate (although this is not certain because of perpetual leakage). However, they also predict that:

global CO2 intensity of energy use remain[s] fairly constant, with increased coal use in some non-OECD countries offsetting improvements in the OECD countries (p. 39).

(Italics added)

They also predict that by 2040 the global energy mix will be:

  • 30% oil,
  • 26% gas,
  • 20% coal,
  • 8% biomass,
  • 7% nuclear,
  • 4% wind and solar, and
  • 4% hydro/geo/biofuels (p. 28).

It hardly needs to be emphasized that this implies that over 80% of a our fuel use will continue to emit greenhouse gases, even by 2040. The degree of transition to renewables will be trivial. Essentially, ExxonMobil predict a transition to a state which is not much different from today, as is shown by the IEA.

The IEA, claims, in its Key World Energy Statistics for 2017, that only 1.5% of world primary energy supply by fuel in 2016 was “geothermal, solar, wind, tide/wave/ocean, heat,” while 2.5% is hydro and 9.7% is biofuel (p. 6). That is, the proportion of our current energy usage in the world, which is renewable, non greenhouse gas emitting, could be said to be less than trivial!

We may also need to recall that we have been aware of the need for transition to low greenhouse gas emission energy, since the early 1980s, with the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change being signed in 1992, and this is the best we have done under the current system, and leaving it to private enterprise. (Because the market always knows what is best).

The change predicted and celebrated by ExxonMobil is hardly a transition, and hardly makes much of an impact on a situation which seems to becoming worse daily.

While recognising low utilisation today, the IEA is somewhat more optimistic in its prognosis: in Renewables 2018, it predicts that the share of renewables in meeting global energy demand is expected to grow by one-fifth to reach 12.4% in 2023. Renewables should have the fastest growth in the electricity sector, providing almost 30% of power demand in 2023, up from 24% in 2017. During this period, renewables are forecast to supply more than 70% of global electricity generation growth, led by solar PV and followed by wind, hydropower, and bioenergy. However:

30% of the growth in renewables consumption is expected to come from modern bioenergy… due to bioenergy’s considerable use in heat and its growing consumption… in transport. Other renewables make a negligible contribution to these two sectors [heat and transport], which together account for 80% of total energy consumption (IEA 2018: 3).

(Italics added)

Bioenergy is not clean. At best it consumes fertile land previously intended for agriculture, or leads to felling of old growth forests, thus dispossessing poorer farmers and forest dwellers and increasing the price of food. Biofuel is only of any conceivable use, if it replaces, and lowers, consumption of fossil fuels.

In another recent report the IEA adds:

Energy consumption worldwide grew by 2.3% in 2018, nearly twice the average rate of growth since 2010… natural gas… emerged as the fuel of choice last year, accounting for nearly 45% of the increase in total energy demand. Demand for all fuels rose, with fossil fuels meeting nearly 70% of the growth for the second year running….

global energy-related CO2 emissions increased to 33.1 Gt CO2, up 1.7%….

The United States had the largest increase in oil and gas demand worldwide. Gas consumption jumped 10% from the previous year, the fastest increase since the beginning of IEA records in 1971. The annual increase in US demand last year was equivalent to the United Kingdom’s current gas consumption.

Growth in India was led by coal (for power generation) and oil (for transport), the first and second biggest contributors to energy demand growth, respectively.

(Italics added)

The IEA points out that the pace and scale of the global energy transition, “is not in line with climate targets”. This we can almost certainly agree with.

It is, however, in line with a future which maximises fossil fuel company profits and destroys normal life for most people. That is were the World’s current policies have led us.

Data like this, might make you think, that we need Revolution, even if the consequences of Revolution will almost certainly be painful and horrendous. However, while we may wonder if we have any time left to avoid looming disaster, let us try the relatively painless, if perhaps insufficient move, of encouraging high renewable targets, ending of fossil fuel exploration, mining and use, within the next ten years, even if it costs some taxpayers’ money and risks financial problems for some companies. The cost will probably be less than that of oil wars.

This may require us to also consider the necessity of “degrowth” which will be considered in a later post.

_______________________________

Addenda

A new report by the IEA (20 September 2019) states that:

After stalling last year, global capacity additions of renewable power are set to bounce back with double-digit growth in 2019, driven by solar PV’s strong performance, according to the International Energy Agency.

The IEA expects renewable capacity additions to grow by almost 12% this year, the fastest pace since 2015, to reach almost 200 GW, mostly thanks to solar PV and wind. Global solar PV additions are expected to increase by over 17%

However:

Renewable capacity additions need to grow by more than 300 GW on average each year between 2018 and 2030 to reach the goals of the Paris Agreement.

Even with the “bounce back”, we are still not moving fast enough.

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Potential Submission for NSW Parliamentary Inquiry into Renewable Energy

September 15, 2019

The terms of reference of the Inquiry are as follows

The inquiry is looking at the capacity and economic opportunities of renewable energy. It will also cover trends in energy supply and exports, including investment and other financial arrangements, and effects on regional communities, water security, the environment and public health. The Committee will also consider options to support sustainable economic development in communities affected by changing energy and resource markets, including the role of government policies.

The Committee on Environment and Planning inquire into and report on the sustainability of energy supply and resources in NSW, including:
1) The capacity and economic opportunities of renewable energy.
2) Emerging trends in energy supply and exports, including investment and other financial arrangements.
3) The status of and forecasts for energy and resource markets.
4) Effects on regional communities, water security, the environment and public health.
5) Opportunities to support sustainable economic development in regional and other communities likely to be affected by changing energy and resource markets, including the role of government policies.
6) Any other related matters.

General

  1. Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions are not declining significantly. Those emissions produce climate change, and need to be cut back, to allow some degree of climate stability to emerge. Otherwise, it may become increasingly hard to sustainably maintain life in Australia.
  2. The problem is global not national. Because of this, every state has to stop pretending that it can only act when others act. Otherwise no one will act.
  3. Fossil Fuel burning is the primary cause of climate change.
  4. Fossil fuel mining and burning, badly affects the health of those living nearby, and the crops being grown nearby. Fossil fuels are poisons. No amount of positive advertising about new technologies will alter this in the foreseeable future.
  5. Exports of fossil fuels do affect the world levels of greenhouse gas emissions. They do not just affect the atmospheres of the countries they burn in. Every export, helps destabilise climate in the world and Australia. That other people will export is no defence as, unless someone stops, no one will.
  6. Carbon Capture and Reuse or Storage, has not been shown to work at the levels, price and low energy usage, required for it to make fossil power climate safe.
  7. Rehabilitation of land devastated by coal mining does not seem that common in Australia, and most of it faces the road, rather than goes deep. See the Hunter Valley.
  8. Coal mining takes large amounts of water, and risks polluting large quantities of water, despoiling rivers or subterranean water aquifers. This is particularly destructive, in times of lengthening drought.
  9. Destroying agricultural land, in a country with few very fertile areas of farmable land, and growing population, strains sustainable survival.
  10. Therefore, as part of the struggle against climate change and ecological despoliation, the government should not allow any more coal or gas mines, no matter how economically beneficial they are claimed to be. It should not encourage the building of more coal fired power stations. Gas based energy should not be enabled unless it is replacing coal, as it is still a source of greenhouse gas emissions, particularly ‘fugitive emissions’ or those emissions from well sites and from leaky pipes. It should be assumed all old gas pipes are leaky.
  11. Transport and agriculture also seem to be major sources of greenhouse gas emissions.
  12. Land-clearing and deforestation prevents the breakdown of carbon dioxide into carbon and oxygen, and heightens the risk of water runoff. It increases the risks of climate change.
  13. Renewable based, electric, or hydrogen, powered transport needs to be encouraged so as to replace petrol fuel transport.
  14. We also need to encourage regenerative agriculture to improve carbon storage, land fertility and water retention.
  15. Different types of energy storage need investigation, development and installation, domestically, locally and grid wide. There may not be one universal solution.
  16. Renewable energy is essential, but it is not enough to solve the problems of climate change, and sustainability, by itself.

Politics of Economics

  1. Polls consistently show that the majority of Australian people want to encourage renewable energy, but this so far has not produced any change in politics, economic regulation, or economic process.
  2. If large-scale renewable energy is installed the way that most major private or public/private projects seem to be installed nowadays, with apparently low levels of real consultation, or as impositions from on high, then there will, more likely, be resistance as people see their landscapes being destroyed for the profit of outsiders, with little local benefit.
  3. This resistance is particularly important in rural areas, where it is easy to organise a resistance which motivates a large proportion of the relatively small local population.
  4. Companies have more incentive to make money than to get local communities involved. Taking a hint from coal mines they may even import labour, so that most of the money earned in construction goes outside the areas being developed.
  5. Renewable projects, in the long term, appear to require few maintenance jobs, so the overall employment available in a rural area may decline as jobs lost from agriculture are not replaced.
  6. As with fossil fuel mining, land use can be changed and valuable agricultural land rendered unfarmable in the long term.
  7. Together with “imposition from on high,” this importation of labour, lack of continual work, destruction of other jobs, and change of land-use may mean that local councils are, at best, unenthusiastic about renewable projects, particularly when faced with relentless upbeat ‘information’ from fossil fuel companies.
  8. It is frequently suggested in the literature, that the ways corporations gain land through secret negotiations with land owners, and with no recompense to other locals who are not involved, but have to look at the results, that conflict and jealousy can be caused in small towns, which adds to the bad reception of the renewable installations.
  9. These points can also encourage astro-turf groups, and corporate deniers move in and make allies to delay the transition, so as to lengthen the time available to profit from fossil fuels, even if people do not want more coal power and coal mines.
  10. If community groups and local citizens can fully participate in the energy transformation the transformation will encounter less resistance.
  11. Lessening community dependence on the grid, means that local areas may be able to survive climate change based weather events that pull down grid power lines, or put centralised power stations out of commission. This supports national resilience.
  12. Community groups can find it hard to build their own energy sources, and lessen their dependence on the grid, because of regulations which are geared towards protecting existing corporate players in the energy market.
  13. Community groups and Local Councils require regulation and implementation schedules that allow them to act.
  14. A paradox. Community energy may lack the speed to produce the transformation in time, but if we do not encourage community based energy, it may be alienating for most people, put in place without proper consultation or participation, and generate protest and disruption.

NSW

  1. Regulations structure the market and both encourage and limit what can be done. Company control over parts of the grid, also encourages and limits what can be done.
  2. Current regulations hinder local community based installations from happening, in the ways that people would like.
  3. For example, I have heard of attempts by small towns to power themselves, as well as use the grid, but it proved impossible, or extremely costly, to link power from one rooftop to another house. Likewise, some local councils have had the same problem with plans to generate power on one of their rooves and transfer the power across the road to another council building. Similarly with trying to power the main street shops with a small solar farm on suitable roof tops.
  4. Talking with people from various organisations and Local Councils it appears that NSW is renowned for the vagueness of its position. It seems hard for people to figure out precisely what help or hindrance is available.
  5. For example, it does not seem clear to many people what the designation of an area as an “energy priority zone” actually means. Although I have heard of companies deciding there must be some benefit to this, it does not really encourage any activity.
  6. Likewise regulations, such as the corporations act, may prevent communities or councils raising money for projects with ease. For example, if the energy source is above a certain size then the certification system works in a different way. If the money is above a certain amount then it appears there are different requirements as to how it needs to be administered and how many shareholders can be involved. These issues can limit the capacity of local organisations to raise money from the community, pay that money back and limit the size of the energy source. If this is not the case, then it needs to be set out clearly, as it certainly appears that people think this is the case.
  7. New regulations, need to be developed in consultation with local community power groups, and local Councils. Government’s need to listen to accounts of the problems that such groups face, and help them as much as they help larger businesses.
  8. I have often been told that the grid connections are such that local suppliers of renewable energy face difficulty shifting their energy elsewhere in NSW. Sometimes the grid is apparently just not designed for non-centralised, non-one way energy traffic.
  9. Grid issues need to be remedied, but large energy companies cannot be relied upon to provide help for their much smaller rivals. So public works may be necessary.
  10. Some Energy companies are both suppliers and retailers. This reputedly enables them to increase the price of supply while selling below cost, thus making life difficult for smaller retailers while still making a profit. If true, such a situation needs remedying.

Climate change and renewables

  1. Climate change, produces tumultuous changes in the weather, and may affect renewables.
  2. Wind patterns may change – affecting the areas which are good for windfarms.
  3. Solar panels may need cleaning regularly because of dust deposits, especially if there are high winds and no rain. This takes water, which may produce problems with locals.
  4. Pumped hydro storage may be affected by drought and evaporation. If installed then it needs to be installed near permanent supplies of water, probably near the coast.

Recommendations

  1. The NSW government should engage in planning to shift the economy away from dependence on fossil fuels in any way; mining, energy supply and so on. It should probably set signposts for the end of large scale fossil fuel exploration, mining, export and import. It should insist on proper rehabilitation for all mines. Fossil fuels do not produce sustainability.
  2. The government, should encourage renewable based electric or hydrogen powered electric transport.
  3. It should encourage regenerative agriculture, and discourage land clearing.
  4. It should encourage an investigation into the best ways of energy storage for different situations – making the information public.
  5. It should encourage Community and Local Council based renewable Energy.
  6. It should discourage “top down” imposition of renewable projects by companies, and make it illegal for companies to have secret agreements and negotiations with local landowners.
  7. It should run an inquiry into the effects of regulation on small scale renewable energy projects, with input from local groups and local Councils.
  8. It should abolish those regulations, or powers held by business, which render small scale energy difficult to impossible.
  9. If the government is going to designate areas as “special” with regard to renewable energy, the designation should have clear and beneficial consequences for the whole of NSW.
  10. The government should aim for regulatory clarity.
  11. It should help simplify processes of raising money for local projects.
  12. It should consider acting to make the grid suitable for renewable energy, by building new parts of the grid and changing the grid anatomy.
  13. It should investigate, and try to eliminate, those ways of price-fixing that benefit large scale operators and penalise small scale operators.
  14. It should make consideration of climate change factors part of any renewable installation.
  15. The government should investigate laws to compel the construction of energy efficient housing and office blocks, and to encourage renewable energy to be deployed on all new buildings in the most appropriate ways. Ideally people in cities should be able to choose between renewable energy and new toll roads.

Thank you.

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