CSIRO, the  CRC for Coal in Sustainable Development and the "Thought Police". (February 16, 2007)

    Senate Estimates come around three times a year and the last round for the 2006/2007 financial year is just winding up.

Censorship - Elizabeth Granton, 2003

The Senate Employment, Workplace Relations and Education Committee looks into matters of Education, Science and Training which is how CSIRO and the Cooperate Research Centres (CRC) come to be examined.

Two of the matters the came under consideration were the suppression of the expression of views by CSIRO scientists based on their findings (gagging) and of publications where part of the funding for research projects comes from the private sector and part from the government, i.e. the tax paying public.

In July last year CSIRO, following an internal review, which Chief Executive Geoff Garrett requested because of "significant concerns alleging that CSIRO was gagging its scientists, and that the previous policy lacked clarity" released a revised Policy on Public Comment by CSIRO Staff which "Supersedes Policy on Public Comment by CSIRO Staff Members 2004/06 - July 2004.

Six specific policy directives were issued regarding CSIRO staff's communications with the public the third and fourth of which are of particular interest here:

Policy statement - 3
    CSIRO staff should not advocate, defend or publicly canvass the merits of government or opposition policies (including policies of previous Commonwealth governments, or State or local or foreign governments).
 

Policy statement - 4
    If a staff member is commenting in a private capacity, he or she should state clearly that it is a personal opinion rather than an official view of CSIRO.

In explanation the the policy document states,   "CSIRO staff have the same right as all Australian citizens to speak as an individual rather than as a representative of their employer." But they are reminded that, "All staff, especially senior scientists and managers, should be mindful of the reality of modern media, such that they are likely to be identified as being employed by CSIRO whether they wish to be or not."

As a CSIRO staffer, might or might not that caution cause you to think twice before making comments questioning or suggesting governmental policy even if preceded by a clearly articulated disclaimer?

On February 14 Dr Ron Sandland, CSIRO Deputy Chief Executive, in response to Greens Senator Christine Milne's questions on CSIRO's media policy during a Senate Estimates Committee replied:

Where the comment is on the science and the scientific work that is being carried out by the scientists, we believe that our scientists are clearly the people who should be communicating those outcomes.

Where, however, it comes to how this plays into policy, we've taken the position that CSIRO people do not comment on government policy, nor do they comment on opposition policy.

 

"[CSIRO would not suppress a paper just because it had potential policy ramifications] If that science impinges on an area in which government has policy, we believe that it is our responsibility to fearlessly publish the science.

 

To the best of my knowledge a scientific paper has not been doctored or suppressed because of its potential implications for policy.

If, however, in a paper it was said "Therefore the government should do X" ... in that situation we would say "Hey, basically you can talk about the science, you can talk about the implications, you can talk about the models and what they're predicting but you can't say "Therefore the government should do X".

I'm aware of one or two situations in which that [has occurred].

What is particularly disturbing is the edict that researchers may not draw conclusions based on their work and how they believe it impinges on national policy. What good reason can sustain such an approach in a nation which prides itself on being a leading democracy? Individual CSIRO researchers are employees of a publicly funded organisation; they are supported by the Australian public and their ultimate responsibility is to that public. Were they to promulgate material that was detrimental to the national interest, that is another matter, but if a statement is counter to the governmental policy of the day and is suppressed, that constitutes gagging regardless of the weasel words that Dr Sandland or his administrative colleagues employ.

Which brings us to a cogent article in today's Canberra Times by Rosslyn Beeby which may be seen as contradicting Dr Sandlands "[CSIRO would not suppress a paper just because it had potential policy ramifications] If that science impinges on an area in which government has policy, we believe that it is our responsibility to fearlessly publish the science."

Well it may depend on how you define fearlessly.

Ms Beeby writes:

The CSIRO has confirmed coal industry bodies have the power to suppress a new report questioning the cost and efficiency of clean-coal carbon capture technologies because they partly funded the research.

Dr David Brockway, chief of CSIRO's division of energy technology, told a Senate estimates committee hearing yesterday it was "not necessarily unusual" for private-industry partners investing in research programs - such as Cooperative Research Centres - to request reports be withheld from public release if findings were deemed to be not in their best interests.

 

Dr Brockway confirmed the report which The Canberra Times understands was largely completed last year - may never be made public. He suggested industry partners tended to regard research as their intellectual property because "they pay for it."

But the "industry partners" did not wholly pay for the research. Ms Beeby's article continues:

The economic assessment, [was]co-authored by CSIRO chemical engineer and carbon capture expert Dr Greg Duffy as part of CSIRO's participation in the Cooperative Research Centre for Coal in Sustainable Development... it raises questions about the efficiency of a new carbon capture technology known as the aqua ammonia process. It says the process is "seriously limited by problems" and "unlikely to be favoured commercially" over the traditional and flawed MEA (monoethanolamine) process for carbon removal from emissions.

Following the estimates hearing Senator Milne said, "What we have here is a situation where research that is funded by the Australian taxpayer and in the public interest can be kept secret because it doesn't suit the agenda of private sector interests. If this situation is typical as CSIRO has implied then it makes you wonder how many scientific reports haven't seen the light of day."

But the matter really goes even deeper and has to do with the Coalition government's funding policy as regards carbon capture research as compared with its funding of sustainable energy and geothermal research.

CSIRO's David Brockway, chief of energy research, told the estimates hearing that CSIRO's energy division has expended a major research effort on carbon capture saying it's "a key feature" in reducing Australia's greenhouse emissions, and went on to claim he was not aware of the findings of Dr Duffy's economic assessment of the aqua ammonia carbon capture process and didn't, "know very much about [the CRC's report]."

Ms Beeby then highlights the handling of energy issues by recalling:

Last September, Dr Duffy told a House of Representatives committee inquiry into geosequestration (carbon capture and burial) technology that carbon capture would double the cost of baseload electricity generation and reduce the output from a power station by "about 30 per cent".

It would cost "hundreds of millions of dollars" to retrofit coal-fired power stations with carbon capture equipment, he said.

The CRC for Coal in Sustainable Development also delayed release of a CSIRO report on solar thermal technology which described it as "the only renewable technology that can make deep cuts in greenhouse emissions" and predicted it would be cost competitive with coal by 2015. The report was released last year after The Canberra Times obtained a copy.

Taking into consideration the bragging of The Greenhouse Mafia and how it pulls the strings of the federal government when it comes to matters of energy production it is hardly surprising that the Coalition has been somewhat sluggish in acknowledging that the anthropogenic origin of greenhouse gases is contributing significantly to global warming.