101 uses for Tony Abbott’s Green Army

Given the inability of its election candidates to explain their party’s climate change policies, it is clear that the Coalition needs some help in defining Direct Action.

When Greenway (NSW) candidate Jaymes Diaz last week was asked to explain Direct Action, the best he could come up with was “Green Army”, “planting real trees”, and “a solar panel.” On Monday, Wakefield (SA) candidate Tom Zorich couldn’t even get that far, saying in a debate doing the rounds on Youtube that “I haven’t got much to tell you about that”.

That’s really not surprising, given that the Coalition policy chiefs are unable to explain the policy either, and will be looking for good ideas to make it work under an energy white paper that Greg Hunt will call for should the Coalition get elected next month.

The one constant we do know about is the creation of Tony Abbott’s Green Army. The Coalition has allocated $300 million (yes, $300 million) to the Green Army, but what will its 15,000 members do?

So far, the Coalition has suggested that it will be deployed to pick up litter, plant trees (real ones according to Diaz), and to build things like boardwalks in mangrove swamps. “The Green Army will march to the rescue of our degraded land and polluted waterways,” Tony Abbott said (with a straight face) at its re-launch in July.

But what else could it do? We’d like your ideas of how the Green Army could be deployed. We’ll kick it off with a few ideas of our own, but we will really need your support to get to the goal of 101 great ideas. Please add here to comments, or tweet at #greenarmy.

Turn back the boats: Two slogans in one, axe the tax, stop the boats. The Green Army could form an impenetrable barrier – either on land or at sea – to repel the invasion of asylum seekers

Reduce ocean levels by forming a human chain with buckets: As cartoonist Alan Moir suggested in last week’s SMH, the Green Army could form a human chain and use buckets to reduce rising sea levels.

Act as a mobile sea wall: To extend on Moir’s suggestion, and given that coastal erosion is one of the major threats to the Australian coastline, the Green Army could be deployed in brigades up and down the coast (or as a single force in worst hit areas) to stand in front of the ocean at king tides to protect vulnerable dunes.

Act as a human solar tracker: If each of the members held one module each, that would equate to around 5MW of capacity. If they followed the sun from dawn to dusk, they could boost output by around 20 per cent, and get rainy days off.  Given that the Coalition will likely scuttle the renewable energy target, the army and its mobile solar farm could be deployed to different states to give all Australians the benefit of utility-scale solar power.

Chop down wind turbines: The Canberra Times cartoonist David Pope came up with his own suggestion last week, suggesting the Green Army could be used for chopping down wind turbines, given the hostility among many Coalition members, and aspiring members and advisors, to the deployment of wind energy.

And now, over to you ……

@renew_economy mosquito decoys!

— Mark Plackett (@MarkPlackett1) August 20, 2013

.@renew_economy suggestion for ‘101 uses for #greenarmy‘: explain climate science & renewable energy to politicians. http://t.co/L02x0BDiVv

— hepburn wind (@hepburnwind) August 20, 2013

@renew_economy I heard the #GreenArmy was to be redeployed on #operationsovereignborders to #taxtheboats. #auspol #ausvotes

— Shane Roberts (@Baabau) August 20, 2013

@renew_economy the green army could be issued with reflective overalls & aluminium foil hats to reflect the sunlight back into space.

— Geoff Bragg – SEIA (@sunman_geoff) August 20, 2013

101 Uses for #GreenArmy @renew_economy: Mining sand & stockpiling ready for sandbag-filling deployments to #climatechange induced flood ops

— Brent Hoare (@brenthoare) August 21, 2013

Well @andypbray all of @renew_economy suggestions for #greenarmy make as much sense as #LNPfail climate policy, filling coastline sandbags?

— Brent Hoare (@brenthoare) August 21, 2013