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Category: pollution

  • Extractive ‘green’ capitalists are abusing workers and communities in Europe and Asia for transition minerals

    Rampant extractive, exploitative capitalism is rearing its ugly head – but this time, it’s over the transition to greener, cleaner energy. As the world grapples with the transition away from fossil fuels to tackle the climate crisis, nations have been on the hunt for the vital minerals needed to power this shift to renewable technologies. Now, a new report has exposed over 400 abuse allegations tied to these transition minerals across Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

    Transition minerals: a litany of abuse allegations

    On Tuesday 30 April, the Business and Human Rights Resource Centre published a damning new report. Specifically, this identified a litany of abuse allegations linked to the development, extraction, and processing of transition minerals in countries across Eastern Europe and Central Asia (EECA).

    In the report, the Centre identified 20 critical transition minerals. Effectively, these are materials that manufacturers use for renewable energy technologies. This includes minerals for battery and other components to produce EVs. For example, this included minerals like copper, iron, lithium, and zinc.

    Of course, these minerals are vital as countries ramp up efforts to shift away from climate-wrecking fossil fuels. Invariably, nations are turning to green technology in order to meet their domestic and international climate commitments. At COP28, nations agreed to triple the global capacity of renewables this decade. As the Canary’s HG reported however, the big players at the G7 are currently falling short of this pledge. Nonetheless, as countries make moves in this direction, the pressure for supplies of transition minerals will creep up.

    However, it’s in this context that the Centre has previously revealed a shocking litany of abuse allegations over transition minerals in other regions. As the Canary previously reported for instance, a report it produced in March 2023 on the Andean region of South America revealed that:

    corporations are inflicting damage on the environment and the territories of peasant farmers and indigenous peoples.

    Similarly, a separate Business and Human Rights Resource Centre analysis from May 2023 revealed that mines in the Philippines and Indonesia had impacted the health of nearby communities.

    Now, the Centre has turned its attention to the EECA region, which is fast becoming a new hotspot for Europe’s supply.

    Harming workers and communities

    Titled ‘Fuelling injustice: Transition mineral impacts in Eastern Europe & Central Asia’, the report looked at the human rights and environmental abuses linked to transition minerals in the EECA region.

    Alarmingly, it identified a total of 421 allegations of abuse across 16 countries between 2019 and 2023. It documented allegations in the following: Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Kyrgyzstan, North Macedonia, Montenegro, Russia, Serbia, Tajikistan, Ukraine and Uzbekistan.

    The allegations detailed a number of human rights and environmental impacts such as labour rights violations, air, soil, and water pollution, and harm to the health of people living and working near mining and processing infrastructure.

    Of course, workers and communities bore the brunt of these human rights and environmental abuses. Allegations impacted workers in 185 instances, with communities hot on their heels at 178 cases.

    As the report noted, for communities these allegations mostly caused environmental impacts, such that:

    Water pollution accounted for 29% of all impacts on communities, closely followed by air pollution (27%) and soil pollution (22%).

    Alongside this, mining and mineral processing also impacted local community livelihoods in 16% of the allegations. These included reports of:

    roads destroyed by open quarries, damaged or collapsed houses, pollution of agricultural and grazing lands, and water contamination.

    Overall, occupational health and safety violations was the top human rights impact associated with transition mineral mining in the region, accounting for 64% of all impacts on workers.

    On top of this, the report found workplace deaths linked to 28% of allegations impacting them, with 52 recorded allegations. Meanwhile, workplace injuries (18%) were also a major concern. Further to this, labour rights issues accounted for 20% of allegations. These included, among other issues, unpaid and underpaid wages, access to information about terms of work contracts, workplace discrimination, long working hours and violations of freedom of association.

    Europe’s drive for transition minerals

    Since Russia invaded Ukraine, Europe has been attempting to cut its dependence on it for its source of transition minerals. However, despite a mass of sanctions, it has continued to to plough billions into mining companies linked to the Kremlin.

    For instance, investigative outlet Investigate Europe found that Europe imported critical minerals to the tune of €13.7bn between March 2022 and July 2023. And the Centre’s new report has laid out the human costs of this.

    Notably, Russia topped the analysis for the number of abuse allegations, at 112 reports associated with transition mineral mining and processing.

    In March, the EU Commission put forward its proposals for the Critical Raw Materials Act (CRMA). Ostensibly, this is partly in response to the EU’s growing need for critical minerals for the green energy transition. Notably, the bloc currently relies on supplies from Russia and China and wants to change this.

    Given this, the CRMA plans to break this dependency and aims for instance for:

    • Extraction from Europe to meet 10% of the EU’s consumption
    • Processing capacity to meet 40% of its consumption

    So, as part of this CRMA strategy, the EU is seeking ‘strategic partnerships’ with other mineral-rich nations.

    It has already signed strategic partnerships with two countries in the EECA region (Ukraine and Kazakhstan). As well as this, it has initiated negotiations on a strategic partnership with Uzbekistan.

    However, non-profits have already raised their concerns over these. In particular, they have noted the lack of transparency and consultation with local communities. In tandem with this, they pointed out the agreements’ insufficient human rights protection safeguards and responsible business conduct requirements.

    For example, in a briefing, they highlighted that:

    In the draft CRMA, the language on environmental impacts, human rights and engagement with local communities remains vague, failing to mention key international instruments or standards.

    In addition to this, they underscored how:

    Efforts to analyse Strategic Partnerships are hampered by a concerning lack of transparency in negotiations and the lack of an inclusive, deliberative, truly participatory, consultation process. Communities impacted by mining, and trade unions, environmental and human rights NGOs have not been consulted, and key stakeholders have had to rely on press releases with incomplete information

    Exposing the “scale and severity of human rights abuse”

    As such, the new research points to the urgent need for significant changes in the EECA mining sector. Crucially, this will be vital if countries are to achieve a fast and fair energy transition.

    Senior researcher for Eastern Europe and Central Asia at the Business & Human Rights Resource Centre Ella Skybenko said:

    While we can all agree the rapid transition to clean energy is essential for the survival of our planet, it is extremely concerning to see this happening at the cost of further harm to human rights and the environment. Our research exposes the scale and severity of human rights abuses and environmental damage caused by mining and processing transition minerals in EECA. The companies responsible for this must no longer be able to enjoy impunity.

    A just transition to clean energy must centre on three core principles: shared prosperity, human rights and social protection, and fair negotiations. Disappointingly, in the EECA region, all three of these principles are currently missing when it comes to transition minerals project development, extraction and processing. There is an urgent need to transform existing business models in the EECA extractive sector if we are to ensure the transition to clean energy is just and sustainable – and does not come at the expense of people and the environment.

    Ultimately, the green energy transition should be just and fair. However, the new report shows that while the usual extractive capitalists are in the driving seat, it’s a far cry from either.

    Feature image via Youtube – Kyiv Post

    By Hannah Sharland

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • On the agenda this Earth Day: A global treaty to end plastic pollution

    Illustration of plastic objects grouped into a circle with a leafy vine in the center

    The spotlight

    Hey there, Looking Forward fam. Happy Earth Day (and Earth Week, and Earth Month) — a time of year when sustainability is elevated in the global consciousness, and my inbox is full of vaguely greenwashy PR pitches.

    Each April, I (and every other climate journalist) revisit the same debate: whether to “cover Earth Day” in some way, or ignore it on account of the fact that we’re immersed in these issues every day. But it struck me that Earth Day 2024 has a particularly timely theme: Planet vs. Plastics. The official Earth Day organization has been assigning yearly themes since at least 1980, and Planet vs. Plastics is hitting in the year when U.N. members are supposed to be finalizing a global treaty to address plastic pollution.

    “We’ve had research for 30 years now saying that plastics are dangerous to our health,” said Aidon Charron, director of End Plastic Initiatives at EarthDay.org. But he and others at the organization chose plastics as this year’s focus because they saw a gap in public knowledge, both about the harm that plastics can cause and about the policy solutions that are currently being debated on an international stage. Discussions about plastic tend to focus on individuals doing their part by reducing, reusing, and recycling, Charron said — but “we’re not going to simply recycle our way or technology our way out of this problem.”

    Charron and other advocates have been pushing for ambitious targets in the global plastics treaty, and EarthDay.org is circulating a petition, which currently has over 22,000 signatures, for some of its key objectives, which include banning the export and incineration of plastic waste and a “polluter pays” principle. “What we don’t want to see is something similar to the Paris Climate Agreement,” said Charron. “While that was a great agreement, the issue is it’s voluntary, and so countries can opt in and opt out. And there’s also no punishment if somebody doesn’t meet the standards they set for themselves.”

    A crowd of people hold up large banners and signs showing anti-plastic slogans

    On Sunday, EarthDay.org and other campaigners organized a march in Ottawa, demanding a strong and ambitious global plastics treaty. EARTHDAY.ORG

    But the negotiations on the treaty have been fraught with competing interests — and even as the deadline nears, much remains to be sorted out. This week, delegates and advocates are gathering in Ottawa, Canada, for the fourth intergovernmental negotiating committee, or INC-4 — the second-to-last session on the books before the U.N.’s self-imposed deadline to finalize the agreement at the end of this year. As the parties have failed to make significant progress at the previous three meetings, the stakes at INC-4 are high.

    So, today, I’m turning the newsletter over to the capable hands of my colleague Joseph Winters, who covers the plastics industry and has been following the negotiations of the global plastics treaty for the past two years. Read on a primer on the history of the treaty, the solutions being proposed in it, and where things stand as negotiators head into another round of discussions this week.

    — Claire Elise Thompson

    -----

    To understand the global plastics treaty, it’s helpful to go back to the 2022 U.N. Environment Assembly meeting, where delegates agreed to write it. By then, plastics had long been considered an environmental scourge. The world was — and still is — producing more than 400 million metric tons of the material every year, almost entirely from fossil fuel feedstocks. Just five years prior, researchers had shown that 91 percent of the world’s plastics were not recycled due to high costs and technological barriers.

    Agreeing to write some kind of treaty was seen as a big success, but the icing on the cake was the promise to address not only plastic litter, but “the full life cycle” of plastics. This opened the door to discussions around limiting plastic production, which most experts consider to be a nonnegotiable part of an effective mitigation strategy for plastic pollution. They liken it to an overflowing bathtub: better to “turn off the tap” — i.e., stop making plastic — rather than try to mop up the floor while the water’s still running.

    Experts see the treaty as a critical opportunity to stop the fossil fuel industry’s pivot to plastic production, as the world begins to phase out oil and gas from transportation and electricity generation. None of the details are even close to being finalized — but observers have called the treaty the “most significant” international environmental deal since 2015, when countries agreed to limit global warming under the Paris Agreement. And advocates hope that this agreement will ultimately have even more teeth.

    Under a very optimistic scenario, it could include global, legally binding plastic production caps for all U.N. member states, plus some details on how rich countries should help poorer ones achieve their plastic reduction targets. The treaty might ban particular types of plastic, plastic products, and chemical additives used in plastics, and set legally binding targets for recycling and recycled content used in consumer goods. It could also chart a path for a just transition for waste pickers in the developing world who make a living from collecting and selling plastic trash. But such a far-reaching agreement is by no means guaranteed; some countries and industry groups are working hard to water down the treaty’s ambition, and have thus far limited negotiators’ progress.

    . . .

    When delegates first met in Punta del Este, Uruguay, in November 2022, it became clear that a vocal minority of countries — mostly oil-producing states including Saudi Arabia and Russia, as well as the U.S., to some extent — wanted to bend the treaty away from plastic production limits by focusing instead on better recycling and cleanup efforts. Petrochemical companies are also pushing for a focus on recycling, despite their trade groups knowing since the 1980s that plastics recycling would be unable to keep up with booming production.

    This disagreement — production versus pollution — has been central to each meeting since then, stalling progress at every turn. Although delegates have held important discussions on plastic-related chemicals and the impact of the treaty on frontline communities, by the end of INC-3 last November, negotiators still hadn’t written anything beyond a so-called “zero draft,” basically a laundry list of options and suboptions for various parts of the treaty. They also failed to agree on an agenda for “intersessional” work between INC-3 and INC-4, meaning they could not use those intervening months to continue formal discussions, although several countries arranged unofficial meetings.

    In a provisional note released ahead of this week’s negotiations, INC chair Luis Vayas Valdivieso made paring down the revised zero draft a key priority for delegates at INC-4. The committee should “streamline” the document, he wrote, and set an agenda for intersessional work to be completed in the months between INC-4 and INC-5.

    “INC-4 is going to be likely the most important of all the INCs,” said Ana Rocha, global plastics program director for the nonprofit Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives.

    In the foreground, a crowd stands before a stage where a handful of leaders are sitting, waiting to speak. In the background is Canada's Parliament Hill.

    The march on Sunday began with a rally outside of Parliament Hill, where crowds heard from activists and Indigenous leaders who traveled from all over the world to join the demonstration. EARTHDAY.ORG

    One of the key priorities for advocates is some kind of quantitative production limit. “If the goal is to end plastic pollution, it’ll be really hard to do without a cap on virgin plastic production,” said Douglas McCauley, an associate professor of ecosystem ecology at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

    Some of the most specific recommendations are based on plastic’s contribution to climate change. To limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit), the nonprofit Pacific Environment calculated last year that global plastic production should be cut by 75 percent by 2050, compared to a 2019 baseline. The Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives has proposed a 12 to 17 percent reduction every year starting in 2024.

    A so-called “high-ambition coalition” of countries — including Norway, Rwanda, Canada, Peru, and a host of small island and developing states — say they support production limits as part of the plastics treaty, although they have not yet rallied around a particular target. It’s also possible that the treaty will have to rely on indirect measures to restrict plastic production, like bans on single-use plastics or a tax on plastic packaging.

    . . .

    Public health has emerged as another major, and surprisingly popular, priority for the treaty. Even in the two short years since world leaders first agreed to broker a treaty, lots of new evidence has emerged to highlight the human and environmental health risks associated with plastics. Last month, scientists raised the number of chemicals known to be used in plastics from 13,000 to 16,000. More than 3,000 of these substances are known to have hazardous properties, while a much larger fraction — about 10,000 — have never been assessed for toxicity. According to one recent analysis from the nonprofit Endocrine Society, plastic-related health problems cost the U.S. $250 million per year.

    As of last November, more than 130 countries supported incorporating human health into the treaty’s primary objective, and many explicitly said they wanted the agreement to somehow control problematic chemicals. This is currently reflected in the zero draft, in proposals to prioritize “chemicals and polymers of concern,” putting them first in line for bans and restrictions. Some substances that would likely be included on this list are polyvinyl chloride, or PVC — the plastic used to make water pipes and some toys — as well as endocrine-disrupting chemicals like phthalates, bisphenols, and PFAS.

    Bjorn Beeler, general manager and international coordinator for the nonprofit International Pollutants Elimination Network, said that chemicals are the most “matured” part of the treaty.

    Other sections, however — like the financial details of how countries will pay for the provisions of the agreement — have been largely unaddressed. With so much left to negotiate and so little time, questions are swirling around whether there will have to be an additional meeting after INC-5, or perhaps an INC-4.1 during the summer.

    For now, many environmental advocates say it’s important that negotiators stick to the original schedule, running INC-4 under the assumption that they can and will finish the treaty by 2025. Should they need an extension, they can consider how best to coordinate that at a later date. Rocha, with the Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives, said she’d rather extend the timeline than rush through a weak agreement.

    “More important than an ambitious timeline is an ambitious treaty,” she said.

    — Joseph Winters

    More exposure

    See for yourself

    Last call for the Looking Forward drabble contest! This is the final week to share your 100-word vision for a clean, green, just future, for a chance to win presents.

    To submit: Send your drabble to lookingforward@grist.org with “Drabble contest” in the subject line, by the end of Friday, April 26 (two days away)!

    Here’s the prompt: Choose ONE climate solution that excites you, and show us how you hope it will evolve over the next 100 years to contribute to building a clean, green, just future. We’ve covered a boatload of solutions you could draw from (100, in fact!) — so if you need some inspiration, peruse the Looking Forward archive here.

    Drabbles offer little glimpses of the future we dream about, so paint us a compelling picture of how you hope the world, and our lives on it, will evolve.

    Here’s what we’re looking for:

    • Descriptive writing that makes us feel immersed in the scene and setting.
    • A sense of time. You don’t have to put a specific timestamp on your piece, but give us some clue that we are in the future (not an alternate reality), approximately 100 years from now, and that certain things have changed.
    • A sense of feeling. Is this vignette about joy? Frustration? Excitement? Nervousness? The mundane pleasure of living in a world where needs are met? Make us feel something!
    • 100 words on the dot.

    The winning drabbles will be published in Looking Forward in May, and the winners will receive presents! Some Grist-y swag, and a book of your choice lovingly packaged and mailed to you by Claire.

    A parting shot

    On Monday (Earth Day), in collaboration with a conservation organization called Oceana Canada, EarthDay.org projected an illuminated message onto the Canadian Supreme Court building in Ottawa, reading “plastic is toxic.” Similar messages were also projected onto Parliament Hill and the Canadian National Arts Centre, sending a clear message to leaders ahead of the treaty negotiations this week.

    A view of Canada's Supreme Court building at nighttime, with large capital letters shining on it, spelling out "PLASTIC IS TOXIC"

    This story was originally published by Grist with the headline On the agenda this Earth Day: A global treaty to end plastic pollution on Apr 24, 2024.


    This content originally appeared on Grist and was authored by Joseph Winters.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • 23 States Ask EPA Not to Consider Environmental Racism When Regulating Pollution

    Echoing arguments similar to those used by the conservative majority on the U.S. Supreme Court striking down affirmative action, Republican attorneys general from 23 states petitioned the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency this week to stop taking race into account when regulating pollution. The petition, authored by the office of Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody, was filed Tuesday with the…

    Source

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • Polluters Must Foot the Bill for Cleaning Up “Forever Chemicals” Under New Rule

    regulators on Friday finalized a rule designating two widespread PFAS chemicals as hazardous substances, a step the agencies says will ensure polluters pay to clean up contamination and reduce Americans’ exposure to the toxic chemicals. Under the federal Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA), or Superfund law, the rule will require leaks and spills of…

    Source

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • At Dutch banking giant ING’s AGM communities will call out the company’s environmental racism

    Activists from the world are uniting against Dutch banking giant ING’s environmental racism. Specifically, at the company’s upcoming AGM they plan to call out ING’s financing of a big polluter and climate-wrecking industries harming marginalised communities throughout the Global North and South.

    On Monday 22 April community defenders from the US, Mexico, Brazil, Liberia, and the Czech Republic will attend ING’s AGM to call out the company’s financing for destructive big polluters.

    Fossil fuel finance accountability non-profit BankTrack and Netherlands climate campaign group Fossielvrij have facilitated their travel to Amsterdam, to take on the banking giant at this key meeting.

    ING financed ‘sacrifice zones’

    Significantly, the coalition of community representatives will draw attention to ING’s financing for liquified natural gas (LNG) and steel projects decimating local communities across the globe.

    In the US, ING has financed seven LNG terminals in the Gulf South, Texas, with more in the pipeline. Notably, data from the IJGlobal database shows that just last year in 2023, ING provided at least US $1.4bn in finance to these LNG terminals and companies planning further expansion.

    There, the ING financed facilities are adding to the already toxic levels of air and water pollution. Of course, this is because companies have situated this infrastructure in the Texas petrochemical corridor.

    Two community defenders fighting projects in their towns of Port Arthur and Freeport will take ING to task for the impacts these are having on the health of residents. Predictably, the LNG projects are disproportionately harming Black and Brown communities in these locations.

    Ostensibly then, these are ‘sacrifice zones’, which as the Guardian has previously articulated, refer to:

    parts of the United States where rates of cancer caused by air pollution exceed the US government’s own limit of “acceptable risk.”

    Crucially, Black and Brown communities make up a disproportionate percentage of the people in these ‘sacrifice zones’. In other words, they are overrepresented in places sitting on the frontlines of the toxic impact from these polluting facilities.

    Calling out environmental racism

    Given this, founder and CEO of the Port Arthur Community Action Network John Beard is attending the AGM in protest. At ING’s meeting in 2023, Beard previously called the company out on its environmental racism. However, the AGM shut down his question, since it did not concern company profits.

    Meanwhile, director of Better Brazoria Melanie Oldham will also be testifying to the meeting on the environmental and health impacts of these LNG terminals in her city of Freeport, Texas.

    She said that:

    LNG projects, including Freeport LNG near my town, are literally killing us and our Earth. Many frontline community leaders from environmental injustice “sacrificed” Gulf Coast areas, including me, have already travelled to the Netherlands to tell ING our stories.

    We demanded that ING stop financing LNG. However, ING management has refused to take any action so far. ING should take the lead and stop financing risky, proven dangerous, health damaging, methane spewing LNG facilities present and proposed on the US Gulf Coast.

    They are adding their names to the representatives of these communities who have been challenging ING’s finance for the past year.

    In October 2023, four residents from the Gulf of Mexico held a demonstration in front of ING’s offices in Rotterdam, calling on the bank to end finance for LNG expansion.

    Steel industry decimating Global South communities

    Of course, ING is also financing environmentally destructive industries in the Global South. Specifically, it is funding a number of steel companies across Brazil, Mexico, and Liberia.

    For instance, ING finances Ternium’s steel plant in Rio de Janeiro in Brazil. The facility is heavily polluting, and disproportionately impacting the health and livelihoods of Black and Brown communities living nearby.

    Meanwhile, ING-funded ArcelorMittal owns the ArcelorMittal Liberia iron ore mine in Nimba county, Liberia. Naturally, the company is attempting to expand its production. Of course, this is despite decades of allegations of corruption, broken promises for social development contributions, and massive biodiversity loss that threatens the livelihoods of local communities living near the mine.

    Similarly, in Jalisco, Mexico, Ternium and ArcelorMittal jointly operate the Peña Colorada iron ore mine. There, three human rights defenders opposing the mine were murdered in 2023.

    Demanding “social, environmental and climate justice now”

    As such, three members of the Fair Steel Coalition from these communities will attend ING’s AGM. These include community organiser at PACs Brazil Ana Luisa Queiroz, co-founder of Green Advocates Liberia John Nimly Brownell, and Eduardo Mosqueda, a human rights lawyer and founder of Tskini, from Mexico.

    Brownell said:

    I’m attending ING’s AGM because I want ArcelorMittal Liberia to address its social and environmental impacts, from customary land grabs to the loss of water and wildlife through pollution. I want ArcelorMittal to value the environment, respect human rights and provide sustainable livelihoods for the communities affected by its mines. The areas damaged by AML’s operations can never be restored to their original natural beauty.

    Adding to this, Mosqueda said that:

    The steel companies that ING finances have torn down hundreds of hectares of forests, covered our communities in dust, and dried up our water supplies. Meanwhile the Indigenous defenders who oppose this model have disappeared or are murdered. We are in Amsterdam now to tell ING that they are just as responsible for their clients’ actions, and that we, the people of the global south, demand social, environmental and climate justice now.

    ING is the third largest European financier of steel. Specifically, it has funded the industry to the tune of US $6bn between 2016 and June 2023.

    Crucially, ArcelorMittal is ING’s largest steel client. According to financial research by Reclaim Finance, since 2016 ING has provided US $3.4bn to ArcelorMittal through loans, bonds and shares. In addition, ING also provided US $100m of $1.5bn loan to Ternium in 2017. In particular, this was for the company to acquire its steel mill in Sao Paulo and set up Ternium Brazil.

    And as well as causing these huge environmental and health harms for people and biodiversity, the industry is responsible for 11% of global carbon emissions due to its reliance on coal.

    Cut ties with community and climate-wrecking projects

    So, on Monday, these community members from across the world will take ING to task for its rampant environmental racism. Inside the AGM, they will call out the banking giant for underpinning these ecocidal and human rights violating projects.

    That evening, they will share their stories about the impact of ING’s finance on people, workers and the climate. They will be highlighting these experiences at a storytelling event in Pakhuis de Zwijger in Amsterdam.

    In tandem with this, Dutch environmental organisation Milieudefensie (Friends of the Earth Netherlands) has prepared volunteers to enter the AGM. It will do so with the clear demand that ING:

    Adhere to the Paris climate agreement, so at least 48% fewer emissions in absolute terms (scope 1, 2 and 3) compared to 2019 by 2030, or we’ll see you in court

    In January, it launched legal action against ING over its inadequate climate policy.

    Together, community defenders will shed light on ING’s financing of ecocidal, racist, and climate-wrecking projects the world over. Vitally, they hope to compel the company to cut ties with these projects. Only then, can it finally bring the harm it is causing to their communities to an end.

    Featured image via BankTrack

    By Hannah Sharland

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Just Stop Oil just exposed the greenwashing at Earth Fest for all the world to see

    Just Stop Oil fundraisers were kicked out of greenwashing Earth Fest for doing anti-capitalist fundraising. Ironic, really, considering the group was one of the few things that was actually addressing the climate crisis properly at the sham Earth Fest.

    Just Stop Oil: showing up Earth Fest

    Two Just Stop Oil supporters were forcibly ejected from Earth-Fest whilst collecting donations for the group. The supporters were asking attendees to financially support effective direct action whilst donations to Just Stop Oil are doubled for the next three days:

    Earth Fest has been criticised for being a ‘greenwashing’ event with sponsors including AutoTrader and attendees including JP Morgan, Jet 2, Tesla, and Drax.

    Peak greenwashing

    For example, as the Canary previously reported Drax is the UK’s single largest carbon emitter, and world’s biggest tree burner. The company currently receives around £1.7 million per day in renewable subsidies from UK energy bills to burn wood – some of which comes from protected forests.

    Meanwhile, Tesla has also come under repeated fire for its “capitalist sham solutions” to the climate crisis. As the Canary previously detailed, the extractive mining and manufacture of electric vehicles is a carbon-intensive and exploitative process:

    There’s still the not so small matter that producing vehicles to replace the entire existing petroleum fleet will generate a lot of emissions. On top of this, you have the pollution and ecological destruction of extracting the multitude of critical minerals required for their manufacture. Not to mention the labour violations, rights abuses, and land-grabbing linked to mining for these materials.

    Mack Preston and Isla Greenwood, a former Greenpeace fundraiser, carried buckets asking for donations at Earth Fest whilst wearing Just Stop Oil t-shirts. The pair took to a megaphone and could be heard saying “Are we really going to sit here and talk about electric cars? We need radical action!”

    Give us your money (but not in the Bob Geldof way)

    For the next three days, until Earth Day, all donations to Just Stop Oil will be doubled by a group of generous donors.

    You can donate to the campaign and have your donation doubled here – money better spent than at Earth Fest.

    A spokesperson for the group said:

    We’re out of time. It is no longer appropriate to be sitting in endless conferences that achieve nothing. We need radical action now and we need system change to avoid the worst effects of ongoing climate breakdown and societal collapse.

    We need to be funding effective direct action that gets the headlines and forces this issue up the news agenda and to the forefront of the public consciousness. History has shown over and over that disruptive civil resistance gets the goods. Donate to Just Stop Oil and have it doubled at Just Stop Oil.org.

    Featured image and additional images via Just Stop Oil

    By Steve Topple

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Should the Scottish government bring in a new ‘ecocide’ law? By the looks of it, yes.

    A new report commissioned by the Environmental Rights Centre for Scotland (ERCS) considers how the unprecedented support for criminalising ecocide can translate into a ‘workable domestic offence’ in Scotland that can hold polluters to account.

    The report cautions that without sufficient investment in environmental enforcement agencies and existing methods of environmental protection, the impact of a law is likely to be limited.

    Ecocide: a new law needed in Scotland

    As campaign group Stop Ecocide notes, the legal definition of the terms means “unlawful or wanton acts committed with knowledge that there is a substantial likelihood of severe and either widespread or long-term damage to the environment being caused by those acts”.

    The new report comes after Monica Lennon MSP launched a public consultation in November 2023 on her proposed Member’s Bill to create a Scottish ecocide law, and is intended to inform proposals for the criminalisation of ecocide – the mass-destruction of nature – in Scotland.

    Co-authored by legal experts Dr Rachel Killean and professor Damien Short, the report draws from existing and developing ecocide laws across the world.

    After reviewing approaches to the domestic criminalisation of ecocide, the report moves on to discuss legal definitions and examples of implementation, sentencing, and enforcement which could be considered for Scotland.

    Finding ‘no evidence’ that criminalising ecocide would make ‘a substantial difference to environmental protection on its own’, the report recommends prioritising investment into Scotland’s environmental enforcement agencies and tackling existing environmental crimes effectively.

    Ecocide has increasingly gained attention as a mechanism to hold the worst polluters to account for severe environmental destruction.

    The European Parliament voted to criminalise ‘cases comparable to ecocide’ as part of a new Environmental Crime Directive in February, while a number of countries including Belgium have made recent moves to introduce laws.

    ‘Forcefully’ holding polluters to account

    Dr Shivali Fifield, chief officer at ERCS, said:

    Our report looks at what Scotland can learn from approaches across the world to create a meaningful and enforceable ecocide law here. We are so grateful to Dr Killean and Prof Short for their analysis and I urge you to read the report and take note of their five recommendations.

    The first critical question they ask is: ‘Why create a domestic ecocide law?’ The ecocide roundtable ERCS convened in January was clear that the current extent of ecological harm and degradation in Scotland is largely due to the lack of enforcement of existing environmental laws.

    Incorporating ecocide into Scots law must be seen in the context of improving the overall environmental governance regime, including establishing a dedicated Scottish Environment Court.

    Only then will we be able to forcefully hold polluters to account and send a clear message that no infringement of environmental law will be tolerated in Scotland.

    Monica Lennon MSP said:

    This welcome report recognises the unprecedented levels of support for making ecocide a crime nationally and globally.

    My member’s bill proposal seeks to place Scotland at the forefront of ecocide law. The ERCS ecocide report makes a positive contribution to the debate.

    No single piece of legislation can tackle climate, nature and pollution threats alone, but ecocide law has the potential to make a huge difference.

    I am grateful to everyone who responded to my consultation and to experts who are taking the time to examine how we can make ecocide law work well in Scotland.

    A petition from We Move Europe on ecocide can be signed here.

    Featured image via We Move Europe – screengrab

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Oil Production in the GCC: Urgent Evaluation of Human Rights Concerns in the Region

    Seventy-six million metric tons of oil reserves are located in the Arab Gulf, constituting around 66% of the global reserves. Oil represents a prominent source of income in the Middle East, proven by the increased production during the last decades. From 1980, oil production passed from 11 million barrels per day to 18 million. The two biggest producers in the region are Saudi Arabia and UAE, respectively, making 39 and 14 percent of the total share. Various studies show that the industry causes significant methane emissions, contributing to global warming and other emissions that create significant health risks for citizens. Notably, on 28 November 2023, the BBC warned that toxic gas in the Middle East is putting millions at risk. In particular, the article showed how oil production was spreading gases over hundreds of kilometers in the region, possibly jeopardizing the health of the residents.

    Most GCC countries have appointed Commissions or National Councils to preserve the environment and control the health risks associated with oil production. The leading producer (Saudi Arabia) has also committed to contributing to the Paris Agreement through different measures. To mention some, installing 50 gigawatts of renewable and nuclear energy can reduce the country’s emissions during production.

    Nonetheless, these measures are still insufficient to mitigate the negative impacts of energy production in the GCC. In an article from December 2023, Human Rights Watch (HRW) highlighted that exposure to particulate matter (PM 2.5) in the UAE was eight times higher than what the World Health Organization (WHO) considers safe. Based on the estimates of the organization, approximately 1872 people have died in 2023 due to outdoor air pollution. The BBC also showed that the GCC countries, due to gas flaring (burning of waste gas during oil drilling), endanger the lives of millions in the region. In particular, pollutants from flaring include PM 2.5 and Ozone NO2, which, at high levels, have been linked to strokes, cancer, asthma, and heart diseases.

    Alarmingly, UAE national oil company Adnoc, run by Sultan al-Jaber, committed 20 years ago to end gas flaring; nonetheless, satellite assessment shows that it occurs daily. Other states, like Iraq and Kuwait, analyzed in the BBC study, declined to comment. On the other hand, oil companies like Saudi Aramco and Shell said they are working to reduce the practice.

    The urgency in mitigating the negative impact of oil production in the Middle East has been vividly stressed. The UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and the Environment, David R. Boyd, recently commented: ‘’ Big oil companies and states in the Middle East are violating the human rights of millions of people by failing to tackle air pollution from fossil fuels.’’. ADHRB also expresses concerns over the health of millions of residents in the region. Acknowledging that respiratory diseases are the leading cause of death in the area, our organization considers that new positive steps should be taken. In particular, ADHRB points out the pronouncements of the Human Rights Committee in view of the case Portillo Caceres v. Paraguay, affirming that states must protect individual degradation under Article 6 of the ICCPR (Right to Life). With these aspects in mind, we stress the need for accountability for human rights violations, which, in this instance, are challenging due to political considerations and the dependency of the West on Middle East oil.

    The post Oil Production in the GCC: Urgent Evaluation of Human Rights Concerns in the Region appeared first on Americans for Democracy & Human Rights in Bahrain.

    This post was originally published on Americans for Democracy & Human Rights in Bahrain.

  • Fossil fuel major Shell is trying to slip away from Nigeria oil spill pollution – but rights groups have called it out

    Human rights groups have called out fossil fuel major Shell’s plans to palm off its projects in the Niger Delta. Crucially, they are highlighting to Nigeria’s government that the company must guarantee Shell honours its responsibilities to local communities, especially regarding pollution.

    Shell pollution in the Nigeria

    The Anglo-Dutch fossil fuel major started operating in Nigeria in the 1950s. Since then, the company has routinely polluted the Niger Delta with oil spills, destroying ecosystems and community livelihoods. The Niger Delta is the heartland of Nigeria’s crude production.

    Moreover, as the Canary previously explained Shell has a notorious history of rights violation in the country:

    The Niger Delta in Nigeria is the site of perhaps one of the most infamous cases of fossil fuel human rights abuse. In 1995, the Nigerian government executed nine activists who were opposing Shell’s operations in the delta. This included writer and human rights activist Ken Saro-Wiwa. For decades, widowers of the Ogoni Nine – the men who were arbitrarily detained and executed without fair trial – have been fighting for justice. They took Shell to court, claiming that the company was complicit in the death of their husbands. However, in March 2022, a district court in the Hague dismissed the case due to insufficient evidence to prove Shell’s role.

    Shell has repeatedly denied any involvement in the execution of the Ogoni 9. However, in 2009, it settled out of court with the Saro-Wiwa estate, relatives of members of the Ogoni 9, and others who faced human rights violations at the hands of the company for a sum of $15.5m.

    Farming and fishing communities in the Niger Delta have fought years of legal battles over damage from oil spills in the area. In November, the High Court in London ruled that over 13,000 Nigerian farmers and fishers could take Shell to court. Specifically, as the Guardian reported:

    The judge ruled it was arguable the pollution had fundamentally breached the villagers’ right to a clean environment under the Nigerian constitution and the African charter on human and people’s rights. Claims under these rights have no limitation period.

    Given all this, on Monday 15 April, Amnesty International and other rights groups called on Nigeria’s government to halt Shell’s sell-off. In particular, they said that the company should first guarantee the rights of local communities.

    Shell “slipping away from its responsibilities”

    Shell has agreed to sell its onshore assets in the country to a Nigeria-based group for up to US $2.4bn as it shifts to offshore operations. Renaissance African Energy is the company seeking to acquire these.

    So, in an open letter dozens of Nigerian and international rights groups called on a Nigeria regulatory commission to refuse approval of the sale of the assets. The letter reads:

    Shell should not be permitted to use legal gymnastics to escape its responsibilities for cleaning up its widespread legacy of pollution

    In addition, it argued that the commission should not be permit the Shell asset sale unless the company fully consults local communities. On top of this, the regulatory commission should stop the sale in its tracks until Shell has cleaned up its mess. Specifically, it suggested the government should assess the environmental pollution Shell has caused to date. Then, it would need to calculate the clean-up costs Shell should fund.

    In a press release Amnesty International’s Nigeria director Isa Sanusi said:

    ​There is now a substantial risk Shell will walk away with billions of dollars from the sale of this business, leaving those already harmed without remedy and facing continued abuse and harms to their health.

    ​Guarantees and financial safeguards must be in place to immediately remedy existing contamination and to protect people from future harms before this sale should be allowed to proceed.

    ​Shell must not be permitted to slip away from its responsibilities for cleaning up and remedying its widespread legacy of pollution in the area.

    Meanwhile, chairman of Nigeria-based Human and Environmental Development Agenda Olanrewaju Suraju added that:

    Shell’s operations in the Niger Delta over many decades have come at the cost of grievous human rights abuses of the people living there. Frequent oil leaks from its infrastructure and inadequate maintenance and clean-up practices have left groundwater and drinking water sources contaminated, poisoned agricultural land and fisheries, and severely damaged the health and livelihoods of inhabitants.

    Feature image via Youtube – Guardian News

    Additional reporting by Agence France-Presse

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • EU Parliament says polluters must pay on wastewater: big pharma and cosmetics companies should clean up their act

    The European Union could soon hold big pharma and the cosmetics industry to account for their wastewater pollution. On Wednesday 10 April, the EU parliament approved a package of rules to make polluters pay for the cost of cleaning up their wastewaters.

    Big pharma and cosmetics must clean up wastewater pollution

    Industrial pollution from pharmaceutical wastewater can have devastating impacts on nature. For instance, studies have shown that drug pollution can impact reproduction and behaviour in fish species – threatening their survival. Moreover, pharmaceutical companies are causing microbes to build anti-biotic resistance through this pollution. Alarmingly, this is fomenting the creation of deadly superbugs.

    According to the EU, pharmaceutical producers generate 59% of micropollutants in water treatment stations. Meanwhile, cosmetics companies are responsible for 14%.

    So, the EU parliament has been drafting plans to make these companies take responsibility for this. On Wednesday 10 April, 481 members of parliament voted in favour, while 79 voted against and 26 abstained.

    “Polluter pays” principle

    Crucially, the package establishes the principle of “the polluter pays”. In effect, it will do so by imposing greater contributions from the pharmaceutical and cosmetic industries. The plan will make pharmaceutical and cosmetics companies stump up 80% of the costs for extra investments needed to eliminate micropollutants. Meanwhile, member states will cover the remaining 20%.

    The European Commission initially wanted industry to cover the full cost, but it dialled back its demands under pressure from the parliament and industry lobbyists.

    The text revises rules in place since 1991 in the EU’s Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive (UWWTD). By 2035, the new regulations will require EU member states to remove organic matter from wastewater before releasing it into the environment. Notably, it reduces the threshold to include all communities with more than 1,000 people. It previously applied this to towns larger than 2,000 people.

    Moreover, towns with more than 150,000 inhabitants will have to remove all nitrogen and phosphorous by 2039. On top of this, it requires them to remove a wider range of micropollutants by 2045.

    Importantly, pharmaceutical and cosmetics companies will have to shoulder a significant share of the cost for reaching these targets.

    Mop up their mess in the EU, but not in the UK

    As the Guardian reported in March, the UK government isn’t planning to follow suit. This means that while the EU may soon hold big pharma and cosmetics companies to account for fixing urban wastewater pollution, the UK government could make the public foot the bill.

    EU member states must still officially approve the new package. However, it’s a significant step to making big polluters finally mop up their mess.

    Feature image via Wikimedia, resized to 1200 by 900, licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0

    Additional reporting by Agence France-Presse

    By Hannah Sharland

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Court catches out ANOTHER airline for greenwashing its pollution

    An environmental non-profit has put another European airline in the hot-seat over its greenwashing – and once again won in court. It was a another damning nail in the coffin for dubious offsetting solutions to the climate crisis.

    Airlines greenwashing – as usual

    On 28 March, climate non-profit Deutsche Umwelthilfe (DUH) won a case against airline Eurowings in the Cologne Regional Court in Germany.

    Specifically, DUH was calling the airline out over its misleading sustainability claims. The company had been advertising that some of its flights were “CO2-neutral” because it “offsets” these. Accordingly, customers could pay a few euros to “offset” their emissions.

    Eurowings uses an offsetting calculator to offer its passengers the opportunity to make their flights supposedly “CO2-neutral” by making a small financial contribution to forest protection and cooking stove projects.

    However, the court ruled that the forest protection projects it used for the alleged offsetting are not suitable for achieving actual compensation. In particular, it found that forest projects cannot be operated for the same length of time as the carbon emitted by the flight remains in the atmosphere.

    Previous research has rubbished airline’s offsetting claims. For instance, a 2021 investigation by Greenpeace Unearthed and the Guardian revealed that major airlines’ carbon neutral claims could not be verified. Notably, it investigated multiple forest carbon offset projects and found that:

    despite multiple audits the reduced deforestation offsetting schemes used to justify eye-catching promises of carbon neutrality and guilt-free flying cannot prove they have produced enough carbon savings to justify these bold claims.

    Responding to the new ruling, federal managing director of DUH Jürgen Resch said that:

    the Cologne Regional Court has fully confirmed our legal opinion. An airline that pretends to offer its customers ‘CO2-neutral’ flights for a few euros more is acting in a highly misleading manner if it uses forest protection projects that are only secured for a few years.

    With this trickery, Eurowings is trying to divert attention from the climate-damaging nature of its business model. The compensation projects that supposedly protect the forest are not suitable for neutralising the greenhouse gas emissions caused by the flights.

    Air travel industry losing court battles all round

    Naturally, Eurowings isn’t the first airline climate organisations have taken to task, either. In fact, some have just recently had their false climate solution comeuppance in the courts.

    As the Canary’s Steve Topple reported in March, courts delivered damning and decisive verdicts against two other European air travel companies.

    First, on 20 March a Dutch court ruled that the Dutch airline KLM had misled customers with its green claims.

    Previously in 2020, the Dutch advertising regulator had ordered KLM  to change advertisements that misleadingly implied up to a 50% usage of so called “Sustainable Aviation Fuel” (SAF). In reality however, its biofuel only accounted for 0.18% of the airline’s fuel use in 2019.

    So Fossielvrij NL (Fossil-free Netherlands) took the big polluter to court over its greenwashing advertisements. As Topple explained:

    Most of the adverts were part of KLM’s “Fly Responsibly” campaign, which the airline says is an “awareness campaign”. They range from general statements such as “join us in creating a more sustainable future” to declarations about KLM’s use of Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF), described as a “promising solution”.

    Then, coinciding with this on 20 March, another Dutch court separately ruled that Schiphol airport would need to limit the number of flights it schedules.

    You can’t “fly greener”

    Invariably, courts and regulators have previously found multiple other airlines guilty of greenwashing.

    In 2020, the UK’s advertising watchdog the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) banned a Ryanair advert claiming it was the UK’s lowest-emissions airline.

    Meanwhile, an advert by Qatar Airways at the UEFA Euros 2020 football tournament suggested without any evidence that it could help passengers “Fly Greener”. So, anti-corporate advertising group AdBlock Bristol called for the UK’s ASA to crack down on its greenwashing.

    Following this, the Austrian Advertising Council reprimanded Austrian Airlines in 2022. In this instance, the airline had promoted misleading advertisements about “CO2-neutral” flying. After that, a consumer rights group took the company to court in 2023 and of course won against its misleading claims.

    Then, in 2023 the Netherlands Authority for Consumers and Markets (ACM) conducted an investigation into offsetting claims in the airline industry. From this, it accused Ryanair of using misleading sustainability claims.

    It goes to show that big airline polluters won’t clean up their act voluntarily. However, campaigners can – and will – force them to stop their blatant greenwashing through the courts.

    Spokesperson for aviation monitoring group Stay Grounded network Magdalena Heuwieser said of the news on the Eurowings ruling:

    Offsets are a licence to pollute. They legitimise business as usual, don’t work, and can lead to new injustices. The industry cannot buy itself out of the necessity to reduce flights. Greenwashing is a major obstacle to the changes that need to happen to counter climate collapse. The sad truth is that the only green plane is the one that stays on the ground.

    Feature image via Lasse B/Wikimedia, cropped and resized to 1200 by 900, licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0

    By Hannah Sharland

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Baltimore bridge crash ship carrying toxic waste to Sri Lanka, says Mirror

    Asia Pacific Report

    The Singapore cargo ship Dali chartered by Maersk, which collapsed the Baltimore bridge in the United States last month, was carrying 764 tonnes of hazardous materials to Sri Lanka, reports Colombo’s Daily Mirror.

    The materials were mostly corrosives, flammables, miscellaneous hazardous materials, and Class-9 hazardous materials — including explosives and lithium-ion batteries — in 56 containers.

    According to the Mirror, the US National Transportation Safety Board was still “analysing the ship’s manifest to determine what was onboard” in its other 4644 containers when the ship collided with Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge, collapsing it, on March 26.

    The e-Con e-News (ee) news agency reports that prior to Baltimore, the Dali had called at New York and Norfolk, Virginia, which has the world’s largest naval base.

    Colombo was to be its next scheduled call, going around South Africa’s Cape of Good Hope, taking 27 days.

    According to ee, Denmark’s Maersk, transporter for the US Department of War, is integral to US military logistics, carrying up to 20 percent of the world’s merchandise trade annually on a fleet of about 600 vessels, including some of the world’s largest ships.

    The US Department of Homeland Security has also now deemed the waters near the crash site as “unsafe for divers”.

    13 damaged containers
    An “unclassified memo” from the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) said a US Coast Guard team was examining 13 damaged containers, “some with Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC] and/or hazardous materials [HAZMAT] contents.

    The team was also analysing the ship’s manifest to determine if any materials could “pose a health risk”.

    CISA officials are also monitoring about 6.8 million litres of fuel inside the Dali for its “spill potential”.

    Where exactly the toxic materials and fuel were destined for in Sri Lanka was not being reported.

    Also, it is a rather long way for such Hazmat, let alone fuel, to be exported, “at least given all the media blather about ‘carbon footprint’, ‘green sustainability’ and so on”, said the Daily Mirror.

    “We can expect only squeaky silence from the usual eco-freaks, who are heavily funded by the US and EU,” the newspaper commented.

    “It also adds to the intrigue of how Sri Lanka was so easily blocked in 2022 from receiving more neighbourly fuel, which led to the present ‘regime change’ machinations.”

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • Government accused of now breaking environmental law TWO YEARS in a row

    The UK government is alleged to have bulldozed through environmental law to greenlight the use of a bee-killing pesticide. It’s more bad news in the midst of the rapidly worsening biodiversity crisis.

    Breaching environmental law

    Lawyers from environmental law firm ClientEarth have warned that the UK’s environmental watchdog that the 2024 ‘emergency authorisation’ of a pesticide poses a serious risk to nature. Crucially, they have suggested that this may be yet another instance of the government breaching environmental law.

    As the name suggests, the government is supposed to use ‘emergency authorisations’  to approve the use of unauthorised chemicals in exceptional or emergency situations. However, ClientEarth is arguing that the government has failed to correctly apply the test for these according to the law.

    As the Canary’s Tracy Keeling previously explained:

    The UK’s underlying ban on neonicotinoids comes from its time as an EU member. There’s a bloc-wide ban on outdoor use of neonicotinoids. Until recently, this ban also had a mechanism for emergency authorisations.

    Moreover, she detailed that a European Court of Justice (ECJ) issued a ruling in January 2023 that will prohibit the EU from using these authorisations. As a result, the EU bans neonicotinoids for outdoor use in the bloc.

    Meanwhile however, the UK continues to grant approval for neonicotinoids, having revoked the ban on these substances in 2019. According to recent research by Pesticide Action Network (PAN) UK, there are now up to 36 pesticides approved in the UK which are no longer permitted for use in the EU.

    Moreover, ClientEarth lawyers highlighted that the UK government has made clear promises to minimise the risks and impacts of pesticides. It did so in both its 25 Year Environment Plan of 2018 and the Environmental Improvement Plan of 2023. Vitally, the Environmental Improvement Plan acknowledged that:

    there is growing evidence that pesticides have the potential to impact non-target species such as pollinators and soil-dwelling invertebrates, which provide essential services to farmers and growers and are crucial for a thriving natural environment.

    A risk to bees

    Alongside this, a key government body and an independent committee both advised against the government’s use of these recent authorisations.

    First, the government’s own health body, the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) refuted that there was a compelling basis for the emergency authorisation. In particular, it stated that it was:

    unable to conclude that the benefit of use outweighs the risks.

    Then, the government’s independent panel of pesticide experts concurred with HSE’s evaluation. It also concluded that the emergency authorisation lacked justification.

    Primarily, HSE and the panel’s verdict came from the significant risks the pesticide could pose to pollinators.

    Bees and other pollinators are vital to biodiversity and the ecosystems that underpin it. This is because they play a huge role in the health of our environment and food systems. For instance, animals pollinate 87 of the world’s major crops, which collectively account for 35% of global food production. What’s more, 80% of wild plants depend on insects for pollination.

    Yet experts have warned that neonicotinoids put their survival at risk. According to HSE’s report, even at non-lethal doses, exposure to thiamethoxam may compromise pollinators’ ability to forage and navigate and potentially cause “a reduction in survival of honeybees”.

    What’s more, studies have shown that neonicotinoid pesticides can stay active in affected soil for years. To make matters worse, separate research has shown that they are also appearing in rivers.

    For instance, recent analysis of data gathered by the Environment Agency shows that more than one in 10 English rivers now contain neonicotinoid pesticides. Alarmingly, it found that many of these were at levels which it considered unsafe for aquatic life.

    Given this, ClientEarth’s complaint also argued that the government was threatening key biodiversity sites. It said that the government had failed to comply with its legal duty to consider the potential impact of the authorisation on protected nature sites.

    Making emergency use “meaningless”

    Naturally, it also isn’t the first time the government has gone against advice to appease agricultural interests either. Nor is it the first time that ClientEarth has taken action in response.

    Notably, the government has approved the harmful pesticide for use for four years running.

    Previously, ClientEarth had challenged the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) on its 2023 approval decision.

    Specifically, in November 2023, ClientEarth lawyers filed a complaint to the Office for Environmental Protection. In this, they argued that by granting an emergency authorisation to use a neonicotinoid pesticide on sugar beet crops in East Anglia in January 2023, Defra may have failed to comply with environmental law.

    As a result, ClientEarth’s UK head Kyle Lischak said:

    For a fourth year in a row, the UK government has now authorised a potent pesticide for what it sees as an ‘emergency use’ – which goes well-beyond the scope of an emergency authorisation in our opinion and runs the risk of making the process meaningless if this kind of approval continues.

    We believe this and last year’s approval are breaches of environmental law and have the potential to undermine the important role played by pollinators in food production and the pollination of wild plants.

    The risks this pesticide poses to these vital systems could be compounded in coming years if the government continues to grant emergency authorisations like this one, on what is, in our view, an unlawful basis.

    Feature image via Louise Docker/Wikimedia, cropped and resized to 1200 by 900, licensed under CC BY 2.0

    By Hannah Sharland

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • It was International Day of Forests – so forest-destroyer Drax marked it with shameless greenwashing

    Thursday 21 of March was the International Day of Forests. Naturally then, tree-burning bioenergy giant Drax marked the occasion by dropping its annual report.

    On the very same day however, two non-profits published scathing new evidence against the company, to perfectly coincide with this shameless display of greenwashing. Once again, environmental groups caught the UK power station operator out. This time it was for sourcing wood from a Portuguese Nature reserve.

    Then, the pièce de résistance: the same day, one of those non-profits also lodged a High Court challenge against the UK government over the company’s flagship power station. Notably, the legal action hits at the heart of a key plank in Drax’s greenwashing agenda.

    Drax deforestation – at it again

    On 21 March, environmental groups Biofuelwatch and Portuguese non-profit NGO ZERO published the results of a new video investigation. The pair revealed that Drax is sourcing wood pellets for its Yorkshire power plant from a nature reserve in Portugal.

    More specifically, Drax is the biggest customer of Pinewells pellet plant in Portugal. Their investigation found that Pinewells has been sourcing trees from clearcuts in the mountainous Serra da Lousã nature reserve. The EU designated it a Natura 2000 site in 2008, under the EU Habitats Directive. Natura 2000 sites form an ecological network across Europe to protect wild animals, plants, and habitats of conservation importance.

    To establish this, the non-profits’ investigators filmed on-the-ground, tracking the logging trucks as they entered the nature reserve.

    The new revelations followed similarly damning allegations at the end of February. As the Canary reported, another non-profit investigation, as well as a BBC report, revealed that:

    throughout 2023, Drax routinely sourced whole logs from logging Primary and Old Growth Forests, including from logging sites with a high proportion of 250-year-old Ancient Forest in Canada.

    As they published these reports, the UK government concluded a consultation on new long-term subsidies for Drax and Lynemouth biomass power stations. It will now deliberate over the results and decide whether to put these subsidies into effect in 2027, to replace existing subsidies which are due to expire. As the Canary pointed out, both power plants burn wood pellets sourced from Drax’s mills in British Columbia (BC), Canada.

    Now, these new revelations add fuel to the fire that these subsidies would pay Drax to enact more destruction in biodiverse and ecologically sensitive forests.

    Co-director of Biofuelwatch Almuth Ernsting said:

    Drax sourcing pellets from a company that has been using trees cut down in a Portuguese nature reserve is yet another example of the serious impact that their huge biomass power station has on forests in many different countries. We are appalled that the UK government is considering giving Drax yet more subsidies for this destructive business once existing subsidies end in 2027.

    Ill-timed or intentional?

    And so, the award for the most poorly timed annual report goes to Drax. On International Day of Forests 2024, Drax released its annual accounts.

    Euphemistically titled Committed to the world’s energy transition, the document boasts a series of the company’s supposed environmental credentials.

    Throughout, Drax has greenwashed its UK power plant operations in sections on its purported climate and nature “positive” impacts. Without a hint of irony, the bioenergy producer declared its aims to be:

    a global leader in both sustainable biomass pellets and carbon removals, and to be a UK leader in dispatchable, renewable generation.

    However, financial website This is Money poured cold water on this palpable contradiction, highlighting its hypocrisy:

    Timing is, as they say, everything. So one has to wonder if Drax made the right call in releasing its annual report on the International Day of Forests.

    In it, the power producer, which burns wood (known as ‘biomass’) at its Yorkshire plant, said it sourced 8 million tonnes of wood from around the world and burned 6 million in 2023.

    None of that was to even mention that consistent analysis by climate thinktank Ember has singled Drax’s tree-burning power plant out as the country’s biggest emitter of climate-wrecking carbon pollution. Its 2023 research found that the power station had produced 12.1m tonnes of carbon emissions in 2022. Significantly, this was more than double the second largest emitter, making it worse than all the UK’s coal and gas-fired power stations.

    Of course, its publication day was therefore either an astounding and blundering display of cognitive dissonance, or it was intentional. Given Drax’s history of green gaslighting – it’s fully conceivably the latter.

    The public footing the bill

    To furnish its climate credentials, Drax seeks to introduce carbon capture technology at its tree-burning Yorkshire biomass plant. In January, energy secretary Claire Countinho approved its plans for this project.

    However, as thinktank Ember pointed out at the time, it’s the public who will foot the bill for the corporation’s expensive climate vanity project. It identified that the project could add £1.7bn to UK energy bills each year. Of course, this comes at a time when UK energy bills are already astronomically high and unaffordable, with energy companies pushing millions into fuel poverty.

    Moreover, in its analysis of the project, Ember detailed how the carbon capture project could not guarantee genuine negative emissions. In particular, it noted that Drax’s claims of the carbon neutrality of its biomass is highly contentious. It explained that this is because:

    Current regulations are not sufficient to prevent unsustainable and high-risk biomass feedstock from being burnt in UK power stations. For example, feedstocks from primary, high-carbon, highly biodiverse or slowgrowing forests.

    Evidently, the recent investigations of Drax’s supply-chain operations in Canada and Portugal underscore this problem.

    High Court challenge

    So, off the back of International Day of Forests and all this, Biofuelwatch UK upped the ante against the serial greenwashing forest destroyer – taking the UK government to court for greenlighting Drax’s controversial project. On the 21 March, it announced that it will commence a High Court challenge.

    Solicitors Leigh Day explained that the non-profit is taking legal action contending that the project fails to comply with UK Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) requirements. Ostensibly, it accuses them of doing so on three key grounds:

    • Drax’s claim that its biomass produces no greenhouse gas emissions.
    • The company’s exclusion of carbon dioxide emissions from the carbon capture units to be fitted.
    • And finally, failing to include greenhouse gas transport and storage facilities linked to the project in its EIA.

    Carbon capture consent is “madness”

    Biofuelwatch bioenergy campaigner Katy Brown therefore said that:

    The Energy Secretary’s decision to accept Drax’s claim that its BECCS scheme will result in a net reduction in emissions is extremely dangerous and irresponsible given we are at a tipping point in the climate crisis. Cutting down trees and shipping them around the world to be burnt in power stations can never be a climate solution.

    Drax is the single biggest carbon emitter in the UK. Its promise to capture and store this carbon uses a technology unproven with wood burning at this scale. Every large-scale coal and gas power plant equipped with Carbon Capture Storage has failed to meet its target for carbon capture performance.

    It is irrational to think that Carbon Capture Storage on a wood burning power plant can be more successful.

    Consenting to this madness means fossil fuel emissions will continue in the false expectation that they will be captured. Burning millions of tonnes of imported wood means continued devastation of the world’s forests with the associated impacts on animals, biodiversity and local communities.

    BECCS diverts money and attention from genuine climate solutions such as wind, solar and insulation which would reduce carbon emissions to the atmosphere in the timescale needed – this decade.

    Ultimately, the company’s environmental credentials are looking increasingly threadbare. Yet, the UK government continues to subsidise and greenlight distraction projects that allow Drax to plaster over its ecocidal activities.

    Since it operates its operations with such unimpeded impunity, it’s no wonder the forest-destroying company put out its annual greenwashing accounts on a day reserved for forest awareness. However, there was some poetic justice in Biofuelwatch’s decision to escalate legal action the same day.

    The non-profit showed that the climate and biodiversity justice community will not stand for its disgraceful greenwashing any longer.

    Feature image via Andrew Whale/Wikimedia, cropped and resized to 1200 by 900, licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0

    By Hannah Sharland

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Activists show the BBC why it shouldn’t buy Perenco’s spin – a year on from major UK oil spill

    Nearly a year on from Perenco spilling 200 barrels of pollution into one of the world’s largest natural harbours in Poole, Dorset, the BBC reported that the oil and gas company has pledged there would be “no repeat.” Yet, just days ahead of the anniversary, Perenco has once again hit headlines. This time, it was for a fatal fire at one of its oil platforms off the coast of Gabon.

    So, on Saturday 23 March local climate activists held a protest march to the site of Perenco’s onshore oil field operations near Poole. There, activists weren’t holding back in calling out Perenco’s well-oiled PR spin to the corporate media – namely the BBC. Crucially, they showed the public broadcaster why shouldn’t so readily buy into the fossil fuel corporation’s narrative, hook, line, and sinker.

    Perenco oil spill

    On March 26 2023, Perenco spilled 200 barrels of ‘reservoir fluid’ into Poole Harbour.

    It leaked from a corroded pipeline situated under Poole Harbour. Perenco caused the spill at its Wytch Farm onshore oilfield site at Studland, Dorset.

    Perenco shut down the pipeline in response to the incident. Following this, the company mobilised the local harbour commissioners and the oil spill response teams to contain the leak. It continued remediation works at the site until January 2024.

    As the Canary noted at the time:

    The harbour is adjacent to multiple biodiverse protected sites. For example, Poole Rocks Marine Conservation Zone lies just east of the harbour entrance, and is home to more than 360 marine species.

    So, a year on from prospective environmental catastrophe, activists marched to the oil field to call for an end to the Anglo-French firm’s extractive operations near key conservation hotspots.

    Protest march to Perenco Wytch Farm

    Extinction Rebellion Bournemouth, Christchurch, and Poole (XR BCP) coordinated the action which saw campaigners from across the South West converge on Perenco’s oil field facilities.

    Activists from Extinction Rebellion Wimborne and Purbeck, alongside East Dorset Friends of the Earth (FoE), Bournemouth and Poole Greenpeace, and other groups turned up to demand the company cease oil extraction in Dorset.

    Around 70 protesters gathered with drums, placards, and flags two miles from Perenco’s onshore site. Before setting off, an activist led the group in protest song:

    Environmental activists gather before setting off on a 3km march to Wytch Farm oil field. A protester leads the group in song.

    They began via road from Corfe Castle, raising banners that read: “Perenco out”:

    Protesters march along a road towards Perenco's Wytch Farm oil field. They carry a banner that reads: "Perenco Out"

    For an hour, activists slow-marched across 3km of lowland heathland and birch-pine woods, where Perenco carries out its oil extraction, purposely out of sight from nearby communities in Poole and Dorset. As they went, they were singing, drumming, and shouting for the oil company to end its drilling at the site.

    Protesters march with drums and "Perenco out" flags across the lowland heath.

    On arrival at Wytch Farm, they blocked the main entry gates for another hour:

    Protesters turn the corner to Wytch Farm's entrance. Perenco Wytch Farm sign in the foreground.

    Activists block Wytch Farm's main entrance with placards and banners. One reads: "Perenco Climate Criminals" while another states: "Eyes on Perenco".

    "Perenco Out" flags blow in the wind near the entrance to Wytch Farm.

    Then, activists held speeches and picnics against the backdrop of Perenco’s entrance, where behind around 70 operating wells are extracting oil beyond:

    Protesters drum and picnic outside Wytch Farm.

    Protesters gather with placards and drums at Wytch Farm.

    The protest marked XR BCP’s sixth demonstration against the fossil fuel corporation since it caused the spill.

    Ecological and human disaster averted in Poole Harbour… for now

    Despite early concerns after the incident, two new reports have suggested that Perenco managed to avoid causing long-term ecological disaster.

    On Tuesday 19 March, local authorities and environmental regulators published impact reports on the spill. Bournemouth, Christchurch, and Poole Council (BCP), and Dorset County Council (DCC) commissioned the first report.

    This found that there were negligible to minimal impacts on the local community’s health, the economy, and the environment. However, it did acknowledge that the financial costs did disproportionately fall on small and medium enterprises in the area. Particularly, the spill hurt local aquaculture and fishing businesses.

    In tandem with this, the Environment Agency and the Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science (CEFAS), with other agencies, released its summary assessment of the environmental impacts. Notably, the report reviewed how the spill had affected shellfish, birds, seagrass, and seabed habitats.

    Overall, it concluded that:

    The investigation and monitoring activity undertaken to date indicates that there has been limited impact from the incident on the wider Poole Harbour area. The key impacts have been on the activity in and around Poole Harbour in the first two weeks after the incident when fishing and shellfish activities were restricted.

    From an ecological perspective there does not appear to have been a material impact on the wider Poole Harbour area from data and observations to date.

    In other words, it determined that the spill had caused limited, short-term damage to marine life in the harbour.

    However, a protester pointed out that despite the purportedly minimised harm, Perenco had only just concluded the spill remediation works in January. Property Manager and XR BCP activist Greg Lambe said:

    what damage would a larger spill cause and how long would it take to remove – if this were even possible, if this relatively small spill took 10 to 11 months?

    Perenco’s “ailing, ageing infrastructure”

    Predominantly, the activists at the demonstration weren’t convinced that this would be a one-time incident.

    Long-time East Dorset Friends of the Earth campaigner Martin Price has been scrutinising Wytch Farm’s activities since the site opened in 1979. He told the Canary that while he acknowledged that the reports showed that Perenco “acted as quickly as it could to deal with the problem once it occurred”, he argued that:

    On the other hand, it has caused a huge amount of damage in a very restricted area and I think one of the problems is that it could happen again.

    In particular, Price emphasised that:

    They say it won’t happen again – this particular problem won’t happen again, perhaps, but if a similar or different problem happens elsewhere, it could be much more devastating to the environment of Poole Harbour and the surrounding area.

    Moreover, he said that this was due to “ailing, ageing infrastructure”. Specifically, Price referenced the site’s former owner, BP. The oil and gas giant sold its Wytch Farm assets to Perenco in 2011. It did so in response to leaking at least 4.9 million barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico, in its infamous Deepwater Horizon disaster.

    Price explained to the Canary that it sold Wytch Farm:

    because it was becoming uneconomic for them. Now, if a big multinational feels it’s uneconomic, then they’re basically handing they’re problem onto somebody else. With the best will in the world, with the best investment in the world, Perenco really can’t afford to keep this going for longer.

    In essence, it decided to sell off older, less profitable assets in the UK to finance the spiralling costs of its clean-up. As a result, Perenco now operates these end-of-life oil wells.

    Of course, it is precisely this ageing infrastructure that campaigners contend is the issue.

    Multiple “wake-up calls”

    In fact, before it sold off Wytch Farm to Perenco, BP also caused a leak at the site. This forced the company to shut down its operations there for two months in early 2011. Fellow East Dorset Friends of the Earth campaigner Angela Pooley told the Daily Echo at the time that the leak towards the end of 2010:

    should be a wake-up call to us all to remind us of the potential for disaster in Dorset.

    Fast forward 13 years later, and of course, the major incident in the harbour unfortunately vindicated Pooley’s warning. Environmental campaigners have continued to echo this since the 2023 spill. As the Canary previously reported, local Green Party politician and environmental activist Chris Rigby said at the time of the incident that it had been an “accident waiting to happen”.

    In particular, Rigby was citing Perenco’s pollution record since it took over the onshore oil field. Crucially, Perenco has presided over ten pollution incidents at the site between 2011 and 2020.

    Now, the Canary can reveal that Perenco has reported another incident since the spill took place in March 2023.

    Through a Freedom of Information request to the Environment Agency, we found that Perenco had breached its permit conditions. More specifically, the company reported exceeding the limits of nitrogen oxide emissions it is licensed to emit to the air from the gas engines on site.

    While comparatively minor, the fault and resulting pollution perhaps show that even on high alert after a major spill, the company can’t guarantee further failures – with all the potentially hazardous consequences for people and nature nearby.

    Perenco disaster in Gabon

    On top of calling for Perenco to leave the Wytch Farm site, the activists drew parallels with its operations in the Global South.

    As the Canary previously outlined, the company is responsible for a litany of environmental and social harms across the planet. So unsurprisingly, less than a week before its Poole Harbour spill year anniversary the company hit headlines for a fatal accident in Gabon.

    On Wednesday 20 March, a fire on a Perenco-operated offshore rig off the coast of the central African nation killed five workers. A further worker is still missing.

    XR BCP member Helen Nicol told the Canary that the accident Perenco is responsible for in Gabon made their protest “especially important”. She said that the spill in Poole Harbour last year had been eye-opening:

    because initially we were focused incredibly locally and then we started looking further afield. We realised what was happening in the DRC, what was happening in Peru, Ecuador, Gabon, and the Caribbean – and it just seems that Perenco have a policy of disregard for their workers, for the lands that they’re based in, and for the whole world.

    If they can cut a corner, they will cut a corner – they’re not safe, they’re not safe in Poole Harbour, and they’re not safe anywhere else.

    Again, she attributed this to Perenco’s business model. Specifically, she referenced how it buys up older oil and gas fields from other companies:

    The strategy they have of taking end of life oil wells and then trying to drag the very last drop of profit out of it, regardless of the consequences to the surrounding landscape and the people who live around them and the people who work for them is disgusting – and they need to stop.

    A representative of Gabon’s space agency has previously corroborated this concern. The representative told media outlet Investigate Europe that despite causing pollution in offshore Atlantic sites:

    They kept on pumping anyway, even though their aging system requires huge maintenance work

    Activists “shine a light” on Perenco’s risky business

    Given the latest incident in Gabon, Nicol therefore said that the group would continue:

    to shine a light on their practices, and keep highlighting the fact that they are not a safe pair of hands.

    Ultimately, the groups want to put a stop to its risky business in Poole and beyond. Activists see Perenco’s Wytch Farm as a significant first target.

    East Dorset Friends of the Earth Martin Price told the Canary that the Climate Change Committee had been clear:

    the government’s main advisor is saying we must totally divest from fossil fuels within the next 16 years. Now, if we’re to do that, we have to start now.

    As such, Price argued:

    Where better to start than in one of the most environmentally sensitive, one of the most rewarding in terms of international status sites in England, and possibly even in parts of Western Europe.

    In stark contrast however, Perenco has also shown no signs of slowing down at the site.

    In 2023, it drilled a new bore from an existing well. Dorset County Council licensed this particular well bore to pump out oil until December 2031. What’s more, for 2024 alone, the company plans to submit applications to drill five new wells on-site.

    Moreover, it has made early rumblings of its intention to use Wytch Farm for carbon capture and storage (CCS). CCS is a notorious fossil fuel industry palatability ploy to make continued extraction appear socially and environmentally compatible.

    At the end of the day then, it’s just another fossil fuel company gaslighting communities and nature into oblivion. Extending the life of its oil and gas business comes over protecting the lives of people and the planet every time. But the local climate community in Dorset will continue to mobilise against it.

    At this latest protest, groups successfully held the profiteering company’s feet to the fire. Crucially, activists articulated that the only way to truly guarantee “no repeat” of a spill like the incident in Poole Harbour, is “Perenco out”, in the UK and everywhere, for good.

    Featured image and additional images via Hannah Sharland and Extinction Rebellion Bournemouth, Christchurch, and Poole.

    By Hannah Sharland

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • European air travel under fire as courts rule against climate-wrecking industry in TWO separate cases

    European air travel faced two major blows this week – as separate courts ruled firstly against an airline, and then against an actual government. It represents a major shift in airlines and governments’ approach to the climate crisis – but not one they’ve done voluntarily.

    Schiphol: reduce your flights or else

    Firstly on Wednesday 20 March a Dutch court ruled that Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport will have to limit the number of flights it hosts every year. As Schiphol Watch reported:

    the judge in The Hague handed down a historic verdict . The government has squandered the interests of residents around Schiphol for decades and must now comply with the law. This means an end to anticipatory enforcement and a maximum of 400,000 flights.

    Anticipatory enforcement is over. The judge was crystal clear about this: this form of toleration has no legal basis and is therefore unlawful. The government must stop this immediately and start enforcing the current legislation, as laid down in the Airport Traffic Decree of 2008 (LVB2008).

    The noise limits included in that decision do not allow Schiphol to operate more than 400,000 to 420,000 flights per year. This is evident from calculations that the Ministry of Infrastructure had made by the To70 agency. The ministry previously assumed that there would be more flying space, but that turned out to be wishful thinking.

    KLM under the microscope

    Then, also on 20 March another court ruled that the Dutch airline KLM has misled customers with with “vague and general” adverts about its efforts to reduce the environmental impact of flying, in a greenwashing case brought by Fossielvrij NL (Fossil-free Netherlands).

    The court also said KLM:

    paints an overly rosy picture of the impact of measures such as Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) [made from renewable raw materials] and reforestation.

    These measures only marginally reduce the negative environmental aspects and give the mistaken impression that flying with KLM is sustainable.

    KLM is no longer carrying the adverts in question, so the court did not order the airline to take any concrete actions.

    The verdict concluded that the airline:

    may continue to advertise flying and does not have to warn consumers that current aviation is not sustainable… If KLM informs consumers about its ambitions in the area of CO2 reduction, for example, it must do so honestly and concretely.

    Greenwashing

    Most of the adverts were part of KLM’s “Fly Responsibly” campaign, which the airline says is an “awareness campaign”. They range from general statements such as “join us in creating a more sustainable future” to declarations about KLM’s use of Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF), described as a “promising solution”.

    In the case of SAF, the court ruled that while it can contribute to reducing the harmful impact of flying, “the term ‘sustainable’ is too absolute and not sufficiently concrete.

    According to the court documents, KLM had disputed the idea that the statements were misleading and said that the firm was free to communicate about its sustainability efforts. Ben Smith, the chief executive of KLM’s parent company Air France-KLM, tried to downplay the ruling. He said that it was “not a fair assessment” considering how much the airline is spending to update its aircraft:

    We committed to buy billions (of euros) worth of new airplanes at KLM… It’s a concrete example of what we’re doing to improve” the environmental performance of KLM.

    Ultimately, these victories against corporate polluters are a result of growing citizen’s campaigns in the Netherlands and beyond.

    Setting an air travel precedent

    Magdalena Heuwieser, spokesperson for the campaign group Stay Grounded network, said:

    This win at Schiphol sets a precedent for airports globally.

    If we want to take resident’s health and the looming climate breakdown seriously, we have to cap flights at airports. It is an illusion to believe that new technology and fuel substitutes are the main answer to climate, air quality and noise problems.

    The ruling on KLM greenwashing is further proof that we cannot trust the industry’s sustainability claims. We have to build pressure for real climate solutions, and Schiphol shows that they are possible.

    Additional reporting via Agence France-Presse

    Featured image via Schiphol Airport

    By Steve Topple

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Greenpeace calls for bold high seas ocean protection outside biodiverse Galapagos marine reserve

    On Monday 12 March, Greenpeace called for new marine protections for the ocean surrounding the Galapagos – a vital biodiversity hotspot. Specifically, the environmental campaign group pushed for governments to create a high seas marine protected zone under a new UN treaty to secure a much wider area around Ecuador’s archipelago.

    Galapagos: protect the high seas

    The islands sit some 1,000 kilometers (600 miles) off the mainland of Ecuador, and have flora and fauna found nowhere else in the world. The islands unique diversity of life famously inspired British scientist Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution.

    Since 1998, they have been home to one of the world’s largest marine protected areas, in the eastern Pacific Ocean. The Galapagos Marine Reserve covers 138,000 square kilometres of ocean around the islands. The enormous protected area is over half the size of Ecuador and home to a vast array of species, including sea turtles, hammerhead sharks, sea lions, and marine iguanas.

    What’s more, in January 2022, the president of Ecuador signed an executive decree to expand the protected area with a new 60,000 square kilometre reserve. Crucially, these reserves restrict forms of destructive fishing and extractive activities. As a result, the protected waters safeguard the fragile ecosystems of nearly 3,000 marine species.

    However, Ruth Ramos of the Greenpeace Protect the Oceans campaign said that:

    just outside the Galapagos protected area, industrial fishing fleets continue to plunder the oceans.

    In other words, while the reserve serves as a refuge, industrial commercial fisheries threaten this marine life traveling beyond its boundaries. For instance, during 2020, nearly 300 international industrial fishing vessels pillaged this precious marine biodiversity at the border of Ecuador’s waters. As the Canary’s Tracy Keeling previously explained, in effect, this means that:

    vessels from richer countries are scooping up vast quantities of fish. They do this before these animals can swim towards – and feed – people in poorer countries.

    Safeguarding a “vital migratory superhighway”

    Given this, Ramos said that:

    We must protect this area

    In particular, Greenpeace urged governments to ratify the so-called High Seas Treaty. UN member states adopted the treaty last June. It provides a framework for governments to create an expanded protected area in international waters, outside of any country’s jurisdiction.

    The ‘high seas’ are oceans beyond the national jurisdiction of coastal states. Until countries negotiated the treaty, nations could only designate conservation sites within their territorial and Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZs). These are the stretches of ocean that generally extend 200 nautical miles (370 kilometres) from their coastlines.

    Governments adopted the High Seas Treaty after more than 15 years of discussions to extend environmental protections to international waters. These waters – outside of any nation’s territorial and economic waters – make up more than 60% of the world’s oceans.

    Once 60 governments ratify the treaty, it can go into effect after 120 days. Currently, ocean protection activists hope to reach this goal by 2025. So far, several dozen states have signed the treaty, but just Pulau and Chile have ratified it.

    Therefore, as Ramos explained:

    This historic treaty, once ratified, will enable us to protect a vast area of international waters near the Galapagos Islands, safeguarding a vital migratory superhighway for marine life such as sharks and turtles

    Ocean “protection in action”

    Currently, the environmental activist group is carrying out a scientific expedition in the Galapagos. Greenpeace said this could be the first marine protected area created since the treaty was adopted and “would remove the threat of industrial fishing fleets.” Vitally, it argued that:

    It would also protect a key area of ocean that many threatened migratory species from Galapagos and adjacent marine regions must cross in order to reach key coastal habitats for pupping, nesting and feeding.

    Moreover, earlier in the expedition, Ramos said that the existing Galapagos marine reserve, which is also a UNESCO World Heritage site, is:

    one of the best examples of ocean protection in action. But it is still an exception in a world where only three percent of the ocean is currently fully or highly protected

    Ramos said the governments of Ecuador, Panama, Colombia, and Costa Rica have taken “admirable steps” to protect the oceans in their national waters. Now, under the treaty Ramos argued that they:

    have a historic opportunity to demonstrate global leadership by protecting this key area of the high seas and further safeguarding the beauty and biodiversity of the Galapagos region for future generations.

    In February, the UN launched its first ever report exploring the state of migratory species. Alarmingly, it found that nearly half the species listed under Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS) – a UN biodiversity treaty – were declining. Moreover, over a fifth of CMS-listed species are threatened with extinction.

    Against this backdrop, Greenpeace is right to take governments to task over their failure to ratify this crucial treaty. A high seas protected area in one of the world’s most critical marine biodiversity hotspots could pave the way to concrete ocean protection.

    Feature image via SeaLegacy/Youtube screengrab.

    Additional reporting by Agence France-Presse

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • New report on climate risks should be “final wake-up call” for the climate crisis in Europe

    A damning new EU climate risk report has warned that Europe could suffer “catastrophic” consequences from the climate crisis if it fails to take urgent and decisive action to adapt to risks.

    Climate risks at “critical levels”

    On Monday 11 March, the European Environment Agency released its first ever “European Climate Risk Assessment” report on the risks that the climate crisis poses to the continent.

    The assessment identified 36 risks related to climate in Europe. Specifically, the report grouped these climate risks into five broad impact clusters. This included: ecosystems, food, health, infrastructure, and economy and finance. Notably, it stated that over half of these – 21 – demanded more immediate action, while eight were “particularly urgent.” The report noted that:

    Depending on their nature, each of these risks alone has the potential to cause significant environmental degradation, economic damage, social emergencies and political turbulences; their combined effects are even more impactful.

    The dangers included fires, water shortages and their effects on agricultural production, mass biodiversity loss in coastal and marine ecosystems, extreme heat, flooding, and saltwater intrusion into vital groundwater supplies.

    Crucially, the agency said that:

    Many of these risks have already reached critical levels and could become catastrophic without urgent and decisive action

    At the top of the list were risks to ecosystems, mainly relating to coastal and marine ones.

    For instance, the report highlighted that the climate crisis impacts result in a catastrophic combination of heat waves, as well as acidification and oxygen depletion of the seas. On top of this, other human-caused factors such as fishing, pollution, and eutrophication act as risk-multipliers. Eutrophication refers to an excess of nutrients which collapses aquatic ecosystems. Collectively, these significantly threaten marine ecosystems. The report noted that:

    This can result in substantial biodiversity loss, including mass mortality events, and declines in ecosystem services

    Climate risk hotspots

    The report found that Southern Europe will be at particular risk to the intensifying impacts of the climate crisis. In particular, the report evaluated three of the risks as among the eight most urgent due to the impacts on Southern Europe.

    It singled out the region as a climate risk hotspot due to wildfire-related and drought impacts on health, biodiversity, and crop production.

    For instance, in 2023, countries in Southern Europe including Greece, Spain, Portugal, and Italy experienced major fires. Wildfires burnt over 500,000 hectares of natural land across the EU during the course of the year. Notably, the European Forest Fire Information Service (EFFIS) recorded the EU’s largest single wildfire ever, in Greece. The Evros blaze alone razed 77,000 hectares – approximately the scale of New York City.

    Meanwhile, the report also highlighted low-lying coastal areas, including populated cities, as hotspots for other climate risks. There, sea-level rise will continue to risk groundwater, and cause coastal erosion and flooding.

    Finally, the report emphasised greater climate risks for Europe’s outermost regions owing to their:

    remote location, weaker infrastructure, limited economic diversification and, for some of them, strong reliance on a few economic activities.

    Despite these exacerbated risks in hotspot regions, the report noted that northern Europe would not be spared the negative impact, as floods in Germany and forest fires in Sweden have demonstrated in recent years. As a result, the EEA warned that:

    Extreme heat, drought, wildfires, and flooding, as experienced in recent years, will worsen in Europe even under optimistic global warming scenarios and affect living conditions throughout the continent

    “Final wake-up call”

    According to the EEA, European governments and populations unanimously recognising the risks and agreeing to do more, faster should be the priority.

    EEA Executive Director Leena Yla-Mononen told a press briefing ahead of the report’s release that:

    These events are the new normal

    Moreover, she said that the new analysis stressed that:

    Europe faces urgent climate risks that are growing faster than our societal preparedness. To ensure the resilience of our societies, European and national policymakers must act now to reduce climate risks both by rapid emission cuts and by strong adaptation policies and actions.

    However, Europe – like other parts of the Global North – has been fudging a full phase out of fossil fuels. For example, some major economies in Europe have doubled-down on liquified natural gas (LNG) – fossil gas – imports and financing in the Global South. Meanwhile, Europe’s major development bank is keeping the door open to potentially fund new fossil fuel refineries, pipelines, and power plants internationally.

    Yla-Mononen said that the report should be:

    the wake-up call. The final wake-up call

    In other words, if Europe fails to take concrete action, and fast, its frontline communities will face the full force of these devastating climate impacts. Given the extreme wildfires and floods that have decimated Europe, inaction is already taking its toll.

    Feature image via AFP News Agency/YouTube screengrab. 

    Additional reporting by Agence France-Presse

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • New Report Finds Links Between Petrochemical Production and Increases in Cancer

    Chemical pollution tied to fossil fuel operations is not only driving harmful climate change but is also posing dire risks to human health at levels that require aggressive private and public efforts to limit exposures, warns a new analysis published in the New England Journal of Medicine on Wednesday. The article authored by Tracey Woodruff, a professor at the University of California San…

    Source

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • Study of Human Placenta Samples Found Microplastics in Every Single One of Them

    A new study on microplastics suggests that the tiny plastic pieces are indeed entering the bodies of nearly every human, and possibly every mammalian creature, on the planet. The study, carried out by a team of toxicology scientists led by Matthew Campen at the University of New Mexico, examined 62 human placenta samples to determine the rate at which they contained microplastics…

    Source

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • Stella McCartney calls on fashion industry to “wake up” to the climate crisis during Paris Fashion Week

    On Monday 4 March, sustainable fashion designer Stella McCartney called on the fashion world to “wake up” to the climate crisis. During the penultimate day of Paris Fashion Week McCartney presented her autumn-winter collections, challenging the fashion industry’s polluting status quo.

    Paris Fashion Week McCartney

    With her father and his Beatles bandmate Ringo Starr watching from the front row, McCartney presented a collection made from 90% “eco-responsible” materials.

    The X post image, displaying McCartney’s message, reads:

    The world is crying out for change and it is our responsibility to act now. The younger generation are standing up and telling us that our house is on fire and that we need to respond like we are in a crisis, because in fact it is a crisis. At Stella McCartney, we challenge the fashion industry every day to be better, questioning things as they are and driving change. I invite you all to join me in this fight, feeling encouraged and hopeful, fearless – because we can build a better future together.

    We aren’t perfect, and we recognise that, like all businesses, we are part of the problem, but we are pushing boundaries every day to find solutions that do exist in an industry desperately in need of change.

    Here are just a few of the things we do at Stella McCartney to have a more positive impact and challenge the status quo, rather than following convention. It’s time to wake up… This is the future of fashion not just a trend.

    Her eco-conscious collection followed showed off oversized suits and clothes with exaggerated proportions:

    McCartney sent one model out with an edgy statement:

    Speaking to the Guardian, she said of the slogan:

    Well, I mean, we’re in a bit of a state here, aren’t we?

    Specifically, McCartney referenced the dual environmental crises and fashions outsized carbon emissions and polluting impact.

    Crucially, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has estimated that the fashion industry is responsible for approximately 10% of global greenhouse gas emissions. For a sense of scale, this is greater than the combined carbon emissions from international flights and maritime shipping.

    To make matters worse, according to statistics from the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), the fashion industry is extremely water intensive. Specifically, it suggested that the industry uses 93bn cubic metres of water per year. This is equivalent to the water consumption needs of five million people.

    Given this, she told the Guardian that:

    I always want the platform of Stella McCartney to have an environmental message. I am here to remind people that this is one of the most harmful industries. But I’m not here to make people depressed and scared. I want to celebrate Mother Earth and all of her creatures and to remind us all to be conscious of that, but at the same time, I want it to be an uplifting experience.

    Forefront of sustainable fashion

    Previously, McCartney has been at the forefront of efforts to tackle the unsustainable practices in fashion. In 2018, she collaborated with the United Nations to create a climate action charter for the industry. Since then, she has presented multiple fashion collections with a concerted sustainability focus.

    On top of this, McCartney has previously supported climate activists fighting big polluters. Notably, she loaned suits, shirts, and blazers to the Extinction Rebellion HSBC 9 activists during their trial in November 2023. A jury acquitted the activists, who had broken windows at HSBC HQ to challenge the bank’s billions invested in fossil fuels.

    During the Paris Fashion Week, McCartney continued to platform the climate and biodiversity crisis through her collection. In particular, she said she had sought out solutions that could not be told apart from traditional textiles by the naked eye. For instance, in one design, a model donned a white suit made from vegan leather.

    By contrast, animal rights activists called out Victoria Beckham’s use of leather during the event. As Stella McCartney’s own website highlights, leather is linked to significant environmental harm, alongside animal rights abuses:

    As well as being cruel, leather’s environmental impact is incredibly high. Animal agriculture accounts for around 18% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions and is driving the destruction of our rainforests.

    Marine Serre’s marketplace

    Meanwhile, another eco-conscious designer held her show in Parisian food hall Ground Control, among café tables, pizza stands, and a florist.

    32-year-old French designer Marine Serre uses as much recycled material as possible in her outfits. Serre told AFP she disliked the way big brands build temporary structures just for a 10-minute fashion show. She explained that:

    I like to find a place that already has a vibration and energy. Most of the time, when you do a show, it’s just in a box, and I’m kind of against that”

    Her models were also more age-inclusive, ranging from older women to a little baby, carried in a white dress-and-baby-carrier combo, screen-printed with Serre’s signature crescent moon.

    In a sea of big-name brands with chequered environmental records, McCartney and Serre used their platforms to highlight that fashion shouldn’t have to cost the Earth.

    Additional reporting by Agence France-Presse.

    Feature image via Stella McCartney/Youtube screengrab.

    By Hannah Sharland

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Oil and Gas Industry Could See Methane Pollution Fees Exceeding $1 Billion

    The Inflation Reduction Act, the 2021 U.S. climate law abbreviated IRA, primarily reduces emissions through financial incentives, rather than binding rules. But in addition to all its well-known carrots, lawmakers quietly included a smaller number of sticks — particularly when it comes to the potent greenhouse gas methane, which has proven to be a pesky source of increasing climate pollution with…

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    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • McDonalds are Dumping their Rubbish in our Community

    The Lindokuhle Mnguni Occupation in Rosherville, Johannesburg, organised strikes on Monday and Wednesday last week. On Monday South Rand Road was blockaded the whole day, from 3:00 am till 4:00 pm. On Wednesday it was blockaded from 5:00 am till 12:30 am.

    The police were not violent to the protestors but some taxi drivers did assault comrades on the blockade.

    This press statement is to explain the demands that led us to strike and will lead us to continue striking until they are met.

    The Lindokuhle Mnguni Occupation is now one year old. The land was occupied in early February last year. Most of the comrades who first occupied the land were renting in Extension Five of the Good Hope shack settlement in Germiston, which is nearby. They could no longer afford to rent and did not believe that land should be bought and sold or rented. Also the Good Hope settlement is between a busy road, a mine dump and a scrapyard and the dust from the mine dump and the scrapyard is toxic. The dust is making people sick. Shacks have been built there without any community planning and it is massively and dangerously overcrowded with all the shacks on top of each other. Living there is very stressful.

    Other comrades have come from places like Soweto, Rosherville, Tembisa, Vosloorus, Katlehong, the Johannesburg CBD and the Germiston CBD. There are comrades from the Eastern Cape, KwaZulu-Natal, Limpopo and other provinces as well as Swaziland, Mozambique and Malawi.

    We decided to find land where we could live well and safely and build a community. Dignity, community and homes all require land so occupying land is always the first step towards freedom. We prayed together asking God to show us the land that we needed to go to, the land where we could fight for our freedom and then we occupied together. Now we are working from this land with comrades across the country, Africa and the world to build a free, democratic and socialist society. Comrades from movements in countries like Swaziland and Argentina have visited the occupation to share ideas and experiences.

    We choose the land that we have occupied because it is not far from where we used to stay, because it is close to where we work and because it is a beautiful and peaceful place that is full of trees. Although there is a mine dump on one side it is covered with trees and other plants so there is not much dust. The land is close to industrial areas and people living here are mostly working piece jobs or selling vegetables, fruit and amagwinya nearby. However, some of the children are going to school in Ekurhuleni and so we need scholar transport.

    We named the occupation after Lindokuhle Mnguni, the leader of the eKhenana Commune in Durban who was assassinated on 20 August 2022. Lindo had a vision of freedom for the oppressed, led the building of the eKhenana Commune and died fighting for poor people, for the forgotten people of this country, for people who are not even recognised as human beings. His spirit is always with us.

    The Eskom Rotek Industries head office is about 200 meters from the occupation but we do not have any electricity. We use wood fires to cook. We do have one people’s connection for water but the water comes very slow and residents of Elandspark keep sending Rand Water to disconnect us.

    There are no political parties here. Our occupation is democratic and our elected council meets on Saturdays and on Sunday all residents are invited to a big meeting, an assembly.

    There is no private ownership of land here and renting is not allowed. Shebeens and drug selling are also not allowed. Women led the decision to not allow shebeens as they are associated with rape, violence against women and robberies.

    There are 150 homes in the occupation. There are a number of small gardens growing crops like spinach and mielies. We are doing careful grassroots urban planning and have included open spaces and streets in our planning. We have measured out spaces for building, including future projects such as a community garden and poultry project, creche, workshop, community hall and political school. This land will not get overcrowded like Good Hope. It will be carefully planned and well managed like the eKhenana Commune.

    Our occupation is a democratic occupation that is moving towards becoming a commune.

    We are facing a number of serious problems though.

    The first serious problem is evictions. The City of Johannesburg has come to evict three times. The first time they came to evict us they didn’t talk to us. They came with metro police and red ants (private security). The metro police turned down their name tags. The red ants destroyed the homes on one side of the occupation. After the homes were demolished they destroyed the building materials. They destroyed many things in the homes and stole money, blankets and a phone. They stole our collective community money as well as money from individual comrades. We rebuilt.

    The second time they came to evict us they demolished every shack. Again we rebuilt.

    The third time they came to evict they engaged us. This time they destroyed 13 incomplete shacks.

    Another very serious problem is that rich people from Elandspark, building contractors and businesses, especially fast food restaurants such as McDonalds and KFC, are dumping their rubbish here at a huge scale. The building contractors dump rubble here but also broken glass which is dangerous to our children. McDonalds dump here every Monday and Friday. Dumpers have threatened to shoot us when we tell them not to dump here.

    They often dump building rubble on the road into the occupation and we have to continually work to keep the road open. We hired a grader to clear the building rubble but the guy took our money and ran away.

    It is very painful that all these people and businesses continue to dump rubbish in our community. There are dumps where rubbish should be taken, and one is not far away, but they just continue to dump their rubbish in our community. We do not count as human beings to them. We do not count as human beings to the municipality which leaves the rubbish here and does not stop the dumping. We are staying here with small children and everyone can see that and yet they continue to dump. It is clear that we are seen as rubbish, that our community is seen as rubbish and that our struggle to free ourselves by building a commune on this land is seen as rubbish.

    Another issue is that the zama zamas (informal miners) came to the occupation and offered money to be able to take the land to rent and sell it. They also dug holes, blasted rocks and threatened us. In Durban our comrades have been assassinated because local gangsterised ANC structures try to take over occupied land to rent and sell it. It is possible that there could be problems with the zama zamas in the future.

    There was also a problem with establishing whether or not the Ekhuruleni or Johannesburg municipalities have a responsibility to provide services to the land we are living on. For almost a year we got contradictory information. In December the ward councillor Faeeza Chame, who is a DA councillor, told us that the land we have occupied belongs to Ekhuruleni. We went to city planning in Johannesburg and Ekhuruleni and confirmed that the land belongs to the City of Johannesburg. On Monday, after the first day of the strike, the councillor agreed that we belong in Johannesburg so this issue has been resolved.

    We made the following demands during the two strikes:

    • The land must be left under the democratic and collective management of the residents. There must be no more evictions.
    • The municipality must provide electricity, water, sanitation and waste collection.
    • We need scholar transport for our children to travel to and from schools
    • The massive amount of rubbish that has been dumped on the land must be removed and the dumping must be stopped.
    • We need to be given an address so that we can apply for grants, jobs and schools and register to vote.
    • There must be an accessible voting station

    On the second day of the strike Nokuthula Xaba from the Premier’s Office came. She is deployed in Ekurhuleni and said that she would refer us to the right person in the Johannesburg Municipality. The ward councillor Faeeza Chame refused to come.

    We are going to continue the strikes until our demands are met. We are not going to stop the struggle.

    When we came to this land it was bush. We opened the land. We brought ubuntu. We are no longer renting and we live peacefully here. We can live socialism here like in the eKhenana Commune.

    The post McDonalds are Dumping their Rubbish in our Community first appeared on Dissident Voice.

    This post was originally published on Dissident Voice.

  • Pollution from pig farm causes mountain of dead fish in nearby river

    A burst sewage pipe at a Chinese-owned pig farm in northeastern Laos has polluted a nearby river, killing over 230 kilograms (500 pounds) of fish, an important food source people in nearby villages, local government officials and villagers told Radio Free Asia.

    It’s the latest example of industry causing environmental damage in Laos, which has been aggressively pursuing policies that encourage rapid development through foreign investment for the past few years.

    The waste from the farm in Viengxay district in Houaphanh province entered the river on Jan. 23 and 24. On Jan. 25, authorities inspected the river and found that it was polluted. 

    The farming company took responsibility for the accident and signed an agreement with the local government promising to pay compensation for the dead fish and to restock the river with young fish, several officials told RFA Lao – although it wasn’t clear how much compensation would be paid.

    A provincial official, who like all other unnamed sources in this report requested anonymity for safety reasons, told RFA that the waste was not deliberately released into the river.

    “What happened was that the waste pipe broke. The company had no intention to release the waste, it was beyond their control,” he said. “The company admitted the mistake and is now in the process of making the repairs to the broken pipe.”

    The official said the company has admitted responsibility and has agreed to pay damages.

    Actions not words 

    The residents of nearby Vanghay village, where most of the dead fish were spotted, are calling on the authorities to make sure that the company complies with the agreement. They want the government to impose a deadline to restock the river with young fish and also expand it to make the company responsible for the loss of other aquatic species, including snails and crabs.

    ENG_LAO_DeadFish_01302024.2.jpg
    A burst pipe from a pig farm released sewage into a river near Vanghay village, contaminating the water and killing more than 500 pounds of fish. The farming firm is under orders to restock the river over the next five years. (Citizen journalist)

    “That section of the river near the Vanghay village is a spawning area for the fish,” a resident of the village explained. “The river is the main source of our food. The section of the river should be a protected area. The agreement should clearly indicate when and how the company is going to clean up the river.”

    Another villager explained how the polluted river affects their lives, saying, “We can’t fish in the river and we can’t eat fish from the river at all. … We also can’t take a bath in the river either because it’s filled with poop and dead fish.”

    A resident from Muang Nga village, downstream from Vanghay demanded that the company pay compensation, but acknowledged that the government would need to hold the company to its word.

    A district official told RFA that the company signed the agreement, but acknowledged that the government is still assessing the data and does not know the exact compensation or when it will be paid. 

    Five fishless years

    As for the river, the official did not know when it would be cleaned up.

    “Right now, we can’t tell you when the water is going to be clean or safe for use, but I think people can use the water to water their vegetable gardens very soon,” the official said. 

    “For fishing, the people will have to wait up to three years to be able to fish or eat fish from the river. Because the river is small, it will take at least three years to recover.”

    Sosavanh Bankhammy, the Director of the Natural Resources and Environment Department of Houaphanh Province acknowledged the incident to the local media and detailed the compensation plan.

    The pig farmer must “refill the river with 100 kilograms (220 pounds) of young fish a year for five years,” he said. “Furthermore, the pig farmer will have to pay residents who collected dead fish from the river at a rate of 15,000 kip per kilogram (34 U.S. cents per pound) of dead fish. If it happens again, the farm must be shut down.”

    Translated by Max Avary. Edited by Eugene Whong and Malcolm Foster.


    This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Lao.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Report Details “Devastating Harms” to TX Communities From Petrochemical Industry

    Toxic pollution from the petrochemical industry along the Houston Ship Channel in Texas is causing “devastating harms” to local communities, according to a new report by international human rights advocacy group Amnesty International. The report underscores the climate, environmental, and human rights tolls linked to petrochemical production, adding to the ongoing controversy surrounding the…

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    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • United States: Texas communities devastated by environmental pollution from petrochemical industries


    This content originally appeared on Amnesty International and was authored by Amnesty International.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Some Residents Say East Palestine Still Isn’t Safe a Year After Train Derailment

    If there hadn’t been construction planned for the bridge that crosses over Leslie Run, one of the creeks that runs through the middle of East Palestine, Ohio, Rick Tsai and Randy DeHaven might not have noticed the worst contamination they’d seen in the creek in weeks. A backhoe had hoisted a chunk of earth from the bank of the creek, leaving a pool about eight feet across and deep enough to come…

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    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • Tibet Made Toxic By Chinese Occupation

    Tibet Made Toxic By Chinese Occupation

    Chinese Regime Launches Food Toxic Testing In Lhasa

    Image: Researched and secured by @tibettruth

    The once pristine land of Tibet is now, courtesy of military invasion and occupation by China, so polluted that foods grown outside the capital, Lhasa are now being regularly tested for toxins.

    It is Chinese colonization and so-called development which has caused the poisoning of Tibet and its people. The mass population transfer of Han Chinese imposes huge environmental pressures and damage.

    Tibet Made Toxic By Chinese Occupation

    Image: Researched and secured by @tibettruth

    While the associated flood of industries, mining, industrial farming, production and processing, along with massive housing projects and transport construction has resulted in significant increases in air, soil and water pollution.

    This post was originally published on Digital Activism In Support Of Tibetan Independence.

  • It’s Not Easy Going Green

    When they were invented in the ’90s, renewable energy certificates were meant to stimulate the green energy market. Back then, building wind and solar farms was way more expensive than it is today. The idea was that renewable energy producers could sell certificates that represented the “greenness” of the energy they made. Anyone buying those certificates, or RECs, could claim that green power and also claim they were helping the environment.

    For years, corporations have bought RECs as a low-commitment way to claim they’re “going green” – all while using the same old fossil fuel-powered electricity.

    So how exactly do RECs help the climate crisis? This week, Reveal investigates RECs and finds that the federal government uses them to pad its environmental stats.

    Reveal’s Will Evans starts with Auden Schendler, the man in charge of sustainability at Aspen Skiing Co. Schendler initially convinced his company to buy RECs to go green, then realized he made a mistake. But even after he spoke out and evidence piled up showing that RECs were ineffective, other companies kept buying them – and the federal government did, too. Evans and Reveal’s Melissa Lewis determined that since 2010, more than half of what the government has claimed as renewable energy was just cheap RECs.

    Next, Reveal’s Najib Aminy takes us to Palm Beach County, Florida, to find out where some RECs are made: in a trash incinerator. Amid all the sounds and smells of burning garbage, Aminy looks into whether buying RECs actually helps the environment and where the money goes. He meets Andrew Byrd, who lives nearby and worries about the fumes. It turns out that federal agencies bought RECs from this incinerator in order to meet renewable energy mandates.

    Finally, we explore another place where the government buys  RECs: two biomass plants in Georgia, where residents complained of toxic pollution. Evans looks into where the government’s modest environmental goals come from and why federal agencies buy RECs in the first place. He also talks to a REC industry veteran and examines how a plan from the Biden administration could change things. 

    This post was originally published on Reveal.

  • EPA Lauded for Opening Review Process of Vinyl Chloride, a Known Carcinogen

    The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced it’s reviewing vinyl chloride under the Toxic Control Substance Act (TSCA), which could lead to restrictions or a ban on the widespread, toxic chemical. Vinyl chloride is used primarily to make polyvinyl chloride (PVC) plastics. The chemical is already classified by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) as a carcinogen, and is linked to…

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    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.