Nuclear Options Vex Europe

The cost of being purportedly green. Aivars Lode

The owner of Électricité de France is spending millions of dollars to upgrade the plant and extend its life span for another decade, seemingly breathing new life into this town on the German border. WSJ's Alessandro Torello and Gèraldine Amiel report. Photo: Reuters

FESSENHEIM, France—The owner of the local nuclear power plant, Electricité de France SA,EDF.FR +1.27% is spending €20 million ($26.4 million) to upgrade it and extend its life span for another decade, seemingly breathing new life into this town on the German border.

But the French governent—EDF's majority shareholder—says it plans to close the site in 2016, amid an effort to reduce the country's reliance on nuclear power and promote renewable energy.

Amid uncertainty, EDF's overhaul is proceeding. But the conflict at Fessenheim illustrates a broader dilemma facing France and other European Union countries.

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Alessandro Torello/The Wall Street Journal

Turbines at EDF's nuclear plant in Fessenheim, simultaneously being upgraded and slated for closure.

Citizens have grown more wary about the dangers of the atom since the March 2011 nuclear catastrophe in Japan, and the political consensus that once existed in some countries around nuclear energy is crumbling.

But phasing out nuclear power, which helps meet nearly 75% of France's electricity needs and about 27% across the EU, could deprive the continent of a key source of energy and jobs, making it more dependent on fossil-fuel imports.

Enlarge Image

Higher fuel bills could also hurt European economies, economists warned. And closing nuclear reactors—which emit little to no greenhouse gas—could jeopardize the EU's efforts to address concerns about global warming.

France's Socialist President François Hollande, who made the decision to close Fessenheim and other plants, said he seeks to transform his country "into a nation of environmental excellence."

He plans to lower the share of nuclear power in France's energy mix to 50% by 2025. He has extended a ban on shale gas exploration and extraction, citing pollution risks.

An unusual coalition of labor unions and business leaders is mounting opposition to Mr. Hollande's environmental drive.

In October, the directors of France's 19 nuclear plants sent a joint letter to EDF employees saying that closing the nuclear plant here would be "a profound injustice."

"Together, let's all stay mobilized," they said.

Employees have posted signs on the barbed wire surrounding the Fessenheim plant protesting against the decision to close it.

Other European countries are grappling with similar problems.

In Belgium, where nuclear power accounts for roughly 55% of electricity output, the decision to phase out nuclear energy by 2025 was made nearly a decade ago. Yet, power companies have been slow to invest in new, mainly gas-fired electricity production, as successive governments discussed whether to extend the lifetimes of some of the country's seven reactors.

Belgium could be missing as much as 4,800 megawatts of capacity—the equivalent of nearly five nuclear reactors—by 2017 as the country awaits new energy sources to come online, according to government scenarios.

In Germany, the Fukushima disaster gave new ammunition to powerful antinuclear lobby groups.

Days after the accident, the center-right coalition government of Chancellor Angela Merkelordered the immediate and permanent shutdown of eight reactors. Months later, Germany concluded a legislative process that would see its remaining nine reactors closing by 2022, reversing an extension of their lifetimes that had just been set.

Germany also boosted its efforts to expand renewable energies such as wind and solar power. The country produces over 25% of its electricity from renewable sources and plans to increase this share to 35% by 2020.

Germany's green push is coming at a price: Electricity rates for households are among the highest in the EU and are expected to keep rising. Consumer groups blame the high prices on a system of surcharges levied on retail power rates to help subsidize renewable energies, and warn that public support for the government strategy could dwindle unless companies help shoulder more of the cost.

In Maintal, a small city northeast of Frankfurt, Wilfried Dieling said his electricity bill is set to increase by about 15% in January. "It hurts," the pensioner said, noting that he was refraining from heating his glass-enclosed porch in the winter. "They make little people carry the load."

In France, President Hollande's decision to close the Fessenheim plant initially came as a surprise. The French Socialists have traditionally been strong supporters of the country's nuclear program.

The move was applauded by his Green Party coalition partners but also faced criticism.

Leading the charge was Laurence Parisot, head of French business lobby group Medef. She said France, which has among the EU's lowest electricity prices, would lose this competitive advantage if it closed Fessenheim and other reactors.

According to some industry estimates, as many as 24 of France's 58 reactors would have to be shut to achieve Mr. Hollande's goal of reducing the share of nuclear power to 50% of overall electricity output.

"The financial cost would be gigantic," Ms. Parisot said at a recent conference.

At the Fessenheim plant, which employs nearly 1,000 people, workers and politicians vowed to defend nuclear power.

"I can't believe they will shut down Fessenheim," the town's mayor Fabienne Stich said. "Not with three million unemployed in France."

EDF has said it would seek financial compensation from the government if the plant is closed.

Soft Commodities Fall Hard In 2012

More manipulation of the news for commodities; they ran it up and now it comes back down. Aivars Lode

Most markets were very good to bulls this year. Soft commodities, however, were a painful exception.

In a sharp shift from the supply concerns of 2011 that had lifted prices of raw sugar, cotton and arabica coffee to multi-year highs, overstock was king in 2012.

Futures of arabica coffee, the world’s most widely consumed variety, plunged nearly 37% – one of the steepest declines across commodity markets – on ICE Futures U.S. this year. The culprit: big production.

The International Coffee Organization expects record global coffee output in the 2012-13 crop year, which started in October, to the tune of 146 million bags. Brazil, the source of around one-third of the world’s coffee, reaped a record crop this past season of 50.8 million bags.

The South American nation, also the world’s biggest sugar producer, was also partially responsible for a drop futures of the sweetener. Raw-sugar prices dropped 16% this year, after Brazilian mills ramped up production following unseasonable rains at the start of the harvest in May. The International Sugar Organization in November forecast a 6.2 million-ton surplus in the 2012-13 year, started Oct. 1, with world production at a record 177.6 million tons.

Cotton prices also saw a steep decline, as weak global demand on the heels of a violent price swing in 2011 and ample supplies of the fiber pressured the market. The U.S. Department of Agriculture expects the world to end with a record 79.4 million bales at the season’s end on July 31. Cotton futures lost 18.1%, settling Monday at 75.14 cents a pound.

The bulls don’t have much cause to clink their glasses for tonight, either, since there isn’t much to lift prices on the horizon.

“Until (consumers) work down these surpluses, it’ll be pretty tough to rally,” says Jack Scoville, a vice president at Price Futures Group.

American Oil Growing Most Since First Well Signals Independence

Amazing how all this oil has been found when only a couple of years ago there was a shortage reported just to justify price increases. Aivars Lode

The U.S. expanded its oil production this year by the most since the first commercial well was drilled in 1859, upending a belief that Americans were increasingly hooked on foreign crude.

Seven years after President George W. Bush declared “America is addicted to oil, much of which is imported from unstable parts of the world,” the country has so much crude that it was able to join Europe in choking off exports from Iran without pushing U.S. benchmark prices over $100 a barrel. And refining capacity helped make the U.S. the world’s largest fuel supplier. Even in Venezuela, where Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM)’s assets were seized, more and more cars run on gasoline made in America.Domestic output grew by a record 766,000 barrels a day to the highest level in 15 years, government data show, putting the nation on pace to surpass Saudi Arabia as the world’s largest producer by 2020. Net petroleum imports have fallen by more than 38 percent since the 2005 peak and now account for 41 percent of demand, down from 60 percent seven years ago, moving the U.S. closer to energy independence than it has been in decades.

“The U.S. has a huge lead in the 21st century in maintaining its superpower status,” said Ed Morse, global head of commodities research at Citigroup Inc. in New York. “There was absolutely no way to anticipate the level of growth in the oil supply.”

Faster, Cheaper

America’s latest oil rush was spurred by new technology that has made drilling faster, cheaper and better at unleashing oil from rock formations, even as it has raised alarms among environmentalists about the potential danger to drinking-water supplies and intensifying greenhouse-gas emissions.

Producers, eager to profit from prices that have remained above $75 for more than two years, deployed as many as 1,432 rigs, the most in records going back to 1987. Trucks bearing pipe traversed Wyoming’s high desert plains and Oklahoma’s back highways, geologists pored over well logs from Colorado to New Mexico, and landmen trying to secure mineral rights crowded into courthouse record rooms from North Dakota to the Gulf Coast.

The U.S. will produce an average of 6.41 million barrels a day this year, a 14 percent increase from 2011, according to a Dec. 11 report from the Department of Energy. It’s the biggest annual gain in the number of barrels since the industry began when Pennsylvania’s Drake well ignited the first American oil rush in 1859, department data show. Saudi Arabia pumped 9.7 million barrels a day in November, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The Paris-basedInternational Energy Agency said last month the U.S. is on track to become the top producer in about eight years.

‘New Thing’

“The shale oil revolution is a new, new thing,” said Francisco Blanch, the head of commodities research for Bank of America Merrill Lynch in New York. “It has come out of nowhere in the last year and a half.”

The nation’s stockpiles increased by a record 13 percent this year, and U.S. refiners are paying less for crude than much of the rest of the world. Landlocked by export restrictions and limited transportation, the glut of U.S. light, sweet crude -- cheaper to process than the high-sulfur, sour grades pumped by Saudi Arabia and Venezuela -- pushed domestic prices down to as much as $28 a barrel less than Brent, the European blend that sets prices for more than half the globe’s oil.

That discount handed Gulf Coast refiners an advantage over competitors and helped the U.S. become a net fuel exporter last year for the first time since 1949, surpassing Russia as the world’s largest. Venezuela quintupled its imports from the U.S. this year to a record 196,000 barrels a day in September, according to Energy Department data.

Global Clout

Rising output from the U.S. has also increased the nation’s sway in the global market by forcing the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries into an unpalatable choice: Increase production to bring prices down and maintain market share; or keep prices high to sustain state spending, and thereby subsidize the competition from U.S. producers, which can provide crude to domestic refineries at a lower price.

The unprecedented gains came so quickly that the industry is rushing to regroup. The 500-mileSeaway pipeline, which was reversed last year and now carries U.S. crude south to Gulf Coast refineries instead of moving imports north, will expand to 400,000 barrels a day as early next year from 150,000 now.

Northeastern fuel makers, on the verge of insolvency a year ago, have begun replacing foreign cargoes shipped by tanker from Africa, Europe and the Middle East with cheaper domestic oil brought in by rail. A pipeline shortage has boosted profits at tank-car maker American Railcar Industries Inc. and at BNSF Railway Co., owned by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc.

Exports Limited

Even if there were enough pipelines to carry more crude from swelling storage hubs to the coasts, oil exports are limited by rules imposed by Congress following the 1973 Arab oil embargo.

Exports may be necessary to avert a surplus that would depress prices and discourage drilling, said Bank of America’s Blanch. West Texas Intermediate oil, the U.S. benchmark contract, could fall to as low as $50 a barrel within the next two years unless the rules are eased to relieve the glut, he said. Until prices drop, it may be difficult for politicians to persuade the American public to allow expanded exports.

“What I see is basically an inability to go out and explain to the public that we have to change the rules before the prices give us the signal,” Blanch said. “If you’re in the White House, why are you going to change the crude-export rules that the U.S. has right now when the country is still importing 8 million barrels a day of oil?”

Forestalling Glut

At least one member of the Obama administration has begun making the case that the U.S. is building toward a crippling surplus. Adam Sieminski, head of the U.S. Energy Information Administration, the statistical arm of the Energy Department, said limited transactions with other countries may help forestall excess supplies that could undermine prices and hobble the industry.

“That’s going to be a policy decision of the Congress and the administration,” Sieminski said. “It’s just a question of what the economics are.”

The surge in oil output, coupled with record natural gas production, allowed the U.S. to meet 83 percent of its own energy needs in the first eight months of 2012, on track to be the highest since 1991, Energy Department data show. The last time self-sufficiency was achieved was in 1952. While the U.S. still imported some petroleum then, exports such as coal more than offset foreign cargoes.

Overseas Shocks

That interconnectedness means U.S. consumers will still be vulnerable to supply shocks overseas, Sieminski said. An Energy Department forecast shows the country will import 10 percent of its needs in 2035. That doesn’t account for slowdowns because of new regulations, which may tighten because drilling has been linked to groundwater pollution and earthquakes, he said.

Then there’s the problem of how burning all these fossil fuels may contribute to climate change, said Anthony Swift, an attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council in Washington.

“There’s a real environmental cost to investing billions of dollars in new sources of carbon-intensive fuels when we know we really need to be investing in clean energy,” Swift said. “It’s better for our environment, better for our economy and better for energy security.”

Tightened automobile-mileage requirements helped reduce consumption of petroleum products by 16 percent through September since peaking in August 2005, a drop of 3.5 million barrels a day, Energy Department data show.

Dakota Boom

The U.S. oil boom began in 2004 with a North Dakota well completed by Continental Resources Inc., which confirmed that a combination of two technologies could unlock profitable amounts of crude in pockets deep underground.

Continental paired horizontal drilling, in which the well is bored at an angle to run lengthwise along the richest slice of rock, with hydraulic fracturing. Better known as fracking, the process forces a high-pressure stream of sand, water and chemicals underground to crack apart the rock and free the crude. Since then, North Dakota’s oil production has increased to 728,000 barrels a day, surpassing Ecuador, an OPEC member.

Harold Hamm, Continental’s founder and chief executive officer, has called for expanding U.S. production. The company estimates the Bakken and other formations under North Dakota contain the equivalent of 27 billion to 45 billion recoverable barrels of oil. By comparison, Nigeriahas an estimated 37.2 billion barrels of proven reserves, according to OPEC.

Wildcatters Compete

Hamm’s success set in motion an oil rush that spread across the U.S. as wildcatters competed to be first to new prospects. Chesapeake Energy Corp. made a deal in early 2007 to buy a million acres of Wyoming’s Powder River Basin, near the Teapot Dome formation that gave its name to the notorious bribery scandal of the 1920s.

Exploration intensified in Oklahoma’s Mississippi Lime, the Eagle Ford Shale in Texas, Ohio’s Utica formation, Louisiana’s Tuscaloosa Marine shale and New Mexico’s Bone Springs.

Competition grew heated as oil prices above $75 encouraged more drilling. In one Wyoming courthouse, the county clerk brandished a cattle whip to keep order among the crowds of landmen packing in to research mineral rights. Joe Thames, a Denver-based contract lease buyer who has worked for companies such as Chesapeake, said rivals once followed his best landman from his motel to try and find out where he was buying.

‘Big Gamble’

When results of EOG Resources Inc. (EOG) 2009 Jake well in northeastern Colorado leaked, lease prices quintupled in less than two months, said Bob Coskey, a Denver geologist. That play, called the Niobrara, turned out to be smaller than people thought, Coskey said. Overnight, acreage outside the best zones became almost worthless.

Hanging over this activity is the specter of past busts. The last boom in the late-1970s came crashing to a halt in 1985 when Saudi Arabia, in an effort to regain declining market share, flooded the world with crude and sent prices to $10 a barrel in 1986. U.S. production fell for 21 of the next 22 years.

“It’s a big gamble,” said Mike McDonald, an Oklahoma wildcatter and president and co-owner of Triad Energy Inc. “Everyone thinks it’s Beverly Hillbillies: You shoot a gun and oil comes out. It’s not.”

It was unclear until this year whether producers would be able to replicate Hamm’s results outside of the Bakken. The answer is yes. Texas pumped the most oil since 1988. Output from Wyoming grew 7 percent, the biggest jump in records going back to 1981, Energy Department figures show. New Mexico’s increased by 13 percent, and Oklahoma’s by 18 percent.

Morse, whose bullish predictions of U.S. energy self- sufficiency early this year met with skepticism, said North America will be able to meet its own needs by 2020. The pace of growth and the potential for worldwide gains driven by ever- improving technology toppled the theory that the world supply of oil had had peaked and begun an inexorable decline, he said.

“Peak oil is dead,” Morse said.

American Oil Growing Most Since First Well Signals Independence

Amazing how all this oil has been found when only a couple of years ago there was a shortage reported just to justify price increases. Aivars Lode

The U.S. expanded its oil production this year by the most since the first commercial well was drilled in 1859, upending a belief that Americans were increasingly hooked on foreign crude.

Seven years after President George W. Bush declared “America is addicted to oil, much of which is imported from unstable parts of the world,” the country has so much crude that it was able to join Europe in choking off exports from Iran without pushing U.S. benchmark prices over $100 a barrel. And refining capacity helped make the U.S. the world’s largest fuel supplier. Even in Venezuela, where Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM)’s assets were seized, more and more cars run on gasoline made in America.Domestic output grew by a record 766,000 barrels a day to the highest level in 15 years, government data show, putting the nation on pace to surpass Saudi Arabia as the world’s largest producer by 2020. Net petroleum imports have fallen by more than 38 percent since the 2005 peak and now account for 41 percent of demand, down from 60 percent seven years ago, moving the U.S. closer to energy independence than it has been in decades.

“The U.S. has a huge lead in the 21st century in maintaining its superpower status,” said Ed Morse, global head of commodities research at Citigroup Inc. in New York. “There was absolutely no way to anticipate the level of growth in the oil supply.”

Faster, Cheaper

America’s latest oil rush was spurred by new technology that has made drilling faster, cheaper and better at unleashing oil from rock formations, even as it has raised alarms among environmentalists about the potential danger to drinking-water supplies and intensifying greenhouse-gas emissions.

Producers, eager to profit from prices that have remained above $75 for more than two years, deployed as many as 1,432 rigs, the most in records going back to 1987. Trucks bearing pipe traversed Wyoming’s high desert plains and Oklahoma’s back highways, geologists pored over well logs from Colorado to New Mexico, and landmen trying to secure mineral rights crowded into courthouse record rooms from North Dakota to the Gulf Coast.

The U.S. will produce an average of 6.41 million barrels a day this year, a 14 percent increase from 2011, according to a Dec. 11 report from the Department of Energy. It’s the biggest annual gain in the number of barrels since the industry began when Pennsylvania’s Drake well ignited the first American oil rush in 1859, department data show. Saudi Arabia pumped 9.7 million barrels a day in November, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The Paris-basedInternational Energy Agency said last month the U.S. is on track to become the top producer in about eight years.

‘New Thing’

“The shale oil revolution is a new, new thing,” said Francisco Blanch, the head of commodities research for Bank of America Merrill Lynch in New York. “It has come out of nowhere in the last year and a half.”

The nation’s stockpiles increased by a record 13 percent this year, and U.S. refiners are paying less for crude than much of the rest of the world. Landlocked by export restrictions and limited transportation, the glut of U.S. light, sweet crude -- cheaper to process than the high-sulfur, sour grades pumped by Saudi Arabia and Venezuela -- pushed domestic prices down to as much as $28 a barrel less than Brent, the European blend that sets prices for more than half the globe’s oil.

That discount handed Gulf Coast refiners an advantage over competitors and helped the U.S. become a net fuel exporter last year for the first time since 1949, surpassing Russia as the world’s largest. Venezuela quintupled its imports from the U.S. this year to a record 196,000 barrels a day in September, according to Energy Department data.

Global Clout

Rising output from the U.S. has also increased the nation’s sway in the global market by forcing the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries into an unpalatable choice: Increase production to bring prices down and maintain market share; or keep prices high to sustain state spending, and thereby subsidize the competition from U.S. producers, which can provide crude to domestic refineries at a lower price.

The unprecedented gains came so quickly that the industry is rushing to regroup. The 500-mileSeaway pipeline, which was reversed last year and now carries U.S. crude south to Gulf Coast refineries instead of moving imports north, will expand to 400,000 barrels a day as early next year from 150,000 now.

Northeastern fuel makers, on the verge of insolvency a year ago, have begun replacing foreign cargoes shipped by tanker from Africa, Europe and the Middle East with cheaper domestic oil brought in by rail. A pipeline shortage has boosted profits at tank-car maker American Railcar Industries Inc. and at BNSF Railway Co., owned by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc.

Exports Limited

Even if there were enough pipelines to carry more crude from swelling storage hubs to the coasts, oil exports are limited by rules imposed by Congress following the 1973 Arab oil embargo.

Exports may be necessary to avert a surplus that would depress prices and discourage drilling, said Bank of America’s Blanch. West Texas Intermediate oil, the U.S. benchmark contract, could fall to as low as $50 a barrel within the next two years unless the rules are eased to relieve the glut, he said. Until prices drop, it may be difficult for politicians to persuade the American public to allow expanded exports.

“What I see is basically an inability to go out and explain to the public that we have to change the rules before the prices give us the signal,” Blanch said. “If you’re in the White House, why are you going to change the crude-export rules that the U.S. has right now when the country is still importing 8 million barrels a day of oil?”

Forestalling Glut

At least one member of the Obama administration has begun making the case that the U.S. is building toward a crippling surplus. Adam Sieminski, head of the U.S. Energy Information Administration, the statistical arm of the Energy Department, said limited transactions with other countries may help forestall excess supplies that could undermine prices and hobble the industry.

“That’s going to be a policy decision of the Congress and the administration,” Sieminski said. “It’s just a question of what the economics are.”

The surge in oil output, coupled with record natural gas production, allowed the U.S. to meet 83 percent of its own energy needs in the first eight months of 2012, on track to be the highest since 1991, Energy Department data show. The last time self-sufficiency was achieved was in 1952. While the U.S. still imported some petroleum then, exports such as coal more than offset foreign cargoes.

Overseas Shocks

That interconnectedness means U.S. consumers will still be vulnerable to supply shocks overseas, Sieminski said. An Energy Department forecast shows the country will import 10 percent of its needs in 2035. That doesn’t account for slowdowns because of new regulations, which may tighten because drilling has been linked to groundwater pollution and earthquakes, he said.

Then there’s the problem of how burning all these fossil fuels may contribute to climate change, said Anthony Swift, an attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council in Washington.

“There’s a real environmental cost to investing billions of dollars in new sources of carbon-intensive fuels when we know we really need to be investing in clean energy,” Swift said. “It’s better for our environment, better for our economy and better for energy security.”

Tightened automobile-mileage requirements helped reduce consumption of petroleum products by 16 percent through September since peaking in August 2005, a drop of 3.5 million barrels a day, Energy Department data show.

Dakota Boom

The U.S. oil boom began in 2004 with a North Dakota well completed by Continental Resources Inc., which confirmed that a combination of two technologies could unlock profitable amounts of crude in pockets deep underground.

Continental paired horizontal drilling, in which the well is bored at an angle to run lengthwise along the richest slice of rock, with hydraulic fracturing. Better known as fracking, the process forces a high-pressure stream of sand, water and chemicals underground to crack apart the rock and free the crude. Since then, North Dakota’s oil production has increased to 728,000 barrels a day, surpassing Ecuador, an OPEC member.

Harold Hamm, Continental’s founder and chief executive officer, has called for expanding U.S. production. The company estimates the Bakken and other formations under North Dakota contain the equivalent of 27 billion to 45 billion recoverable barrels of oil. By comparison, Nigeriahas an estimated 37.2 billion barrels of proven reserves, according to OPEC.

Wildcatters Compete

Hamm’s success set in motion an oil rush that spread across the U.S. as wildcatters competed to be first to new prospects. Chesapeake Energy Corp. made a deal in early 2007 to buy a million acres of Wyoming’s Powder River Basin, near the Teapot Dome formation that gave its name to the notorious bribery scandal of the 1920s.

Exploration intensified in Oklahoma’s Mississippi Lime, the Eagle Ford Shale in Texas, Ohio’s Utica formation, Louisiana’s Tuscaloosa Marine shale and New Mexico’s Bone Springs.

Competition grew heated as oil prices above $75 encouraged more drilling. In one Wyoming courthouse, the county clerk brandished a cattle whip to keep order among the crowds of landmen packing in to research mineral rights. Joe Thames, a Denver-based contract lease buyer who has worked for companies such as Chesapeake, said rivals once followed his best landman from his motel to try and find out where he was buying.

‘Big Gamble’

When results of EOG Resources Inc. (EOG) 2009 Jake well in northeastern Colorado leaked, lease prices quintupled in less than two months, said Bob Coskey, a Denver geologist. That play, called the Niobrara, turned out to be smaller than people thought, Coskey said. Overnight, acreage outside the best zones became almost worthless.

Hanging over this activity is the specter of past busts. The last boom in the late-1970s came crashing to a halt in 1985 when Saudi Arabia, in an effort to regain declining market share, flooded the world with crude and sent prices to $10 a barrel in 1986. U.S. production fell for 21 of the next 22 years.

“It’s a big gamble,” said Mike McDonald, an Oklahoma wildcatter and president and co-owner of Triad Energy Inc. “Everyone thinks it’s Beverly Hillbillies: You shoot a gun and oil comes out. It’s not.”

It was unclear until this year whether producers would be able to replicate Hamm’s results outside of the Bakken. The answer is yes. Texas pumped the most oil since 1988. Output from Wyoming grew 7 percent, the biggest jump in records going back to 1981, Energy Department figures show. New Mexico’s increased by 13 percent, and Oklahoma’s by 18 percent.

Morse, whose bullish predictions of U.S. energy self- sufficiency early this year met with skepticism, said North America will be able to meet its own needs by 2020. The pace of growth and the potential for worldwide gains driven by ever- improving technology toppled the theory that the world supply of oil had had peaked and begun an inexorable decline, he said.

“Peak oil is dead,” Morse said.

Australia’s 1996 gun law reforms: faster falls in firearm deaths, firearm suicides, and a decade without mass shootings

This story is on the back of the tragic shooting in  Connecticut yesterday. I want to make this very clear to everyone. I hunted as a kid shot Rifles and Shotguns I am not anti gun however, I have been at dinners where I have been told to take my foreign views and put them somewhere unpleasant. Here is a link to a study on what happened in Aussie after numerous mass shootings they banned certain types of weapons. I am not advocating the same approach here but something has to happen and we should look elsewhere for help on what to do. Aivars Lode

S Chapman, P Alpers, K Agho, M Jones ...............................................................................................................................

See end of article for authors’ affiliations ........................

Correspondence to: Professor S Chapman, School of Public Health, University of Sydney, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia 2006; sc@med.usyd.edu.au

Accepted 6 November 2006 ........................

Injury Prevention 2006;12:365–372. doi: 10.1136/ip.2006.013714

Background: After a 1996 firearm massacre in Tasmania in which 35 people died, Australian governments united to remove semi-automatic and pump-action shotguns and rifles from civilian possession, as a key component of gun law reforms. Objective: To determine whether Australia’s 1996 major gun law reforms were associated with changes in rates of mass firearm homicides, total firearm deaths, firearm homicides and firearm suicides, and whether there were any apparent method substitution effects for total homicides and suicides.

Design: Observational study using official statistics. Negative binomial regression analysis of changes in firearm death rates and comparison of trends in pre–post gun law reform firearm-related mass killings. Setting: Australia, 1979–2003. Main outcome measures: Changes in trends of total firearm death rates, mass fatal shooting incidents, rates of firearm homicide, suicide and unintentional firearm deaths, and of total homicides and suicides per 100 000 population.

Results: In the 18 years before the gun law reforms, there were 13 mass shootings in Australia, and none in the 10.5 years afterwards. Declines in firearm-related deaths before the law reforms accelerated after the reforms for total firearm deaths (p = 0.04), firearm suicides (p = 0.007) and firearm homicides (p = 0.15), but not for the smallest category of unintentional firearm deaths, which increased. No evidence of substitution effect for suicides or homicides was observed. The rates per 100 000 of total firearm deaths, firearm homicides and firearm suicides all at least doubled their existing rates of decline after the revised gun laws. Conclusions: Australia’s 1996 gun law reforms were followed by more than a decade free of fatal mass shootings, and accelerated declines in firearm deaths, particularly suicides. Total homicide rates followed the same pattern. Removing large numbers of rapid-firing firearms from civilians may be an effective way of reducing mass shootings, firearm homicides and firearm suicides.

On 10 May 1996, 12 days after 35 people were shot dead and 18 seriously wounded by a gunman at Port Arthur, Tasmania, Australia’s state and federal governments agreed to enact uniform gun control laws. Between June 1996 and August 1998, the new restrictions were progressively implemented in all six states and two territories. As the Port Arthur gunman and several other mass killers had used semi-automatic weapons, the new gun laws banned rapid-fire long guns, specifically to reduce their availability for mass shootings. Under the 1996–7 Australian Firearms Buyback, 643 726 newly prohibited semi-automatic and pump-action rifles and shotguns were purchased by the federal government from their civilian owners at market value, funded by a levy on income tax.1 Tens of thousands of gun owners also voluntarily surrendered additional, non- prohibited firearms without compensation.2 In total, more than 700 000 guns were removed and destroyed from an adult population of about 12 million. Australia’s revised gun laws also require that all firearms be individually registered to their licensed owners, that private firearm sales be prohibited and that each gun transfer through a licensed arms dealer be approved only after the police are satisfied of a genuine reason for ownership. In this context, possession of firearms for self-defence in Australia is specifically prohibited and few civilians are licensed to possess handguns. A detailed summary of the reforms can be found in Ozanne-Smith et al.3

In Australian federal law, firearm means ‘‘a device designed or adapted to discharge shot, bullets, or other projectiles by means of an explosive charge or a compressed

gas’’.4 Legislation in all Australian states and territories echoes this definition, and all include airguns and com-

5

pressed gas guns in their definition of a firearm. Using publicly available data, we examined Australian firearm death rates before and after the Port Arthur massacre and the gun law reforms it precipitated to explore the hypothesis that the introduction of the gun laws was associated with an accelerating decline in deaths caused by firearms. We also examine all-cause homicides and all- method suicides in order to assess the possibility that substitution effects may have occurred: that reduced access to firearms may have caused those with homicidal or suicidal

intent to use substitute methods.

METHODS

Data on unintentional (accidental), and intentional (suicide and homicide) deaths caused by firearms were obtained from the National Injury Surveillance Unit,6i sourced from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) mortality data collec- tion 1979–2003, coded as International Classification of Diseases, 9th revision and 10th revision. This represents a census of all firearm deaths in Australia for those 25 years. In all Australian jurisdictions (state and territory Firearms Acts

iThese figures were updated in a private correspondence from NISU on 16 October 2006 (table 2).

Abbreviation: ABS, Australian Bureau of Statistics

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and Regulations), at federal level (the Customs Act and Regulations) and in the ABS mortality collection, ‘‘firearm’’ includes guns whose projectiles are propelled by compressed air or gas. Although we know of no such fatalities, any deaths from airguns or ball bearing guns would be included in this dataset.

Population data were obtained from the ABS for the same period. Firearm death rates per 100 000 were then calculated. The trend in these rates for the 18 years up to and including the year in which the new firearm laws were announced (1996) were compared with the corresponding trend for the next 7 years (1997–2003), to examine the hypothesis that the announcement and implementation of the gun laws were associated with an acceleration in the existing decline in firearm homicides, firearm suicides and total firearm deaths. Fatal ‘‘legal intervention’’ shootings by police, which averaged 4.5 per annum, were excluded as they were not targeted by the gun laws in question. For the post-Port Arthur period, rates of total all-cause (and non-gun) homicides and suicides were also examined, to consider whether perpetrators may have substituted other means of killing if the gun laws reduced their access to firearms.

Numbers of deaths by category (total and components) have been viewed as arising from an overdispersed Poisson process and analyzed using negative binomial regression, with annual Australian population estimates used as an offset. In practical terms, the model views deaths as a number of events per head of population, although for convenience we report rates per 100 000 heads of population. The model has been used to estimate the change in trend of the relative rate of firearm deaths associated with the introduction of uniform gun laws. Given that the rate of firearm deaths had been decreasing before the harmonization of gun laws, the statistical question addressed is not just whether death rates were lower after the laws were changed, as the pre-existing trend would predict this even in the absence of changed laws, but whether the rate of decrease in firearm deaths seems to be greater after the gun laws were announced. Given the observational nature of the data available, we can directly comment on the association of gun law harmonization and firearm-related death rates, but conclusions regarding causality of the association must remain interpretive rather than definitive. However, as it would be politically almost inconceivable that any govern- ment would conduct a randomized controlled trial of gun law effects, the evidence presented must be among the best that could ever be available to deal with the question of the effects of such law reform. As counts are of deaths, it is reasonable to assume that observations are independent across years. Three models have been fitted for each type of firearm death.

ln{deaths/population} = b00+b106year,year = 1979,...,1996 (a)

ln{deaths/population} = b01+b116year,year = 1997,...,2003 (b)

ln{deaths/population} = b02+b126year+b22 Lawj+b326year6Lawj, year = 1979,...,2003, j = 0,1 (c)

Models (a) and (b) are used to estimate the trend (measured as average annual change in rate/100000 population) in gun deaths before and after the introduction of gun laws, through the terms and respectively. Model (c) is used to estimate the effect on trends in firearm- related deaths associated with the introduction of gun laws through the interaction term ‘‘year6law’’. As the model is parameterized, b32 = b112b10 and therefore estimates the ratio of trend after introduction to that before the introduction of the gun laws. Trends and relative trends have been reported as relative rates (before and after 1996) and relative trends (comparing periods) with 95% confidence intervals. The statistical significance of the relative trends has

also been reported. Analysis has been undertaken separately in firearm-related and non-firearm-related deaths as well as total deaths for homicide and suicide to investigate possible substitution effects. If substitution occurred, we would expect an increasing downward trend in firearm deaths after the introduction of gun control laws but a compensatory lesser downward or even upward trend in non-firearm-related deaths over the same period. The extent of influence of mass shootings has been investigated by repeating firearm-related homicides excluding mass (>5 victims died) shootings.

An alternate view of these data might have been as a time series of mortality rates, as was done by gun lobby affiliated researchers Baker and McPhedran.7 However, we saw two disadvantages to this approach. One is that calculating mortality rates and then treating them as a number in a time series ignores the natural variability inherent in the counts that make up the numerator of the rate. Another is that the Box–Jenkins class of models, including the auto- regressive integrated moving average model used by Baker and McPhedran,7 is unable to explicitly address the effect of an intervention such as the introduction of gun laws. Interpretation of these models is reduced to comparing the mortality rates expected under a model assuming no effect of the intervention with that observed, both in the post- intervention period. This is however an insensitive approach, and its interpretation is not based on formal statistical inference but rather on visual inspection and qualitative interpretation of graphs, which may be prone to selectivity.

The second author has archived reports of all mass shooting incidents in Australia (defined here as when >5 victims died; table 1). These were used to compare the incidence of such shootings before and after the introduction of the new gun laws.

RESULTS

In the 18 years up to and including 1996, the year of the massacre at Port Arthur, Australia experienced 13 mass shootings. In these events alone, 112 people were shot dead and at least another 52 wounded (table 1).8 In the 10.5 years since Port Arthur and the revised gun laws, no mass shootings have occurred in Australia. Figure 1 comprises seven graphs plotting both pre-law and post-law data and trends for (a) firearm homicide death rate, (b) non-firearm homicide death rate, (c) firearm homicide minus mass shootings death rate, (d) unintentional firearm death rate, (e) firearm suicide death rate, (f) non-firearm suicide death rate and (g) total firearm death rate.

Each graph presents the observed annual death rate (triangles) and the expected death rate under the hypothesis of an effect of gun laws (dots) estimated from a negative binomial model. The vertical line on the horizontal axis indicates the revision of gun laws commencing in 1996.

An interpretive note that applies to all the graphs in fig 1 is that the shape of fitted lines (trend pre-law and trend post- law) involves two components. The first is that the post-law trend line is shifted upward or downward according to the underlying rates of mortality in the pre-gun law and post-gun law periods. Where there is a pre-existing downward trend in mortality, such a shift would occur regardless of the effect of gun laws. The more interesting component is how much the slopes of the pre-gun law and post-gun law trends differ. Although it can be difficult to judge the magnitude from the graph itself, this is quantified in the final column of table 3, which provides estimates of the relative slopes of the post- to pre-law trends.

Total firearm deaths

Table 2 shows that gun-related deaths (both in numbers and as a rate per 100 000) had been steadily falling throughout

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*Definitions of ‘‘mass shooting’’ and ‘‘mass homicide’’ have ranged from 3 to 5 victims killed.28 29 To exclude most of the more common firearm-related spousal and family violence killings, ‘‘mass shooting’’ is defined here as one in which >5 firearm-related homicides are committed by one or two perpetrators in proximate events in a civilian setting, not counting any perpetrators killed by their own hand or otherwise. Details of each case were collected from police and coroners’ files, by personal communication with police and counsel involved, or as a last resort from corroborating newspaper reports.

the years before the new gun laws were announced. In the 18 years (1979–96), there were 11 299 firearm deaths (annual average 627.7). In the 7 years for which reliable data are available after the announcement of the new gun laws, there were 2328 firearm deaths, (annual average 332.6). Figure 1G and table 3 indicate that although the rate per 100 000 of total firearm deaths was reducing by an average of 3% per year, this rate doubled to 6% after the introduction of gun laws. The ratio of trend estimates differed statistically from 1 (no effect; p = 0.03). The decline in total firearm deaths thus accelerated after the introduction of the gun laws.

Firearm suicides

Firearm suicides represent the largest component cause of total firearm deaths in Australia (more than three in four of all firearm deaths). In the 18 years (1979–96), there were 8850 firearm suicides (annual average 491.7). In the 7 years for which reliable data are available after the announcement of the new gun laws, there were 1726 firearm suicides, an annual average of 246.6. Figure 1E and table 3 indicate that while the rate of firearm suicide was reducing by an average of 3% per year, this more than doubled to 7.4% per year after the introduction of gun laws. The ratio of trend estimates differed statistically from 1 (no effect; p = 0.007). Again, we conclude that the decline in total firearm suicides accelerated after the introduction of the gun laws.

Firearm homicides

In the 18 years (1979–96), there were 1672 firearm homicides (annual average 92.9). In the 7 years for which reliable data are available after the announcement of the new gun laws, there were 389 firearm homicides, an annual average of 55.6. Figure 1A and table 3 show that while the rate of firearm homicide was reducing by an average of 3% per year, this increased to 7.5% per year after the introduction of gun laws. However, the ratio of trend estimates failed to reach statistical significance (p = 0.15) because of the low power inherent in the small numbers involved.

When all firearm mass homicides (>5 victims shot dead per incident) were removed from the data (fig 1C and table 3), the conclusions were only slightly altered. The reason for this slight change is that all mass shootings in Australia in the years studied occurred before the introduction of gun laws (table 1). This increases the apparent downward trend in the pre-gun law period (0.971 when all homicides are considered,

v 0.961 when mass shootings are removed, table 3). The trend in the post-gun law period is unaffected.

Unintentional firearm deaths

Unintentional (accidental) firearm deaths have always been the smallest component of the total firearm deaths in Australia, representing around 6% of all firearm deaths. Figure 1D and table 2 indicate that although the rate of total gun deaths reduced by an average of 7.6% per year, the rate of unintentional gun deaths actually increased by 8.5% per year after the introduction of the gun laws. We discuss this finding below.

Total homicides

Figure 1B and table 3 indicate that the rate of total non- firearm homicides increased by an average of 1.1% per year before the introduction of the gun law and reduced by an average of 2.4% per year after the introduction of the gun laws (see row 3, columns 2 and 3, respectively, in table 3). The ratio of the pre-law to post-law trends differ to a significant extent (p = 0.05).

Table 2 also shows the total homicides (by all methods) for the period 1979–2003. In the pre-gun law period, total non- firearm homicides were essentially stable and did not differ from steady state to a statistically significant extent (table 3). After the introduction of gun laws, a significant downward trend was evident in total homicides, and the ratio of pre-law to post-law trends differed statistically from ‘‘no effect’’ (p = 0.01, table 3). We conclude that the data do not support any homicide method substitution hypothesis.

Totalsuicides

Figure 1F and table 3 indicate that the rate of total non- firearm suicides increased by an average of 2.3% per year before the introduction of the gun law and reduced by an average of 4.1% per year after the introduction of the gun laws (see row 6, columns 2 and 3, respectively in table 3). The ratio of the pre-law to-post-law trends differs statistically (p,0.001).

Table 2 also shows total suicides for the period under review. Total suicides follow a similar pattern as total non-firearm homicides. In the pre-gun law period, total suicides were essentially stable (table 3). After the introduc- tion of gun laws a significant downward trend was evident in total suicides and the ratio of pre-law to post-law trends differs statistically from ‘‘no effect’’ (p,0.001; table 3). We

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conclude that the data do not support any suicide method substitution hypothesis.

In all, total suicide (all methods including firearms) increased by an average of 1% per year before the introduc- tion of the gun laws and decreased by an average of 4.4% per year after the introduction of the gun laws, whereas, total homicide (all methods including firearm) was essentially steady (decreasing by an average of 0.1% per year) before the introduction of the gun law and decreased further by 3.3% per year after the introduction of the gun law. The ratio of the pre-law to post-law trends reaches statistical significance for

DISCUSSION

both total suicide (p,0.001) and total homicide table 3).

(p = 0.01;

After 11 mass shootings in a decade and 13 in the 18 years before the introduction of the new gun control laws, Australia collected and destroyed categories of firearms designed to kill many people quickly. In his immediate reaction to the Port Arthur massacre, Australian Prime Minister John Howard said of semi-automatic long guns: ‘‘There is no legitimate interest served in my view by the free availability in this country of weapons of this kind... Every effort should be made to ensure such an incident does not occur again. That is why we have proposed a comprehensive package of reforms designed to implement tougher, more effective and uniform gun laws.’’9 10

Figure 1 (A–G) Total firearm deaths (excluding ‘‘legal intervention’’ (police shootings)), firearm homicides and suicides, unintentional firearm deaths, total homicides and suicides; rates per 100 000, Australia 1979–2003. Note that the total firearm deaths include deaths of undetermined intent as shown in table 2.

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In the 10.5 years which followed the gun buy-back announcement (May 1996–October 2006), no mass shootings have occurred in Australia. As one study on the Australian firearm buy-back notes: ‘‘Given that mass murders cause so much community fear, it is appropriate to choose this as an evaluation outcome separate from homicide rates gener- ally.’’11 Yet, in a recent paper examining the same dataset,7 two authors with declared affiliations with firearm advocacy groups failed entirely to report on this fundamental outcome, and issued press releases headlined Gun Laws Failed to Improve Safety and New Research Vindicates Gun Owners.12 13 Given that the banning of semi-automatic rifles and pump-action shotguns was premised on the explicit objective of reducing the likelihood of mass shootings, such a flagrant omission from their analysis is extraordinary.

We suggest an analogy here. If a government addressed a recurrent incidence of level crossing car/train collisions by mandating alarmed barrier gates, it would be appropriate to ask two questions when later evaluating the effect of such a measure. One could ask ‘‘Have there been fewer level crossing car/train collisions and fatalities?’’ and ‘‘Have there been fewer road toll deaths from any cause?’’. The outlawing of rapid-fire rifles and shotguns in the revised Australian gun laws was the equivalent of level crossing barrier gate legislation: its primary intention was to reduce mass shootings, a national concern after the Port Arthur massacre. Accelerating the reduction in overall firearm deaths—as occurred—is a bonus, particularly as the data show that there is no evidence of method substitution for either suicide or homicide.

Three categories dominate firearm death data in Australia: suicide, homicide and unintentional (accidental) shootings. Suicide is the leading category, with an average of 79% of all firearm deaths each year. Firearms have a high lethality index (or ‘‘completion rate’’) in both homicide and suicide.14 Had the gun law reforms not occurred, more Australians contemplating suicide—in particular, impulsive young peo- ple—might have more easily found a method of instant completion. Reliable national data on suicide attempts are not available in Australia to examine whether suicide completion rates changed after Port Arthur. However, the data show that the declining rate of suicide by firearms accelerated significantly after the 1996 gun laws, with there being no apparent substitution by other methods.

As only a single shot is involved in most firearm suicides, it might be argued that reduced access to rapid-firing semi-automatic weapons would be irrelevant in policies designed to reduce suicide: a person intending suicide with a firearm need use only a single-shot gun. However, a person attempting suicide might just as easily use any available gun, including one capable of firing rapidly. The removal of more than 700 000 guns from an adult population of around 12 million therefore may have reduced access to guns among potential suicide attempters.

However, many gun owners own .1 firearm and may well have handed in the newly prohibited weapons after the new laws required this, but retained their non-prohibited weap- ons. This means that although 700 000 firearms were removed from the community, the number of persons (and households) with access to (still legal) firearms is unlikely to have reduced significantly. What can be said with certainty though is that 700 000 fewer guns were available to be stolen or otherwise leaked from lawful owners to criminals.

The finding that there was a significant increase in unintentional (accidental) firearm deaths after the new gun laws is perplexing, although it should be emphasized that the numbers involved in this increase are small. The average annual increase in unintentional firearm deaths in the 7 years since 1996 was just 1.4 deaths. We can conceive of no plausible hypothesis as to why the removal of more than 700 000 guns from the population, the introduction of firearm registration and the tightening of shooter licensing procedures would be associated with an increase in uninten- tional fatal shootings, however small in number.

There are considerable problems in accurately estimating the number of gun owners and guns in a community. Given the political volatility of gun control, and the widespread and virulent opposition of many firearm owners to gun laws, which is often manifested in statements of open defiance on gun lobby websites and publications, under-reporting of gun ownership is common in both survey research and in police registers of licensed gun owners. In 1992, Kellerman et al reported that owners of registered handguns were much more likely to be prepared to answer questions about gun ownership than about their income.15 However, licensed firearm owners are those who self-select to obey shooter licensing requirements. Before the 1996 gun law reforms, there was no national system of firearm registration in Australia, so there is no way of accurately comparing the estimated number of guns in the Australian community before the 1996 gun laws with the known number of registered guns after the introduction of the laws. Notwithstanding these uncertainties, in a trend that preceded the Australian Firearms Buyback but seems to have been greatly accelerated by it, the reported private gun ownership fell by 45% between 1989 and 2000, leaving a three times less likelihood of an Australian household reporting owning a firearm compared with a US household.16 By destroying an estimated one fifth of their country’s estimated stock of firearms—the equivalent figure in the US would be 40 million guns17—Australians have chosen to significantly shrink their private arsenal. All remaining guns must now be individually registered to their licensed owners, private (owner-to-owner) firearm sales are no longer permitted, and each gun purchase through a licensed arms dealer is scrutinized by the police to establish a ‘‘genuine reason’’ for ownership. Possession of firearms for self-defence is speci- fically prohibited, and very few civilians are permitted to own

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Key points

N A radical gun law reform occurred in Australia after a gun massacre (35 dead and 18 seriously injured) in April 1996. Semi-automatic and pump-action shotguns and rifles were banned; a tax-funded firearm buyback and amnesties saw over 700 000 guns surrendered from an adult population of about 12 million.

N The total firearm deaths, firearm homicides and firearm suicides had been falling in the 18 years preceding the new gun laws. In all, 13 mass shootings were noticed in the 18 years preceding the new gun laws.

N In the 10.5 years after the gun law reforms, there have been no mass shootings, but accelerated declines in annual total gun deaths and firearm suicides and a non-significant accelerated decline in firearm homi- cides. No substitution effects occurred for suicides or homicides.

handguns. Australia’s state governments, police forces and police unions all supported the tightened gun laws. In 2002– 3, Australia’s rate of 0.27 firearm-related homicides per 100 000 population was one fifteenth that of the US.18 19

It would also be negligent to omit what seemed plain to Australians, but could be less easy to measure in empirical terms. After the death and serious injury of 54 people at Port Arthur, facilitated by firearms then openly marketed by licensed gun dealers as ‘‘assault weapons’’, a national upwelling of grief and revulsion saw pollsters reporting 90– 95% public approval for stringent new gun laws.20 21 Resistance to gun control was roundly condemned in virtually all news media,22 and governments’ 12 days of resolve deprived the firearm lobby of crucial delay time. Announcing the law changes, Prime Minister John Howard invoked the majority will of Australians when he said ‘‘This represents an enormous shift in the culture of this country towards the possession, the use and the ownership of guns. It is an historic agreement. It means that this country, through its governments, has decided not to go down the American path ... Ours is not a gun culture, ours is a culture of peaceful cooperation.’’23 24 Later opinion polling ranked Howard’s new gun laws as by far the most popular decision in the first year of his conservative government.25 In the opinion of the authors, the 1996 sea change in Australian attitudes—and perhaps also a significant component of the public health benefits of lower rates of firearm-related mass shootings, suicide and homicide reported here—is best described as a national change of attitude to gun owners and their firearms.

Limitations

Table 2 shows that across the 25 years, there were 200 firearm deaths classified as being of undetermined intent. Of these, 157 (80.1%) occurred before 1991, and only 15–23 after 1996. (To preserve victims’ privacy, publicly released data for years in which there are >3 firearm deaths of undetermined intent are recorded as NA. This was the case for 4 of 7 years between 1997 and 2003, meaning that there could have been a maximum of 12 and a minimum of 4 undetermined cases in this time.) Across the study period, firearm deaths of unknown intent comprised 1.3% of all firearm deaths, falling to 0.8% after 1990 and 0.4% after 1996. The decrease in ‘‘unknowns’’ is attributed to improved reporting practices. These ‘‘missing data’’ from the component analyses of firearm suicide, homicides and unintentional deaths may account for small variations in the results shown, were their status able to be known.

Although ABS mortality data were also available for 2004, the National Injury Surveillance Unit warned of significant questions of accuracy due to the number of coroners’ cases not closed at the time, and potential miscoding of suicide, homicide and unintentional firearm-related death in that year.26 Accordingly, this study ends with 2003, the most recent year of reliable data.

Implications for prevention

The data swings shown are so obvious that if one were given the data in table 2 and were asked to guess the date of a major firearm intervention, it would be clear that it happened between 1996 and 1998. The Australian Firearms Buyback remains the world’s most sweeping gun collection and destruction program.27 A combination of laws making semi- automatic and pump-action shotguns and rifles illegal, paying market price for surrendered weapons, and registering the remainder were the central ingredients. The Australian example provides evidence that removing large numbers of firearms from a community can be associated with a sudden and ongoing decline in mass shootings and accelerating

declines in total firearm-related deaths, firearm homicides and firearm suicides.