Franklin Dam Controversy
   HOME
*





Franklin Dam Controversy
The Franklin Dam or Gordon-below-Franklin Dam project was a proposed dam on the Gordon River in Tasmania, Australia, that was never constructed. The movement that eventually led to the project's cancellation became one of the most significant environmental campaigns in Australian history. The dam was proposed for the purpose of generating hydroelectricity. The resulting new electricity generation capacity would have been . The proposed construction would have subsequently impacted upon the environmentally sensitive Franklin River, which joins with the Gordon river nearby. During the campaign against the dam, both areas were listed on the UNESCO World Heritage Area register. The campaign that followed led to the consolidation of the small green movement that had been born out of a campaign against the building of three dams on Lake Pedder in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Over the five years between the announcement of the dam proposal in 1978 and the axing of the plans in 1983 ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Tasmania
) , nickname = , image_map = Tasmania in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of Tasmania in AustraliaCoordinates: , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , established_date = Colony of Tasmania , established_title2 = Federation , established_date2 = 1 January 1901 , named_for = Abel Tasman , demonym = , capital = Hobart , largest_city = capital , coordinates = , admin_center = 29 local government areas , admin_center_type = Administration , leader_title1 = Monarch , leader_name1 = Charles III , leader_title2 = Governor , leader_name2 ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Franklin River
The Franklin River is a major perennial river located in the Central Highlands and western regions of Tasmania, Australia. The river is located in the Franklin-Gordon Wild Rivers National Park at the mid northern area of the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area. Its source is situated at the western edge of the Central Highlands and it flows west towards the West Coast. The river is named in honour of Sir John Franklin, a Governor of Tasmania, who later died searching for the Northwest Passage. Location and features The river rises below Mount Hugel west of Derwent Bridge on the western slopes of the Central Highlands and flows generally west and south through remote and rugged mountainous country until meeting its confluence with the Gordon River. From source to mouth the river is joined by sixteen tributaries including the Surprise, Collingwood, Lucan, Loddon, Andrew and the Jane rivers. In its upper reaches, the Franklin is impounded by two reservoirs, Lake Undine an ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Franklin-Gordon Wild Rivers National Park
Franklin-Gordon Wild Rivers is a national park in Tasmania, 117 km west of Hobart. It is named after the two main river systems lying within the bounds of the park - the Franklin River and the Gordon River. Location The Franklin-Gordon Wild Rivers National Park lies between the Central Highlands and West Coast Range of Tasmania in the heart of the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area. It is bisected by the only road to pass through this area - the Lyell Highway. History The genesis of the Wild Rivers National Park was in the earlier Frenchmans Cap National Park which had the Franklin River as its boundary on the northern and western borders. Frenchmans Cap is a dominant feature in the region, and can be seen on the skyline from the west and north of the park. The Gordon and Franklin Rivers were the subject of one of Australia's largest conservation efforts. The Franklin Dam was part of a proposed hydro-electric power scheme that had been in the plans of The Hydro ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Doug Lowe (Australian Politician)
Douglas Ackley Lowe AM (born 15 May 1942) was the 35th Premier of Tasmania, from 1 December 1977 to 11 November 1981. His time as Premier coincided with controversy over a proposal to build a dam on Tasmania's Gordon River, which would have flooded parts of the Franklin River. The ensuing crisis saw Lowe overthrown as Premier and resign from the Labor Party, acting as an independent for the remainder of his political career. Born in Hobart, he was a former electrician by trade. He is married to Pamela June Grant and has four children, two sons and two daughters. Early political career Lowe was elected to the Tasmanian House of Assembly representing the electorate of Franklin for the Labor Party on 10 May 1969, at the 1969 state election. He was made a minister in the government of Eric Reece on 3 May 1972, when he became Minister for Housing. In 1975 he became Minister for the Environment and Planning, and was also appointed Deputy Premier. In 1976, he took on the Industrial ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Australian Labor Party (Tasmanian Branch)
The Australian Labor Party (Tasmanian Branch), commonly known as Tasmanian Labor, is the Tasmanian branch of the Australian Labor Party. It has been one of the most successful state Labor parties in Australia in terms of electoral success. History Late beginnings: until 1903 The Labor Party came into existence in Tasmania later than in the mainland states, in part due to the weak state of nineteenth-century Tasmanian trade unionism compared to the rest of the country. The two main Trades and Labor Councils, in Hobart and Launceston, were badly divided along north–south lines, and were always small; they collapsed altogether in 1897 (Hobart) and 1898 (Launceston). Denis Murphy attributes the poor state of the unions to a number of factors, including a more conservative workforce, divisions between various groups of workers, the smaller nature of Tasmanian industry, heavy penalties directed against a prominent early union leader, Hugh Kirk, and a lack of job security for the mi ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Olegas Truchanas
Olegas Truchanas (22 September 1923 – 6 January 1972) was a Lithuanian- Australian conservationist and nature photographer. He was a key figure in the attempt to stop the damming of the ecologically sensitive Lake Pedder in South West Tasmania by the Hydro Electricity Commission. His photographs, along with those of his protégé, Peter Dombrovskis, helped raise public awareness of the importance of the south-west Tasmania. Early life Truchanas was born in Lithuania. In 1941, he graduated from the Šiauliai Gymnasium. After the 1945 fall of Lithuania to the USSR, he fled to Munich, Germany. Though he enrolled in a law degree at UNRRA University, he was sent to a displaced persons camp, and subsequently migrated to Tasmania in 1948. Upon arriving in Tasmania, Truchanas worked for a zinc company in Hobart for two years, as was necessary under Australian migration law of the time. At that time, he began to take an interest in the Tasmanian wilderness. South West Tasmania ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  




Tasmanian Wilderness Society
The Tasmanian Wilderness Society was a Tasmanian environmental group that started in 1976 in response to a proposal by the state's Hydro Electric Commission to construct a dam on the Gordon River, downstream from the Franklin River, that led to the Franklin Dam controversy. The group evolved from membership of the South West Tasmania Action Committee and members of the United Tasmania Group. It was active in public protest about the issues of Wilderness, the Franklin River and South West Tasmania. After the Franklin Dam campaign the group changed its name in 1983 to The Wilderness Society (Australia) The Wilderness Society is an Australian, community-based, not-for-profit non-governmental environmental advocacy organisation. Its vision is to "transform Australia into a society that protects, respects and connects with the natural world that .... Notes {{reflist 1976 establishments in Australia ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Hydro Electric Commission
Hydro Tasmania, known for most of its history as the Hydro-Electric Commission (HEC) or The Hydro, is the trading name of the Hydro-Electric Corporation, a Tasmanian Government business enterprise which is the predominant electricity generator in the state of Tasmania, Australia. The Hydro was originally oriented towards hydro-electricity, due to Tasmania's dramatic topography and relatively high rainfall in the central and western parts of the state. Today Hydro Tasmania operates thirty hydro-electric and one gas power station, and is a joint owner in three wind farms. The Minister for Energy, currently the Hon. Guy Barnett MP, has portfolio responsibility for Hydro Tasmania. Hydro Tasmania operates under the ''Government Business Enterprises (GBE) Act'' 1995 and the ''Hydro-Electric Corporation Act'' 1995, and has a reporting requirement to the Treasurer of Tasmania, currently the Hon. Michael Ferguson (Australian politician) MP. Hydro Tasmania was projected to pay the Tasm ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Bob Hawke
Robert James Lee Hawke (9 December 1929 – 16 May 2019) was an Australian politician and union organiser who served as the 23rd prime minister of Australia from 1983 to 1991, holding office as the leader of the Australian Labor Party (ALP). Previously he served as the president of the Australian Council of Trade Unions from 1969 to 1980 and president of the Labor Party national executive from 1973 to 1980. Hawke was born in Border Town, South Australia. He attended the University of Western Australia and went on to study at University College, Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar, during which time he set a world record for downing a yard of ale in 11 seconds. In 1956, Hawke joined the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) as a research officer. Having risen to become responsible for national wage case arbitration, he was elected as president of the ACTU in 1969, where he achieved a high public profile. In 1973, he was appointed as president of the Labor Party. In 1980 ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

1983 Australian Federal Election
The 1983 Australian federal election was held in Australia on 5 March 1983. All 125 seats in the House of Representatives and all 64 seats in the Senate were up for election, following a double dissolution. The incumbent Coalition government which had been in power since 1975, led by Malcolm Fraser (Liberal Party) and Doug Anthony ( National Party), was defeated in a landslide by the opposition Labor Party led by Bob Hawke. This election marked the end of the seven year Liberal-National Coalition Fraser Government and the start of the 13 year Hawke-Keating Labor Government. The Coalition would spend its longest ever period in opposition and the Labor party would spend its longest ever period of government at a federal level. The Coalition would not return to government until the 1996 election. Background and issues At the time of the election, the economy suffered from high inflation and high unemployment, alongside increases in industrial disputation and drought across much ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Malcolm Fraser
John Malcolm Fraser (; 21 May 1930 – 20 March 2015) was an Australian politician who served as the 22nd prime minister of Australia from 1975 to 1983, holding office as the leader of the Liberal Party of Australia. Fraser was raised on his father's sheep stations, and after studying at Magdalen College, Oxford, returned to Australia to take over the family property in the Western District of Victoria. After an initial defeat in 1954, he was elected to the Australian House of Representatives at the 1955 federal election, as a member of parliament (MP) for the division of Wannon. He was 25 at the time, making him one of the youngest people ever elected to parliament. When Harold Holt became prime minister in 1966, Fraser was appointed Minister for the Army. After Holt's disappearance and replacement by John Gorton, Fraser became Minister for Education and Science (1968–1969) and then Minister for Defence (1969–1971). In 1971, Fraser resigned from cabinet and denoun ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Peter Dombrovskis
Peter Dombrovskis ( lv, Pēteris Dombrovskis; 2 March 194528 March 1996) was an Australian photographer, known for his Tasmanian scenes. In 2003, he was posthumously inducted into the International Photography Hall of Fame, the first Australian photographer to achieve that honour. Biography Dombrovskis was born in 1945 in a refugee camp in Wiesbaden, Germany of Latvian parents. Together with his mother, he migrated to Australia in 1950, and they settled in , a suburb of . The protégé of noted wildlife photographer and activist Olegas Truchanas, his photographs of the Tasmanian Wilderness, particularly his own annual Tasmanian Wilderness Calendar and the Wilderness Calendar produced by the Tasmanian Wilderness Society, brought images of once remote and inaccessible areas of the state into the public realm. Dombrovskis founded West Wind Press in 1977 and later went on to print calendars entirely of his own work, featuring incisive commentary from pre-eminent environmental prof ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]