NSW: Australia a world leader on AIDS: Wooldridge

AAP General News (Australia)
12-01-2000
NSW: Australia a world leader on AIDS: Wooldridge

SYDNEY, Dec 1 AAP - Australia's apolitical approach to AIDS had made the country a
world leader in treating the disease, federal Health Minister Michael Wooldridge said
today.

"We're regarded as having one of the best responses in the world," Dr Wooldridge told
a luncheon in Sydney on World AIDS Day.

"We didn't make it a party political issue and that provides for a stable policy."

AIDS first came to public prominence in the early 1980s and was considered primarily
a disease contracted by gay men.

Nearly 20 years on it is ravaging Africa to such an extent that South Africa's GDP
in 2010 is expected to suffer by 17 per cent, Dr Wooldridge said.

So far 22 million people have died worldwide from AIDS and in 2004 the disease will
have claimed more lives than influenza or bubonic plague.

"The international community was very slow to respond to HIV. The time to respond was
the mid-1980s," he said.

"They're now trying to catch up. There are a few bright spots - Uganda and Tanzania
have shown you can reduce the rate of HIV.

"But too many governments internationally have their heads in the sand and the result
of that is people are going to die."

AAP ij/jo/apm

KEYWORD: AIDS WOOLDRIDGE

2000 AAP Information Services Pty Limited (AAP) or its Licensors.

Qld: Heavy fines for dumping needles in public places

AAP General News (Australia)
04-19-2000
Qld: Heavy fines for dumping needles in public places

BRISBANE, April 19 AAP - Drug addicts who dump hypodermic needles in public places
will face fines of up to $3,000 under a Queensland government crackdown announced today.

State cabinet this week approved the tough new penalties for people caught dumping
used needles in public, Premier Peter Beattie said today.

"The state government is horrified by the casual way in which some people dispose of
used needles," Mr Beattie said.

The government intends giving the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) extra powers
to fine needle droppers, by amending regulations dealing with unlawful waste disposal.

Mr Beattie said the new regulations should be in place by mid-year.

"The regulation will be administered by the Environmental Protection Agency and enforced
by the EPA, the police, Queensland Transport and local government," he said.

Mr Beattie said the Local Government Association of Queensland supported the proposed
new fines for dumping needles.

AAP bja/jhm

KEYWORD: HYPODERMICS

2000 AAP Information Services Pty Limited (AAP) or its Licensors.

QLD: Libs call for clean by elections

AAP General News (Australia)
02-03-2000
QLD: Libs call for clean by elections

By Gil Breitkreutz

BRISBANE, Feb 3 AAP - The Liberal Party today made a last-minute plea for a "clean
voting day" at Saturday's crucial by-elections that could see the Beattie Labor government
lose its one-seat majority.

Liberal leader David Watson said there was a danger Labor could adopt bogus second
preference voting cards as it had done in past elections.

These were done to confuse voters into giving second preferences to Labor, he said.

Dr Watson said Labor had previously been before the courts charged with "offending
the Electoral …

SA: Hot blast continues over Adelaide

AAP General News (Australia)
12-02-1999
SA: Hot blast continues over Adelaide

The blast of summer weather across South Australia continues, with an expected top
in Adelaide today of 37 degrees.

Soaring temperatures have prompted the Country Fire Service to ban fires in much of
the state's west, including the Eyre and Yorke peninsulas and the Murraylands.

The fire danger in the south-east of the state is considered moderate.

A change is tipped for later in the day, with rain and thunderstorms to follow.

Yesterday Adelaide's ambulance officers treated five people after they collapsed in the heat.

The small town of Nullarbor on the west coast had the worst of the weather with a top
temperature of 41 degrees.

Renmark in the Riverland is likely to be the hottest spot today with a forecast maximum of 39.

AAP RTV tjd/kbw/rp

KEYWORD: HEAT (ADELAIDE)

1999 AAP Information Services Pty Limited (AAP) or its Licensors.

VIC; Docks body torpedoes Grollo skyscraper plan

AAP General News (Australia)
04-13-1999
VIC; Docks body torpedoes Grollo skyscraper plan

The Melbourne Docklands Authority has decided to scrap plans to build the tallest building
in the world, shattering the GROLLO family's bold dream.

But developer DANIEL GROLLO says he isn't giving up and will explore all options for
building the tower.

Docklands Authority chief executive JOHN TABART says an agreement to build the 113-storey,
560-metre tower at the waterfront site is terminated.

He says GROLLO Tower Pty Ltd cannot meet fundamental financial conditions.

Mr GROLLO, who maintains the $1.5 billion tower is financially viable, says Melbourne,
Victoria and Australia will enter the new millennium gravely diminished by this decision.

But Melbourne University associate professor of architecture and urban design KIM DOVEY
says it was a stupid idea which has fallen over and that common sense has prevailed.

Another critic, Baptist Church minister TIM COSTELLO, said he will not shed any tears.

However, building unions, facing a loss of work with the end of a series of large building
projects, are disappointed that international investors have not backed the tower.

AAP RTV lmw/ra/wz

KEYWORD: GROLLO (MELBOURNE)

1999 AAP Information Services Pty Limited (AAP) or its Licensors.

Fed: Survivors tell of two harrowing days at sea

AAP General News (Australia)
12-29-1998
Fed: Survivors tell of two harrowing days at sea

By Rod McGuirk

PAMBULA, NSW, Dec 29 AAP - Distraught survivors of the sunken Sydney-Hobart race yacht
Winston Churchill today told shipmates and rescuers of their harrowing time at sea and the
anguish of watching three friends swept to their deaths.

The bodies of Winston Churchill crewmen James Lawler and Michael Bannister were recovered
today before the search for missing shipmate John Dean was abandoned.

The three, all from Sydney, were washed out of a liferaft by giant waves which had earlier
overturned and sunk their yacht.

The two survivors, John "Steamer" Stanley and John Gibson, were rescued late last night by
emergency services from what was left of their liferaft.

Sea Hawk helicopter pilot Nic Trimmer, who rescued the survivors, revealed the anguish of
the men who had to leave their colleagues behind.

"One of the survivors, he was quite distraught, he informed us that ... somewhere in the
early hours of yesterday morning there were actually five people in the liferaft," Lieutenant
Trimmer told AAP.

"They got hit by numerous big waves, but one wave in particular threw three of them out and
they were unable to recover these three back into the liferaft."

Stanley and Gibson were recovering in hospital today after being plucked by helicopter from
their shredded liferaft late last night.

They told their skipper Richard Winning and shipmate Bruce Gould, who were among four
rescued from another liferaft hours earlier, that they had decided to slash the floor of their
upturned raft to breathe.

"When they turned upside down, they had to put a slit in the top (floor) to get some air
because they couldn't get it up again," Mr Gould told journalists after visiting Mr Stanley in
the Pambula District Hospital.

"Then they got turned turtle again. When they got inside the thing, the floor caved in."

Mr Winning said the liferaft, which is designed to be enclosed with a floor and canopy, was
reduced to a large life ring that slipped repeatedly in the mountainous seas.

"(It capsized) many times," he said. "You couldn't put a number on it."

"We copped it twice but they copped it a lot more than that. They had a liferaft that had
no bottom in it at all. So basically all they had in effect was a child's lifering that they
were clinging onto."

MORE rmg/mb/mo/it/de

KEYWORD: SYDHOB SECOND NIGHTLEAD

1998 AAP Information Services Pty Limited (AAP) or its Licensors.

QLD:Algae trial could lower carbon emissions

AAP General News (Australia)
12-13-2011
QLD:Algae trial could lower carbon emissions

By Darren Cartwright

BRISBANE, Dec 13 AAP - A ground-breaking experiment that uses algae to absorb carbon
dioxide emissions could have the rest of the world green with envy.

Government-owned power corporation Stanwell will trial the clean energy technology
developed by James Cook University at its coal-fired plant at Kingaroy, in southeast Queensland.

The trial involves trapping carbon emissions from the power station and pumping them
into water which is used solely to grow algae.

Because of the high concentration of Co2, the algae doubles in mass every one to two
days and in vast quantities it can be used to produce either bio-diesel or cattle feed.

The university spent three years developing and trialling the technology on a much smaller scale.

MDB Energy will oversee the trial at Stanwell over a one hectare plot and determine
its long term viability and commercial prospects.

If successful it could be a major breakthrough in lowering carbon emissions.

"It's a one hectare blueprint, using the gasses from the power station to produce commercial
products," MBD managing director Andrew Lawson said.

"It's a really great step to using commercial ways of using Co2."

He said the algae was from local rivers and the water was purified so if there was
spillage into any waterways it wouldn't damage the environment.

"Algae has been sourced from the local streams, it's not modified in anyway," Mr Lawson said.

"So if any breaks its bags or there is any leaking into local waterways, it's algae
from those waterways.

"It's really just taking the algae and giving it the perfect conditions to grow."

Mr Lawson said producing feed for cattle could be a highly profitable by-product of
the experiment.

"Queensland imports a billion dollars of soy meal from overseas (for cattle)," Mr Lawson said.

"This is an opportunity to offset that import."

Premier Anna Bligh said the project had huge potential because the idea and the algae
products could be exported.

"This is world first technology, using algae and innovations created at James Cook
University," Ms Bligh said.

"If it is successful over the next 12 months we can take this technology to the world."

Stanwell boss Helen Gluer said the experiment also had a spin-off for customers.

"Any carbon that the algae uses is less carbon tax we have to pay," Ms Gluer said.

AAP dac/gd/wf

KEYWORD: ALGAE (WITH AAP VIDEO)

� 2011 AAP Information Services Pty Limited (AAP) or its Licensors.