Alternative sources of power: Think twice about taking the nuclear route

I REFER to your report that a paper on nuclear energy, as an alternative source of power for Malaysia, would be tabled at a cabinet meeting later this year ("Cabinet to study nuclear power" -- NST, Oct 21).

Rising oil prices (until recently) and climate change have given the nuclear industry an opportunity to promote nuclear energy as a viable alternative to fossil fuels. It depicts nuclear energy as the best way to solve climate change. This claim has no basis in fact. Nuclear energy is neither effective nor viable. It is not a sustainable energy source and it causes devastating problems for mankind.

How does nuclear energy generate electricity? Instead of burning fossil fuels to produce steam, which is then converted to electricity, nuclear energy uses nuclear fission to generate heat to boil water to produce steam.

In 1954, the head of the US Atomic Energy Commission predicted that nuclear power plants would provide electricity "too cheap to meter".

Twenty years later, the International Atomic Energy Agency forecast that there would be up to 4,450 nuclear reactors of 1,000 megawatts in operation worldwide by 2000. Today, 44 countries operate about 450 nuclear reactors, providing 15 per cent of world electricity generation.

The world does need energy that is safe, clean, affordable, renewable, environmentally sound and socially acceptable. Nuclear energy can meet none of these criteria. But the nuclear industry has propagated many myths, claiming, among other things, that nuclear power does not emit greenhouse gases, is economically viable and that the fast breeder technology will eventually mature and provide unlimited nuclear fuel.

The facts are that in the various stages of the nuclear process, nuclear energy indirectly does produce greenhouse gases, much less than electricity production from burning fossil fuels, but significantly more compared with electricity production from renewable, sustainable energy sources, such as sun or wind.

Nuclear power is associated with several problems. Nuclear reactors generate lethal waste, which emits invisible radioactivity for thousands of years and for which there is absolutely no safe method of disposal. Plutonium has a half-life of 24,000 years. Nuclear accidents through human error can cause widespread radioactive contamination as in the 1986 accident in Chernobyl, Ukraine.

There is also a higher incidence of cancers in the workers of nuclear power plants and the people who live in the neighbourhood.

The cost of nuclear energy is huge. The cost is rising and is likely to continue rising for the foreseeable future. In the 1970s, nuclear power cost half as much as electricity from burning coal. By 1990, it cost twice as much.

Today, it costs about US$0.05-0.7 per kWh, making it two to four times more expensive than electricity from burning fossil fuels. Also, there are the high costs of insuring for accident liability and decommissioning nuclear power plants.

The market itself shows evidence that nuclear power is not financially viable. Since the privatisation of Britain's energy markets, companies have not invested in nuclear energy, as it cannot be competitive without government subsidies. Even in France, where nuclear power accounts for 75 per cent of total electricity production, it has been admitted that nuclear power is far more expensive than electricity from efficient fossil fuel-burning power plants.

The supply of nuclear fuel is limited. Based on current uranium reserves, it is estimated that they will be depleted by 2038, if the Group of Eight major industrialised countries were to build just enough nuclear reactors every year to meet their commitment to reduce by half carbon emissions by 2050. But this timeline could be extended if significant amounts of uranium were recovered from civil and military stockpiles, and by reprocessing spent nuclear fuel and enriching depleted uranium.

Fast breeder technology has been touted as another source of nuclear fuel but after decades of research, fast breeders are a technical and economic failure. From 1964 to 1994, the United States experimented unsuccessfully with a few fast breeder reactors, but eventually shut them down. Japan has also failed with the technology. At present, only one or two fast breeder reactors are in operation.

Electricity production is a small part of the climate-change problem, accounting for just nine per cent of total greenhouse gas emissions. To solve climate change, we should also implement alternative options, such as energy conservation and efficiency, and renewable energy (solar, wind, hydro, tidal, biomass, etc). Finally, we must make modern living sustainable.

The public and the government must be apprised of the facts of nuclear power. The government and the media have a duty to facilitate a full and transparent public debate on nuclear energy which, if embarked upon, could have dire health, environmental, economic and security consequences for the country.#

Nuclear power no longer the way forward- Malaysiakini

Elizabeth Wong | Oct 23, 08 11:20am

The Selangor government views with concern the statement made yesterday by Deputy Science, Technology and Innovation Minister Fadillah Yusof concerning plans for the development of nuclear power in Malaysia, including a bill in Parliament.

MCPX

We are concerned as to why the new state government’s input has not been sought in this process and why nuclear power has been identified as an alternative source of power generation for Malaysia by the year 2020.

Nuclear power bears considerable safety, waste disposal and cost issues, and the industry is in decline worldwide. The relevant ministries and the federal government also need to explain why cleaner renewable energies and energy efficiency measures have not been prioritised.

Malaysians have a right to know where these nuclear plants may be sited and why the government is keen on importing nuclear age technology when the solar and renewable energy age is upon us.

The US National Academy of Sciences has concluded that there is no safe level of radiation. Even at low exposures, negative health impacts such as cancer can result. Leukaemia, blood disorders, spontaneous abortions, stillbirth, and increased chances of heart disease, diabetes mellitus, arthritis, asthma, and allergies are some of the common ailments associated with radiation poisoning.

The production and consumption of nuclear fuels produces high levels of toxic waste. Typically only one percent of mined ore becomes fuel-grade. The remainder leaves a legacy of toxic waste and thorny disposal and storage solutions.

Nuclear reactors can generate up to 50 tonnes of high-level radioactive waste per reactor each year. What will happen to this waste? Will it be dumped in Malaysia, exported to pollute another country or be sold as material for nuclear weapons?

Will the government’s desire for nuclear energy inadvertently facilitate nuclear weapons proliferation?

Where are the potential dump sites for nuclear waste? Malaysia already has a bad track record of managing the disposal of radioactive waste. During the 1980s and 1990s, the Asian Rare Earth (ARE) company in Perak engaged in open dumping of radioactive waste next to populated areas.

Even though the government declared the radiation levels at the illegal dumpsites to be safe, nearby villagers, including children, developed leukaemia and many babies were born with congenital defects. Community residents who took ARE to court were arrested under the Internal Security Act (ISA) during Operasi Lalang.

Even if this situation were not to repeat itself, concerns still remain over the disposal of waste given that Malaysia still has far to go in improving its culture of environmental responsibility.

How safe will nuclear power be?

A still prevalent culture of official secrecy and lack of accountability raise questions about the safe and effective management of a risky and hazardous technology such as nuclear power.

Even countries such as the US, Britain, France and Japan struggle to establish genuinely secure dumpsites as the radioactive half-life of waste materials can span millions of years. Radioactive materials are typically hazardous up to ten half-lives.

Where will trained nuclear engineers come from to safely run and manage these proposed plants? Even the US is facing a shortage of adequately trained personnel, largely due to the stagnation and decline in the popularity and financial prospects of the nuclear industry.

Nuclear plants worldwide enjoy unique legal exemption from extensive liability for catastrophic accidents. Will the same be granted in Malaysia? What does this say about the safety of nuclear power? How will this impact nearby businesses and residents?

Does Malaysia have the capacity to deal with the worst-case scenario of a reactor meltdown or leak? Does Malaysia even want to accept this risk when cheaper and safer energy alternatives are available?

How will reactors be safeguarded against the threat of terrorism or military aggression?

Reactors require enormous quantities of water to operate. Most states in Peninsular Malaysia are struggling to meet commercial and residential demand without having to face the burden of feeding precious water through nuclear plants.

Since nuclear plants typically discharge some waste into water and the environment, how can the government justify the costs to society and nature given that even low levels of radiation exposure are dangerous?

Will Malaysians be truthfully informed about radiation pollution or will disclosure mirror the Air Pollution Index during the haze crisis?

Who will the money come from, and who will it go to? Studies have documented that the first generation of reactors in the US cost over 200 percent more than originally estimated. New generation nuclear plants being built in Europe are experiencing both cost overruns and construction delays.

The Olkiluoto plant in Finland is now two and a half years behind schedule, and 50 percent over budget, due in part to major construction mistakes on safety significant structures.

The costs of nuclear tend to be underestimated, typically the enormous capital costs are downplayed and the low operating costs are put forward instead. The ministry comments yesterday follow this line.

Cheaper and safer options abound

The ministry claims initial costs will be RM6 billion but, including financing charges and cost overruns – which can range from 200 percent to 380 percent - today's reactors typically cost more than RM35 billion (US$10 billion) each to build. How much of this bill will Malaysian taxpayers foot?

Nuclear energy has been heavily subsidised in rich countries, yet it is still not as competitive as emerging renewable energy technologies. Right now, nuclear costs about 14 to 15 US cents per kilowatt hour, whereas wind energy costs 7 cents and solar energy, whose price is continually decreasing, costs around 20 cents – and this is without the massive subsidies nuclear enjoys.

In the next few years, solar and nuclear energies are predicted to cost the same. Since solar does not have the same capital and waste disposal costs of nuclear, the real cost of solar, to economy, society and the environment, will be much lower.

The trend for nuclear energy is rising costs while renewables are becoming more affordable, yet the Malaysian government is planning for a nuclear rather than renewable future.

Forbes magazine described the 1970s and 1980s nuclear expansion in the US as the "the largest managerial disaster in US business history, involving US$100 billion in wasted investments and cost overruns, exceeded in magnitude only by the Vietnam War and the then savings and loan crisis".

We hope that Malaysia is not poised to make a similar mistake when cheaper and safer options can be developed.

Combining energy efficiency measures and renewable energy development would eliminate any justification for nuclear power. We would also reduce our dependency on fossil fuels and help the international effort to protect the global climate.

Many of the ways in which Malaysians consume and use energy are inefficient. Depending on the process or component, energy efficiency measures can realise four- to ten-fold improvements that simultaneously reduce resource costs and energy demands.

Energy efficiency measures would not only save the multi-billion ringgit expense of a nuclear power plant, but also help reduce peak energy demand for Tenaga to meet, and energy bills for consumers to pay. Currently we are running and paying for a surplus of more than 40 percent.

Nuclear power is just a supply-side solution, and a risky and expensive one at that. The government needs to take a bigger view of energy supply and consumption and assess where affordable and dramatic improvements can be made.

Better planning and design of buildings can reduce lighting and cooling costs. Making solar electricity more affordable and accessible can turn entire residential neighbourhoods into 'power plants' that are clean, have low operating costs, and eliminate the cost and inefficiency of transmitting electricity from remote plants. Further, Malaysia is fast becoming a major producer of photovoltaic cells.

The Selangor government is opposed to the development of nuclear power plants and hopes that other Pakatan Rakyat states will also join it in its stance against nuclear energy and for an energy efficient and renewable future for Malaysia.

Bad news! Cabinet to study nuclear energy

By Farrah Naz Karim (NST)

2008/10/21

PUTRAJAYA: A paper on nuclear energy as an alternative source of power for the country will be tabled at a cabinet meeting by the end of the year. Deputy Science, Technology and Innovation Minister Fadillah Yusof said another objective of the paper, which outlined the direction of nuclear power, was to enable further studies and plans on the initiative to be carried out by his ministry and the Energy, Water and Communications Ministry.

Faidilah said while nuclear power would only be a reality after 2020, the foundation of the plan and efforts to create awareness of nuclear power needed to start now.

He said it was important for the public to know that nuclear power was safe, environmentally friendly and more affordable in the long run.

Fadillah said the government would expect some form of resistance from the people once the project took off.

He said that under the proposal, the plant to generate nuclear power would be built in a solid and rocky area in the peninsula.

The implementation of nuclear fuel facilities would take about 12 to 15 years.

Once in operation, the nuclear plant could operate for 60 years after which it has to be decommissioned.

Malaysia would need to use nuclear energy to produce electricity by 2023 as global supplies of natural gas and coal are depleting and also becoming very expensive.

Eighty-five per cent of electricity generated in Malaysia is produced by fossil fuels such as natural gas, oil and coal.

我不是环保分子 I am not an Environmentalist

《辣手杂志》第一篇专栏

谢谢大家打开小妹在《辣手杂志》的第一篇文章。读者们进入这篇文章，很可能是因为这个标题，也很可能是因为我的名字。

无论如何，我肯定不是文坛红人，只是喜欢写写文章，凑凑热闹，分享感受。这一次，要感谢辣手主编给我这个空间。

最近加入一个与环境有关的工作。在针对无线上网新科技的安全课题上，与一位交往多年的朋友闹意见，争论未开始，他便狠狠抛下一句话：我以为你是环保分子。

我愣了好久。

身边很多朋友把我当成环保分子，我想了想，或许是由于以下原因：

（1） 当我还是小朋友时，我常在百货广场里问爸爸妈妈：卖不完的食物、衣服都被丢去哪里？垃圾场有那么大吗？

（2） 中学时代，我看了一则断翅鲨鱼被抛入大海中可怜楚楚地等死的照片后，便开始不吃鱼翅。很幸运地，一些损友在婚宴上不点鱼翅。

（3） 两次上大学时修的是社会科学类，但老是往理工学院的环境选修课堂里钻。

（4） 有了一点知识、一点醒觉，我开始关心、开始写文章。后来还和朋友创办了一个保育海马的组织。

（5） 在吉隆坡工作时，我在小小办公室推行垃圾分类活动。

（6） 我常常叫同事们把冷气温度维持在24-26度之间，在马来西亚穿着寒衣上班，对我而言是不可思议的。

（7） 由于肯德基对待鸡只的不良记录，我两年没有踏入他们的店面。

（8） … …

还有很多很多，再写下去，读者就要睡了。其实，我只想使用自己的方式，来抗议现实经济模式、发展状态的不完美。我何德何能，竟变成环保分子？

不过，这么多年来，我的确把一些行为、想法内化成本身的生活习惯。我凭自己有限的知识、对生活的直觉，选择一些我认为自己可以对社会环境好一点的生活方式。

若称我为“环保分子”是很可悲的，这意味着很多人“还不是”，因此把我的所作所为看成“某一种人”的行为。我常常会反问：你还要生小孩吧？那环保就不是我一个人的事啦！你其实可以改变自己的生活习惯，大家的小改变，一定会成就一些伟大的变革。

然而，我绝不是环保分子，我有一些习惯戒不了，我身处的社会也没有完善的社会制度让我从容地做选择。当我举例后，你们就会同意了：
（1） 我还是开车一族。汽车是全球气候暖化的“最得力助手”。但是，我常幻想自己骑脚车、搭巴士去上班。

（2） 我有时还是忘了自备购物袋去shopping，然后抱一堆五颜六色的塑料袋回家。

（3） 我喜欢自助旅行。所谓的“背包行者”常常制造垃圾而不自觉，比如：矿泉水瓶、包装食物。

（4） 我喜欢购买书本、衣服及翻版光碟。这些东西都是我死后带不走、必须处理的垃圾。当然，希望再循环运动能够修成正果，那么，我们就不用每天对焚化炉心痒痒。

看到吧？还要说我是环保分子吗？我只是很努力地在一些事物上保持高度省慎，尽量为了不让自己太内疚而做一点事。比起砂劳越那些丧失家园、甚至整个族群文化被连根拨起的比南人所做的斗争，我真的什么都不是。

我并不乐观。因为，科学家说，就算这一刻，巫婆把全世界人类一起变成“睡美人、睡王子”，立刻停止碳排放，现有的气候暖化现象，还会继续困扰人类生活长达100年！

到了这种地步，如果大家不愿坐以待毙，那么，让我们互相勉力，一起关心、一起努力吧！

Translation:

Thank you for dropping by. This is my first column for www.laksou.com. If you clicked through to this article, either you were attracted by the title or the name of the author.

No matter the reason, I am sure that I am not that famous or popular. I’m just a citizen who likes to write and share my thoughts, and I’d like to thank the editor for giving me a platform to voice my opinions.

Recently, I was assigned to an environment-related job. I hold a different view from a friend who is against the Wireless City Project, and he has often expressed his safety concerns about it. When I told him I have no strong objections against it, he threw out the following accusation: “I thought you are environmentally conscious.”

I was stunned into silence.

Indeed, a lot of my friends see me as an environmentalist. I can see why they might:

（1） When I was just a little girl, in a shopping centre I asked my parents:,“Where are they going to throw the food and clothes if they cannot sell them off? Is our land big enough for all that rubbish?”

（2） During high school, I felt pity for the some sharks that I saw in some photos, who were dying as their fins had been but off for food, and who were thereafter dumped back in to the sea to slowly die. Since that day, I stopped eating shark fins. Some of my friends who support my cause did not order shark fins for their wedding in solidarity.

（3） Although I majored in social sciences, when I pursued my higher education degree I always sought to take options related to the environment in the Faculty of Science and Technology.

（4） After gaining a bit more knowledge, I began to become aware of what was happening; I began to express my concerns through my writing. I even set up a team to do seahorse conservation.

（5） I promoted recycling in my KL office.

（6） I always ask my colleagues who turn on their air-con to keep the temperature in between 24-26 degree. Wearing winter clothing at work in Malaysia seems ridiculous.

（7） Due to KCF’s bad record of mistreatment of the chickens from which their product is made I boycotted them for two years.

（8） … …

There are plenty more stories I can tell, but they are beside the point. The fact is, all I am trying to do is protest against an imperfect situation created by the current economic model’s method of development in my own way. I never thought of myself as an environmentalist.

Nevertheless, in the past, some of my thoughts and living habits have actually been internalized in my way of life. I live in a way that I think would be good for our environment.

It is lamentable that people feel the need to label me an environmentalist. To a lot of people I am still the “some people” they may refer to when referring to environmentally practices as through it doesn’t relate to them,

To people like these I always ask: “Do you want children? Then being environmentally friendly is also your business! Everyone can change their living habits, and little changes can bring about a revolution. It is for your own children’s good!”

Definitely, I am not an environmentalist because I cannot stop some of my destructive habits. I am unable to make choice without fear in my society. For instance,

(1) I drive a car. Cars are the biggest contributor to climate change. I always dream of going to work by cycling or taking the bus, but have never done so.

(2) Sometimes I forget to bring my shopping bag, and then I am forced to bring back a pile of colourful plastic bags with me.

(3) I like to travel as a backpacker. “Backpackers” are rubbish generators - most of the time we consume water in disposable bottles and eat packaged food.

(4) I like to own books, clothes and CDs. I know that I can’t take them with me once I leave this world, when they will then become rubbish. Of course, I pray that recycling campaigns will be very successful one day, so that our government will never need to consider using an incinerator.

Now do you see? Do you still wish to label me an environmentalist? I am just trying hard to keep myself alert to certain issues, doing something so that I won’t feel guilty towards Mother Nature. Compared to the Penan community who are struggling over their homeland and their unique culture in Sarawak, I am nobody.

Neither am I an optimist. Some scientists contend that even if were to ask a witch to cast her magic and make the whole world become sleeping princes and princesses, stopping carbon emissions immediately, the consequences of global warming will still affect mankind for one decade.

Are you just waiting for the worst situation? If not, then let us work together, show our concern, and make some efforts to protect this precious Earth of ours.

---

Don't pay for a failed system

Tony Iltis

11 October 2008

“Meltdown” is a word that one hears a lot on the news these days.

Despite the US$700 billion government bailout of banks in the US, similar (albeit smaller) bailouts in Europe, and various forms of state intervention in the finance industry on both sides of the Atlantic, sharemarkets worldwide are in free fall.

Comparisons with the Great Depression of the 1930s are common. Homelessness and unemployment are rising and are set to increase dramatically.

Meanwhile, more quietly but even more relentlessly, another meltdown is occurring: that of the polar icecaps. According to the Western world’s establishment politicians and corporate media, the way to avert catastrophic climate change lies in setting up elaborate emissions trading schemes and carbon markets: that is, relying on precisely the mechanisms that have created the economic meltdown!

Superficially, the crisis has created a dramatic reversal in the orthodoxy of Western economic policy. After decades of preaching the virtues of deregulation of financial markets, privatisation of public assets and the superiority of the “hidden hand of the market” over government involvement in the economy, Western governments are now spending gargantuan amounts of public money intervening in the economy.

Following the US government’s nationalisation of the mortgage institutions Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae and insurance giant AIG, and its unpopular $700 billion bailout of the banks, British PM Gordon Brown announced a £50 billion (US$89 billion) bailout for British banks, including partial nationalisations, with a further £450 billion being earmarked should the banks need more.

Likewise in Germany, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Ireland and Luxembourg, massive state interventions and partial nationalisations are on the agenda.

In Iceland, where a globally oriented finance industry dwarfs domestic economic activity, the three largest banks have been taken over by a government desperately trying to stop the country becoming bankrupt. Iceland’s stock exchange has closed.

There has also been mutual recrimination between the governments of Iceland and Britain. The British government has condemned Iceland for not guaranteeing the deposits of British individuals and institutions in Iceland’s banks, including about £2 billion from British local councils. Iceland, for its part, has charged that the British seizure of Icelandic bank assets (using anti-terrorism laws!) has contributed to the crisis.

Iceland is currently negotiating a 4 billion euro bailout from Russia.

‘Hidden hand’ still reigns

However, the failure of this expensive government intervention to halt the global collapse of sharemarkets — and remove the spectre of a massive downturn in production, fuelling unemployment and poverty — reflects that the old orthodoxy has not, in fact, been overturned. The thrust of the “emergency” economic interventions has been to pump money into the finance industry in the hope that this will encourage the banks to restart the flow of credit to productive industry. The “hidden hand of the market” still reigns.

At the heart of the crisis is speculation on debt. With US wages remaining static since 1973, while the cost of living has risen considerably, consumer spending (and therefore corporate profits) have been maintained by a credit-fuelled economy.

Furthermore, deregulated financial markets created a huge industry based on repackaging and reselling debts, creating incomprehensible investment options (“collateralised debt obligations”, “credit default swaps”). In the US these “products” grew to a value of US$64 trillion — five times the annual output of the US economy.

There are nationalisations and there are nationalisations. Under the various bailouts, the assets that governments are taking over are the so-called “toxic assets” — precisely those ecomomic “products” that have proved to be worthless.

A more rational response would be to simply put the banks under state ownership.

For their former owners, who have made countless billions, compensation should not even be considered — criminal charges would be more appropriate.

What $700 billion could achieve

It is worth considering what the $700 billion spent on bailing out the US banks could have been spent on. Less than $200 billion would end poverty in the US.

The widespread hostility of the US working class to the bailout reflects that while money can be found to protect billionaires’ profits from “toxic assets”, no assistance has been forthcoming for those who’ve lost their homes through “toxic” variable interest rate mortgages.

Earlier this year, US President George Bush vetoed legislation to give medical coverage to 9 million poor children in the US, on the grounds that such expenditure, less than $6 billion, was “useless”!

Seven hundred billion dollars is twice the combined debt of the world’s poorest 49 countries. Underpinning world poverty is the fact for every dollar spent on Western aid to the Third World, $25 are paid back as debt servicing. Currently, global inequality condemns 11 million children to death each year due to lack of healthcare, sanitation, food and water. Ten billion dollars — a 70th of the bailout — would be sufficient to save these lives.

Six billion dollars would provide basic education for the whole world, while $9 billion would provide water and sanitation, $12 billion reproductive health for all women and $13 billion adequate nutrition and healthcare.

Along with increasing inequality within nations, the doctrine of neoliberalism (reliance the “hidden hand of the market”) has more than doubled the wealth gap between rich and poor countries.

Much trumpeted debt relief and aid programs (such as the “Millenium Development Goals”) make any assistance dependent on poor countries following International Monetary Fund (IMF) diktats to privatise and deregulate their economies for the benefit of Western corporations.

Privatising and commodifying basic services such as water and sanitation, and the removal of food and fuel subsidies, literally means misery and death for millions.

The IMF’s offer of similar “assistance” to Western countries in response to the current financial crisis should be treated with trepidation by workers and poor people in these countries.

War spending

While the $700 billion bailout dwarfs Western social expenditure and international development aid, it is itself dwarfed by spending on the military. Since the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the US has spent $3 trillion on the war alone. The $1.339 trillion annual global military expenditure is, as much as the bailouts, assistance to the corporate elite.

Not only do corporations make direct profits through the arms trade, and increasingly privatised military infrastructure, military force ensures Western corporations’ access to the world’s resources and the labour of its people.

With excuses for the Iraq war (weapons of mass destruction and involvement in the 9/11 attacks) long discredited, it is difficult to disguise that the real reason for the invasion was to corner the fossil fuel market. The centrality of fossil fuels to the Western-imposed global economic system raises the question of the other meltdown: global warming.

Both crises have the same source: the profit-driven capitalist economy. Even when the economy was apparently booming, it was incongruous that finding solutions to the climate crisis was tasked to economists, such as Sir Nicholas Stern in Britain and Professor Ross Garnaut in Australia.

It should now be considered insane for the market to solve the problem of climate change when it has proved spectacularly incapable of solving the problems of the market! It is necessary to redefine what is meant by “the economy”.

Mainstream economists have claimed that speculators trading incomprehensible financial products based on debt are creating wealth. The financial meltdown has proved these claims fraudulent.

Wealth is actually created by people working to make goods and services. The corporate rulers of the world take this wealth rather than create it.

With a large increase in unemployment looming due to the financial collapse it is worth remembering that the solutions needed to avert catastrophic climate change are labour intensive: for example, wholesale conversion of entire economies to renewable energy, sustainable agriculture and public transport instead of private car-based transport.

More than 150 years ago Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, explaining that the working class, as the creators of wealth, could, if they took control of society, create a world without poverty, inequality or oppression, said, “We have a world to win”.

Today it could be added that we also have world to lose.

From: Comment & Analysis, Green Left Weekly issue #770 15 October 2008.

总是在陌生的地方，重新开始

再过几个月，俺将踏入“而丽”之年。

回想起来，从很小的时候，因爸爸工作关系全家人总是举家搬迁，我出生在怡保，但据说我从小开始就混过很多地方，包括关丹、龙溪、百万镇几个地方。

我10岁时举家搬到新山。至今还记得小时候，爸爸工作的油棕厂突然倒闭，老板跑路，在我三年级未结束前，就离开龙溪小学，当时的我，根本来不及向班上的小小朋友告别。

在完全陌生的环境，一切重新开始。

在新山，由于租房的关系，全家人也搬过四次家。最后一次搬家，恰好本小姐在中国求学，没有参与举家搬迁到爸爸的梦想家园的行列。那次搬家以后直到现在，我从来没有在家里待超过三年。

1997年，我一个人坐火车到董总申请贷学金，一个人报读中国广州暨大，当时的中国，在很多人眼中是个蛮荒之地，人们总会对于我到中国求学寄予奇异、不可理解的眼光，彷佛在问：那种地方你也去读书？（哼，现在再让我遇到这种人，我会打从心底同情这种井底蛙。）

在完全陌生的环境，与那么多讲着听起来相同的语言、生活背景却截然不同、有些甚至没有听过“马来西亚”的中国同学一起学习，重新寻找自己的身份，一切重新开始。

2001年，我毕业回到新山，近3年的记者生涯，让我发觉手中的笔越发没劲、越觉无聊，于是与朋友学人家合股作生意。

在完全陌生的教育领域，账目的盈亏彷佛就是生与死的交恶，一切重新开始。

2006年1月，生命中很重要的一个朋友去了另一个世界。几个月后，生意渐渐上了轨道，却应验了“好朋友最好不要一起做生意”的诅咒，我全身引退、拆伙、亏光。我只能总结说，朋友真的有很多种，有时还得靠运气。

我与一班“海马友”轰轰烈烈地成立了海马保育组织， 发起保护蒲莱河的海马运动、办海马资料展。过后，我向家人、校友会贷款，8月，一个人飞到寒冷的英国打工、升学。

在完全陌生的环境，一切重新开始。

在经济拮据的情况下，挨饿、流着泪，苦啃满是ABC的课本、文章，在断断续续的打工生涯中，还遭一些应该是自以为英国就是全世界的白皮肤金头发的老外白眼。

2006年秋天，我把心一横，毕业回国后下飞机的第二天，直奔八打灵再也民主行动党总部宣传局应征，一个星期后正式上班。立志在有生之年成就一番“推翻国阵”的大业。

在完全陌生的环境，一切重新开始。

一个全职的政治工作者，需要拥有90％对美好社会的理想来撑着肚子和生活的物欲。但是当我发现，社会上其实很多人用尽90％的虚伪来填饱肚子及物欲，于是我学会容忍，原来这个社会就像那些缺了很多角的拼图，拼拼凑凑，还是一副悲惨世界。

2008年3月8日，我竟然见证了原本以为我白发苍苍才会出现“政治海啸”。海啸的激情过后，我重新思考自己究竟还可以在这种工作岗位待多久。

大选过后，被老板传召上槟城的首三个月，幸还是不幸？我过着像游牧民族的生活，居无定所、食不知味，常常感觉自己像个傻子，开始不知道自己还撑着多少％的理想，干着什么活。

我终于开口告辞，向上天祈求，放我一条生路，让我浪迹天涯。

结果，漫长煎熬的谈判后，我重新做选择，决定接受调职到华人居多数的槟城的建议。

其实，我有很多选择离开的理由：比如每天上班停车的Pragin Mall停车场的卫生安全状况实在糟透了、在乱七八糟的马路上以龟速开车的压力让人心烦意燥、办公室的冷气冷得让人满肚火、想吃一顿普通的晚餐选中了地点却总是找不到停车位、在州政府大厦上班还要被人监视衣着，还有，常常让我不知所措的岛民，和一些岛屿国度如新加坡、英国、台湾的人民同样心态，自以为脚下踩的那个岛就是全世界。

既然彷佛预见不快乐，我为什么选择留下呢？为什么要典当本小姐背起大背包周游列国的梦想呢？在接受什么挑战呢？看来，我很容易受新事物的诱惑、未知的生活不是很刺激吗？这是一种自虐。为什么，此时此刻，我会觉得身边的一切其实无所谓，尤其当我阅读报章上那些原本会令我愤怒的低能政府所干的好事时，我竟然开始当做笑话来阅读… …

无论如何，我即将迁移到一个陌生的地方，一切重新开始。但愿，我还有能力，从心出发。

每到一个陌生的地方，意味着必须离开身边的一切熟悉的人与事物，即使是在自已的国家，在陌生的环境，别人予我，或我予别人都是陌生人。最悲壮的牺牲，我想就是远离早已熟络的亲友，重新在陌生的地方适应举目无亲、没有知交、常常孤独到想要抽闷烟的生活。

然而，我也同时发现，人最赞及最可怕的地方就是适应能力。最赞，是因为人不像北极熊或企鹅或海马，离开栖息地就会死掉。最可怕，是因为往往在适应了一些事物后，容易安于现状、丧失危机感，懒于进行重大改变和调整，这和目前大多数人应对全球气候变化的态度一模一样。

从前有一班“只想活到40岁”的朋友，如今各奔东西。若40岁为生命的终点，我总算活过了四分之三。我期待，不久的将来，我还能展翅，再次前往陌生的地方，再让一切重新开始。

Pulau Perhentian Kecil

I was in Pulau Perhentian Kecil during Raya Holiday with 10 colleagues and 3 DAP families! The water was so clear and calm... ...from shallow blue to deep blue. We saw the hibrid windmill after 20mins of jungle trekking!

请用客观、全面、专业的论据说服我

2008年第9期《火箭报》专栏

教育总监阿里慕丁的“综合意见和研究报告”总结，让人见识了马来西亚的官员，是如何地咨询民意。

他可以单凭英文报章以及本身所收到的电邮信件的言论，就可以妄下定论：“大多数人是支持延续英语教数理政策。”

过去几个月，我紧密观察这些英文报章有关支持英语教数理的言论，这些支持者所提出的论调不外有三点：
（1）取消英语教数理，我国学生英语水平将一落千丈。
（2）学生数理学习成绩不好，是数理教师英文能力不好所造成的。
（3）世界科技用语是英文，唯有使用英语教数理，我国才能发展科技。

世界各国的教育专家以及《联合国教科文组织世界文化多样性宣言》都承认母语教学的优越性和有效性。偏偏这是我国一批“精英”（精通英语的人士）企图垄断民间声音，然后发表一些自以是“真知灼见”的言论。这些使用ABC学习的精英，自然无法体会小朋友们以自己熟悉的语言来学习基础知识、发现新事物的乐趣。

我在部落格抛出第一种论调的逻辑：要学好英文就必须使用英文教数理？那不如说学会弹钢琴就会拉小提琴？朋友马上回应这种荒谬的逻辑，来证明这种论调的无知及可笑：要吃饭，就是要先学会煮饭。很奇怪的是，很多懂得吃饭的人，都还学不会煮饭。

至于第二种论调，这种逻辑应该就等于：不久前踏出神州七号在太空漫步的中国太空人翟志刚以及全体研发太空船升空的航天人员，应该也没有资格成为我国华小的数理科老师，因为他们绝大多数人小学阶段都不是以英文学习数理。

第三种论调更加令人喷饭，这些“精英”人士似乎永远不明白也不想知道，为什么日本、德国、俄国、中国等英语为第二甚至第三语言的国家，其科技、工商业会一直领先那些很努力把英语变成主流语的非洲国家？

别搞错了，我从来不反对提高学生的英文水平，但是，掌管教育的，请展现你们的专业程度，对症下药，认真检讨我国英文教师的素质、课程纳要、教学法、成效、设备等各种各样硬软体措施。

当一个人选择听什么，他就会只听到什么。教育总监也如此，当然，他可以继续选择读不到那些民间团体、教育专业学者的研究报告，他可以继续看不到大部分国小、华小、淡小的学生，背着多么沉重的学习心理负担，在惨遭陌生的语言抹杀了学习兴趣之后，丧失了学习的动力。他可以继续听不到关于素质教育不应是以功利为导向的呐喊。反正，他不必承担任何后果。

Visa abusers cause inconvenience to others

I know that there are a lot of Malaysians choose to overstay in the UK to earn sterling pounds.

Living cost in the UK is lower compared to Malaysia. They can afford to buy a car or even a low-cost house after working as a waitress for 2-3 years in the Chinese restaurants. Even if you are just a cleaner there, you live with human dignity. There are no RELA personnel in Britain who are allowed to crackdown illegal workers anytime, anywhere. What is RM1 in Malaysia? But it is true you can have a 1-pound meal with milk and bread in the UK.

However, such visa abusers have caused some of the applications to the UK were rejected by British High Commissioner, which means our applicants cannot be trusted anymore. Shame indeed, let Malaysians blacklisted and let the country fell under visa regime, let the whole world knows how bad is our economic situation.

But do Malaysian leaders know the meaning of 'shameful'?

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Friday September 26, 2008
Malaysians the top Britain visa abusers
By CHOI TUCK WO


LONDON: Malaysia is in the top five countries whose citizens are consistently being denied entry into Britain.

If that is not bad enough, Malaysians are also among the top 10 nationalities who overstay and in the top 20 for overall immigration abuses.

Revealing these statistics, Malaysian High Commissioner to Britain Datuk Abdul Aziz Mohamad said most Malaysians who overstayed were from Johor, Perak, Penang and Selangor.

He said Malaysians had been in Britain’s bad books over visa abuses, with about 1,500 of them refused entry last year.

Aziz said Malaysian passports were often abused by nationals from China, Sri Lanka and India to gain illegal entry into Britain.

“And Malaysians are frequently reported as acting as facilitators to arrange for other nationals to enter Britain,” he said when briefing the Malaysian community here on the proposed visa ruling for Malaysians travelling to Britain.

More than 80 representatives from Malaysian organisations, including the Overseas Malay­sian Executives Club, Malaysian Chinese Society, Umno UK Club, MCA Club UK, MIC London Club and the Britain & Eire Council for Malaysian Students, attended the briefing on Wednesday.

Aziz said the Home Office’s third and last stage of its visa-waiver test for Malaysia and 10 other countries was expected to run until January or February next year.

He said British authorities would probably decide around March whether Malaysia would fall under the visa regime.

On whether Malaysia would retaliate if Britain imposed the visa, the High Commissioner said it would have to weigh the situation in Malaysia’s best interests.

He urged Malaysians who were unsure of their visa or stay in Britain to contact the High Commission, which would offer assistance.

International Organisation for Migration’s (www.iomlondon.org) communications director (UK) Marek Effendowicz offered pointers about the agency’s services for those whose visas had expired, were staying illegally in Britain or were asylum seekers.

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