By Walter Starck - posted Monday, 8 September 2014 in On Line Opinion - Australia's e-journal of social and political debate.
In the fable about the boy who cried wolf the villagers quickly decided
the boy was lying and ceased to respond to his alarms. It seems modern
day journalists must be much more gullible than those ancient villagers.
Every year for almost a half-century the news media have breathlessly
reported alarmist claims of imminent threats to the existence of the
Great Barrier Reef. Despite the fact that all have proved to be
fictitious, trivial or short lived fluctuation of nature, the phony
alarms never seem to lose credibility with news reporters or even
provoke any investigation.
The latest such instance has involved uncritical propagation of alarmist
claims regarding the threat from some additional dredging of an
existing dredged shipping channel in connection with expansion of the
coal loading terminal at Abbott Point in central Queensland. (See: BATTLE FOR THE REEF, reported by Marian Wilkinson and presented by Kerry O'Brien, broadcast on ABC 4 Corners Monday 18 August 2014)
Only a modicum of investigation would reveal that all of the ports along
the Queensland coast have been dredged and require periodic re-dredging
to maintain their entrance channels. The GBR itself is many km offshore
and no detriment to the reef attributable to coastal dredging has ever
been documented. A scattering of low diversity inshore reefs does occur
in the region but these are restricted to rocky outcrops where wave
action prevents sediment build-up and these reefs are comprised of a
limited range of silt tolerant coral species.
Most of the inshore sea floor of the GBR lagoon is heavily blanketed by
fine sediments accumulated over millennia. This is a windy coast and
wave action resuspends the top layers of sediment every time there is a
strong blow. These are naturally very turbid waters and the turbidity
from dredging is only localised and short lived. The most noticeable
ongoing effect of dredging is that the dredged channels create a more
favourable habitat for fishes and a noticeably better fishing area than
the naturally flat silted sea floor through which they are constructed.
The port dredging amounts to not much more than moving some mud and sand
from one place to another of similar substrate.
In the matter of the dredging at Abbott Point alternatives are
suggested but not examined. One is pumping the dredge spoil onto the
land but this would reguire the destruction of a large area of coastal
wetlands with much greater environmental impact than simply moving it to
similar sediment bottom nearby. Another suggested possibility has been
to extend the existing 3 km long loading wharf farther offshore into
deeper water but this would entail greater cyclone risk and much higher
cost.
Environmentalists always prefer hypothetical solutions to imaginary problems, at least so long as these remain only theoretical or uneconomic. They advocated aquaculture, tree farms and biofuels until they became a reality. Now they oppose them.
Despite incessant claims of dire threats to the GBR, it is in fact in
excellent condition. Fishing pressure is at less than 1% of the average
sustainable level for reefs cited by the most recent and comprehensive
global survey of coral reefs. Tourism only regularly visits less than
two dozen of the more than 2500 named reefs which comprise the GBR.
Nutrients and agrichemicals from land runoff are at trace levels and far
below any concentrations known to have harmful effects. They are also
well below the levels commonly found in our own food and their usage in
the GBR catchment area has decreased over the past two decades. The
warming and reduction in alkalinity (misleadingly called ocean
"acidification") predicted for the end of the century due to climate
change would in fact only result in levels that now occur naturally in
other regions where reefs thrive and even reach their peaks of
biodiversity. Severe cyclone frequency is not increasing and has been
much lower over the past century than the previous one. Coral bleaching
events are in line with past occurrences as evidenced by the
characteristic scars they leave in coral skeletons and crown-of-thorns
likewise as evidenced by the varying frequency of their characteristic
spines in reef sediments.
Why then are all the reef "experts" so alarmed? For a start expertise is
based on facts and facts speak for themselves. When we have to be told
someone is an expert they probably aren't. Then too, our actual
understanding of reef biology remains very limited. There is much we
don't know and much of what we think we know is simply wrong. In the
1970s and 80s reef researchers were beginning to make good progress in
our knowledge of reefs; but, since then basic research has largely
ceased. Most research now focuses on environmental concerns and most of
these are only hypothetical possibilities, not demonstrable problems.
Unfortunately though, when funding is obtained to investigate a possible
problem it is unlikely that the finding will be that there isn't one.
The usual result is that the situation is found to be uncertain and more
research is called for.
We now have a whole generation of researchers whose entire experience of
the reef has been in the context of investigating environmental
"problems" and they see every variation of nature as evidence of some
threat. As the Law of the Instrument states, ifthe only tool you have is
a hammer it is tempting to treat everything as if it were a nail.
Worse yet, the academic system from which all researchers derive has
itself become the very font of political correctness and PC has come to
encompass environmental correctness. By this diktat environmental
concerns are morally beyond question, any attempt at objectivity is a
delusion and scientific ethics are subordinate to some higher truth
known to all right thinking people to be politically correct. In short
the science itself has become corrupted.
One widely cited recent example of this from reef research has been the
claim that the expanded green zones on the GBR have resulted in a
doubling of coral trout numbers on the protected reefs. This arose from
claims made in a press release issued by the lead research institution
involved in the study but is inconsistent with abundant other evidence
including that which is presented in the report itself. In the actual
study the claim of a doubling of fish on protected reefs appears to rest
on a single example from among 8 reef areas surveyed and that area had
the lowest level to begin and lowest difference between fished and
unfished reefs. In 5 of the 7 other areas the protected reefs actually
showed a decline in coral trout numbers. In the remaining two areas no
statistically significant change was found. On fished reefs, three areas
showed increases in biomass while 5 showed declines. This is clearly
not the "extraordinary" 2-fold increase in protected areas that was
bannered in the press release and widely reported in the media. Such
natural variability is in fact common between reefs and over time on the
same reefs. While one might excuse this as only the result of an
overzealous copy writer in the PR department no effort was made to
correct this grossly misleading claim.
Another recent and widely reported study claims a halving of coral cover
on the GBR over the past 27 years. Interestingly only two years earlier
a co-author of this report was the lead author in another study using
the same survey data but found no evidence of any widespread decline in
coral cover. The only additional evidence comes from surveys made to
assess coral damage from two severe tropical cyclones which crossed the
reef in the two subsequent years. Naturally these surveys were made in
the affected areas and not over the majority of the reefs which were
outside the storm track. With a bit of statistical jiggery-pokery this
new data was incorporated and smoother into a 27 year decline.
The new study was published in a high profile peer reviewed journal
which requires that any conflicting evidence be addressed. Although the
earlier study was briefly cited no mention was made of its directly
contradictory conclusion. By not mentioning any conflicting evidence in a
journal which specifically requires this, the clear impression is that
there was none. Obviously this was not just a matter of not being aware
of the earlier study but had to be a deliberate decision to ignore its
conflicting findings. At minimum this kind of misrepresentation must be
seen to constitute scientific misconduct and quite arguably could be
seen as fraud.
Government and taxpayers have been paying extravagantly for, and relying
heavily upon, scientific advice which is often provably false, highly
selected or of grossly exaggerated certainty. Laws against fraud and
false or misleading advertising are being blatantly violated and need to
be enforced.
Trying to frame it all as simply honest differences of opinion among
researchers makes a farce of the very concept of scientific integrity.
There is compelling prima facie evidence of violations of
existing legislation regarding fraud and unethical business practices.
This deserves proper investigation and charges being made if indicated.
If those found guilty were simply stripped of all public funding and
barred for a lengthy period from any future funding the humiliation plus
the horror of having to find some honest means of making a living would
surely inject a much needed concern for honesty into the research
community.
Australia now faces a developing economic crisis that
may well become the most serious in our history. Three-quarters of our
small miners, fishers, timber cutters, farmers and graziers have been
forced out of a cherished way of life that helped sustain us all.
Misguided and often malignant environmental restrictions and demands
have played a major role in this decline. We have the most expensive
housing and power in the developed world, soaring food prices and the
smallest manufacturing sector of any OECD nation. There are numerous
other more real and important needs for our limited government revenue
than maintaining several hundred bureaucrats and academics on a
permanent Barrier Reef holiday.
To further confuse the issue, much of the opposition to the dredging is
being driven more by opposition to coal mining than by any actual threat
to the reef. Unfortunately both the world economy and our own are still
going to require a lot of coal for a few decades yet to come. Trying to
force a premature adoption of alternative energy at this point is a
recipe for disaster.
Fortunately the real situation is far less bleak than the alarmist's
proclaim. The GBR is in excellent condition and under no threat. The
warming effect of increased CO2 has been greatly exaggerated and the net effect of a slightly warmer climate plus the stimulation of plant growth from CO2
is more likely to be a net benefit than a detriment. Meanwhile
population growth is falling in most nations, and is already below
replacement level in many with the global population projected to begin
to decline by mid- century.
A variety of technological advances in energy generation, use and
storage are on the horizon and promise to eliminate the problems
associated with a heavy dependence on fossil fuels. However, their
ongoing use for a few more decades will be essential to get from here to
there.
In the meantime the most certain way to assure a speedy recovery of the
GBR would be to take the reef experts at their word, accept it is doomed
and stop throwing good money after bad in a hopeless effort to save it.
If it got as bad as they claim despite all the money and effort
expended and while starting from a vastly better condition to begin
with, surely nothing can save it now.
Closing down GBRMPA and reducing reef research to pallative care in the
form of a modest monitoring effort could save over $100 million
annually. If this were done and future expenditure made contingent upon
any positive signs of a possible turnaround, I am confident we could
soon expect a miraculous recovery.
Source: On Line Opinion
About the author: Dr Walter Starck has a PhD in marine science including post graduate
training and professional experience in fisheries biology. He is the
editor and publisher of Golden Dolphin, a quarterly publication on CD focusing on diving, underwater photography and the ocean world.
