Reading physics and engineering texts can be enlightening. Pouring over politically skewed economic forecasts passing as facts, can be confronting. The physics of our politics is now encroaching on our futures.
I do a fair amount of reading in this job, putting this magazine together. There is always something new to learn, and even some old stuff I missed at university. I’m no expert, but I love the fun of physics. The cold hard facts of metallurgy. The real physics of metalic tolerances, engineering and cutting metals, machining the various forms from the sheets, plates and billets. I dive into technical reports, industry studies, scientific papers and thought-pieces, to collect the right kind of manufacturing, business and technology editorial you might like to read at the other end. Never a dull day. It’s just the kind of guy I am. I’m great at parties.
‘Econobabble’ is that noise you hear when lobbyists, politicians and commentators use incomprehensible economic babble to dress up their self-interest as the national interest, to make the absurd seem inevitable or the inequitable seem fair. Econobabble is also the title of the latest updated book from Richard Denniss, the Chief Economist at the Australia Institute. The book exposes the circular arguments, contradictions and lack of evidence used in economic and political discourse in Australia. Well worth a read. Denniss also talks about job losses. Every job loss is tragic, but almost everyone who has lost their job knows there’s usually something out there for them shortly afterward. Hear me out. Every whaler out there has lost their job. Asbestos miners have lost theirs. Steam-powered ships destroyed jobs in sail making and the digital media industry spelled the end of the road for film process workers and their labs. I worked in film for fifteen years, so I know. And one day, my writing/editing job may well be done by some sentient AI processor. But I’m amazed at the concern by some of the loss of jobs in the coal mining industry.
According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, an average of around 330,000 people get new jobs every single month. That’s more than six times the number employed in the coal mining industry in Australia. In 2020-21, the Queensland government earned more from speeding fines and car registrations than it did from the coal mining industry, and these figures are from the ATO. The world is changing faster now than it ever has before. Society, economics, climate and the world of work are all changing just as fast. It is so exciting to delve into the many facets of Australian manufacturing and the changes going on in front of us. Surely, I thought, it would be cheaper to avoid the effects of the climate crisis and to change our energy systems right now by stopping digging up coal, than to just let it happen and then try to 'adapt'. But then, as I’ve also just read, the export of Australian coal to Asia for smelting into metals isn’t going to stop anytime soon.
Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek has now signed off on a fifty (50)-year extension to the permit for the Gregory Crinum coal mine, 60kms northeast of Emerald in Central Queensland. The Gregory Crinum mine will now produce metallurgical coal used in steelmaking until 2073. At first I thought this was Econobabble. The International Energy Agency also released a statement: ‘Steel production will remain coal-based in the medium term. Other promising technological approaches, such as hydrogen-based steelmaking, are not yet available on the scale and at the cost required and are not expected in the coming years.’ Of the 1.9Gt(Gigatonnes) of steel produced in the world, 1.4Gt is produced in Asia—1Gt in China alone. China produces 90% of its crude steel via the blast furnace method. A transition to green steel will have to be centred in Asia.
The bottom line is that the world needs Asia to prioritise the energy transition over green steel. It’s pointless for Australia to try to accelerate steel decarbonisation by denying coal to Asian producers. They will procure lower quality, higher emissions metallurgical coal from elsewhere. Or dig up their own. So what else can one say? Whatever job you may have, find the fun and do it well. If not, make your move, because there’s no time to lose. Perhaps I should read more factual physics papers, find the fun and go to more parties.
Paul Hellard
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