ARIES: Fostering Environment Sustainability in Accounting

One of the challenges in the emerging cultural shift towards protecting the ocean revolves around the fact that environmental service costings are not a classic element of the balance sheet used by business and industry. Notable, however, is that a key strategy in the Australian Government's National Action Plan for Education for Sustainability in key professions may be bringing this a little closer.

The Australian Research Institute for Environment and Sustainability (ARIES) have been exploring the question around the drivers and barriers to progressing the integration of sustainabiity into the accounting profession. In conjunction with Macquarie University and the University of Technology Sydney, ARIES hosted the first of a series of high level rountable dialog forums to better articulate the nature of the ‘soft skills’ which need to be incorporated into accounting professional education for the future.

 Imagine a time where we might see equitable values placed on environmental services and pollution impacts before they hit the ocean outfall. Some businesses have led the way and many have discovered some extra profits around better waste managment. It is nice to think that ARIES is making an effort to bring the barriers down and facilitate a new sustainability paradigm.

If you would like to know more about how this project is progressing or would like to download the project report click here.

SPOTLIGHT ON: Marine Education at Australian Aquariums

Underwater World, Mooloolaba. 

Who doesn’t love an aquarium? As a coast loving country Australia is lucky enough to have several significant aquariums. They are places where you actually get to see marine life first hand, and if you are lucky enough, really learn about what life is like under the sea. Excursions to an aquarium will be long remembered and can provide teachers with a wealth of all weather practical opportunities to inspire.

Good quality aquariums provide a tremendous service to the community by offering school programs that not only teach about ocean wildlife but also the need for sustainable solutions for keeping oceans healthy.

Cooper and Fred look at litter

At UnderWater World in Mooloolaba, for example, middle year students undertaking the Message in a Bottle 4 program examine the effects of human action on the natural environment. The program is one that aims to encourage sustainability, stewardship and ways students can actively participate in conserving their ocean environments.

If you want a great excursion, go to an aquarium!

To find more about Aussie aquariums:
o UnderWater World in Mooloolaba, Sunshine Coast, Queensland (click here)
o Reef HQ of Townsville, Queensland (click here)
o Oceanworld Manly in Manly, New South Wales (click here)
o Sydney Aquarium in Sydney, New South Wales (click here)
o Melbourne Aquarium, Victoria (click here)
o The Aquarium of Western Australia (AQWA) (click here)

PRE/POST VISIT STUDIES: Teachers can take advantage of AUSMEPA's freeonline marine education packages as pre or post aquarium visit studies. (click here)  
Posters are also available.

Baird news: Telescopic hard sail concept for bulk carrier

There has been a growing momentum in the use of wind power once again, even on larger vessels. Recently a pair of Japanese professors designed a cargo ship with telescopically reefing hard composite sails, 50 metres high and 20 metres wide. The the motor assisted vessel would use 64% less fuel according to a simulation done using an actual trade route.

To see the full article at Baird Maritime News Alert click here

ABC News in Science: Lord Howe corals light up cancer fight

Monday, 16 August 2010

Below find an excerpt of the ABC News in Science article.

"Lord Howe Island, Australian scientists have discovered a cluster of brilliant shallow-water corals that could help in the search for anti-cancer drugs and to understand global warming."

"The vividly fluorescent cluster was found in waters off Lord Howe Island, 600 kilometres east of the Australian mainland, with some displaying rich reds that were difficult to find and in high demand for studies of cancer cells, says researcher Dr Anya Salih."

"We are using these pigments to light up the workings of living cells and to study what goes wrong in cancer cells," says Salih, from the University of Western Sydney."

"Earlier this year, the coral reefs of Lord Howe Island experienced a sudden mass bleaching event caused by warming of seawater. But the fluorescent corals had been much less damaged by the bleaching, lending "support to the hypothesis that fluorescence can provide some level of protection to corals from temperature stresses due to climate change."

click here for full article

To include a study of the effects of climate change on coral-bleaching into your classroom planning please visit the AUSMEPA free online unit of work. Click here

The Majestic Plastic Bag - A Mockumentary

It is really easy to focus on shocking news events that show us stunning and frightening images like the Deep Water Hoizon tragedy. It is much harder to keep our focus on the things creating marine pollution that fall within our own sphere -- the continuous plastic pollution rolling into the sea day after day, month after month, year after endless year. The only real difference between the two is the time frame and the long term impact.


Teachers wishing to include a study of marine pollution into their planning can click here to enter AUSMEPA's Marine Stormwater Pollution unit of work.

AUSMEPA MEDIA RELEASE: Plastic bottles and plastic bags pose one of the greatest threats to our seas and oceans

We have all heard this cry so many times before and tend to dismiss it as somebody else’s problem. Thankfully, at long last, something is being done which if adopted will reduce plastic bottles and plastic bags ending up in the sea and destroying our valuable marine life.


Michael Julian, Executive Director of the Australian Marine Environment Protection Association (AUSMEPA) said today he was very pleased that Federal and State governments were beginning to seriously tackle the problems caused by plastic bottles and bags ending up in the sea and killing a range of marine life from turtles to whales which swallow these items mistaking them as a food surce.

AUSMEPA strongly supports the initiative of the Federal and State governments in announcing a move towards a national scheme for a deposit levy on cans and containers referred to as CDL, which will include plastic bottles.

The Environment Protection and Heritage Council agreed last month to undertake the development of a Consultation Regulatory Impact Statement (RIS) which will be based on the substantial work already completed on options to address environmental impacts and the reduction of litter from packaging wastes such as beverage containers. However, the RIS will go beyond just a Container Deposit Levy and look at other options to reduce the environmental impact of discarded packaging.

AUSMEPA also congratulates the Northern Territory government which will be joining South Australia in the banning of plastic bags used by shops and supermarkets. The Northern Territory announced this week that it will ban the use of plastic bags from the middle of next year; the ban will be phased in over 4 months and will help reduce the 40 million plastic bags used in the Territory. Mr. Julian said this should happen right across Australia not just in those proactive States and Territories which have already taken this action, pollution of the sea knows no boundaries.

The disposal of packaging material is a global problem, the Asian Development Bank has announced the work it is doing to reduce major litter pollution in the Citarum River in Indonesia. A video clip on U-Tube which can be seen on the AUSMEPA Oceans Whispers Blog site http://ausmepa.blogspot.com/ tells the horrifying story.

David de Rothschild recently drew international attention to the problem of pollution and the considerable harm to the marine environment caused by plastic bottles when he sailed his boat “Plastki”, made with 12,500 plastic bottles, across the Pacific Ocean from San Francisco to Sydney.

Michael Julian fully endorses David de Rothschild’s comments that governments have to step up their endeavours in reducing the community’s reliance on plastic. Mr. de Rothschild said voters need to rediscover people power to force change and bring about real and meaningful policies to help the planet.

He said it is well known that 80% of the pollution in the sea comes from the land and we all have a responsibility to do much more to stop this happening.

In an effort to make Australians more aware of the problems of litter and chemicals getting into stormwater drains AUSMEPA has developed an educational unit of work for schools titled Marine Stormwater Pollution which is freely available for all middle year students at schools throughout Australia from AUSMEPA’s website ( see http://www.ausmepa.org.au/marine-stormwater-pollution/ ), a free poster which highlights the problems of storm water pollution is available on request. The simple message from this education unit is what you put down your drains can end up in the sea.

For more information about AUSMEPA and the suite of marine environment education units of work, please visit the AUSMEPA website http://www.ausmepa.org.au/

To find our more information on Plastiki http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3Sb3TGuxss&feature=channel

ADB: a Clean Future for World's Dirtiest River

Many of us have been appalled at the photos floating around on the net about the Citarum River in Indonesia. This clip shows some of the problem sources, outputs and some of the work being put into play through the Asian Development Bank (ADB) to turn it around. It will be interesting to see how the cleanup progresses.

Once again, the importance of keeping our stormwater run-off clean is made stridently clear. Education and action to prevent polluting our rivers and ultimately our oceans is vital to the health of us all.

AUSMEPA has an educational unit that is free and online specifically on Stormwater Pollution (click here)