Four Australian guys are driving across the globe attempting to ‘fill-up’ only on biofuel. Jamesina McLeod reports.

Four Australian guys are attempting to drive across the globe the green way. Image: thegreenwayup.com

Burgers and Friday afternoon fries – the next solution to our environmental energy crisis?

According to the boys from The Green Way Up, it could be a possibility. The Green Way Up team consisting of Justin, Oscar, Bob and Chuck, are recycling all the plant and animal fats they can beg, borrow or steal from restaurants and street stalls to drive, sail and moped their way from Tasmania to Belgium.

Using biofuel to make their way across multiple continents, their aim is to never have to fill up at a petrol station.

Harnessing their respective DJ-ing, marketing, engineering and welding talents, Justin, Oscar, Bob and Chuck have been planning the six-month trip for two years. Most of this time was spent designing and building the portable biofuel converter and aluminium boat they are using on their trip. When finished, they will be donated to a tsunami-affected community.

Starting with a big idea but with no money, the team was stunned by the generosity of supporters who heard about them through their Facebook and Twitter pages.

The Green Way Up interview with Justin

“Fundraising has been really good at the moment, we’ve been getting support from all over the world,” said Justin, who was surprised by the number of anonymous donations after word spread about the project online. The $20, 000 needed to microfinance their boat was raised in three weeks through online donations.

Apart from carving donators’ names onto their boat, the boys will continue to thank their supporters through an interactive googlemaps page allowing people to track their progress and comment on their journey on thegreenwayup.com.

Their trip is being made into a documentary to be released later this year.

Read the transcript below.

Jamesina: So Justin, it’s yourself, Bob, Chuck and Oscar setting off on this epic expedition. How did this all start?

Justin: You know initially when we started the idea we didn’t have an idea of what the benefit would be apart from just engaging our friends and followers as we got on the road and for us that was an attractive idea simply because it was going to inform what we saw along the road, where we went and what was cool and interesting to do.

Jamesina: And how does the Green Way Up concept campaign fit in?

Justin: The Green Way Up concept was exactly that it, it was to make the whole movement palatable, to show what was good and interesting and to not associate environmentalism with guilt and negative emotions. Not to ram a message down anyone’s throat or run a hard line with a particular sort of perspective on the environment but we just wanted to create conversation around what was happening in every aspect of sustainability.

And that’s what we’ve done with our website – greenwayup.com – it’s a commentary on what was cool and interesting, innovative and just fantastic in the world of green design, green technology, green art, all of the above.

Jamesina: How important has social media been for you guys?

Justin: We knew the best way to spread the message was through a medium that our generation was familiar with and community participation, social media participation has been critical. That’s one of our main tools for engaging as we go. No one had seemed to have done that facebook-twitter-googlemaps mashup before, enabling one to geographically find and follow our route.

Jamesina: You’re on the road for 6 months and almost as many continents – what are you looking forward to most?

Justin: Once the website really gets up and rolling, when we start getting a lot of comments on the [interactive google]map, I’m really looking forward to actually meeting the people who are engaging with us through our facebook and twitter and maps and saying “come visit us here and here and here!” I think that’s going to create a really nice organic element to the whole trip.

The four of us haven’t really contemplated what to expect once we hit the road because it’s been “go-go-go!” working on the boat, the biofuel processor, the trailer. It’s pretty intense at the moment and most of us haven’t had time to look forward to what it’s going to be like on the road. But it’s going to be a hell of an adventure.

From iPhones and TV to wind turbines and electric cars, rare earths are minerals essential to modern technology and 21st century society. Brigid Mullane spoke with experts on Australia’s nascent rare earth industry, its place in the international market and the environmental implications of mining.

Rare earth computer magnets. Image: Steven M

Out in Western Australia, an ancient volcano is stirring: it is called Mount Weld, and it’s near Laverton, about 700 kilometres northeast of Perth.

While it’s not actually going to erupt, with some help from heavy machinery, it will be releasing tonnes of minerals called rare earth elements, that are essential to modern life.

Dr Matthew James of Lynas Corporation Ltd, the mine’s developer, said he was enthusiastic about the many applications of these minerals, particularly in computers.

“That hard disk drive has two rare earth magnets, one to make the disk spin, the other that controls the arm that reads and writes data on that disk and that has allowed the miniaturisation of these hard disk drives . . . the phosphors behind the computer screen – the materials that create the colour and light – are a combination of rare earths.”

“Europium creates the colour red and terbium creates the colour green and there are no substitutes for those, so no rare earths – black and white world,” he said.

Rare earths in minute quantities are found in many of our modern electronic gadgets, but their crucial role today is in green energy technology, notably, hybrid electric cars.

“Rare earths create the world’s strongest magnets – neodymium rare earth magnets – and they’re used in the electrical generator of the car, also the electric motor of the hybrid vehicle,” James said.

A car like the Prius needs about one kilogram of neodymium for its generator and motor as well as 10 to 15 kilograms of lanthanum for its battery and one-kilowatt wind turbine’s generator requires more than 200 kilograms of neodymium.

So, in the renewable energy age, the market for rare earths will continue to expand, and Australia may be looking at a new mining boom.

In the mining boom, China will be a competitor, not a customer.

In recent years, China has virtually cornered the rare earths market, with an estimated 60% of the world’s reserves and 95% of production.

China wants to use its supply for its own technology industries, and has recently reduced exports – that could mean higher prices in the short term.

On the other hand, China could increase production and exports at any time and with cheap labour, poor environmental regulation and a large black market, it could price other suppliers out of the market, as it did in the late 1990′s.

Despite the uncertainty, Australian miners are forging ahead with exploration and development.

The Mount Weld site is likely to be the first to get its minerals processed to a factory-ready state, by the second half of 2011.

The processing starts at the concentration plant adjacent to the mine, where the ore is crushed and ground to liberate the fine grains of rare earths.

These are added to a soap-like solution where they cling to the bubbles and float to the surface, where the floatation process
produces a concentrate of various rare earths.

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The concentrate is then shipped to the company’s processing plant at Kuantan on the east coast of Malaysia.

“Our plant uses quite a lot of water, natural gas and chemical reagents, and water in Western Australia is scarce; in Malaysia it’s plentiful. Also the chemical reagents we require we can find locally in the industrial estate in Malaysia”, James said, adding that natural gas is also available nearby from Petronas, Malaysia’s national oil and gas company.

At Kuantan, the concentrate gets severe treatment.

“We hit it with sulphuric acid at relatively high temperatures and this breaks down the minerals and releases the rare earths from the mineral structure,” says James.

The resulting sulphate solution is subjected to a technique called solvent extraction, to separate the individual rare earths and produce single oxides such as neodymium oxide, ready for industrial use.

The company expects to sell its output to manufacturers in Japan, Europe and the United States, with many supply contracts already signed.

One question remains: Will the environmental benefits of green technology be undermined by the environmental impact of mining and processing essential components like rare earths?

James believes that his company is dealing with the issue.

At the Australian mine site they retain the topsoil removed from the pit area to allow future rehabilitation.

The plant in Malaysia needs more complex procedures.

“We have a very good . . . waste gas system that cleans the gases before they’re released to the atmosphere. We have what will be the largest industrial wastewater plant on the east coast of Malaysia, again to ensure that any water we release is properly treated and cleaned and meets the environmental standards,” he said.

The company also makes use of the plant’s byproducts.

“The non-rare-earth solids that we produce are actually synthetic mineral products like gypsum . . . and these products can be used in cement products or plasterboard.”

Recycling is another goal of the industry.

James noted that it is difficult to recycle the very small quantities in many discarded electronic items, but recycling programs are being put in place in the automotive industry.

As well, magnet manufacturers make use of production off cuts, and so optimise resource use.

So, if Australian rare earth producers cannot compete with the Chinese on price, they may be able to trade on their environmental credentials, at least until China catches up.

And with Australia’s new government contemplating a revised mining tax and a carbon-pricing mechanism, this new mining boom could be a long one.

Brigid Mullane is a reporter for Diffusion. She is also a minor shareholder in Lynas Corporation Ltd.

Victoria prepares for summer with a bushfire briefing after warnings of a tough season from the Bureau of Meteorology. Faith Valencia reports.

Hazeldene, Victoria is just one victime of the bushfires. Image: S2art

The Bureau’s predicts a nasty season of fires for southern Australia and of cyclones in Queensland were addressed in the annual bushfire briefing yesterday in Victoria.

The briefing, which will be conducted in all States and Territories, was a key recommendation of the Victorian Bushfires Royal Commission and will provide details of Commonwealth support arrangements that are available in the event of a serious disaster or emergency.

Commonwealth Attorney General Robert McClelland said the briefing was to advise Victoria of what Commonwealth assets were available to assist in an emergency, the greatest being bushfires.

“We went through to advise of possible defence assets; the Bureau of Meteorology, what assistance they can provide in prediction, Geosciences Australia in terms of aerial surveillance, but even right through to assistance that the Department of Human Services can play in any recovery operation. So that’s essentially engaging in the dialogue, working out what might be needed, developing communications channels and then just panning all possibilities that lie ahead,” McClelland said.

“We’re actually bringing online a new crisis coordination centre, which will be opened early in the New Year in Canberra. We have an interim crisis coordination centre now but we’ve placed out for the first time representatives of Emergency Management Australia.”

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“They’re going to be liaison officers and they’re going to be placed with the crucial state emergency response organisations to smooth the communication channels so that we can get firsthand feel of what’s happening on the ground then in turn feed that into the commonwealth agencies that may be required to provide assistance,” he said.

The Victorian Bushfires Royal Commission recommended last bush fire season that the Commonwealth meet with the states to just run through the Commonwealth assets that are available for health state emergency responders annually.

“Last year we had such a briefing but it was conducted on a national basis and it was considered that that briefing was a little too broad and covered everything from cyclones to fire to floods, and it was thought it was better if we had more targeted and specific meetings where we could actually get the feedback on likely scenarios that would affect that particular region. So that’s why we’ve divided it up by a state by state and territory by territory basis this year,” said McLelland.

Forecast rainfall might balance out the threats in Victoria, but not all are predicted to be as lucky.

Alasdair Hainsworth, Assistant Director of Weather Services with the Bureau of Meteorology, said, “Here in Victoria it looks as though we’ve got a slightly higher than average chance of receiving above medium rainfall so there’s slightly better chance of reasonable rain over the summer period here in Victoria.

“But what that means generally is that we could be looking at an above average season in relation to cyclone activity and rainfall through the northern territory and parts of Queensland and even into northern NSW.”

Faith Valencia is a producer for The Wire.

Dominic Geiger | The Wire

Plans to build nine dams along the Mekong in Laos will have both environmental and social implications. Image: Themiz

Plans to build nine dams on the main stretch of the Mekong river in Laos has outraged environmentalists and humanitarian groups.

According to the Laos government, the plans are designed to lift many people out of poverty by selling off hydroelectricity to the country’s energy hungry neighbours; Thailand and Vietnam.

“Mekong is a fantastic river. It has an amazing diversity. It is one of the most prolific rivers in the world for fish with more than 1000 species,” says Marc Goichot, senior adviser on sustainable infrastructure at the World Wildlife Fund.

Goichot says the benefits the Mekong fishstocks bring to the people of the region is unequal elsewhere in the world.

“It produces some, brings in $7 billion within a year and produces more than $3 billion tonnes of fish a year.

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“[The proposed dam] would affect the fisheries because it will breach the connectivity and affect the fisheries and the people along the Mekong depend on the fisheries.”

Professor Stuart Bunn, Director of the Australian Rivers Institute at Griffith University agrees with Goichot and says that the proposed dams will radically change the way of life for people living on the Mekong.

“The Mekong is one of the last of the relatively unscathed large rivers and that’s largely due to the fact that it hasn’t had a large number of dams put on it. Building the dams and particularly the ones that are talked about are likely to have a big environmental and social impact down stream.”

“On the river itself, there is not going to be, I don’t think too much in the sense of displacement of people. These are not dams that are designed to backflow them and move people out.

“I think the most significant environmental issue for communities is the potential damage to natural fisheries downstream and that, the social impacts of that, in terms of removing a major source of protein for communities down stream is probably the most significant effect.

The World wildlife Fund has predicted that species of fish including the Mekong catfish are likely to become extinct if the proposed dams are built. A prediction Bunn agrees with.

“Yes… the Mekong has an unusually high fish species diversity. It’s something like 1300 species of fish are already described and many of the ones in the river migrate large distances up… And there are other more charismatic ones, like the giant Mekong catfish which, you know, they are under a pressure already from fishing and these are ones that simply won’t be able to navigate their way through a series of barrages and dams.”

Trials to increase snowfall in the Snowy Mountains are under scrutiny, Michael Kermode reports.

Snowfall could rise by 14% with cloudseeding. Image: Arbyreed.

A cloudseeding program in the Snowy Mountains may become a permanent fixture if the NSW government gives its approval.

Attempts to increase the amount of precipitation that falls from weather fronts in the Snowy Mountains have been running for six years, with mountainside generators releasing silver iodide particles into clouds that would not otherwise create snow.

Snowy Hydro Corporation (SHC), the company behind the trial, wants to transfer the program into an operational stage.

“We have completed six seasons to date and we are currently getting towards the completion of the seventh season. The reports up to sixth season now are very favourable. They’ve indicated that you could be looking at as much as a 14% increase in snow,” says Paul Johnson, spokesperson for the SHC.

The NSW Natural Resources Commission are responsible for deciding whether or not to keep seeding clouds in the Snowy. The report the Commission is expected to release at the end of the month, could decide whether SHC should be allowed to continue seeding on a permanent basis.

The company stands to make millions as more water flows through their hydroelectric generators, but they are adamant that a permanent operation will benefit everyone.

“From an operation of cloudseeding, if you get additional snow on the tourism areas of the Snowy Mountains, that is the ski fields get that extra snowfall, then obviously that results in extra tourism and that tourism flows through all branches of the region and the community,” Johnson says.

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SHC says the project could create 70 gigalitres of extra water per year, and some of that could be directed to the ailing Murray-Murrumbidgee catchments.

John Cahill, the mayor of Snowy Shire, says this as a position reason to favour cloudseeding.

“We know that the Murray-Darling system is in terrible trouble through lack of water. So I think we should go into an operational phase with a review to take place, say 2015, to examine if there have been any changes over that 10 or 11 year period,” he says.

But not everyone is in favour of making the trial permanent.

Keith Muir from the Colong Foundation for Wilderness, fought Snowy Hydro’s trial in 2006. He cited concerns about the levels of silver iodide cast in the atmosphere, and the potential effect the snow falling at lower altitudes could have on wildlife.

“[It is] probably the most sensitive area in Australia, that is alpine areas above the snowline and above the tree line. They are very, very unique and very small, and we shouldn’t be conducting experiments in relation to them,” he says.

SHC’s own report released earlier this year, said the plan was independently found to have no significant adverse environmental effects. But Muir says that six years is not enough to determine that, let alone whether the technology works.

“If they run 15 years of cloudseeding, and they can demonstrate a long term average better than the five years before or the decade before the trial started and we have that data, then they have the evidence. They definitely need to run the trial for the full period to get the data.”

But scientists disagree.

Steve Siems, cloud physicist at Monash University, conducted studies on a similar operation in Tasmania. His studies show that the cloudseeding technology has increased falls. And while the Tasmanian program spanned 46 years, Siems suggests the recent Snowy trial has gone for long enough to establish that the extra snow is not due to other factors.

“They’re looking at event by event storms. So when they look at this scale, they’ve accumulated enough events over the years to get their statistical significance. It’s perfectly sound, perfectly valid, it means that they’re analysing first test.”

Michael Kermode is a producer for The Wire.

The green consensus on emissions trading may be fragmenting, as environmentalists and economists swing their support behind a permanent carbon tax instead.Tim Roxburgh reports.

Environmentalists and big businesses come together to support carbon tax. Image: Dustin Sacks

The announcement of the new multi-party climate change committee’s plan to look into ways of placing a price on carbon has experts saying that a carbon tax could serve as a permanent part of our response to climate change.

“We had an emission trading system essentially thrust upon us. It was a decision made by the Labor Party even before they got elected in 2007, and it was really the only model that was therefore investigated,” says Professor Barry Brook from the University of Adelaide.

“The debate about whether to have an emissions trading scheme or a carbon tax was one that we never really had.”

But it seems that an overdue debate could be about to begin, with more than a few commentators stating their support for carbon tax as a permanent solution to the climate problem instead of ETS.

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Ben Spies-Butcher, a lecturer at Macquarie University, says there are two reasons why we should forget about ETS and stick to carbon tax.

“One is that the tax is a lot simpler both to understand and to administer than an emissions trading scheme, and I think in all genuine political respects it achieves the same goal,” he says.

“The second is that I think it sends a different message about carbon pollution, where one turns carbon pollution into a kind of commodity that says you can buy out rights to pollution; that you’re allowed to, entitled to pollute. A tax says pollution is not a great thing, and the more you do of it the more we’ll tax you. It doesn’t provide the same sort of endorsement to conduct the activity that buying a right to be able to do it does.”

Professor Barry Brook agrees that an ETS is an over-complicated way to go about reducing our carbon emissions.

“It’s very difficult to know what the price of the permits will be, so there’s a lot of uncertainty there. It’s very easy to corrupt such a system by giving out free permits and grants furthering permits, and all of these problems lead to the fact that in reality getting an effective emissions trading scheme has been inordinately difficult. Whereas the carbon tax, in theory, could be very, very simple.”

This view is starting to garner support even amongst big business. BHP Chief Executive Marius Kloppers recently stated that while action on climate change is necessary, “a single encompassing trading system and the academically elegant economic surrounding it is not the solution”.

Professor Brooke believes that with such cooperation from big business, the carbon tax could become a permanent part of the Australian response to climate change.

“I think what Kloppers has said is quite sensible… You can try and over-engineer this sort of economic model and it hasn’t worked anywhere else. I think the best reference we have is what has happened in the real world, and nowhere have we had an effective emissions trading scheme.”

“There is one in Europe it’s just not reducing Europe’s emissions, so you’ve really got to question whether that one’s been effective. You’ve had one that’s been debated endlessly in the US Senate and Congress and it still hasn’t gone anywhere. But we have had jurisdictions that have implemented a simple carbon tax and they’re doing fine.”

Andrew Macintosh, Associate Director of the ANU Centre for Climate Law and Policy says that ETS no longer has the universal support amongst policy makers that it once enjoyed.

“I think that consensus that existed during parts of 2000 has faded away and there’s a real chance that a tax is going to be the way forward,” he says.

“In the United States for example, they’re talking about a tax that is potentially a long term solution. In a number of European countries they have taxes. I understand in British Columbia in Canada, they’ve recently introduced a carbon tax.”

Ben Spies-Butcher says that once and if Australia settles on the carbon tax, the debate will melt away.

“People will have got a price on carbon; that’s what people are really interested in,” he says.

“There might be easier ways to increase that price over time by gradually increasing the tax on carbon as we have with the tax on tobacco or the tax on alcohol. That might be a much more effective way to campaign and to try and convert the whole system again into another more complicated variant.”

Tim Roxburgh is a producer for the Wire.

Leah Cassidy | London, England

London has pledged that the 2012 Olympic Games will be the most sustainable ever. Image: Michael Pead

It was announced four years ago that London would play host to the 2012 Olympic Games.

In a bid to get the Games to England, organisers pledged to host a sporting spectacular as well as to deliver the most sustainable Games to date.

In particular, the London 2012 committee said it would regenerate the area of East London where the Games will be predominately hosted.

But can we have a sustainable Olympics? Or is it simply an oxymoron?

Organisers have pledged a car-free event but with BMW as a main sponsor of the Games, they will be bringing a fleet of around 4,000 vehicles to the country.

Additionally, it is not yet known what the venues, where the Games will held, will be used for after the 2012 Olympics have concluded.

Shaun McCarthy is the chair of the Commission for a Sustainable London 2012, the independent body set up to ensure that the sustainability pledge will be met. He says that the sustainability targets set for the 2012 Olympic Games are on track.

“The ODA [Olympic Delivery Authority] have done a great job of meeting some very challenging targets which is basically reducing the carbon emissions in legacy by 50 per cent and all of the things that should happen: the wind turbine being built on the north side of the park; the plans for some solar power and microwind energy on the park so people can actually see the sustainability of the energy.”

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However, critics claim that the targets are not tough enough.

Business articles by Ethical Corporation magazine have revealed that many of the aims are falling short of existing government energy targets including the plans for the Olympic village to save 25 per cent more energy than the usual household would be meeting this years national target which is two years before the Games are set to start.

Dan Epstein, head of sustainability for ODA says the targets that have been set are challenging.

“50 per cent reduction in carbon, for example, is a huge set forward from where we were… the most important thing about this project is it’s not a project about 2012. It is a project about legacy.

“And so we are setting up the baseline for a development that is going to go on for hundreds of years hopefully. It would be a bit churlish actually, to say that we haven’t set ourselves difficult targets or that we kind of prevented industry from going on and doing more on the site,” he says.

Despite assurances from organisers that targets will be met, McCarthy admits the main pledge of regenerating East London is a concern.

“I am kind of answering the question yes and no. Yes for the guys on the ground, the objectives are extremely tough and I think it is a bit snooty of the Ethical Corporation to say they [targets] are not tough enough,” he says.

“If you take a bigger, longer term, more strategic view of what needs to happen in London to deliver a truly sustainable legacy for the Olympic Park, then no enough has been done now.”

Leah Cassidy is an exchange student from Murdoch University who is currently at City University London, a partner in the Global Environmental Journalism Initiative.

Joel Filk | The Wire

The 'Nuclear Scumbags tour' was part of the week long activities during the SOS conference. Image: Students of Sustainability

Hundreds of students have protested outside the offices of the big players from Australia’s uranium industry.

The ‘Nuclear Scumbags tour’ day of action was part of the Students of Sustainability (SOS) conference being hosted by Flinders University in Adelaide on Wednesday.

“Students are bearing witness to the uranium industry in Australia. They want change. They want that end to uranium mining,” said Nuclear free campaigner David Noonan.

“They want an end to the nuclear risks and the unresolved waste management that comes from our uranium exports.”

“The truth needs to be told. People need to know that Australia has driven down environmental protection standards to suit the uranium mining industry,” he said.

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Workers at the BHP Biliton building were told that the building entrance was shut down during the protests with one protestor, a former BHP employee, pouring green slime outside the building to represent the destruction being caused in leaking uranium mines.

Police were on site to ensure safety during the event but protesters said they were not there to cause any trouble, but to highlight issues.

One protester said, “Peaceful protest definitely… hopefully we won’t be looking at Adelaide through some jail bars.”

Madeline Hudson, Anti-Nuclear and Clean Energy Collective (ACE) thinks that everyday Australians need to care about rallying together for this issue because protests have made the difference before and can make the difference again.

“The Australian public think we live in a democracy but when it comes to, and particularly uranium mines, they not applicable. They are exempt. And why should they be exempt. Especially when we need to be transitioning to safe, renewable energy,” she said.

“I think it will be an effective point-of-note when it gets in the media that he has been contacted and that we want a response from him.”

Joel Filk is a reporter for the Wire.

By Sarah Michael

Consumers are confused with so many different recycling labels in use. Image: Trounce

Almost 90 per cent of Australian homes have access to recycling but many don’t know what the various symbols stand for.

A report released by Victoria University entitled “The Role of Labels in Directing Consumer Packaging Waste”, found that many are confused by the numerous recycling symbols currently in use.

Author of the report, Sarah Buelow says some of the most commonly used recycling symbols are also the most misunderstood.

“The little chasing arrows with the number inside that’s on pretty much all plastic packaging that you’ll find, everyone thinks that that’s the recycling symbol when it’s actually just the identification code to inform you what plastic the package is made out of.

“People automatically assume that means recycle it when that’s not really, that’s definitely not what its saying.”

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Buelow thinks that manufacturers are using too many different kinds of symbols and consumers are left confused because there is no standard set in place.

“There is a whole bunch of different things kind of all based on the same ideas but they [the labels] are just very different. You can combine those labels… because only a few of them are regulated. It’s a bit of a free-for-all.”

Australia has committed to reducing carbon emissions, but traffic is congesting our major cities and pumping out greenhouse gases. Are electric cars the answer? Britta Jorgensen reports.

Most car manufacturers plan to release their electric vehicle models by 2012. Image: Todd Mecklem

More than 700 000 cars travel through Sydney city every day, and if the government gets its way, many of those could soon be electric. Sydney’s Lord Mayor Clover Moore officially opened Australia’s first on-street electric vehicle charging station in the city’s inner west early this week.

“This is historic, this is a beginning, this is a trial,” she said.

“We don’t have electric vehicles operating in Australia yet, so this… will enable us to assess the usage here and the take up, and when electric vehicles start arriving in Australia in the next 12 to 18 months we’ll be ready. Certainly the city is investigating the purchase of electric vehicles for our fleet.”

Sydney is one of six countries around the world taking part in a program to fast track the introduction of electric vehicles. Clover Moore committed to the program at the Copenhagen Climate Change Summit last year.

“The other thing the city will be doing over the next 18 months is purchasing 50 electric vehicles for use in the city, and of course we’ll be wanting to see the roll out of other charging stations. This trial will enable us to assess how this one goes, so then we can see them being provided throughout our cities.”

Chargepoint is the company managing Sydney’s charging station, which can charge a plug-in hybrid Toyota Prius in three hours. Its Chief Executive Officer Luke Grana says they have plans to conduct similar programs in Melbourne, Perth and Adelaide later this year.

“We’ve got plans for a pile of programs in each state of Australia happening later this year and next year as it becomes a model. The next charging station installation will actually be in Canberra next month,” he says.

“We know that most major automakers are releasing their electric vehicle models in the next two to three years. Mitsubishi is releasing later this year, I believe Tesla as well are releasing this year- but if you look at all the major automakers, they’ve got electric vehicles in development and they plan to release them in 2012.”

So far, Chargepoint has been dealing with local councils and fleets who have adopted the early electric vehicles.

“We provide an infrastructure for home and for business and on-street use, but as more of electric vehicles come into the market then we plan to roll out more of an infrastructure to support the uptake of electric vehicles over time.”

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But there are some doubts about the possibility of a mass production of electric cars in the near future. In a submission to last year’s Copenhagen Summit, the Society of Automotive Engineers suggested it was 20 years away and that government money would be better spent in making traffic flow more efficiently.

There have also been some safety concerns.

“There’s obviously safety aspects to the charging stations, so any alerts or faults we get alerted straight away and we can send someone here to make sure the charging station is in operation,” says Mr Grana.

“There’s an RCD [safety switch] in the charging station, so it trips at 20 milliamp seconds. It’s very quick, so if there is any issue the whole station will be de-energised very quickly.”

The Sydney trial station will provide usage data that will be used to determine whether or not Australia should invest more in the electric car infrastructure.

“We’re very excited about his and we’ll be assessing it and we’ll be looking at how we’ll roll it out,” said Clover Moore on Monday.

“I have made a commitment together with other city leaders in Copenhagen last December, and we’re really committed to this project but we’re learning. It’s historic and it’s a first, and it’s a learning experience for us all.”

Britta Jorgensen is a producer for The Wire .