Page 2791 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 14 August 1990
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them built well before the oil crisis of the 1970s. They are often poorly insulated, sited with little regard to passive solar opportunities and without adequate shading. One of the things we have delighted in seeing recently is the recognition in design work by architects of the need to site buildings, particularly our residential homes, to take full advantage of the sun's effects, and thus cut down on the requirements for heating aids.
But there are many places where Canberra could lead the way. We could, for example, convert our incandescent globes to fluorescent ones as they become due to change. When I attended the Australian and New Zealand Environment Council in Sydney some months ago, I was able to hear the noted energy consultant Dr Amory Lovins speaking on energy conservation options. His talk generally was very thought provoking, and I am convinced that there are many opportunities for Canberrans to take advantage of his ideas in reducing our total energy needs. Measures which conserve energy could not only reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but could, if properly organised, allow us to reduce or defer the cost of infrastructure and reticulation.
We can look at our energy use, our planning guidelines, our building requirements, our use of CFCs, education, nature reserves, corridors - in short, the whole way we do things here in the ACT. The paper that the Government has recently released is a skeleton of an approach - a shopping list of things that might be done. There is no doubt there is a lot of scope for consultation with the community and with affected people. I hope that in the long run the ACT Government strategy to respond to the greenhouse effect will be supported by sector strategies generally, which will give the detail of how specific industries will respond. Nationally industries have already responded this way in the ANZEC Ozone Protection Strategy.
Members of the Assembly will be interested to note that, in a very small way, the ACT contributed to the United Nations Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change. Three working groups were formed: the first dealing with scientific assessment of climate change, the second dealing with possible impacts of climate change, and the third dealing with responses to those climate changes. On 25 May this year the first working group reported on the scientific assessment of climate change. The Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change, the IPCC, is the best informed group of people working on the greenhouse problem. It draws together experts in many fields, and its conclusions represent a consensus of very high credibility.
I would like to inform the Assembly of some of these findings, because they certainly are matters that the general population, and that of the ACT in particular, could take up. But basically there is no doubt that there is a natural greenhouse effect which already keeps the earth warmer than it would otherwise be. I do not think
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