NSW: Activists lay banner in name of climate change

AAP General News (Australia)
02-15-2005
NSW: Activists lay banner in name of climate change

SYDNEY, Feb 15 AAP - Environmentalists have unfurled an Olympic pool-sized banner in
the dry bed of NSW's biggest dam to highlight growing climate change problems.

Greenpeace activists laid the banner across a waterless part of Sydney's low-level
Warragamba Dam, bearing the words "This is what climate change looks like".

The move is designed to prompt the NSW government to tackle global warming after the
Commonwealth opted not to ratify the Kyoto Protocol.

The agreement, in which developed and developing nations agreed to limit their greenhouse
gas emissions to 1990 levels, comes into effect tomorrow.

Greenpeace Australia Pacific Dr Bob Wilson, a former Sydney Water managing director,
said there was clear evidence climate change was a factor reducing our water supplies.

"Since the Howard government still refuses to ratify the treaty, pressure is building
on state and territory leaders to show leadership by implementing strong policies to reduce
greenhouse pollution," Dr Wilson said.

He called for the state government to introduce mandatory renewable energy targets.

"If NSW Premier Bob Carr took real leadership by implementing a mandatory clean energy
target of 10 per cent by 2010, he would see billions of dollars and thousands of jobs
flowing into NSW," Dr Wilson said.

Warragamba Dam, which supplies 80 per cent of Sydney's water, has dropped from 86 per
cent capacity to 39 per cent in three years.

A spokeswoman for the Sydney Water Authority said moderate rainfall had stabilised
levels over the past four months.

Scientists believe climate change, caused primarily by burning coal, oil and gas for
energy, is reducing rainfall and increasing evaporation in NSW, leading to water shortages.

AAP tam/jel/drp/de

KEYWORD: CLIMATE

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