PEAK OIL

The Hon. SANDRA KANCK (16:02): The issue of peak oil is one that this government appears not to comprehend and which is reflected in its abject failure to develop a comprehensive public transport plan and in its plans to extend Adelaide's urban growth boundary.

Peak oil is a shorthand description for the point at which all the reserves of oil in the world (both known and unknown) are estimated to have reached their halfway point of consumption. I typed 'peak oil' into the search facility on the Liberal Party's national site and the message came up 'Sorry, no data found'. I went to the Liberal Party's state site and typed in 'peak oil' and none of the offerings that came up were about peak oil. I went to the Labor Party's national website and did the same and the message came up 'The search terms returned no result'. I went further into that website to a section entitled 'Roads, transport and aviation' and came up with about a dozen statements from their federal leader, Kevin Rudd, but it contained diddly-squat about public transport—in fact, it was almost exclusively about roads.

I then I tried the Labor Party's state site and when I clicked on 'news' it took me to the government's website. On I battled, and I typed 'peak oil' into the search facility on the government's website. The page of results that came up for that had absolutely nothing to do with peak oil. For comparison, I checked out my own party's national site and, after typing in 'peak oil', I got 40 different entries about speeches and media releases, which is what I would have hoped to find on Labor Party and Liberal Party websites.

My party's view is that decision-making about transport must be based on the recognition of two crucial environmental limiters: peak oil and climate change. We know that the world's total recoverable supplies of oil will have reached the halfway point of exploitation somewhere between last year and (if you are an extreme optimist) 2012. Oil is congealed solar energy.

The Hon. B.V. Finnigan interjecting:

The Hon. SANDRA KANCK: Yes, it is contested. You can always get flat earth scientists; they are buyable. Oil is a natural form of carbon sequestration. It took millions of years to be created and, in only 100 years, human beings have used up half of it, and we are using the remainder at a still faster rate, particularly as the economies of India and China create greater demand. Given the lack of information about peak oil on Labor Party and Liberal Party websites, I suspect that most members in this chamber would not understand why this is a critical issue, and so I invite them to consider how dependent we are on oil.

In its various forms we use it to fuel almost all our transport needs: private cars, buses, trucks, trains and planes. Without it, the whole nature of our economy will be forced to change. Businesses that export their products are lauded by government but, as the price of oil goes up—and it will do dramatically as supplies decrease—the cost of those products on world markets will similarly rise, because the price of transport will go up. Businesses that import products will find a similar result. The tourism industry will be hit very hard. It is worthwhile considering that half of the fertiliser applied to our crops is derived from oil. What are we going to do to replace it, and what is the government doing to come up with an alternative? This is an unrecognised but potential disaster in the making.

Today I was talking to a commuter who comes in by train from Gawler. He caught the train at 7am and, by the time he got to Smithfield, there was standing room only. He tells me that it is like this from 7am to 7pm Monday to Friday. Part of the problem is that the platforms for the trains allow only three carriages. So, where is the planning? It is not as if people have not known that peak oil is coming upon us. It was first proposed by an oil geophysicist in 1956. I first became aware of it 20 years ago. Just last month, the former US energy secretary James Schlesinger said:

The battle is over; the peakists have won.

In an interview with last oil shop.com, he said:

We are going to face a great difficulty in the near future. Whether or not it is defined as a crisis depends on how you define 'crisis,' but there is difficulty, great difficulty ahead.

It seems that, despite all the evidence, the South Australian government and the opposition will continue dancing on towards the sunset hand in hand, blithely unaware of the reality that faces us. At crisis point, if we are lucky, they just might decide to take some action.

Time expired.