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The mid-latitude cyclone with no name that hit South Australia last week, spawning two tornadoes and 80,000 electricity strikes, destroyed 22 massive transmission towers carrying electricity across the state.

The consequences of the superstorm could have been dire – both from the direct effects of the wind and floods but also for the life support systems that depend on electricity. 1.7 million residents lost power as winds reached 120km/hour.

Yet in the midst of South Australia being in a state of emergency, federal Coalition ministers launched what seemed to be a co-ordinated and, for many, outrageous campaign against renewable energy.

It was co-ordinated in that Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce and Environment and Energy Minister Josh Frydenberg all spoke from the same script: that “energy security” is Australia’s number-one priority. Or, as Frydenberg also put it:

We must keep the lights on.

Turnbull spoke of the extremely “aggressive” renewable energy targets the states have put in, which ironically are helping the federal government meet its own targets as part of UN framework agreements. And this in an environment where both major parties have just agreed to cut A$500 million from the Australian Renewable Energy Agency.

Along with Turnbull, Frydenberg was able to concede that severe weather was the source of the blackout. But the cyclone became a mere footnote to a full-frontal assault against renewables, which was taken up by mainstream media around the country. It sometimes became a bigger story than the storm itself.

Frydenberg continued the crusade over the weekend. He declared:

We’ve got the states pursuing these ridiculously high and unrealistic state-based renewable energy targets.

Joyce’s appearances on radio put the panic over renewables well ahead of the storm’s potential dangers. He compared the one-day blackout to the dark ages and put it down to bad planning, of which wind power was seen to be public enemy number one.

Joyce pointedly refused to acknowledge the storm as the cause of the blackout, and instead regressed to his well-known anti-wind rhetoric:

Of course in the middle of a storm, there are certain areas where wind power works – it works when wind is at a milder style, it doesn’t work when there’s no wind and it doesn’t work when there’s excessive wind – and it obviously wasn’t working too well last night because they had a blackout.

For these ministers, putting out a message that renewables were to blame because, they argued, they could not deliver a stable power system to South Australia, was an urgent priority that could both kill any climate message while denigrating renewables.

In a way what they did was very clever. As I have argued elsewhere, extreme weather presents the best opportunity for communicating climate stories.

That is, people are looking for an explanation as to why catastrophic weather is affecting them, and pointing to the link with between extreme weather and climate change is very persuasive at these times. But the Coalition’s campaign hijacked such messaging by simply swapping climate change with renewables.

The anti-renewable campaign was also outrageous. It was an affront to those who were confronting the storm’s immediate dangers and discomfort. But far more outrageous than this was the hypocrisy of drawing a link between the outage and renewables, rather than to climate change. The latter connection has been so vehemently rebuked by the Coalition during past extreme weather events.

During the NSW bushfires in October 2013, Abbott government ministers declared that talking about climate change during a “natural”/unnatural disaster to be taboo. This was in response to Greens MP Adam Bandt, who had linked the fires to climate change.

At the time, Environment Minister Greg Hunt declared:

There has been a terrible tragedy in NSW and no-one anywhere should seek to politicise any human tragedy, let alone a bushfire of this scale.

Given how progressive Turnbull himself has been on climate change in the past, this co-ordinated attack on renewables only demonstrates how captive he is to the right wing of the party and to the fossil-fuel industry.

Turnbull’s declaration on the day after the blackout was to “end the ideology” of the states pursuing renewables too aggressively. Ironically, what all of the polls around climate change show in the last five years is that enthusiasm for renewables is consistently high across Australia.

Perhaps Turnbull believes that if something is popular it must be ideological by definition. This departs from the idea that ideology is actually a worldview in the service of power – for example, the corporate power of fossil-fuel companies, which stand to lose much by the aggressive pursuit of renewables.

But the Coalition campaign got a huge lift from the ABC in the form of an opinion piece by political editor Chris Uhlmann. He says:

Renewables are the future but, today, they present serious engineering problems. To deny that is to deny the science.

Those problems can be sorted in time, but rushing to a target to parade green credentials exposes the electricity network to a serious security risk and, in the long run, risks permanent reputational damage to the renewable energy cause.

Uhlmann took his piece to national TV with a PowerPoint presentation during the ABC’s evening bulletin the day after the blackout. He claimed that only coal and gas could provide continuous energy or “synchronous supply”, and that renewables fail to do this.

The story really made it look like renewables were to blame. Yet his story in no way reconciled his teacherly diagrams with a soundbite from the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) in an earlier story – that:

Energy generation mix was not a factor in the power blackout.

Uhlmann’s story mentioned that the main interconnector with Victoria had failed, but then focused on renewables as a problem, while claiming the AEMO advised him that the causes of the blackout were yet to be identified. He failed to mention what he had in his online article, which was that AEMO also advised:

Initial investigations have identified the root cause of the event is likely to be the multiple loss of 275 kilovolt (kV) power lines during severe storm activity in the state.

Anyone who saw the images of the toppled and mangled transmission towers could easily figure out that if electricity has no way of being transmitted, it really does not matter where it comes from.

This is the point Labor politicians were trying to make. But they did not get a very good run, because the Coalition’s media blitz had been much more planned.

But neither did Labor politicians, including Bill Shorten, make the alternative link to climate change. South Australian Premier Jay Weatherill was a little more effective, saying:

This was a weather event, not a renewable energy event.

But he also did not go further.

Uhlmann’s report was preceded by a pre-cyclone story posted on the ABC website last week which claimed renewables had caused an astronomical spike in energy prices in South Australia on a July day when the wind was not blowing. But the headline belies the reality that a privatised system of energy supply enables the kind of price gouging that was seen on that day, especially as the interconnector with Victoria was also down.

The interconnectors across Australia are very important, as Australia actually has one of the largest continuous grids in the world. This means that as long as we manage the grid itself, with “better planning” we will be able to avoid blackouts.

The importance of managing grids, and “distributed energy” that may use home storage as well, is the key to continuity. Otherwise, it is very easy to see outages, as was the case in the US in 2003. Then, long before renewables were significant, a single tree branch touching an overloaded power line turned off the lights for 50 million people in the US and Canada.

Managing a reliable grid is important, but it never seems to have occurred to federal Coaltition politicians that “good planning” is to aggressively cut emissions – which is exactly what many states are trying to do. This reduces the amount of energy in the climate system that ends up as increased water vapour and flooding, increased storm intensity, and many other forms of extreme weather.

Shorten, like Turnbull, knows that recent polls are showing climate change is returning a high level of concern, and has missed an opportunity to link the storm to climate – something the Abbott government had always considered must be avoided at all costs.

Turnbull’s team has managed to divert attention away from climate and go one better than the Abbott government by attacking renewables all in one campaign. For the fossil-fuel industry and the Coalition’s climate deniers alike, this was one perfect storm.

A leading UK-based solar farm developer has received approval for its first 140MW solar farm in Queensland, and intends to bypass Australia's major electricity utilities and sell the output from its growing portfolio of projects to the spot market.

Solar and storage micro-grid will lead to town of Onslow sourcing 70 per cent of its electricity from renewables, improve reliability, reduce costs and state subsidies.

Originally published in the Manchester Guardian on 7 October 1916

Surrey, October 5
A warm sun, as of the latter days of August, broke through this morning and brought summer along the hedgerows. Almost before the dew had dried, a dragon-fly, green and gold, was searching over the tops of the bushes, where almost innumerable insects were on the wing, appearing suddenly as if from nowhere. Thrushes had been singing, but not loudly, for a long while, but they stopped just as a few larks rose out of the meadow and were heard above, although you could not see them for the strong light of the sun. Presently there were noises in the grass, just audible, less than a rustle, but enough to speak of life; a grasshopper leapt over a stray dandelion feather-bloom caught in a piece of thistle which the wind last night had tossed from the ditch bank. On the underside of a bramble-leaf, which was tinted beautifully in the clear light, a ladycow was crawling: all nature was alive.

Across in the stubble a pair-horse, light-soil plough was at work, with a young woman in the thills; the newly sheared earth turned from above the chalk gave out a faint, but fresh smell which was like a tonic to the sense; a flock of grey pigeons came sailing from the far corner of the field, and went straight and true into the oak wood among the acorns; the rooks were flying higher backward and forward, as though in sheer pleasure at being on the wing, yet always moving a little farther towards the west until they disappeared. By noon all was quiet. The hedge fruit was ripening; you could fix on nothing else for the red glory of the haws, which clothed all the thorns and seemed even to colour the nearer air.

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The 182 countries at the Johannesburg summit did reach a compromise banning only the trade in bones, teeth and claws from wild lions

An attempt to ban all international trade in African lions, from trophy heads to bones, has failed at a global wildlife summit.

Related: Cecil the lion's legacy: death brings new hope for his grandcubs

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The federal government is considering changes to Australia’s marine reserves to implement a national system. This week The Conversation is looking at the science behind marine reserves and how to protect our oceans.

Australia has the third largest marine jurisdiction in the world, a vast ocean territory that contains important natural and biological resources. The oceans separate us from, and connect us to, the rest of the world.

They supply food, play a significant role in determining our climate, and are fundamental to our national identity. Protecting our oceans is of paramount importance and Australia is signatory to several international agreements and conventions to establish a network of marine reserves aimed at looking after marine resources.

In 2012 the Australian government declared a network of marine reserves to conserve our marine environment. In 2014, we were asked to co-chair a review of the reserves, with the results released this September.

We looked at five marine regions (North, North-West, South-West, Temperate East and the Coral Sea) but not the South-East network which had been established in 2007. Of the 40 reserves administered by the commonwealth government, we recommended changes to 26.

Click on the marine reserve regions in the map below to details of the changes proposed.

The review was established to address stakeholder concerns about how the reserves were zoned – and what activities were allowed in each zone – as well as ensuring that zoning decisions were informed by the best available science.

One of the strong messages we received was that people were tired of the process – having been asked about the same concerns when the reserves were declared. But the opportunity to raise concerns and suggest solutions was quickly taken up.

We held more than 260 meetings with more than 650 people between February and August 2015, considered 13,124 written submissions, the vast majority from individuals, and received 1,859 responses to an online survey.

What has changed?

The primary goal of the National Representative System of Marine Protected Areas (NRSMPA) is to create a system of reserves that is comprehensive (includes the full range of ecosystems within and across each bioregion), adequate (ensures ecological viability and the integrity of populations, species and communities) and representative (reasonably reflects the biodiversity of the marine ecosystem). This will ensure our marine ecosystems stay healthy for generations to come.

Zoning allows us to regulate activities within marine reserves without detracting from their conservation value. These zones range from no-take, which doesn’t allow any resource extraction (such as fishing or mining), through to multiple use and special purpose zones, where certain uses are, or may be, allowed, subject to an assessment of their potential impacts.

We made seven major recommendations:

• Put more conservation features such as seafloor types, canyons, reef, slope and shelf in no-take protection (from 331 to 352 of the 509 primary conservation features recognised in the reserves).

• Increase the area of no-take zones in four regions, but reduce the area of no-take zone to 41% of the Coral Sea. This means the overall proportion of no-take across the 40 reserves drops marginally from 36% to 33% – the same level as the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park.

• An 81% increase in the area zoned as Habitat Protection Zone (HPZ) – an additional 450,000 square kilometres – rising from 24% to 43% of the estate; and add more conservation features in the HPZ – (from 192 to 272 of the 509 conservation features).

• A 27% increase to just over three quarters (76%) of the overall area of the estate receiving a high level of protection under Sanctuary Zone, Marine National Park Zone or Habitat Protection Zone; all these zones prohibit activities such as seabed mining and fishing that damages the seafloor.

• The total area zoned as Multiple Use Zone is halved, from 36% to 18% of the estate.

• Protection for the coral reefs in the Coral Sea is improved (three additional reefs – Holmes, South Flinders and Wreck – zoned as national park, and all 34 reefs zoned as sanctuary, national park, or habitat protection, and notably improving protection of the reefs of the Marion Plateau).

• Our proposed zoning in the Coral Sea to decrease national park zones and increase habitat protection more strongly reflects zoning in the adjacent Great Barrier Reef, effectively increasing the area of GBR green zones.

Clearly these changes do not support claims that the recommendations will “trigger a devastating loss of threatened marine life”. Nor do they represent “huge cutbacks to marine hotspots”, or “expanded mining”.

On the contrary, they represent a significant improvement to biodiversity included in no-take and other highly protected zones, and better conservation of key features such as southern coral reefs of the Coral Sea.

Who will this affect?

Commonwealth waters, starting at 3 nautical miles (about 5.5 km) from the coast, are generally beyond the safe reach of most recreational fishers and the direct influence of coastal communities.

Nonetheless, there were some areas of particular significance to the recreational fishing, charter fishing and dive tourism sectors such as the Perth Canyon and the Coral Sea, which were adversely affected by the reserves’ proclamation in 2012. The review recommendations accommodated almost all of these concerns through local solutions developed in close consultation with users and their representatives.

The guiding principles of the marine reserves include that zones are based on specific activities, and socioeconomic costs should be minimised.

We were particularly mindful of the socioeconomic importance of fisheries, especially to regional communities. Australia has been globally acknowledged for its management of fisheries. For instance, we recognised Marine Stewardship Certification (MSC) of tuna longlining in the Coral Sea and the Northern Prawn Fishery in our consideration of these two valuable fisheries.

We assessed the risk that certain fishing methods such prawn trawling, longlining and midwater trawling posed to marine habitats using the most up-to-date scientific information and understanding. Along with historical catch records, we used these to develop recommendations on zoning in the marine reserves.

For commercial fisheries that operate in Commonwealth waters, we consulted with users and industry peak bodies and found solutions that reduced impacts on these fisheries while improving the protection of conservation features. The outcome is that displacement of commercial fishing, and therefore adjustment cost to taxpayers (if any) is lower.

Due to the importance of energy security, the original reserve network design was constrained by largely avoiding areas of oil and gas prospects and leases. Where marine reserves and prospects co-exist the zoning is generally multiple use.

The review recommended several departures from this constraint. Much of the Bremer reserve in WA, an area where large fish, mammals and seabirds are known to aggregate, is proposed as a no-take national park, despite high petroleum prospects. Similarly, we recommended that mining and exploration activities be excluded from Geographe Bay.

In the North we proposed more protection in several reserves by extending areas under habitat protection and national park where prospects are low. We also recommended a significant extension of national park at the head of the Great Australian Bight, a well-known site where whales gather.

By-and-large the ports and shipping sectors are not affected by marine reserves. Safe passage of ships is guaranteed under the law of the sea. However, we proposed changes to the Dampier marine reserve to include a Special Purpose Zone for an area where there is existing high intensity port and shipping activity.

Finally, Indigenous groups and representatives also participated in the review. We recommended that Indigenous communities should be encouraged to explore future socioeconomic opportunities from activities in reserves in or near traditional sea country. These activities could include Indigenous rangers monitoring and managing marine reserves.

Where to from here?

We believe the review struck a considered, science-based and robust balance of marine user interests, while improving the protection of key conservation features. Its recommendations address almost all of the major areas of contention raised during the review.

There is no loss of area under conservation management (reserve outer boundaries are unchanged), more of the estate is more highly protected, yet the displacement of commercial fisheries has been reduced through careful zone adjustments.

The review provides a strong foundation for future generations to benefit from the conservation, appreciation and sustainable use of the marine reserves – as long as it is effectively managed and adequately resourced.

Colin Buxton was co-chair the Bioregional Advisory Panel and a member of the Expert Scientific Panel of the Commonwealth Marine Reserves Review He is currently Chair of the Board of Southern Rocklobster Ltd and a member of the Board of the Fisheries Research and Development Corporation (FRDC) He has been the recipient of several research grants from the FRDC and the Tasmanian State Government

Peter Cochrane was a co-chair of the Bioregional Advisory Panel and a member of the Expert Scientific Panel of the Commonwealth Marine Reserves Review. He chairs the Steering Committee of the National Environment Science Program's Marine Biodiversity hub. He is a Councillor of the International Union for Conservation of Nature. He has received funding from the Australian Government Department of Environment.

With poachers killing an elephant every 15 minutes on average, the pressure to shut down the legal trade in ivory is intensifying

Legal ivory markets across the globe must be urgently closed in order to combat the elephant poaching crisis, according to an agreement struck by 182 nations on Sunday.

The decision is significant in intensifying the pressure on countries that still host such markets, which conservationists say provide cover for criminals to launder illegal ivory.

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Delegates at a UN wildlife conference in South Africa endorse calls for the closure of all domestic ivory markets.

Convention in Johannesburg votes to end all international trade in popular pet birds whose populations have plummeted

The loquacious African grey parrot, one of the most illegally trafficked birds in the world, has been talking itself towards extinction for years thanks to its reputation as a gregarious and long-living pet.

On Sunday it was given extra protection after a global wildlife summit agreed a ban on the international trade.

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Narendra Modi has committed that by 2030 at least 40% of country’s electricity will be generated from non-fossil sources

India will ratify the Paris climate change agreement at the United Nations, an environment ministry official said.

Narendra Modi’s cabinet had given its approval on Wednesday to ratify the Paris agreement on Sunday. The date is the birth anniversary of India’s independence leader Mahatma Gandhi, who led a life of minimum carbon footprint, said Modi.

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Nasa's Solar Dynamics Observatory captures a magnificent display of coronal loops above an area with strong magnetic fields.

Warmer seas have attracted a new fish to the Maine coast – but puffin chicks can’t stomach it

Eastern Egg Rock is a freezing speck of island that clings to the coast of Maine, north of Boston. It is fringed with a few bushes, has little soil and no supplies of fresh water. Yet this unprepossessing, seven-acre scrap of wave-washed granite is a site of major ecological interest. Thanks to research carried out here, scientists are gleaning invaluable – and alarming – data about the impact of climate change on the planet’s wildlife.

The project is the work of Steven Kress, a veteran ornithologist who constructed a sanctuary here for the Atlantic puffin 35 years ago. The puffin (Fratercula arctica), distinguished by its parrot-like, red-and-yellow bill, had been wiped out there by hunters in the 19th century. In the 1970s, Kress decided to bring them back.

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Fresh local produce has been replaced by cheap, bland, industrial-farmed food as supermarkets slash prices. What will it take to bring change?

Four strawberries, picked an hour earlier, sit on a saucer on the dining-room table of Lindsey Lodge Farm, a 40-acre farm growing fruit and vegetables in Suffolk. It is June and these strawberries are the first of the English season. Andrew Sturgeon, a farmer for 30 years, smiles, certain of the quality. The aroma is heady, the taste is of strawberries as they ought to be, naturally sweet.

Sturgeon delivers to 45 stores belonging to the East of England Co-operative, owned by its members. It is independent from the Co-operative Group chain and has more than 200 shops in Essex, Suffolk and Norfolk. Ninety per cent of Sturgeon’s fruit is delivered straight to stores within 36 hours of being picked. They sell at £2.25 a punnet, compared with under £2 elsewhere. “Customers know what they are buying when they ask for our strawberries,” he says.

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Strategy, which helps track and monitor sharks without baiting or killing them, will be prioritised on north coast

Up to 100 extra “smart” drumlines will be rolled out along the New South Wales coastline to keep swimmers safe from sharks, the state government has announced.

The controversial shark management strategy helps authorities track and monitor sharks without baiting or killing them, and the rollout announced on Sunday will be prioritised on the NSW north coast following a recent shark attack.

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Seven species of yellow-faced bee native to Hawaii are the first bees to be added to the US list of endangered species.

Horns will lock over the future of the African elephant at Cites CoP17. We ask experts whether they believe the ban on the international ivory trade is working

Enrico Di Minin, research fellow in conservation science at the University of Helsinki, and Douglas MacMillan, professor of biodiversity economics at the Durrell Institute of Conservation and Ecology, University of Kent.

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Arab nations join forces with African countries in a bid to suppress the illegal live trade in cheetahs, with a special focus on social media.

The continuing violence in Syria, the Rosetta spacecraft’s final descent, Sam Allardyce leaves the England manager’s job, the ongoing migration crisis – the best photography in news, culture and sport from around the world this week

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New analysis shows impact of storms across the north of England last winter, with some councils still helping homes to recover

More than 15,000 homes and businesses were flooded in areas across northern England in last year’s devastating storms, new analysis shows.

Councils are still helping flood-hit homes recover from the disruption caused last winter as storms Desmond, Eva and Frank swept across the country, the Local Government Association (LGA) said.

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Cilgerran, Pembrokeshire Lime-green bunches clustered heavy on each branch, spinning down with the equinoctial gales or hanging as grim, dry, umber swags

Even before the first frost, ash trees along the Teifi gorge are taking on the pale autumn tints that are prelude to their fall. The river here roils darkly down to salt-marshes round Cardigan, its depths brown and turbid with slurry run-off, tide-lines blanched by agrochemical pollutant along each bank, dippers and wagtails gone, birds silent in the woods, the life departed. Salmon, sewin (sea trout) and brown trout, which once drew anglers and coracle-fishers to this place, raise scarcely a ripple now on the smooth and dying flow.

I’ve come to look for ash-keys, which vary so much from year to year. I think back to my childhood, when bright lime-green bunches clustered heavy on each branch, spinning down with the equinoctial gales or hanging as grim, dry, umber swags throughout the winter until late black buds of spring opened into leaf to hide them from view.

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