The House Natural Resources Committee advanced a portion of the GOP budget package this week that would open vast swaths of public lands to private oil and gas extraction, logging, and coal and mineral mining while fast-tracking permits and slashing oversight of proposed fossil fuel projects. If signed into law, the bill would require the Interior Department to lease out Alaska’s Arctic…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
Frack Free Coastal Communities and Frack Free Scarborough are urging residents to join them on a march through Burniston in a show of opposition to Europa Oil & Gas’s plans to drill for gas under local villages.
The event, planned for 22 March, will also mobilise people to register their objections to the application with North Yorkshire Council’s planning committee. It is backed by York City Unison, Parents For Future UK, Scarborough Green Party, York City Unison, Scarborough Unity, Social Justice Party Scarborough, Friends of the Earth, and York Trades Council.
Europa Oil & Gas has submitted a planning application for a gas well at Burniston, which would use a form of hydraulic fracturing (‘fracking’) to extract gas from the sandstone beneath the neighbouring village of Scalby.
The initial application is for a ‘test and appraisal’ well. However, future plans include more wells directed beneath Burniston and Cloughton and twenty years of continuous gas extraction. And this at a time when the climate crisis means we must double down on progress to net zero.
As the Canary previously reported, fracking is not currently allowed in England. However, Europa is exploiting a loophole to try to push ahead with the Burniston project.
It will involve a form of fracking known as a ‘proppant squeeze’. Essentially, it’s a process that injects a proppant – a solid material, usually sand – and water slurry into the wellbore. Technically, this isn’t the same procedure that Cuadrilla used at notorious fracking site Preston New Road. This is because it uses less water, and due to the proppant, less pressure to carry out the operation. Ultimately though, the end goal is no different – that is, to fracture the gas-bearing rock.
Chris Garforth from Frack Free Coastal Communities said:
We’re fed up with being fobbed off with misinformation and platitudes from fossil-fuel dinosaurs. The company is playing down residents’ justified concerns about damage to the local rural and coastal environment, the impact of hundreds of heavy goods vehicles on road safety, air and noise pollution, methane leaks, flaring, and the potential for earthquakes and damage to important aquifers. To say nothing of the damage to efforts to keep global warming down to survivable levels.
John Atkinson from Frack Free Scarborough said:
We can’t just rely on the planning process to protect us. It’s vital we back up individual objections with a collective show of opposition on the streets and within our organisations. We intend to be a force that can’t be ignored.
Anyone wanting to object to the planning application can find out more here. There are more details about the march on the Frack Free Coastal Communities and Frack Free Scarborough Facebook pages.
Featured image via Neil Terry
By The Canary
This post was originally published on Canary.
China went from one of the poorest countries in the world to global economic powerhouse in a mere four decades. Currently featured in the news is DeepSeek, the free, open source A.I. built by innovative Chinese entrepreneurs which just pricked the massive U.S. A.I. bubble.
Even more impressive, however, is the infrastructure China has built, including 26,000 miles of high speed rail, the world’s largest hydroelectric power station, the longest sea-crossing bridge in the world, 100,000 miles of expressway, the world’s first commercial magnetic levitation train, the world’s largest urban metro network, seven of the world’s 10 busiest ports, and solar and wind power generation accounting for over 35% of global renewable energy capacity. Topping the list is the Belt and Road Initiative, an infrastructure development program involving 140 countries, through which China has invested in ports, railways, highways and energy projects worldwide.
All that takes money. Where did it come from? Numerous funding sources are named in mainstream references, but the one explored here is a rarely mentioned form of quantitative easing — the central bank just “prints the money.” (That’s the term often used, though printing presses aren’t necessarily involved.)
From 1996 to 2024, the Chinese national money supply increased by a factor of more than 53 or 5300% — from 5.84 billion to 314 billion Chinese yuan (CNY) [see charts below]. How did that happen? Exporters brought the foreign currencies (largely U.S. dollars) they received for their goods to their local banks and traded them for the CNY needed to pay their workers and suppliers. The central bank —the Public Bank of China or PBOC — printed CNY and traded them for the foreign currencies, then kept the foreign currencies as reserves, effectively doubling the national export revenue.
Investopedia confirms that policy, stating:
One major task of the Chinese central bank, the PBOC, is to absorb the large inflows of foreign capital from China’s trade surplus. The PBOC purchases foreign currency from exporters and issues that currency in local yuan. The PBOC is free to publish any amount of local currency and have it exchanged for forex. … The PBOC can print yuan as needed …. [Emphasis added.]
Interestingly, that huge 5300% explosion in local CNY did not trigger runaway inflation. In fact China’s consumer inflation rate, which was as high as 24% in 1994, leveled out after that and averaged 2.5% per year from 1996 to 2023.
https://www.macrotrends.net/global-metrics/countries/CHN/china/inflation-rate-cpi?form=MG0AV3
How was that achieved? As in the U.S., the central bank engages in “open market operations” (selling federal securities into the open market, withdrawing excess cash). It also imposes price controls on certain essential commodities. According to a report by Nasdaq, China has implemented price controls on iron ore, copper, corn, grain, meat, eggs and vegetables as part of its 14th five-year plan (2021-2025), to ensure food security for the population. Particularly important in maintaining price stability, however, is that the money has gone into manufacturing, production and infrastructure. GDP (supply) has gone up with demand (money), keeping prices stable. [See charts below.]
Gross Domestic Product for China (MKTGDPCNA646NWDB) | FRED | St. Louis Fed
The U.S., too, has serious funding problems today, and we have engaged in quantitative easing (QE) before. Could our central bank also issue the dollars we need without triggering the dreaded scourge of hyperinflation? This article will argue that we can. But first some Chinese economic history.
From Rags to Riches in Four Decades
China’s rise from poverty began in 1978, when Deng Xiaoping introduced market-oriented reforms. Farmers were allowed to sell their surplus produce in the market, doors were opened to foreign investors and private businesses and foreign companies were encouraged to grow. By the 1990s, China had become a major exporter of low-cost manufactured goods. Key factors included cheap labor, infrastructure development and World Trade Organization membership in 2001.
Chinese labor is cheaper than in the U.S. largely because the government funds or subsidizes social needs, reducing the operational costs of Chinese companies and improving workforce productivity. The government invests heavily in public transportation infrastructure, including metros, buses and high-speed rail, making them affordable for workers and reducing the costs of getting manufacturers’ products to market.
The government funds education and vocational training programs, ensuring a steady supply of skilled workers, with government-funded technical schools and universities producing millions of graduates annually. Affordable housing programs are provided for workers, particularly in urban areas.
China’s public health care system, while not free, is heavily subsidized by the government. And a public pension system reduces the need for companies to offer private retirement plans. The Chinese government also provides direct subsidies and incentives to key industries, such as technology, renewable energy and manufacturing.
After it joined the WTO, China’s exports grew rapidly, generating large trade surpluses and an influx of foreign currency, allowing the country to accumulate massive foreign exchange reserves. In 2010, China surpassed the U.S. as the world’s largest exporter. In the following decade, it shifted its focus to high-tech industries, and in 2013 the Belt and Road Initiative was launched. The government directed funds through state-owned banks and enterprises, with an emphasis on infrastructure and industrial development.
Funding Exponential Growth
In the early stages of reform, foreign investment was a key source of capital. Export earnings then generated significant foreign exchange reserves. China’s high savings rate provided a pool of liquidity for investment, and domestic consumption grew. Decentralizing the banking system was also key. According to a lecture by U.K. Prof. Richard Werner:
Deng Xiaoping started with one mono bank. He realized quickly, scrap that; we’re going to have a lot of banks. He created small banks, community banks, savings banks, credit unions, regional banks, provincial banks. Now China has 4,500 banks. That’s the secret to success. That’s what we have to aim for. Then we can have prosperity for the whole world. Developing countries don’t need foreign money. They just need community banks supporting [local business] to have the money to get the latest technology.
China managed to avoid the worst impacts of the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis. It did not devalue its currency; it maintained strict control over capital flows and the PBOC acted as a lender of last resort, providing liquidity to state-controlled banks when needed.
In the 1990s, however, its four major state banks did suffer massive losses, with non-performing loans totaling more than 20% of their assets. Technically, the banks were bankrupt, but the government did not let them go bust. The non-performing loans were moved on to the balance sheets of four major asset management companies (“bad banks”), and the PBOC injected new capital into the “good banks.”
In a January 2024 article titled “The Chinese Economy Is Due a Round of Quantitative Easing,” Prof. Li Wei, Director of the China Economy and Sustainable Development Center, wrote of this policy, “The central bank directly intervened in the economy by creating money. Seen this way, unconventional financing is nothing less than Chinese-style quantitative easing.”
In an August 2024 article titled “China’s 100-billion-yuan Question: Does Rare Government Bond Purchase Alter Policy Course?,” Sylvia Ma wrote of China’s forays into QE:
Purchasing government bonds in the secondary market is allowed under Chinese law, but the central bank is forbidden to subscribe to bonds directly issued by the finance ministry. [Note that this is also true of the U.S. Fed.] Such purchases from traders were tried on a small scale 20 years ago.
However, the monetary authority resorted more to printing money equivalent to soaring foreign exchange reserves from 2001, as the country saw a robust increase in trade surplus following its accession to the World Trade Organization. [Emphasis added.]
This is the covert policy of printing CNY and trading this national currency for the foreign currencies (mostly U.S. dollars) received from exporters.
What does the PBOC do with the dollars? It holds a significant portion as foreign exchange reserves, to stabilize the CNY and manage currency fluctuations; it invests in U.S. Treasury bonds and other dollar-denominated assets to earn a return; and it uses U.S. dollars to facilitate international trade deals, many of which are conducted in dollars.
The PBOC also periodically injects capital into the three “policy banks” through which the federal government implements its five-year plans. These are China Development Bank, the Export-Import Bank of China, and the Agricultural Development Bank of China, which provide loans and financing for domestic infrastructure and services as well as for the Belt and Road Initiative. A January 2024 Bloomberg article titled “China Injects $50 Billion Into Policy Banks in Financing Push” notes that the policy banks “are driven by government priorities more than profits,” and that some economists have called the PBOC funding injections “helicopter money” or “Chinese-style quantitative easing.”
Prof. Li argues that with the current insolvency of major real estate developers and the rise in local government debt, China should engage in this overt form of QE today. Other commentators agree, and the government appears to be moving in that direction. Prof. Li writes:
As long as it does not trigger inflation, quantitative easing can quickly and without limit generate sufficient liquidity to resolve debt issues and pump confidence into the market.…
Quantitative easing should be the core of China’s macroeconomic policy, with more than 80% of funds coming from QE…
As the central bank is the only institution in China with the power to create money, it has the ability to create a stable environment for economic growth. [Emphasis added.]
Eighty-percent funding just from money-printing sounds pretty radical, but China’s macroeconomic policy is determined by five-year plans designed to serve the public and the economy, and the policy banks funding the plans are publicly-owned. That means profits are returned to the public purse, avoiding the sort of private financialization and speculative exploitation resulting when the U.S. Fed engaged in QE to bail out the banks after the 2007-08 banking crisis.
The U.S. Too Could Use Another Round of QE — and Some Public Policy Banks
There is no law against governments or their central banks just printing the national currency without borrowing it first. The U.S. Federal Reserve has done it, Abraham Lincoln’s Treasury did it, and it is probably the only way out of our current federal debt crisis. As Prof. Li observes, we can do it “without limit” so long as it does not trigger inflation.
Financial commentator Alex Krainer observes that the total U.S. debt, public and private, comes to more than $101 trillion (citing the St. Louis Fed’s graph titled “All Sectors; Debt Securities and Loans”). But the monetary base — the reserves available to pay that debt — is only $5.6 trillion. That means the debt is 18 times the monetary base. The U.S. economy holds far fewer dollars than we need for economic stability.
The dollar shortfall can be filled debt- and interest-free by the U.S. Treasury, just by printing dollars as Lincoln’s Treasury did (or by issuing them digitally). It can also be done by the Fed, which “monetizes” federal securities by buying them with reserves it issues on its books, then returns the interest to the Treasury and after deducting its costs. If the newly-issued dollars are used for productive purposes, supply will go up with demand, and prices should remain stable.
Note that even social services, which don’t directly produce revenue, can be considered “productive” in that they support the “human capital” necessary for production. Workers need to be healthy and well educated in order to build competitively and well, and the government needs to supplement the social costs borne by companies if they are to compete with China’s subsidized businesses.
Parameters would obviously need to be imposed to circumscribe Congress’s ability to spend “without limit,” backed by a compliant Treasury or Fed. An immediate need is for full transparency in budgeted expenditures. The Pentagon, for example, spends nearly $1 trillion of our taxpayer money annually and has never passed a clean audit, as required by law.
We Sorely Need an Infrastructure Bank
The U.S. is one of the few developed countries without an infrastructure bank. Ironically, it was Alexander Hamilton, the first U.S. Treasury secretary, who developed the model. Winning freedom from Great Britain left the young country with what appeared to be an unpayable debt. Hamilton traded the debt and a percentage of gold for non-voting shares in the First U.S. Bank, paying a 6% dividend. This capital was then leveraged many times over into credit to be used specifically for infrastructure and development. Based on the same model, the Second U.S. Bank funded the vibrant economic activity of the first decades of the United States.
In the 1930s, Roosevelt’s government pulled the country out of the Great Depression by repurposing a federal agency called the Reconstruction Finance Corporation (RFC) into a lending machine for development on the Hamiltonian model. Formed under the Hoover administration, the RFC was not actually an infrastructure bank but it acted like one. Like China Development Bank, it obtained its liquidity by issuing bonds.
The primary purchaser of RFC bonds was the federal government, driving up the federal debt; but the debt to GDP ratio evened out over the next four decades, due to the dramatic increase in productivity generated by the RFC’s funding of the New Deal and World War II. That was also true of the federal debt after the American Revolution and the Civil War.
One chart that tells the story of US debt from 1790 to 2011
A pending bill for an infrastructure bank on the Hamiltonian model is HR 4052, The National Infrastructure Bank Act of 2023, which ended 2024 with 48 sponsors and was endorsed by dozens of legislatures, local councils, and organizations. Like the First and Second U.S. Banks, it is intended to be a depository bank capitalized with existing federal securities held by the private sector, for which the bank will pay an additional 2% over the interest paid by the government. The bank will then leverage this capital into roughly 10 times its value in loans, as all depository banks are entitled to do. The bill proposes to fund $5 trillion in infrastructure capitalized over a 10-year period with $500 billion in federal securities exchanged for preferred (non-voting) stock in the bank. Like the RFC, the bank will be a source of off-budget financing, adding no new costs to the federal budget. (For more information, see https://www.nibcoalition.com/.)
Growing Our Way Out of Debt
Rather than trying to kneecap our competitors with sanctions and tariffs, we can grow our way to prosperity by turning on the engines of production. Far more can be achieved through cooperation than through economic warfare. DeepSeek set the tone with its free, open source model. Rather than a heavily guarded secret, its source code is freely available to be shared and built upon by entrepreneurs around the world.
We can pull off our own economic miracle, funded with newly issued dollars backed by the full faith and credit of the government and the people. Contrary to popular belief, “full faith and credit” is valuable collateral, something even Bitcoin and gold do not have. It means the currency will be accepted everywhere – not just at the bank or the coin dealer’s but at the grocer’s and the gas station. If the government directs newly created dollars into new goods and services, supply will grow along with demand and the currency should retain its value. The government can print, pay for workers and materials, and produce its way into an economic renaissance.
The post “Quantitative Easing with Chinese Characteristics” first appeared on Dissident Voice.This post was originally published on Dissident Voice.
With the U.S. Senate holding confirmation hearings for several of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s Cabinet nominees on Wednesday, climate organizers were joined by progressive lawmakers outside the Capitol to speak out against one potential administration official in particular — who they warned poses “a threat to our democracy and our future.” The subject of the press conference…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
As the Biden administration scrambles to shield President Joe Biden’s climate legacy from Donald Trump in its waning days, the president-elect is staring down serious political dilemmas over the future of energy. Two remarkable trends — a rush to lock-in major fracked gas exports for decades to come, and Big Tech’s growing thirst for energy to run supercomputers at artificial intelligence…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
A whistleblowing Pennsylvania oil and gas worker, together with the state’s former lead environmental regulator, are ringing the alarm bell on an unregulated and shadowy network of pipelines at least hundreds, and perhaps even thousands of miles long. The pipeline system was constructed over the past decade by oil and gas operators in Pennsylvania to transport toxic and radioactive fracking wastewater.
“There is no oversight,” says Robert Green, who works in southwestern Pennsylvania as a hydrostatic tester, a niche job in the industry that involves assuring pipelines can appropriately handle the complex and often hazardous fuels and waste streams they contain.
The post Whistleblower Demands Governor Fix ‘Completely Unregulated’ Fracking Wastewater Network appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.
This post was originally published on PopularResistance.Org.
As we broadcast all week from the COP29 talks in Azerbaijan, we look at what Donald Trump’s reelection as U.S. president means for the climate. Clean energy and environmental advocates are raising alarm over Trump’s picks for key roles in his administration, including fracking magnate Chris Wright to serve as energy secretary and North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum to lead the Interior Department, where he could greatly expand drilling on federal lands. Burgum, a major ally of the fossil fuel industry, was also tapped to head a newly created National Energy Council aimed at increasing oil and gas production. For more on the White House transition, we speak with Manish Bapna, president of the Natural Resources Defense Council and Natural Resources Defense Council Action. He calls Trump’s picks “deeply troubling” but says there is still room for optimism. “The clean energy transition in the United States is unstoppable. It’s going to hit some speed bumps now, but it will move forward,” says Bapna.
This content originally appeared on Democracy Now! and was authored by Democracy Now!.
This post was originally published on Radio Free.
In a move that alarmed green groups, Republican President-elect Donald Trump on Saturday tapped Chris Wright — the CEO of a fracking company who denies the climate emergency — as his energy secretary. Wright, who leads the Denver-based oil services company Liberty Energy, is a Republican donor whose nomination to head the Department of Energy is backed by powerful fossil fuel boosters…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
Fossil fuel company Europa Oil & Gas is seeking permission for a fracking project in North Yorkshire. And thanks to a gaping loophole in the current moratorium on the environmentally destructive process, it just might happen.
Yet, if the fact the fracking may go ahead in itself weren’t bad enough, the proposed project has exposed something else concerning about current regulations. In particular it has underscored how some new fossil fuel projects may also evade a landmark recent ruling on downstream emissions.
Predictably, Europa has pulled out all the stops in its efforts to do just that – and kicked its PR machine into action over the planned frack.
In June, the Supreme Court delivered a devastating blow to the fossil fuel industry. This was the historic case against UK Oil and Gas’s (UKOG) Horse Hill site. It was brought by Extinction Rebellion campaigner and former Surrey resident Sarah Finch, on behalf of the Weald Action Group.
Crucially, the groundbreaking judgement ruled that greenhouse gas emissions produced from consumers combusting the oil and gas:
are entirely within their control
In other words, companies could choose not to extract them in the first place.
Now, fossil fuel firms will have to consider these downstream emissions and their possible impact in their EIAs.
However, it’s important to note that this doesn’t automatically mean a blanket ban on fossil fuel projects. It simply requires firms to include these in their EIA – and for planning authorities to take this into account when deliberating over approval for an application.
Nevertheless, the landmark ruling will bring the climate impacts of combusting fossil fuels into the mix. In theory, this will make it harder for fossil fuel projects to get planning consents, in the context of the UK Climate Change Act and the country’s binding international commitments.
As the Canary previously reported, fossil fuel firm Egdon has now submitted a pre-application on behalf of Europa Oil & Gas to frack for gas near Scarborough. And crucially, a spokesperson from Frack Free Scarborough highlighted to the Canary that the fracking project at Burniston was a case and point of how the fossil fuel industry might try to get around the recent judgement in some projects anyway.
In Burniston’s case, Egdon and Europa had said an EIA would be unnecessary. They’d argued that the exploration drilling:
is not likely to have significant environmental effects by virtue of its characteristics, based on the relatively short duration of the drilling operations
As it happens, this is exactly the get-out clause UK’s EIA regulations afford. Notably, both the absence of “significant environmental effects” and the project occurring over a “short period” can rule out the requirement for an EIA.
Indeed, there have been cases where councils have screened out fossil fuel projects for EIAs. Particularly notable, in 2014, Cheshire West and Chester Council didn’t ask for EIAs when granting consent for the fracking project at Upton – famously the site of the longest-running anti-fracking camp.
Why is this important in the context of the judgement on Horse Hill? Put simply, because the ruling only applies to projects with EIAs. This is the case since the EIA is where companies have to set out and consider the effects of their downstream emissions. In other words, it means some onshore fossil fuel projects can – and potentially will – evade the moratorium.
Ultimately however, North Yorkshire Council disagreed with the fossil fuel companies assessment. It concluded on the basis of the company’s pre-application that the project:
could have significant environmental impacts
In particular, it emphasised these:
in relation to landscape and transport
It means that Egdon and Europa will have to submit an EIA – and include the impacts of its downstream emissions in it.
Initially, Europa applied for a dispensation on this from the government. Essentially, this is where the government could overrule the council’s decision. However, strong local opposition appears to have put paid to this ploy.
Frack Free Scarborough’s spokesperson recounted to the Canary how over 150 local people and councillors at a Burniston local meeting unanimously voted that the company should produce an EIA. Obviously, this wasn’t binding, but this and local campaigners continued vocal protests against the project seems to have given the company pause for thought.
It has now said it will disregard a dispensation if the government grants it. Of course, its agenda is apparent. This is the company’s ‘good will gesture’ – in actuality, a manoeuvre to get the community – and by extension, the council, on-board with the project.
And throughout, Europa has indeed been playing a charm offensive with the local community.
One part of this has been its online feedback consultation form. Unsurprisingly, it’s rammed with leading questions that yield foregone conclusions. One particular question frames its narrow multiple choice answers with the claim that:
imported gas results in emissions over 20 times greater than domestic production
However, this is an entirely bogus figure. For one, it’s unclear where Europa got this from. It appears as if the company has plucked it from thin air. Of course, it’s a common industry line that UK domestic production is cleaner in terms of emissions than imported liquified natural gas (LNG). However, the claim is persistently overblown.
In reality, the UK imports the vast bulk of its LNG from Norway, and the government’s own data has shown this is less polluting than gas produced from the UK’s North Sea. It also entirely misses the point that just because Europa would be producing the gas here, it doesn’t mean it will stay here.
In reality, the gas will most likely go to the highest bidder on the regional gas markets. In fact, it admitted in its engagement with the community that it couldn’t guarantee the gas it produces wouldn’t be for export.
So, this also eviscerates one of its other key arguments for the project. This is the idea that the fracked gas is to meet UK energy demand, and bring down bills – which is patently false. It has splashed this across a series of slick online community information material.
Naturally, there’s plenty more industry hot air where these came from too. Largely, it’s all to pitch itself as the friendly neighbourhood fracking company.
Obviously, the ‘consultation’ is just a tick-box exercise when it comes down to it. It will enable the company to claim it has engaged with the community and taken their opinions on board.
Unfortunately for Europa, this isn’t going to fly. Frack Free Scarborough’s spokesperson articulated how campaigners fighting the project are not falling for its PR:
There’s an inherent contradiction at the heart of fossil fuel exploration and that is that the fossil fuel companies have one responsibility — to make money for their shareholders. They can talk about all sorts of other stuff but when it comes down to it that’s what they’re there for. We, as residents and community members, also have one responsibility – to take care of our families, and our communities, and extended outwards from that, to take care of the planet.
Those two sets of interests do not mix and that means that the fossil fuel industry isn’t welcome anywhere. It has to force itself on the communities it wants to operate within. Obviously, tactics vary depending on the political context. From murder in the Niger Delta to obfuscation, a campaign of lies and disinformation, and downright bribery.
In the middle of that spectrum from carrot to stick is the schmooze zone, and this is where the onshore UK drilling industry prefers to operate. This is where they talk about energy security, as Europa has, gas prices, which Europa has, about the pathway to net zero. All of this kind of stuff, including even more insidious and sneaky stuff.
Predictably then, Europa has done a good job of dressing up their fracking operation. From “small-scale standard oilfield operation” to “conventional hydraulic fracturing”, the company has gone to every effort to downplay the fact it plans to frack in Yorkshire.
Similarly, Frack Free Scarborough’s spokesperson also highlighted how the industry’s terminology has helped it bypass the moratorium and pitch itself as a safer fossil fuel process:
That term ‘proppant squeeze’ is part of the schmooze effort – it sounds very friendly, doesn’t it?
Unsurprisingly, at a community drop-in session, the merchant of doubt kicked this misinformation machine into full gear.
Again, Europa took umbrage at the use of the term ‘fracking’. A member of the local community took notes on the meeting. Frack Free Scarborough shared them with the Canary. According to these, the company’s CEO Will Holland, and COO Alastair Stuart expressed their frustration over this.
In particular, they suggested the project shouldn’t be equated with so-called high volume fracking. In another ostensible schmooze-fest then, they purportedly opined how they wished people would use:
less contentious language around ‘well stimulation’.
Fortunately, independent onshore oil and gas monitoring site Drill or Drop’s Ruth Hayhurst has held the company’s feet to the fire over its claims during the meeting.
In particular, it disclosed how it would use 1,200 cubic metres (m3) of fluid in total, across up to three so-called “proppant squeezes”. A single frack would use up to 500m3. And crucially, as part of its presentation, it compared these to other high-profile former fracking sites in the UK.
However, it was here that Hayhurst caught the company out. Europa’s exhibition panel showed vastly higher amounts than operators at these sites actually used in practice. She pointed out that Preston New Road’s individual fracks used between 2.5m3 to 472m3. In other words, the largest frack used a similar volume to the amount Europa could use in its exploration at Burniston.
Of course, this is another sticking point with the moratorium too. Notably, it was the earthquakes at Preston New Road that ultimately formed the basis for it.
According to Hayhurst, the company argued that Preston New Road earthquakes were due to the existence of geological faults. But, it said that none had been identified at Burniston.
Once more though, there was a significant problem with this. Hayhurst highlighted that Europa hasn’t conducted 3D seismic surveys yet – meaning, it doesn’t properly have the full picture of geological faults at Burniston. Worse still, it won’t do this until next year – that is, after it has submitted its application.
On top of this, Europa’s leaflet again leans into the fact it’s a lower volume, lower pressure form of fracking. It says that:
There will be no earthquakes as a result of this operation. Despite there being no risk we will still monitor seismic activity at the site and the operation will be immediately shut down if any unusual seismic activity is noted as a result.
Of course, again, this is patently false. Europa can’t conclusively rule out the possibility that its operation could trigger seismic activity. Realistically, it can at best say that it’s unlikely. This is what an assessment at Wressle determined before Europa venture partner Egdon carried out its frack in 2021.
So, Europa compared the Burniston proposal to the proppant squeeze operation at Wressle further. On this, Hayhurst noted:
proppant squeeze used 146m3, just over a quarter of the fluid volume that could be used in a single operation at Burniston.
Obviously, the point here is that Wressle was a smaller operation and therefore not necessarily a good comparison. The chances of inducing an earthquake may very well be small. However, Europa’s misinformation deliberately tries to obfuscate that it’s even a possibility.
At the end of the day, no amount of Europa’s sly public relations pitch is going to change the reality. And that is to tackle the climate crisis, there should be no new fossil fuel projects. The EIA downstream emissions is one significant nail in the coffin of this planet-wrecking industry. But evidently, fossil fuel companies will continue to do everything in their enormously well-resourced power to weasel out of it.
The fact a fracking project nearly did shows that these profiteering polluters have every intention of maintaining business-as-usual. And they’ll do so whatever the cost is to communities, and the planet at large. However, climate activists and local people will be damned if they let them get away with it.
Featured image supplied
This post was originally published on Canary.
A fossil fuel company, Europa, has plans afoot for a fracking project in Scarborough, North Yorkshire.
Despite the 2019 moratorium on hydraulic fracturing, Scarborough’s local authority – or the government – could very well give the project the go-ahead. This is because the ban as it currently stands doesn’t cover it. However, local campaigners already resisting the project have accused the firm of attempting to push “fracking by loophole”.
As a result, the brewing battle has thrown the gaping hole at the heart of the existing fracking moratorium into the spotlight. What’s more, it has inadvertently underscored the current gaps in the new Labour government’s pledge to ban fracking.
UK-based fossil fuel firm Europa Oil & Gas is gearing up to frack for gas near Scarborough, at a cliffside site within the North Yorkshire and Cleveland Heritage Coast.
It will involve a form of fracking known as a ‘proppant squeeze’. Essentially, it’s a process that injects a proppant – a solid material, usually sand – and water slurry into the wellbore. Technically, this isn’t the same procedure that Cuadrilla used at notorious fracking site Preston New Road. This is because it uses less water, and due to the proppant, less pressure to carry out the operation. Ultimately though, the end goal is no different – that is, to fracture the gas-bearing rock.
Operator Europa holds a 40% stake in this onshore oil and gas licence at Burniston. The remainder is owned by Egdon Resources parent company Heyco Energy Group (40%), and Petrichor Energy UK (20%).
In July, Egdon, on behalf of Europa, put its feelers out with North Yorkshire Council over its proposals. It submitted a screening request from the local authority. Essentially, this asked it to set out whether its full application would require an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA).
Already, Europa has indicated that it will submit a full application for gas exploration at the Scarborough site by the end of the year. Notably however, this wouldn’t be to extract gas for commercial sale. Instead, it would be to test the rates of gas it could bring into commercial production, which would require a further licence.
At this point then, across 37 weeks, it is proposing to prepare the site, drill a borehole, frack for gas, and finally decommission and restore the site. Ultimately though, if it finds gas that it can frack – and it certainly expects to – a production application will invariably follow.
In other words, Europa is sizing up the lucrative prospects of this so-called “low volume hydraulic fracturing” at Burniston. Yet, this industry ascribed framing is misleading – and for multiple reasons. Crucially, it’s not quite the small affair the company is making it out to be.
In fact, if the project at Burniston goes ahead, it could very well be the biggest onshore gas field operating in the UK.
As it stands, Angus Energy’s Saltfleetby conventional gas field in Lincolnshire is the UK’s largest producing field. It has made up nearly three-quarters of the onshore gas production in the UK for the first half of 2024. Similarly in 2023, it made up over 70% for the whole year.
So far, the gas field has averaged at producing just shy of seven million standard cubic feet of gas per day(mmscf/d). By comparison, the second largest onshore producer has averaged less than 1mmscf/d in the first six months of 2024. Europa’s modelling has indicated the site could produce approximately 6mmscf/d. Obviously, this means that Burniston could be hot on Saltfleetby’s heels.
In fact, in an investor presentation, Europa CEO Will Holland suggested that it’s possible it could far exceed this, reaching as high as 20mmscf/d. Largely though, the company expects it to be closer to the lower 6mmscf/d.
Despite this, by offshore standards, it’ll make up a tiny proportion of the UK’s domestic gas production. In 2023, 34 offshore fields produced over 6mmscf/d on average. The largest producing gas field was majority owned Spirit Energy’s Cygnus in the southern North Sea. British gas owner Centrica holds the largest stake in the fossil fuel company. This produced 210mmscf/d on average in 2023 – 35 times more than Europa’s modelled estimates for Burniston.
Nonetheless, Burniston would still place within the top 50% of gas fields currently producing in the UK. And certainly, it would sit among the highest onshore gas producers, if not the top.
Holland also told Burniston residents in an information meeting that the company thinks it could recover around 50 billion cubic feet (bcf) from the gas reservoir. This is over double the remaining recoverable reserves of gas in the UK’s current largest onshore site at Saltfleetby.
Most significantly however, Europa has been curiously quiet about one key detail. That is, how the project at Burniston could prove to be among its biggest cash cows.
As it stands, the company makes most of its profits from its stake at Wressle oil and gas field in Lincolnshire. Of its total £6.7m revenue in 2023, £5.3m of this was from the site alone.
Yet, Angus Energy’s operations at Saltfleetby has netted it £12.1m in just the first six months of 2024. Even with just a 40% stake at Burniston, Europa – and its partners – could turn a tidy multi-million profit on it. Therefore, there’s a decent possibility it could become the company’s main money-spinner.
Of course, there’s currently a moratorium on fracking in the UK. With the exception of a brief period under Liz Truss’s short-lived stint as prime minister, this has been in place since 2019.
Given this, the fracking project at Burniston surely shouldn’t be on the table? However, Europa and co wouldn’t be submitting an application for it if that were the case. For one, the fact is, the moratorium isn’t an outright and permanent ban anyway.
Aside from that, there’s also another gaping hole in it too. Crucially, it’s this lapse in regulation within the moratorium that the fossil fuel companies are targeting in particular at Burniston.
So, local climate campaigners have called it “fracking by loophole” and for good reason – because that’s exactly what it is.
Unsurprisingly, Europa has fervently refuted that it constitutes this. It has laboured over this point in its public-facing literature for the project. In particular, it states that:
low volume hydraulic fracturing operations, which have been used for many decades in the UK, were not included in the 2019 moratorium. They were deliberately excluded because these operations are well established and proven to be safe, both from a health and safety and an environmental perspective. As such the legal basis under which the ban on high volume hydraulic fracturing was prosecuted does not apply. This is therefore not a “loophole” in the law relating to the 2019 moratorium.
Despite its protestations however, it’s definitively a form of fracking. For one, the clue is in the name: hydraulic fracturing – which is quite literally, fracking. In other words, the process the fossil fuel companies plan to use at Burniston involves fracturing rock to obtain gas.
However, what Europa has said about the moratorium is correct – at least insofar as the fact it doesn’t apply to this specific form of fracking. Largely, the reason for this is the UK’s legal definition for fracking. Crucially, the Infrastructure Act 2015 only includes projects that involve the injection:
(i)more than 1,000 cubic metres of fluid at each stage, or expected stage, of the hydraulic fracturing, or
(ii)more than 10,000 cubic metres of fluid in total.
When the then Tory government implemented this, leading geologist professor Stuart Hazeldine at the University of Edinburgh lambasted it for only defining fracking by the amount of high pressure fluid injected. Tellingly, at the time he used the same word to describe this that anti-fracking campaigners have levied against the Burniston project. Then too, he branded it a word evidently instilling dread in the minds of Europa’s top brass: a “very large loophole”.
In fact, Hazeldine showed exactly why the definition was hugely controversial. In an analysis of more than 17,000 gas wells fracked in the US, he identified that 43% of these would elude the UK’s definition. For 4,500 fracked oil wells, 89% would not qualify as fracking under UK rules.
In short then, it is fracking by any other name. It’s just that the former government’s legal definition of fracking, and ergo its moratorium, doesn’t cover it.
The Canary talked to a spokeperson for Frack Free Scarborough, who have been fighting the project since Europa announced it. They told us that this had been a deliberate “sleight of hand”, emphasising that:
When we were campaigning, and Horse Hill were campaigning, and Preston New Road were campaigning, and everybody nationally was campaigning to get a fracking ban, people were campaigning for an end to all forms of fracking. That was the fight — to say, ‘We don’t want any of this. We don’t want acidification near Scunthorpe. We don’t want proppant squeeze in Wressle. We certainly don’t want high volume, high pressure fracking at Preston New Road or at KM8.’
But when you wake up on the morning of the renewed moratorium and the ink has dried, you realise they’ve just appeased people by saying fracking is not allowed, and all of this other stuff we’ve been campaigning about is still perfectly OK. It’s not.
Needless to say, this has certainly benefited fossil fuel companies like Egdon and Europa. Now, Burniston will be another case and point.
In fact, it actually isn’t the first time a fracking project like this has slipped through the moratorium’s widely-holed net. Another site part-owned by Europa, and operated by Egdon conducted the same process in 2021. Union Jack Oil also holds a stake in this licence.
At Wressle oil and gas field in North Lincolnshire, Egdon carried out a proppant squeeze operation for oil. The site the second largest producing onshore oilfield in the UK after Wytch Farm, in Dorset.
What’s more, only this September, North Lincolnshire Council greenlit Egdon to conduct two other smaller scale fracks at Wressle for oil.
Frack Free Scarborough’s spokesperson also raised with the Canary that obviously, the “political context has changed” with Labour now in government. And notably, in its manifesto, it promised to “ban fracking for good.”
Of course, this follows its opposition motion in 2022 to do just that as well. Vitally however, this was essentially to shift the moratorium into a permanent ban.
Ostensibly then, it referred to fracking as set out by the active legal definition in the Infrastructure Act. Obviously, it’s this which currently allows projects like Burniston to bypass the moratorium. In all likelihood then, the manifesto’s commitment will seek to do the same. And if this is the case, all fracking won’t be banned “for good” after all.
Despite this, Scarborough and Whitby MP Alison Hume has already come out against the project, so the Frack Free Scarborough spokesperson explained that:
As a campaign, one of the things that we will do is encourage Alison Hume and others in the Labour Party to put pressure on Keir Starmer to listen more strongly to us than he might be tempted to listen to the fossil fuel companies.
Already though, Starmer and his government are a little too close for comfort with the fossil fuel industry. The party cosied up to corporate lobbyists shilling for the oil and gas sector at its recent 2024 conference. In fact, Global Witness identified that oil and gas linked companies and organisations sponsored a fifth of its climate events.
What happens at Burniston will ultimately be a litmus test for the new government’s commitment to ending this environmentally destructive, and climate-wrecking fossil fuel practice. It could do so “for good” and for the good of all communities these companies are planning to impose themselves on. At this rate however, the new Labour government just might listen to those that shout the loudest with their wallet – and the lobbyists representing them that have had its ear all along.
Featured image via the Canary
This post was originally published on Canary.
On one of the most consequential nights in the 2024 presidential race, the fate of our entire planet received all of 120 seconds. Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump were each allotted one minute to discuss their plans for fighting the climate crisis during the September 10 presidential debate. Harris’s response to the question, which arrived in the final moments…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
Pittsburgh — A Pennsylvania-based fracking company is the subject of controversy after one of its projects was listed as an environmental justice initiative under a federal government program by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). An environmental monitoring project conducted by CNX Resources, a natural gas company headquartered in Pittsburgh, was included on a list of Justice40 efforts…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
With the presidential election just two months away, all eyes are on Pennsylvania. Donald Trump and Kamala Harris’s campaigns have each spent more than $130 million to advertise in the swing state, hoping to win its coveted 19 electoral votes and clear a path to the Oval Office. Since securing Pennsylvania is likely crucial for winning the overall election — Trump won the state in 2016 and…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
In her first major interview since replacing Joe Biden on the ballot, Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris was questioned about her shifting statements on fracking, which has been linked to a surge in methane gas emissions over the past decade. Harris, who has previously made comments opposing fracking, vowed not to ban it if elected. The vice president went on to highlight the Biden…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
This content originally appeared on Democracy Now! and was authored by Democracy Now!.
This post was originally published on Radio Free.
In her first major interview since replacing Joe Biden on the ballot, Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris was questioned about her shifting statements on fracking, which has been linked to a surge in methane gas emissions over the past decade. Harris, who has previously made comments opposing fracking, vowed not to ban it if elected. The vice president went on to highlight the Biden-Harris administration’s environmental record, which activists have criticized for vastly expanding oil production rather than drawing down the country’s reliance on fossil fuels. “The data is telling us that what Kamala Harris said about fracking — that we can do it without dealing with reducing the supply of fossil fuels — it’s just not borne out by the numbers,” explains The Lever’s David Sirota, who adds, “Ultimately, consequences for that will be on the United States, for the entire world.”
This content originally appeared on Democracy Now! and was authored by Democracy Now!.
This post was originally published on Radio Free.
Siri Lawson and her husband live on a stamp of wooded, hilly land in Warren County, Pennsylvania, nestled in the state’s rural northwest corner. During the summer heat, cars traveling on the county’s dirt roads cast plumes of dust in their wake. Winter’s chill can cause a hazardous film of ice to spawn on paved roads. To protect motorists from both slippery ice and vision-impairing dust…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
With residents of frontline communities in Texas and Louisiana protesting outside, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) approved on Thursday a crucial permit for a massive fossil gas export terminal in Southwest Louisiana that has become of one the nation’s biggest climate and environmental justice controversies. FERC authorized construction of CP2, a liquified natural gas (LNG) export…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
Fossil fuel financier Barclays is trying to weasel out of concrete climate action. Crucially, a new report has shown that the climate-wrecking bank won’t backdown from financing fracking.
New analysis by responsible investment non-profit ShareAction has revealed that Barclay’s recently updated energy policy flies in the face of the net zero commitment the company set in 2020. It found slippery loopholes which allow the company to continue providing a significant amount of finance for fracking.
The bank amended its energy policy in February, following negotiations with ShareAction and Barclays shareholders. It pledged to no longer directly finance new oil and gas projects and to restrict its financing of ‘pureplay’ companies. Specifically, these are corporations that focus exclusively on fossil fuel extraction and exploration.
However, Barclays has exempted pureplay companies working on short-term extraction projects from this commitment. Of course, fracking activities are typically short-term.
The analysis found that Barclays directed a third (34%) of its financing during 2016-2022 to upstream oil and gas companies to pureplay fossil fuel extraction and/or exploration companies.
It identified that Barclays has been decreasing the volume of its financing to pureplay companies since 2016. However, the same isn’t true of its financing for fracking.
Notably, the analysis showed that proportionally the majority of this financing – on average 57% – goes to companies specialising in fracking. On top of this, it rose to 80% in 2022 – or US $902 million – the latest year for which figures were available.
Alongside this, ShareAction’s analysis revealed how Barclays has taken advantage of another sneaky gap in its energy policies. In particular, the company has also committed to restrict financing for fracking in the UK and Europe. However, fracking is mostly banned or suspended in these regions, while the bank’s fracking client base is largely located in the US.
Campaign Manager at ShareAction Kelly Shields said:
Barclays’ energy policy contains loopholes that allow the bank to continue to financially support fracking – a risky activity that contributes to climate change and can destroy habitats and contaminate water supplies.
Barclays’ stance on fracking leaves it out of step with other large banks that have listened to the concerns of investors and customers and started taking steps to cut off support for this fossil fuel.
We’re calling on Barclays’ shareholders to ask the bank to close these loopholes and rule out financing for all pureplay oil and gas companies, including fracking clients, wherever they are in the world.”
In November, Extinction Rebellion glued shut over 50 Barclays branches to draw attention to the fossil fuel financier’s climate-wrecking investments.
The latest Banking on Climate Chaos report named Barclays among its “dirty dozen”. That is, the bank was one of the top financiers of fossil fuels between 2016–2022. During that period, it poured $190.5bn into the polluting sector.
Moreover, the report found that Barclays is Europe’s number one financier of fracking and the eighth largest globally. Many of Barclays’ peers such as HSBC and BNP Paribas have applied restrictions to financing for fracking in North America as well as the UK and Europe. BNP Paribas committed to cease financing for fracking in 2017.
YouGov surveyed the UK public last summer and over a third of UK adults said they would be likely to change banks if they discovered their bank was investing in companies that use large quantities of fossil fuels.
Of course, the public has already been boycotting the company over its unethical investments. Specifically, thousands of people have recently cancelled their bank accounts with Barclays over its unconscionable financing of Israel’s genocide.
So, once again, big banks like Barclays will continue to underpin the colonial extractivist economy at any cost – so long as its not their own.
Sign ShareAction’s petition to ask Barclays to close their policy loophole and stop financing fracking.
Feature image via Youtube – NBBJ ESI Design
This post was originally published on Canary.
A House committee is considering legislation introduced by Colorado Republican Rep. Lauren Boebert that could leave taxpayers on the hook for up to $17.7 billion in costs associated with cleaning up oil and gas wells abandoned on public lands by fracking companies and other polluters, according to a new report from the watchdog group Public Citizen. Oil and gas industry lobbyists and their allies…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
It’s been two years since United States Interior Secretary Deb Haaland announced the Honoring Chaco Initiative, a multiphase plan with the potential to transform how land stewardship decisions about mineral extraction, remediation and cleanup of extraction sites on federally controlled lands are made in the Greater Chaco Region of northern New Mexico. But members of the Greater Chaco Coalition are…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
Pittsburgh — Waste from the oil and gas industry contains toxic and radioactive substances. Disposal of this waste is supposed to be carefully tracked, but 800,000 tons of oil and gas waste from Pennsylvania oil and gas wells is unaccounted for, according to a recent study. Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh and Duquesne University initially set out to investigate whether sediment in…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
On Monday 21 August, a coalition of nonprofits urged for Global North nations and institutions to cancel the crushing debts they have imposed on Global South countries. Crucially, the campaigners said that these debts are locking indebted countries into exploiting their fossil fuel resources.
Around 35 groups, including ActionAid International and Friends of the Earth International, published a joint new report titled ‘The Debt Fossil Fuel Trap’. In it, they argued that countries such as Argentina and Mozambique may find it “impossible” to phase out fossil fuels and transition to renewable energy sources unless the debt-fossil fuel trap is resolved.
The report highlighted Argentina as a key example of the burden of the debt-fossil fuel trap. The country has pursued fracking in Northern Patagonia as it seeks to ease its debt crisis. Notably, this has been backed by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). As the Canary previously explained:
Since Argentina nationalised its oil company in 2012, the government has been aiming to dramatically increase the extraction and export of oil and gas. In particular, the government plans to increase petroleum exports to address the country’s spiralling debt and poverty.
Echoing this, the new report stated that:
global north powers, especially global north dominated institutions like the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank, have actively encouraged and enforced the continued reliance on commodity exporting in global south countries through, for instance, direct funding or conditions attached to loans pushing a policy prescription based on extractive development models that see natural resources, including fossil fuels, as a key opportunity for economic growth and development.
Indeed, financial institutions like the World Bank and IMF have been financing and pushing the destructive Vaca Muerta fracking megaproject in the region. As the Canary detailed, Vaca Muerta is:
the second-largest reservoir of shale gas in the world. Additionally, it holds the fourth-largest deposits of shale oil globally. The oil field is found mostly in the Neuquén province, and spans an area the size of Belgium.
Naturally, the large-scale project has devastated the Indigenous Mapuche communities of the Patagonian region.
Meanwhile, far from resolving the country’s economic strain, 350.org has estimated that the potential societal costs of the project – such as the public health impacts, and potential oil and gas leaks – could exceed US $5.6 trillion. This would amount to 13 times Argentina’s enormous national debt.
Of course, Global North fossil fuel majors like TotalEnergies also turn a profit through operations in the destructive Vaca Muerta fracking fields.
In addition, the new analysis also pointed out that many Global North countries:
continue to finance fossil fuel projects, often through loans, adding to debt burdens and keeping countries locked into fossil fuel production.
In May, G7 committed to maintaining the public financing of overseas gas projects. As the Canary underscored, this finance has facilitated ‘energy colonialism’ in the Global South. In particular, the G7’s funding has enabled new fossil gas projects which has primarily supported exports of energy, as opposed to supplying the domestic market.
On top of this, while finance continues to flow to fossil fuels, Global North nations have been shirking their climate funding pledges. The joint report detailed that as a result of their failure to deliver the necessary finance:
many global south countries are forced to find resources for adaptation, mitigation and addressing Loss and Damage elsewhere, including taking on more debt.
In other words, the rich countries which are already saddling poor countries in extortionate fossil fuel debts are also entrenching it further. Without adequate funds from wealthy nations, the Global South is forced to turn to its fossil fuel reserves. The revenue from the exports of these reserves then finances the growing costs of climate impacts.
Recent duplicitous discussions on the loss and damage fund have also exemplified the Global North’s bad-faith promises on climate finance. In November 2022, countries committed to the historic fund at the COP27 climate summit in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt. Delegates agreed to the fund to facilitate the vital transfer of finance to Global South countries. Specifically, the fund would direct aid to countries dealing with the devastating impacts of the climate crisis.
While Global South bloc negotiators articulated the need for grants-based finance, Global North nations doubled-down on private streams of funding. In particular, former colonising countries have argued for expanding existing loans and insurance-based funds for loss and damage. Needless to say, this will only add to the debt burdens of countries and communities on the frontlines of climate chaos.
Echoing this, Tess Woolfenden from Debt Justice said that:
High debt levels are a major barrier to phasing out fossil fuels for many global south countries. Many countries are trapped exploiting fossil fuels to generate revenue to repay debt.
She urged Global North countries to cancel debts for Global South nations “to prevent further climate turmoil”.
Meanwhile, Mae Buenaventura from the Asian People’s Movement on Debt and Development said that the root of the problem was:
the global north’s relentless extraction of human, economic and environmental resources to feed the drive for profit and greed.
In addition, Buenaventura argued that:
Surely, debt cancellation – especially of fossil fuel debts – is the least that rich countries and lenders can do to repay the global south, to make reparations and bring about restitution as a matter of justice
In short, Global South nations are bearing the brunt of the increasing number and intensity of climate-fueled extreme weather events. Given that these countries are the least responsible for the climate crisis, Global North countries should ditch these unjust debts once and for all.
Additional reporting via Agence France-Presse.
Feature image via Televisión Pública/Youtube screengrab.
Time itself is neutral; it can be used either destructively or constructively. More and more I feel that the people of ill will have used time much more effectively than have the people of good will. We have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of bad people, but for the appalling silence of the good people. Human progress never rolls in on wheels of inevitability; it comes through the tireless efforts of men and women willing to be coworkers with God, and without this hard work, time itself becomes an ally of the forces of social stagnation. We must use time creatively, in the knowledge that the time is always ripe to do right.
— Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., in “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” 1963
Two days ago I publicly read these words during a time for public comment of a Newark, NJ-based state agency, the Passaic Valley Sewerage Commission. In the Ironbound environmental justice neighborhood in inner city Newark, an area which already has three of them, PVSC plans to build a fourth fracked gas power plant. There has been a strong resistance movement against this plan for years, led by local residents, and we have jammed it up so far.
As one of the tactics used in fighting this project members of our movement have been attending, in person and virtually, the monthly meetings of this agency. This was probably the tenth such meeting I’ve attended and spoken at. Before each meeting I try to think of a different angle to get through to the PVSC board members. This time, because of my having read several months ago all five of Dr. King’s books, the idea came to me of reading from King’s Birmingham jail letter.
I don’t know enough about this group to know how “good” each of them are, but I’m sure most of them see themselves as upstanding citizens. So when I read it, I emphasized King’s line about the “appalling silence of the good people.”
What King wrote in 1963 is always applicable to some degree or the other. There are always people who live decent lives on a personal level, love their family and work hard but who never speak up or speak out about systemic injustice and oppression. Indeed, successful mass movements like the civil rights/Black Freedom movement of the 50’s and 60’s win important victories largely because they are able to dramatically expand the ranks of those willing to speak up and take action.
How can those of us already actively working for a just, peaceful and loving world do this today, right now, at this “worst of times” that can also become the “best of times” if we unite, stay strong and keep organizing?
The most important way is to be a consistently good example for others, day after day, hour after hour.
There is a deep and long history on the political Left worldwide of people who were once justice-seeking revolutionaries becoming corrupted after they individually or the movements they led got into positions of societal power. This historic fact is why we must reject individualistic, patriarchal and racist models of “leadership” and daily be all about building a progressive movement internal culture which is cooperative and supportive for all within it.
The building of this positive way of working together is most definitely another key way to help other good people—who most people are—to find their voice. It is extremely hard to have the emotional strength to speak out if there’s no community of support to do so. That community could be very small, even one or two close friends, but it can make all the difference.
But it’s more than personal and cultural. Also critical is not-yet-active good people seeing actions, events or demonstrations, in person or electronically, that make clear that there are a growing number of people joining in and throwing down. We need mass movements. Dr. King believed deeply that key to fundamental social transformation, to revolutionary change, is the tactic of mass nonviolent direct action. He believed that based on his practical experience in the brutally segregated South. Ever a visionary, he wrote, in the Birmingham letter:
“Now is the time to make real the promise of democracy and transform our pending national elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood. Now is the time to lift our national policy from the quicksand of racial injustice to the solid rock of human dignity.”
True then, still true now. Good people, speak out and rise up!
Last November the Canadian province of Alberta experienced the largest earthquake in its recorded history. Shortly thereafter a geologist from the University of Calgary claimed that the series of seismic events — which registered a 5.6 on the Richter scale as it rattled homes down to their bones and knocked residents to their knees — told a local publication that the earthquake was “probably…
As of Monday, more than 500 physicians and other medical professionals had signed on to a letter urging federal regulators to prevent the expansion of a fracked gas pipeline in the Pacific Northwest.
The sign-on campaign comes as the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) is expected to weigh in on TC Energy’s Gas Transmission Northwest (GTN) Xpress project as soon as this month.
The Canadian company’s proposed expansion would boost the capacity of a pipeline that runs through British Columbia, Canada and the U.S. states of Idaho, Washington, Oregon, and California.
“FERC should deny the permit for this pipeline expansion proposal, which is both unnecessary to meet our energy needs and harmful to people in our communities.”
“We are in a climate crisis, where we are already experiencing the devastating effects of rising temperatures, the direct result of burning fossil fuels, including so-called ‘natural gas,’ i.e., methane,” the health professionals wrote, noting that methane has more than 80 times the warming power of carbon dioxide over its first 20 years.
Dr. Ann Turner of Oregon Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR) said that “as medical practitioners, we see the impact the climate crisis has on people each and every day. And we have a responsibility to sound the alarm. We urge FERC to prioritize the health of our most vulnerable communities over profit.”
As the letter explains:
TC Energy proposes to increase the amount of gas in its existing pipelines by expanding compressor stations which provide the force which propels gas through pipelines. These compressor stations emit significant amounts of air pollution, both from the operation of the engine which powers the pump as well as from venting. Compressor stations and meter stations vent methane, volatile organic compounds like formaldehyde, particulate matter, nitrogen dioxide, and carbon monoxide. All of these air pollutants have serious health impacts, including increased risks of stroke, cancer, asthma and low birth weight, and premature babies. Compressor stations also produce significant noise pollution. The air and noise pollution from these compressor stations disproportionately harms the rural, low-income, and minority communities that already experience significant health disparities, especially those that are living in proximity to the pipeline expansion project.
“In addition to the health consequences from the pipeline expansion project itself, gas in the GTN pipeline is extracted by fracking in Canada,” the letter highlights. “Fracking degrades the environment including contamination of soil, water, and air by toxic chemicals. Communities exposed to these toxins experience elevated rates of birth defects, cancer, and asthma.”
“The negative health impacts of methane gas, and its contribution to warming the climate and polluting the air, are unacceptable impacts that disproportionately affect Black, Indigenous, and people of color and low-income communities,” the letter adds, arguing that the project is inconsistent with both global and regional goals to reduce planet-heating emissions.
Organizations supporting the letter include Wild Idaho Rising Tide as well as the San Francisco, Oregon, and Washington arms of PSR—which have previously joined other local groups in speaking out against the project alongside regional political figures including U.S. Democratic Sens. Jeff Merkley and Ron Wyden, both of Oregon.
\u201cTAKE ACTION: Sign on to the letter urging the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to deny the bid to expand shipments of fracked gas through WA.\nhttps://t.co/A86LLz8lRY\u201d— Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility (@Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility) 1678146398
“Idahoans dread FERC approval of the GTN Xpress expansion project, which would force greater fracked gas volumes and hazardous emissions through the aging GTN pipeline,” according to Helen Yost of Wild Idaho Rising Tide.
“This expansion project would further threaten and harm the health and safety of rural communities, environments, and recreation economies for decades,” she warned. “This proposed expansion does not support the best interests of concerned Northwesterners living and working near compressor stations and the pipeline route.”
Dr. Mark Vossler, a board member at Washington PSR, pointed out that “states in the Northwest have made great strides in reducing our dependence on fossil fuels and creating healthier communities.”
“I urge FERC to consider the human health impact of the proposed pipeline expansion and respect the leadership of local, state, and tribal governments in addressing the climate crisis,” he said. “FERC should deny the permit for this pipeline expansion proposal, which is both unnecessary to meet our energy needs and harmful to people in our communities.”
This post was originally published on Common Dreams.
The American Petroleum Institute and a pair of oil companies filed a petition for certiorari with the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday in a bid to overturn a lower federal court ruling that blocked fracking in public waters off California’s coast.
“The decision to halt fracking was exceedingly well-reasoned, and I hope the court rejects the oil industry’s reckless attempt to overturn the 9th Circuit’s ruling,” Kristen Monsell, oceans legal director at the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD), said in a statement. “Fracking is dangerous to whales, sea otters, and other marine wildlife, and this dirty, harmful technique has no place in our ocean.”
CBD and the Wishtoyo Foundation sued the Trump administration to stop offshore fracking in 2016. Then-California Attorney General Kamala Harris filed a similar case.
In 2018, U.S. District Judge Philip S. Gutierrez ordered a prohibition on permits for offshore fracking in federal waters off California, ruling that the U.S. Department of Interior (DOI) had failed to adhere to multiple federal laws.
A three-judge panel of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld Gutierrez’s decision last June, arguing that the DOI violated the Endangered Species Act, the National Environmental Policy Act, and the Coastal Zone Management Act when it allowed fracking in offshore oil and gas wells in all leased public waters off California.
In late August, the Biden administration, of which Harris is the vice president, asked the 9th Circuit for an en banc review to overturn the panel’s ruling.
The Biden administration’s request, which drew the ire of environmentalists because it would have enabled offshore fracking to resume, was denied in September.
“Fracking is dangerous to whales, sea otters, and other marine wildlife, and this dirty, harmful technique has no place in our ocean.”
In its June ruling, the 9th Circuit stated that the DOI “should have prepared a full [environmental impact statement] in light of the unknown risks posed by the well stimulation treatments and the significant data gaps that the agencies acknowledged.”
Instead, the agency “disregarded necessary caution when dealing with the unknown effects of well stimulation treatments and the data gaps associated with a program of regular fracking offshore California in order to increase production and extend well life,” the 9th Circuit wrote.
The panel’s decision prevents the DOI from issuing fracking permits until it completes Endangered Species Act consultations and published an environmental impact statement that “fully and fairly evaluate[s] all reasonable alternatives.”
In addition to the fact that offshore fracking increases planet-wrecking greenhouse gas emissions, tens of millions of gallons of toxic fracking wastewater have been dumped into the ocean since 2010.
According to CBD scientists, “At least 10 chemicals routinely used in offshore fracking could kill or harm a broad variety of marine species, including sea otters, fish, leatherback turtles, and whales.”
This post was originally published on Common Dreams.
