What do whales and coal have in common?

You'd have to have been living in seclusion this week not to have heard about the ICJ decision to ban Japan from whaling in the Southern Ocean. This is a huge step forward for the whales, for the environment movement and for common sense. It's been pretty obvious for many years that Japanese whaling activities had nothing to do with scientific research but it took years to gather the required evidence, paperwork and political will to do something about it. This is in no small part due to the efforts of various groups and activists over many, many decades. Pressure from within Japan has been mounting at the same time, with many Japanese actively protesting against whaling and boycotting whale meat, to the point where it was really no longer economically viable. The costly and very public stoushes with Sea Shepherd on the high seas only added to the glare of unwanted, and rather gruesome, publicity, not to mention the expense, of continuing down this road. 

Coal, oil and gas seem so entrenched in the halls of power and in the global economy, it seems that they will never be budged. But it was once this way with many other industries, including whaling, believe it or not. Politics, activism, public opinion and economics need to align to make change happen really fast and fossil fuels are now getting caught up in a 'perfect storm'. It might not seem like it in Australia, but politically they are 'on the nose' in many countries. Economically, they are on a downhill run and are already being out-competed by renewables. In another few years it will be all over financially for new coal projects. Oil and gas won't be far behind. The smart money has already moved. The mainstream is following. Only a handful of slow reactors are still pushing the coal cart with any enthusiasm or optimism. There are large and small public protests everywhere in the world every day about climate change, CSG mining, the Keystone Pipeline, the Great Barrier Reef dredging, coal mining pollution, divestment actions, spills, bribery, corruption and undue political influence ... you name it. It's happening everywhere. You won't see it on the nightly news though, because they don't like to talk about things like that, preferring to lavish their limited reporting budgets on lost airplanes, missing pets and domestic disputes for reasons of their own (ratings?). 

Although you have to read between the lines in the business pages to get any real sense of what's happening, it's obvious that coal stocks are a bad idea in the long term. Although the mainstream media likes to play this down for reasons of their own (probably to do with not upsetting their advertisers) change is coming and coming fast. One day burning fossilized compost to power our cities and light our homes will seem as anachronistic, and just plain inefficient, as using whale oil. Let's hope it happens pronto, before it's too late. Our focus as the Greens is to work on what sort of a world we want to create in the post-carbon, post-industrial, post-growth century. It's important to make sure we don't keep taking these wrong turns down unsustainable and inequitable paths. We want a world of social justice, economic responsibility, environmental wisdom and peace and disarmament. It won't happen overnight and it won't happen by wishing for it, but it will happen if we all do a little bit about it every day.