The Long Ecological Revolution

[blindpig]

Greenwash: Oil industry promotes carbon capture fantasy
November 24, 2021
Fossil fuel production gets rebranded as “carbon management.”


After decades of sowing doubt about climate change and its causes, the fossil fuel industry is now presenting itself as the source of solutions.

by June Sekera and Neva Goodwin
The Conversation, November 23, 2021

After decades of sowing doubt about climate change and its causes, the fossil fuel industry is now shifting to a new strategy: presenting itself as the source of solutions. This repositioning includes rebranding itself as a “carbon management industry.”

This strategic pivot was on display at the Glasgow climate summit and at a Congressional hearing in October 2021, where CEOs of four major oil companies talked about a “lower-carbon future.” That future, in their view, would be powered by the fuels they supply and technologies they could deploy to remove the planet-warming carbon dioxide their products emit – provided they get sufficient government support.

That support may be coming. The Department of Energy recently added “carbon management” to the name of its Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management and is expanding its funding for carbon capture and storage.

But how effective are these solutions, and what are their consequences?

Coming from backgrounds in economics, ecology and public policy, we have spent several years focusing on carbon drawdown. We have watched mechanical carbon capture methods struggle to demonstrate success, despite U.S. government investments of over US$7 billion in direct spending and at least a billion more in tax credits. Meanwhile, proven biological solutions with multiple benefits have received far less attention.

CCS’s troubled track record

Carbon capture and storage, or CCS, aims to capture carbon dioxide as it emerges from smokestacks either at power plants or from industrial sources. So far, CCS at U.S. power plants has been a failure.

Seven large-scale CCS projects have been attempted at U.S. power plants, each with hundreds of millions of dollars of government subsidies, but these projects were either canceled before they reached commercial operation or were shuttered after they started due to financial or mechanical troubles. There is only one commercial-scale CCS power plant operation in the world, in Canada, and its captured carbon dioxide is used to extract more oil from wells – a process called “enhanced oil recovery.”

In industrial facilities, all but one of the dozen CCS projects in the U.S uses the captured carbon dioxide for enhanced oil recovery.

This expensive oil extraction technique has been described as “climate mitigation” because the oil companies are now using carbon dioxide. But a modeling study of the full life cycle of this process at coal-fired power plants found it puts 3.7 to 4.7 times as much carbon dioxide into the air as it removes.

The problem with pulling carbon from the air

Another method would directly remove carbon dioxide from the air. Oil companies like Occidental Petroleum and ExxonMobil are seeking government subsidies to develop and deploy such “direct air capture” systems. However, one widely recognized problem with these systems is their immense energy requirements, particularly if operating at a climate-significant scale, meaning removing at least 1 gigaton – 1 billion tons – of carbon dioxide per year.

That’s about 3% of annual global carbon dioxide emissions. The U.S. National Academies of Sciences projects a need to remove 10 gigatons per year by 2050, and 20 gigatons per year by century’s end if decarbonization efforts fall short.

The only type of direct air capture system in relatively large-scale development right now must be powered by a fossil fuel to attain the extremely high heat for the thermal process.

A National Academies of Sciences study of direct air capture’s energy use indicates that to capture 1 gigaton of carbon dioxide per year, this type of direct air capture system could require up to 3,889 terawatt-hours of energy – almost as much as the total electricity generated in the U.S. in 2020. The largest direct air capture plant being developed in the U.S. right now uses this system, and the captured carbon dioxide will be used for oil recovery.

Another direct air capture system, employing a solid sorbent, uses somewhat less energy, but companies have struggled to scale it up beyond pilots. There are ongoing efforts to develop more efficient and effective direct air capture technologies, but some scientists are skeptical about its potential. One study describes enormous material and energy demands of direct air capture that the authors say make it “unrealistic.” Another shows that spending the same amount of money on clean energy to replace fossil fuels is more effective at reducing emissions, air pollution and other costs.

The cost of scaling up

A 2021 study envisions spending $1 trillion a year to scale up direct air capture to a meaningful level. Bill Gates, who is backing a direct air capture company called Carbon Engineering, estimated that operating at climate-significant scale would cost $5.1 trillion every year. Much of the cost would be borne by governments because there is no “customer” for burying waste underground.

As lawmakers in the U.S. and elsewhere consider devoting billions more dollars to carbon capture, they need to consider the consequences.

The captured carbon dioxide must be transported somewhere for use or storage. A 2020 study from Princeton estimated that 66,000 miles of carbon dioxide pipelines would have to be built by 2050 to begin to approach 1 gigaton per year of transport and burial.

The issues with burying highly pressurized CO2 underground will be analogous to the problems that have faced nuclear waste siting, but at enormously larger quantities. Transportation, injection and storage of carbon dioxide bring health and environmental hazards, such as the risk of pipeline ruptures, groundwater contamination and the release of toxins, all of which particularly threaten the disadvantaged communities historically most victimized by pollution.

Bringing direct air capture to a scale that would have climate-significant impact would mean diverting taxpayer funding, private investment, technological innovation, scientists’ attention, public support and difficult-to-muster political action away from the essential work of transitioning to non-carbon energy sources.

A proven method: trees, plants and soil

Rather than placing what we consider to be risky bets on expensive mechanical methods that have a troubled track record and require decades of development, there are ways to sequester carbon that build upon the system we already know works: biological sequestration.

Trees in the U.S. already sequester almost a billion tons of carbon dioxide per year. Improved management of existing forests and urban trees, without using any additional land, could increase this by 70%. With the addition of reforesting nearly 50 million acres, an area about the size of Nebraska, the U.S. could sequester nearly 2 billion tons of carbon dioxide per year. That would equal about 40% of the country’s annual emissions. Restoring wetlands and grasslands and better agricultural practices could sequester even more.

Per ton of carbon dioxide sequestered, biological sequestration costs about one-tenth as much as current mechanical methods. And it offers valuable side-benefits by reducing soil erosion and air pollution, and urban heat; increasing water security, biodiversity and energy conservation; and improving watershed protection, human nutrition and health.

To be clear, no carbon removal approach – neither mechanical nor biological – will solve the climate crisis without an immediate transition away from fossil fuels. But we believe that relying on the fossil fuel industry for “carbon management” will only further delay that transition.

https://climateandcapitalism.com/2021/1 ... e-fantasy/

*********************************************

US must match its words with action on climate
By Gao Qingxian,Ma Zhanyun,Li Yingxin and Yan Wei | CHINA DAILY | Updated: 2021-11-26 07:32



Combating climate change by, among other things, achieving carbon neutrality is necessary to not only protect our planet but also build a community with a shared future for mankind. So all countries should work together and adopt more effective policies and measures to achieve this goal.

In this regard, the joint China-US statement on climate change came as welcome relief for the world, simply because the global climate fight will not be successful without cooperation between the biggest developed country and the biggest developing country.

What's more important is that the US, like China, should take concrete actions to fight climate change.

Addressing the 75th session of the United Nations General Assembly on Sept 22,2020, President Xi Jinping pledged that China will peak its carbon emissions before 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality before 2060, demonstrating the country's responsibility as a major power and commitment to fighting climate change.

In fact, President Xi has reiterated the pledge at several international events, explaining China's goals and visions for peaking carbon emissions and realizing carbon neutrality.

In line with the principle of "common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities" under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, Xi has explained to the world that China, as a developing country, faces an extremely arduous task in realizing the 2030 and 2060 goals, yet it will strive to honor its pledge.

Under the UNFCCC, developed countries need to drastically reduce their greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, and set quantitative emissions reduction targets in line with the now expired Kyoto Protocol.

In 2019, developed countries emitted GHGs equivalent to 16.70 billion tons of carbon dioxide, of which the US contributed 6.56 billion tons, or 39.28 percent of the total. Taking 1990 as the base year, the US' greenhouse gas emissions have not decreased, but increased－by 1.80 percent－showing the negative impact of its bipartisan politics on global climate governance.

The Bill Clinton administration announced in November 1998 that the US would join the Kyoto Protocol, the first legally binding global GHG emissions pact, promising to reduce its GHG emissions by 7 percent from the 1990 level.

But the George W. Bush administration withdrew the US from the Kyoto Protocol in August 2001 before the first commitment period, saying "reducing GHG emissions will affect the US' economic development" and that "developing countries should also bear the obligations and curb GHG and carbon emissions". As a result, the US not only failed to meet its emissions reduction target during the first commitment period from 2008 to 2012, but also its GHG emissions grew by an average of 6.79 percent every year.

And although the Barack Obama administration implemented more positive policies and measures to tackle climate change, such as signing the Paris Agreement on April 22, 2016, and ratifying it the same year, the US' greenhouse gas emissions continued to grow, compared with the 1990 level, increasing by 3.55 percent in 2015.

Despite that, the Donald Trump administration withdrew the US from the Paris Agreement and immediately stopped the implementation of National Determined Contributions under the UNFCCC and contribution to the Green Climate Fund. Trump pulled the US out of the Paris Agreement for the same reason that George W. Bush withdrew the country from the Kyoto Protocol.

An analysis of GHG emissions trend during the four different administrations over a period of 28 years shows the US did not have a coherent, consistent, transparent or responsible climate change policy, nor did it fulfill its commitments to the international community on emissions reduction or provide support for developing countries. Worse, its total GHG emissions have continued to rise.

After the Biden administration took office in January 2021, the US has been trying again to use climate change to regain its leading position in the world. True, Biden restored the US as a signatory to the Paris Agreement, but the US' climate policy continues to fluctuate. So the Biden administration has to take concrete actions to prove it will match its words with action and uphold international rules.

The US should stop violating international rules by saying one thing and doing another on climate change. The lack of transparency in the formulation of its climate change policy and measures makes it difficult for the US to be recognized by the international community as a climate leader. As an old saying goes, "fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me".

The authors are researchers with the Chinese Research Academy of Environmental Sciences.

http://global.chinadaily.com.cn/a/20211 ... 779c8.html

[blindpig]

| John Bellamy Foster Posted on September 7 2021 Marxism Ecology and the Climate Crisis
‘Marxism, Ecology and the Climate Crisis’ – John Bellamy Foster
Posted Nov 29, 2021 by John Bellamy Foster

Originally published: The Havens Wright Center for Social Justice (September 7, 2021 )

Watch the full video at the Havens Wright Center for Social Justice or clicking on the image below
https://havenswrightcenter.wisc.edu/202 ... my-foster/

Foster divided his talk into three parts:

1. The planetary emergency
2. Marxian ecology and what is has to bring to bear on the subject
3. The ecology of the future

To paraphrase John Bellamy Foster’s lecture:
Officially we’re still in the Holocene epoch, which goes back 11,700 years. We have lived in a fairly benign climate and environment—but science has concluded, although it’s not official, that that epoch is over. The usual markers are the first nuclear detonation in 1945 followed by the dropping of the first atomic bomb on Nagasaki that same year, the radionucleids that were left behind after the testing of Hydrogen bombs in the 1950s, and another marker is the proliferation of plastics.

There is an anthropogenic rift in the biogenic cycles of the planet. Science has defined nine planetary boundaries regarding what constitutes a safe planetary home for all of us on the planet (in other words, the holocene), and we are crossing almost all of them:

1. Climate change
2. Ocean acidification
3. Depletion of ozone layer
4. Biodiversity loss (including species extinction)
5. Disruption of the Nitrogen and phosphorus cycles.
7. Loss of fresh water (desertification)
8. Aerosol loading
9. Chemical and radioactive pollution

Individually, each of these are planetary emergencies which all have as one common denominator: The capitalist economic system. Even if we deal with one of these emergencies, we have to deal with the rest.

It is important to understand that climate change is only part of the problem. But the 6th assessment report of the United Nations published in early August—including Part 3 (mitigation) and Part 2 (impacts), both leaked early—makes clear how much we’re trouble we’re in on that front alone. (FYI: The reason the IPC leaks are occurring is that we’re in such a serious situation that scientists from within COP26, acting through Science Rebellion (attached to Extinction Rebellion), acted to get out the science-approved data in time for potential political action, but before various governments could censor it.)

Of the 5 socio-economic scenarios that the IPCC dealt with, the first, SSP1.9 is the best we can hope for, according to the science: that is, the only scenario in which we find ourselves below 1.5 degrees increase in global average temperatures. To conform to this optimistic scenario, carbon dioxide emissions have to peak in 4 years–we have to hold off reaching 1.5 degree C increase until 2040. We no longer can stay under 1.5 for a whole century. We have to have net zero carbon emissions in 2050. Note that we used to think that 2 degrees was the point of no return.

The 5th scenario is the most apocalyptic, and that is SSP20.5, the one we are most likely to be headed for. In this situation, the best estimate is that we will be at more than 4.4 degrees higher than global levels. The science tells us that we cannot maintain industrial civilization at this level, and if that occurs, state structures will crumble completely. This is the situation we are faced with. What’s interesting about the leaked portions of the report is that they focused on impacts and mitigation, the portions that would have been least likely to reach the public fully uncensored. Part 2 tells us that during the 6th extinction, other species may be able to evolve beyond this, but we will not. We can kill ourselves and almost every other species off, and other species might come back, but human species will not.

Part 3 represents a fundamental shift in terms of the view of the IPCC: We won’t make it with Scenario 1, but even with Scenario 2 (with 2 degrees as the guardrail), we won’t survive unless we make fundamental change in our socio-economic system. This tells us that we need to carry out the equiv of a neological revolution. Previously the IPCC’s orientation was towards seeking technological solutions–technologies that don’t alter capitalistic social relations and allow us to maintain social relations as they are. This report says that tech can’t get us there. Right now wind and solar account for 7 % of wind and energy use and nuclear power shouldn’t be pursued and couldn’t solve the problem, and they’ve shifted to a demand-side approach, as suggested in de-growth circles. In arguing for the almost immediate closing of all coal-fired plants, more sustainable cities relying on mass transit, and a just transition for the working classes and even more vulnerable populations, they point out that 46% of GDP from less developed countries should be counted as emissions from the Global North. They reference figures like Hickle, Sorgenson, etc, people coming from an ecosocialist analysis, even pointing in the direction that capitalism is unsustainable altogether.

We’re at threat of breaking “the chain of human generations,” as Marx once said. Let’s go beyond Marx, who said that the point is not to understand the world, the point is to change it—if he were alive today that he might have said: the point is to change it before it is too late…. It’s time to raise the relevance of a materialist approach to fighting for survival, to point to the possibility of an environmental proletariat—perhaps highlighting Engels’ discussion of capitalism’s epidemiological impacts.

Herein a materialist approach means: people who are fighting for not just their jobs and housing, but food and water, and basic health, understanding that these things are all connected, that expropriation of our resources and our labor, and enslavement in various ways, are tied together. These are struggles not just for freedom, but out of necessity. This is a crucial way of understanding our time–the fight for all of these things at once.

Some on the left have said we should call the times we live in the “Capitalocene,” as opposed to Anthropocene. This is a failure to understand the critical nature of the Anthropocene, as occurring in context of an ecological crisis. What defines it is that for the first time in planetary history, human beings—anthropogenic factors—are the major force of change in the entire earth system. And that’s going to stop. If we follow down the path we’re on now, headed to a 4.4 degree increase, the fifth Scenario, what we’re talking about is the 5th extinction, which will take all humanity with it. The Anthropocene will continue to exist so long as industrial civilization exists, humans will continue to be on the razor’s edge where we are the main factor in earth system change. The “Capitalocene,” as an age, doesn’t confront that. Well, what comes after the Capitalocene?

Right now we are in the Meghelian age of the Holocene, which goes back 4,200 years, officially. This coincides with the major crises of human civilization associated with climate change. Brett Clark and I decided to named this the “Capitalonian,” a geological age rooted in capitalism, and capitalism’s destruction of the earth, such that capitalism has become destructive to the entire earth system. We argue that by 2050, we have to shift to new age of ecological sustainability and substantive equality, that can only occur through an ecological revolution waged by the ecological proletariat. This builds on work addressing the specific ways that the Global South is being affected in “Imperialism and the Anthropocene” co-written with Hannah Holleman and Brett Clarke…..

https://mronline.org/2021/11/29/marxism ... my-foster/

*******************************

.
Farming in Karnataka, India.

Debunking the “Eco-Fortress Nationalism” of the AOC/Markey Green New Deal

Originally published: Developing Economics by Sheetal Chhabria (November 26, 2021 ) | - Posted Nov 29, 2021

This book review is a part of a symposium on Max Ajl’s book the ‘People’s Green New Deal‘



Max Ajl’s People’s Green New Deal is a brutal reminder for the American left that even the most celebrated and progressive developments in American politics are still simply American politics, in other words they are a politics for America, and America first. Ajl situates both the longer history of environmental destruction and the response to it within a planetary frame without losing sight of geographical unevenness. The book is divided into two parts. The first part is where Ajl systematically debunks the American-centrism of the Cortez/Markey Green New Deal (GND). The second part is an imagination-widening exposition of an alternative People’s Green New Deal that centers the livelihood of the majority of the world’s people by putting forth an anti-imperial and anti-capitalist framework for a just transition.

In the first part, Ajl exposes the “Eco-Fortress Nationalism” at the heart of the Cortez/Markey GND. It is is remarkable that even while paying lip service to the “systemic injustices” of racial, gendered, regional, and economic injustices of environmental destruction, Cortez/Markey’s made the case for H-Res 109 that was introduced in Congress in 2019 by claiming that, “climate change constitutes a direct threat to the national security of the United States.” Therefore, this GND is a blueprint for how, through some combination of green capitalism and new technologies, America will save itself and become a “leader” in the world. The current GND has its origins in other blueprints for “green transitions” articulated in the early 2000s that exhibited a:

Tendency towards apolitical social management–the governance approach–which tries to dissolve contradictions around class and colonialism, and capitalism’s inability as a historical system to respect the earth-system and the tenuous, delicate, and easily shattered niche it has for many billions of humans. Long-term planning and the equally vague call for “decent minimum living standards” all gesture towards using the GND as a lever to shift the social system to “sustainability,” another voguish word adulterated to meaninglessness through technocratic, bureaucratic, and academic misuse and overuse.

The main problem with the GND is it seeks to ameliorate rather than confront or negate structural inequalities between North and South or rich and poor.

In what is probably the most counter-intuitive and yet compelling argument against the claim that the GND is useful because it is practical or viable, Ajl exposes the political damage the GND has done. Rather than inaugurate or even open up the possibility for a green transition, the Cortez/Markey GND uses the slogan of a green transition to center U.S. security interests in ways that displace and “disorganize” other movements for a just transition. Ajl reminds us that prior to the Cortez/Markey GND, climate activists called for rich countries to pay the climate debt owed to countries of the global south which serving as a dumping ground for northern industrial waste and repeatedly had their atmospheric sovereignty violated. So the GND doesn’t represent the victory of an organized eco-left in the United States, rather, the GND “may well end up disorganizing resistance to the broader ruling-class agenda by embracing a false opposition to it.” (italics mine, Introduction) Discussions of the GND thus end up being depoliticizing or reformist precisely because many concessions have already been made to arrive at it. What is “pragmatic” or “viable” about the Cortez/Markey GND, which is in fact the one the Sanders faction also endorses, is the very thing that makes it not a just transition at all and instead a U.S.-security centered vision.

Instead we need climate reparations that consist of actual transfers of sums so that 1.) countries of the global south can undertake intentional and carefully planned projects of industrialization, 2.) Northern countries can take responsibility for the people who will undergo forced climate migrations, and 3.) an honoring of these as a part of the “universal right of mother earth.” What we do not need are intellectual property rights for green technology hoarded through patents on which the North retains power and control. The Red Nation’s Red Deal provides a much better starting point for how to think boldly, citing as it does as a first principle that, “What creates crisis cannot solve it.” So the U.S. military, the largest polluter on earth, has absolutely no role to play besides disappearing itself as fast as possible. This is a fact not recognized at all when even “progressives” like Elizabeth Warren state, “We don’t have to choose between a green military and an effective one.”1 In addition, green capitalism cannot save us from the environmental destruction of capitalism itself, nor can the U.S. build an “isolated utopia while the rest of the world burns.” Yet, it is the very strategic ambiguity of the Cortez/Markey GND that leaves wide open the possibility of co-optation by the U.S. “security” beneficiaries, as witnessed in the Pentagon’s recent report where the climate threat becomes a threat to our security. The Pentagon’s solution seems to be to ramp up military spending more strategically to deal with the fallout.

The second half of Ajl’s People’s Green New Deal is an astonishing read. It aims to “expand the scope of what is understood to be feasible.” The amount of detailed research on very specific historical and current metrics of resource use, allocation, and impact on livelihood and equity are remarkable. In marshaling such learning, Ajl reminds us that the climate crisis is not an “impending” crisis that we must urgently forestall, rather it is already here. In the countries of the Global South, vast majorities of people have already been and currently are living with the systematic destruction of the planet occasioned by capitalist exploitation of nature and labor.

If we are to solve the problem, we must conceive of a just transition that includes climate reparations and a whole host of other methods for planning carefully how to use which resource, where, and when. It is in the second half of the book that we learn so clearly that environmental destruction is not simply climate change; it includes desertification, soil depletion, land degradation, rising waters, droughts, fires, depletion of fisheries and wildlife, etc. All these things and more have disrupted livelihoods in many places for much longer than most think. And to take just one example of the folly of fashionable “northern” eco-trends, vegetarianism might sound like the earth-friendly ethical solution. But de-industrializing meat production instead would allow pastoralists and small-holders to have a livelihood and allow us to confront the problem of scale that is driving most environmental destruction. Not to mention, the fake meat industry is not innocent. Instead of simply lifestyle changes, Ajl advocates for planning a structural transformation that is purposeful, intentional, and knowledge-based to attain the stuff we need and forego what is harmful.[Text Wrapping Break] What is most remarkable about A People’s Green New Deal, and is almost never discussed even in heated debates about the GND is agriculture. Taking agriculture as a central part of human existence in the second half of the book, Ajl provides such a detailed account of how we can plan to save ourselves and the earth that entire curricula should be built around it. Only de-growth can work but not in the way most North-Atlantic centered thinkers imagine it. Some places have to have the right to industrialize in strategic ways. So this is neither romanticism of de-industrialization nor a common blueprint for all places.

Reading the book, one can’t but help wonder what it is we teach in all our educational institutions if not how to concretely plan, and therefore build a livable and collective future. One can imagine courses in economics, sociology, anthropology, history, biology, geology, and even math, all dedicated to the task of debating and thereby planning a just transition that centers ecology and labor across the global south. Each subject would have to be thoroughly re-thought, of course. For instance, we learn about economics that the price mechanism is not a neutral arbiter of value or the market, but rather represents social power. We also learn that, “Words like economies and livelihoods are kaleidoscopic. They hint at human needs for food, shelter, and the good life and conflate them with the well-being of the economy. In this discourse, it is simply assumed that the health of “the economy” leads to the health of concrete individual human beings.” Such insights should thoroughly transform what is taught in economics, where relations of power are made invisible and “the economy” is treated as a natural artifact.

If a curriculum were built around A People’s Green New Deal, the only climate transition plans that would be debated would be ones which enshrine a universal right to health, education, electricity, housing, food, and work that isn’t demeaning or alienating. At the center of such a just transition would be a serious consideration of agriculture, not in its technocratic vein in which the agricultural sciences are harnessed to do the work of creating economic growth but agriculture as the work the majority must do to sustain ourselves and the earth.

It is rare that a book comes along that is so explicitly connected to current American politics and yet is global in scope without riding roughshod over the details of other places. It is also rare that such a work could center the needs and aspirations of peasants, landless landworkers, and laborers from the once third world or now global south. If a landless agricultural laborer in India, or the majority of the world, could shout at or argue against even the most “progressive” of American politicians, this is the book that one might compose from the wisdom of that confrontation.

But as is usual, probably every regional specialist will have their quibbles with the book. As a historian of India, I winced when I read the occasional endorsement of “Gandhian economics.” For one, Gandhi allied with industrialists to advocate for a total deregulation of agriculture in India’s first year of independence.2 Nehru obliged for a few months and the results were devastating. In other words, planning was never a Gandhian virtue and Gandhi may have been a libertarian in today’s parlance. Second, Gandhi actively undermined labor strikes in colonial Bombay, replacing collective labor power with calls for “spiritual cleansing.” “Gandhian economics” deserves much criticism as does what we now call the Indian economists whose nationalist conception of a drain of wealth sidelined critiques of capitalism within India. But for every such wincing there is also the fact that regional historiographies can be invigorated by the new questions this book poses, implicit or explicit. For instance, Ajl’s reading of the Green Revolution in India leads him to claim that there is insufficient evidence to prove India was food insecure in the 1960s, rather it was the Green Revolution that caused landlessness and food insecurity. These are the debates that would be enlivened by building a curriculum around Ajl’s book. For historians for instance, what kinds of new questions about the past would we ask if we saw de-growth and a people’s green new deal as the only viable future? Upon reading the book it is clear, we need an entire new generation of thinkers who ask what a truly People’s green new deal would have to look like if it centered laborers, de-fetishized technology, sought neither industrial-modernization nor romanticized versions of village life—a green new deal that planned for a collective future rather than containing or managing our uneven demise.

Sheetal Chhabria is Associate Professor of History at Connecticut College.

Notes:
1.↩ Cited in A People’s Green New Deal. Note 33.
2.↩ Benjamin Seigel, The Hungry Nation.

https://mronline.org/2021/11/29/debunki ... -new-deal/

[blindpig]

Backed by AFRICOM, Corporations Plunder DR Congo for “Climate-Friendly” Materials and Blame China
December 3, 2021
By T.J. Coles – Nov 30, 2021

Cobalt, a key metallic element used in lithium batteries and other “green” technology, is sourced from slave labor in the Democratic Republic of Congo. As the West points the finger at China, the US Africa Command is indirectly policing mining operations that profit US corporations.

Ever since Belgium’s King Leopold II (1835-1909) established the Congo Free State in 1885, international powers have exploited the region’s vast resources. Leading a regime that went on to kill an estimated eight million people to plunder their gold, ivory, and rubber, Leopold reportedly described Congo as “a magnificent African cake.”

More recently, US President Biden’s International Trade Administration declared: “With total mineral wealth estimated in the tens of trillions of dollars,” what is now called the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) “offers opportunities for American firms with a high tolerance for risk.” The role of the Africa Command is to reduce that risk. The US Department of Defense says that Africa “has a plethora of strategic materials, such as cobalt, chromium, tantalum and more. African resources are critical to 21st century progress” (read: US corporate dominance).

From the late-1990s to the present, Euro-American mining, processing, and financial corporations have relied on the slave-labor of miners and the muscle of armed gangs to export rare earth metals, such as coltan and tantalum, to the West for vital components in computers, phones, missiles, etc. The rush to renewables ushers in a new era of competition for the rare metal, cobalt.

The US sets its sights on a mineral rich Congo

DRC has an estimated population of 93 million. The country’s entire gross domestic product is around $50 billion, making it one of the poorest countries in the world. As trillion-dollar companies like Apple, Microsoft and Tesla rely on DRC’s materials, seven in 10 Congolese survive on less than $1.90 a day. Life expectancy is 60 years, compared to 78 in the US, and infant mortality is 66 deaths per 1,000 live births compared to 5.6 in the US.

The Pentagon’s main interest in Congo began during the Second World War (1939-45). Owned by Belgium’s Union Minière, the Shinkolobwe mine in the southern Katanga province contained the purest known uranium ore, which the US Army Corps of Engineers used in the Manhattan Project launched in 1942 to construct the world’s first nuclear weapon. Ore from the mine was used in the subsequent manufacture of nuclear weapons.

By the 1950s, the US State Department planned to invest $660 million (around $7 billion today) to “develop” Congo’s infrastructure for corporate exploitation. In 1960, Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba declared independence from Belgium, naming the country the Republic of the Congo (RoC), and making relatively mild overtures to the USSR. The politician Moïse Tshombé declared Katanga’s independence from RoC.

MI6 murdered Lumumba and the CIA replaced him with its asset,General Mobutu Sese Seko, who later renamed the country Zaire and ruled until his overthrow in 1997.


Mobutu (left) was a key CIA asset

Throughout the 1960s, the CIA essentially created and managed the Zairian Armed Forces (Forces Armées Zaïroises, ZAC), training special air units and hiring mercenaries to bolster Mobuto’s forces. Tshombé’s secession was crushed, as were intermittent struggles, such as the Simba Rebellion from 1963 to ’65; one of whose leaders was future President, Laurent-Désiré Kabila. The US reluctantly tolerated smallCuban and Chinese military contingents in Zaire because they did not affect mining operations. By the 1980s, Belgian, French, German, and Israeli personnel were also training the ZAC.

Washington plays innocent bystander while fueling intrigues

Geographical considerations, the involvement of neighboring states, international interference, the role of specific ethnic groups in particular conflicts, and shifting paramilitary alliances make the Congo Wars extremely complicated. What follows is a basic outline focusing on the largely-overlooked US role.

Since at least 1990, the US has used Uganda as a conduit to arm Zaire/DRC. Until Uganda’s role in the wars was exposed, the Bill Clinton administration’s African Crisis Response Initiative saw an initial round of US military training for the Uganda People’s Defense Force. Clinton’s International Military Education and Training programs continued regardless. Both programs worsened the Congo crises, as we will see.

The centerpiece of the First Congo War that began in 1996 was the overthrow of Gen. Mobutu, led by Kabila’s Alliance of Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Congo (Alliance des Forces Démocratiques pour la Libération du Congo-Zaïre, AFDL). The AFDL was supported by the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), whose Maj. Gen. Paul Kagame, now the president of Rwanda, had been trained by the US at Fort Leavenworth. RPF personnel were trained by the Green Berets.


Rwandan President Paul Kagame

Described as a “visionary” by US Gen. George Joulwan, Kagame had honed his craft murdering Hutu during the Rwanda Genocide in 1994. Hundreds of thousands of Hutu fled into DRC, settling in the eastern regions where the mineral resources happened to be located. The RPF and its allied paramilitaries occupied DRC, initially to help build up Kabila’s Armed Forces, but also to avenge massacres of Tutsi and secure the mines.

We can plausibly assume based on chronicles of events that Washington’s role was to play innocent bystander while benefiting from the mining and supply-chain operations of the RPF, Ugandan military, and related gangs.

Foreign demand for rare earth minerals drives an unprecedented death toll
Even before Kabila seized power, international mining and infrastructure giants were negotiating contracts with his AFDL party.

American Mineral Fields landed a $1 billion deal to mine DRC. Bechtel hired NASA to provide satellite images of mineral-rich regions and allegedly acquire information on rebel movements for Kabila’s military. As Anglo-American, Barrick Gold, DeBeers, and other corporations signed mining contracts, Kabila created the Banque de Commerce, du Developpement et de l’Industrie to finance mining operations. The bank was based in Rwanda, from which untraceable coltan sourced from DRC conflict areas was exported to Western corporations, including Afrimex, Banro-Resources, and Union Transport.

The Second Congo War, from 1998-2003 and de facto to the present, has led to the deaths of an estimated 5.4 million people: most of them civilians who perished from war-related hunger and disease. The war was, in large part, an effort by different powers and factions to back or depose the Kabila family dynasty, seize control of resource-rich areas, and to settle long-standing rivalries. Unlike the first war, this one was explicitly driven by demand in Asia, Europe, and North America for rare materials.

The Wall Street Journal reported at the time that Kabila’s nationalizations “sent a worrying signal … to foreign companies that are eager to do business in this mineral-rich country.” Kabila soon fell out with his Ugandan and Rwandan backers, who in 1998 helped to form a new party: the Rally for Congolese Democracy (Rassemblement Congolais pour la Démocratie, RCD). The anti-Kabila RCD splintered into militant rebel groups and advanced across the country. Troops from Angola, Chad, Libya, and Zimbabwe entered DRC to back Kabila, who was assassinated in 2001, leaving his son Joseph (b. 1971) to rule from 2003 until 2019.

As far as international investors were concerned, the myriad rebel factions were crucial for maintaining the supply lines of rare materials. Typically, they were smuggled to Europe-bound cargo planes via Rwanda.


From the Kony 2012 psy-op by the NGO Invisible Children

Kony 2012: a US psy-war op aimed at protecting a key proxy

Uganda’s President Yoweri Museveni was one of America’s top proxies in DRC, and a UN report describes Uganda as a main sponsor of the conflict. In his effort to remove Museveni, the so-called Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) led by the cultist Joseph Kony attacked Uganda from DCR. In 2006, the UN backed Uganda’s invasion of DRC to hunt for Kony. The newly-formed US Africa Command (AFRICOM) provided covert assistance to Uganda, including training and satellite phones, in a failed counterinsurgency war which caused the LRA to exacerbate their killings in DRC.

From 2011 to 2017, the US initiated the anti-Kony operation, Observant Compass. As part of the mission, the US Special Operations Command Africa established a task force “to command and control the operation that stretched from Uganda, through the eastern [DRC] into the Central African Republic, and across South Sudan.” Personnel from the fabled A-Team “served as advisors to [the] African Union Regional Task Force.”

Released in the eponymous year, the documentary Kony 2012 brought the atrocities of the LRA to international attention. But US Special Operations Command documents suggest that the film’s producer, the NGO Invisible Children, was unwittingly part of a US psychological warfare operation. Army Special Operations Forces name the Congolese and Ugandan militaries, as well as several NGOs including Invisible Children, as “partners” in their operations.

Unlike the first attempt, Observant Compass reduced the LRA’s numbers and notoriety.

As China fears rise, AFRICOM enters the fray – and atrocities ensue

Washington and various European “former” colonial powers shifted policy from indirectly backing proxies, like the Uganda and Rwanda-supported rebels, to “professionalizing” the central Armed Forces (Forces Armées de la République Démocratique du Congo, FARDC). The George W. Bush administration introduced a DRC “security sector reform” program, which included hiring the private “contractor,”Camber Corporation.

The Bush administration’s urge to “professionalize” and “legitimize” the FARDC coincided with China’s growing activities in the country. A Fort Benning Training and Doctrine Command document bemoaned the fact that in 2007 “China signed an agreement with [DRC] in which China provides $5 billion for infrastructure improvements in exchange for rights to DRC’s natural resources.”

Now that China was in DRC, human rights and traceable supply lines suddenly became a concern for Washington. US advanced training of the FARDC coincided with the passing of Dodd-Frank 2010, which requiredthe Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to mandate companies to verify supply chains.

In the same year, AFRICOM facilitated the US-DRC military partnership. The objective was “to transform the [FARDC],” among other things for “internal security operations.” A new Light Infantry Battalion was inaugurated by US Ambassador William Garvelink at the Kisangani Base Camp in north-central DRC. Training was provided under AFRICOM’s Special Operations Command, led by Brig. Gen. Christopher Haas, and unnamed State Department “contractors.”

By September, 750 soldiers had graduated in what AFRICOM describesas “a model for future reforms within the Congolese armed forces” and reveals the creation of a new 391st Commando Battalion. Commander of training at Camp Base, Maj. John Peter Molengo, said: “In 2006 our president [Bush] promised a transformation of the [DRC] armed forces. I see this as an important step.”

Within a few years, the “important step” was revealed for what it was. Members of the Battalion had been exposed by the UN looting villages, murdering civilians, and raping dozens of women and girls, some as young as six. Stars and Stripes reported: “AFRICOM declined to comment …, referring questions to the U.S. State Department.”

Uganda’s military spreads chaos

If adding to chaos is the goal, AFRICOM’s strategy is working. To date, there are 4.5 million internally displaced Congolese, over one million of whom lost their homes during fighting in 2016-17 alone.

Like the LRA, another rebel group – this time, Islamic – called the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), bolted from the Ugandan military and based itself in DRC where it is now attempting to establish a caliphate. The UN Organization Stabilization Mission DRC is helping the FARDC. Operations that began in North Kivu in November 2019 wound up displacing 400,000 people. In a repeat of botched US efforts to conquer the LRA, FARDC tactics caused the ADF to enter previously peaceful territory.

Founded in the 1970s, the Cooperative for Development of the Congo (Coopérative de développement économique du Congo, CODECO) is an umbrella of militia based in Ituri province in the northeast. CODECO mainly consists of ethnic Lendu whose are engaged in long-standing conflict with the Hema people. Despite the July 2020 peace agreement, FARDC operations have exacerbated the violence.

Founded in 1969, the ethno-federalist Kongo-majority Bundu Dia Kongo (BDK) is a Christian cult that encourages violence against non-Kongo peoples, even setting up roadblocks to divide communities. The BDK faces crackdowns by the police and FARDC, which in April 2020 launched anti-BDK operations in Kongo Central and in the capital, Kinshasa.

Greenwashing the race for trillions in renewables profits

As the violence continues across much of the country, so do the exports to most of the world. Corporate profiteering from the global climate emergency has triggered a cobalt rush. The unreliability of DRC supply chains has also triggered a move to design cobalt-free renewables.

Concentrated among 3,000 companies, the so-called global green economy is worth $4.5 trillion; more than the international oil and gas sector. The renewables market alone is worth over $600 billion. Electric vehicles (EV) are valued at around $170 billion and expected to growth to $700 billion within the next five years.

Cathodes are an essential part of the lithium ion batteries (LiBs) that, until recently, had been ubiquitous but tiny, hitherto requiring small amounts of cobalt. The emerging EV market means that large 100 kilowatt-per-hour LiBs contain 20 kg of cobalt in their cathode components. The US Department of Energy explains that in addition to being mined, cobalt (Co) is obtained as a by-product of other materials and almost entirely sourced from abroad, making US businesses dependent on metal markets and exporting countries. American corporations are therefore “looking to secure sources of Co, to drastically reduce the Co content in LiBs, or both.”

At present, 255,000 Congolese mine for cobalt, mainly in the conflict-free south, earning less than $2 per day with no benefits in conditions that are both immediately hazardous (e.g., collapsing tunnels, dangerous tools) and carry long-term risk (e.g., respiratory, orthopedic). Some 40,000 cobalt miners are children.

Bolstered by their legal obligations to report to the Securities and Exchange Commission, numerous US corporations have attempted to greenwash their supply chains by claiming that they are sourced ethically. The Anglo-Swiss mining giant, Glencore, has a market capitalization roughly equal to DRC’s entire GDP. In recent years, it has signed partnership pledges with renewables customers to ethically source cobalt.

Other initiatives include Apple’s Supplier Responsibility Progress reports. BMW, Samsung, and others, meanwhile, have launched the Cobalt for Development Project. Tesla says that it will phase out cobalt from its lithium batteries and, in the meantime has, joined the Fair Cobalt Alliance. But a recent class action lawsuit on behalf of several injured Congolese miners alleges that Alphabet (Google), Apple, Dell, Microsoft, and Tesla are “aiding and abetting the cruel and brutal use of young children … to mine cobalt.”

Playing the blame China game

Despite the greenwashing, the cobalt mining, refining, smelting, and exportation industries remain dangerous, exploitative, polluting, and terrible for public relations. On the other hand, these conditions help to keep production costs low and profits high. The informal solution for many Western businesses and governments is to deploy media, NGOs, and the intelligentsia to point the moral finger of blame at China, whose corporations operate extensively in southern, cobalt-rich DRC.

For example, a recent Guardian article exposes the cruel working conditions in the town of Fungurume imposed on small and “artisanal” miners contracted by the big, so-called legitimate companies, like China’s Molybdenum. Describing a “slave and master” relationship, one of thousands of miners revealed how he works for $3.50 a day, eating two tiny bread rolls, with wages deducted for missing work.


A November 8, 2021 Guardian a
rticle sponsored by Pam Omidyar’s Humanity United
The report was funded by Humanity United, an NGO founded by eBay billionaire and Intercept owner Pierre Omidyar’s wife, Pam. Humanity United has received grant money from numerous sources, including the William J. Clinton Foundation. “This grant funded Humanity United’s continued contribution and membership to the 2011 Clinton Global Initiative.”

But such reports omit that China’s Molybdenum is owned by US institutional investors: JPMorgan Funds, Vanguard Total International, Vanguard Emerging Markets, BlackRock, and others. Amnesty International traces the “downstream” supply chain of Chinese-acquired cobalt to Asian, European, and US corporations.

Cobalt is typically smelted and refined by China’s Huayou and its CDM subsidiary, put into batteries by Amperex, BYD, LG, Samsung, Sony, and others, and sold as components in Apple, BMW, Dell, Fiat-Chrysler, GM, Microsoft, Tesla, and other Western products.

Weaponizing space to win the “Great Power Competition”

DRC is directly linked to Washington’s long-term efforts to rule the world by force. Just as King Leopold II described Congo as a “magnificent African cake,” ex-US Naval Intelligence Officer, Dr. Mir Sadat, Policy Director of the National Security Council, says:

“Great Power Competition in space is in some ways analogous to the Great Game of the 19th and early 20th centuries between Great Britain and Russia, which competed over access to resources and geostrategic positioning in Central and South Asia. Today, there is a similar great game brewing between China and other spacefaring nations led by the United States over access to potential cislunar [between Earth and Moon] resources and overall space dominance.”

But it wasn’t China that first declared its intention to rule space and therefore the world. In 1997, the US Space Command published its “full spectrum dominance” doctrine: to weaponize space by the year 2020 “to protect U.S. interests and investment” (read: corporate profits). Endangering us all, “full spectrum dominance” includes hypersonic missile drones and high-altitude craft that can strike Russia and/or China with “low-yield” nuclear weapons.

Like other products that emerged from taxpayer funding under the cover of military research and development (satellites, computers, the internet, etc.), space exploration is now commercialized through companies like Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin company, while serving the Pentagon by, for instance, launching military satellites, as Elon Musk’s SpaceX has done. The Pentagon and other federal agencies describe this arrangement as the Space Industrial Base.

Sadat helped to establish the Space Force, which largely took over from the Space Command. Specifically naming cobalt and other rare materials as the “greatest” supply risks, a fear-mongering report about supposed lack of US influence, co-authored by Sadat and sponsored by the Space Force, says: “The United States must compete for global market share and leadership – currently dominated by China, Russia over terrestrial commodities – basic and manufactured – into the space economy.”

It may turn out that the millions of destitute Congolese sitting on tantalum and coltan, and the hundreds of thousands of slave-like and child miners toiling in hazardous conditions to extract these products are not the only victims. If the “Great Game” for “full spectrum dominance” continues without grassroots pressure to end it, escalating geopolitical “competition” between nuclear powers could annihilate the rest of the world as well.

T.J. Coles is a postdoctoral researcher at Plymouth University’s Cognition Institute and the author of several books, the latest being We’ll Tell You What to Think: Wikipedia, Propaganda and the Making of Liberal Consensus.

Featured image: By MONUSCO Photos – The Congolese National Armed Forces (FARDC) in 2013

(The Grayzone)

https://orinocotribune.com/backed-by-af ... ame-china/

******************************************************



Profiting from the carbon offset distraction
Posted Dec 02, 2021 by Anis Chowdhury, Jomo Kwame Sundaram

Originally published: JOMO (November 29, 2021 ) |
Climate Change, Environment, Imperialism, InequalityGlobalNewswire'Race to Zero Breakthroughs'
SYDNEY and KUALA LUMPUR: Carbon offset markets allow the rich to emit as financial intermediaries profit. By fostering the fiction that others can be paid to cut greenhouse gases (GHGs) instead, it undermines efforts to do so.

Committing to achieve ‘net-zero’ carbon emissions has become a major climate change policy goal. But most climate scientists agree the target is dangerously misleading. Ostensibly promoting decarbonization, it actually allows carbon emissions to continue rising.

Breakthrough?

On 28 January 2021, two High-Level Climate Action Champions, the COP25 and COP26 Presidents, and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Executive Secretary launched the Davos’ World Economic Forum’s ‘Race to Zero Breakthroughs’ initiative.

More than 130 countries pledged in Glasgow to reach net-zero carbon emissions by 2050. Despite well-known setbacks, the COP26 Glasgow Climate Pact has been hailed as a breakthrough on the “path to a safer future”.

Before COP26, many cities, regions, businesses, investors and higher education institutions joined the 120 countries already committed then. Achieving net-zero via offset trading has thus become the main climate action distraction.

Following difficult, protracted negotiations after the 2015 Paris Agreement (PA), Article 6 was the last of its 29 Articles agreed to. Article 6 unifies carbon offset trading standards in order to minimize ‘double counting’.

Offsetting allows countries and companies to continue emitting GHGs instead of cutting them. Buying offsets lets them claim their emissions have been ‘cancelled’. Thus, offset markets have slowed climate action in the rich North, responsible for two-thirds of cumulative emissions.

Cheap cheats

Clearly, Article 6 does not stop emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) and other GHGs. The Kyoto Protocol’s Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) also enables not cutting GHG production by paying others to do so. Thus, offset markets enable the wealthy to avoid cutting GHG discharges at little cost.

But why pay for emission cuts which would have happened anyway, even without being paid for via offset sales? At best, net-zero is a zero-sum game maintaining atmospheric GHG levels. But progress requires CO2 reduction, i.e., being net-negative, not just net-zero.

Many carbon credits sold as offsets do not additionally remove carbon as claimed. For example, J.P. Morgan, Disney and BlackRock have all paid millions to protect forests not even under threat. A CEO agreed its offset–buying into a Tanzania forestry programme–“is cheating”.

The Economist sees carbon offsets as “cheap cheats”. By ramping up the supply of offsets, prices were kept low. Much scope to game the system remains. Energy-intensive companies collude and lobby against high carbon prices, insisting they damage competitiveness.

Often buying in bulk, they pay too little for carbon credits to incentivize switching to renewable energy. Averaging only US$3 per tonne of CO2 in 2018 cannot accelerate desirable energy transitions.

Less than 5% of all offsets actually reduce CO2 in the atmosphere. A 2016 European Commission study of CDM offset projects found 85% provided no environmental benefits.

Making money instead

The Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ)–a US$130 trillion investor club of over 450 financial firms in 45 countries–was launched at COP26 in Glasgow. It is chaired by former Bank of England Governor Mark Carney, now UN Special Envoy for Climate Action and Finance.

The GFANZ claims to be leveraging the power of big finance to innovatively achieve the PA goal of keeping the temperature rise over pre-industrial levels under 1.5 degrees Celsius.

Advocates claim this will unlock trillions of dollars to protect forests, increase renewable energy generation and otherwise mitigate global warming. But GFANZ does not even seek to cut finance for GHG-intensive industries.

GFANZ members pay ‘experts’, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and governments to achieve net-zero ‘pathways’. Offset markets have enabled environmental NGOs to make money from supposed climate mitigating projects or by certifying other schemes.

Meanwhile, big businesses burnish their green credentials with offset purchases. After all, there are no agreed metrics to ensure portfolio alignment with the PA. Unsurprisingly, the Marshall Islands’ climate envoy urges remaining “vigilant against greenwashing”.

Touting market solutions, the World Bank has noted a recent surge in demand from major financial investors, including Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and Lansdowne Partners. But much goes to profits from arbitrage, speculation or trading for third parties–not decarbonization or net-zero.

Even Larry Fink–CEO of Blackrock, the world’s largest asset manager–is sceptical,

We are lying to ourselves if we think we can do it just by conveniently asking banks and financial service companies, public companies, to conform to TCFD reporting. We are creating the biggest capital arbitrage of our lifetimes.

Selling the sky

Offset markets have meant new opportunities to create new tradable assets. By aggregating all GHG emissions–from fossil fuels, deforestation, landfills, agriculture, etc.–profitable new financial products have been engineered for emissions trading and carbon credits.

The implicit premise is that market-based approaches always work best to address problems, in this case, to reduce GHG emissions. They do not distinguish between ‘luxury emissions’ and those due to the poor’s livelihoods.

Meanwhile, the world’s wealthiest 1% produces twice the total carbon emissions of the poorest 50%! Worse, emissions from private jets, mega-yachts and space travel of the super-rich greatly exacerbate global warming.

As with CDM and voluntary offset markets, the burden of emissions reduction has been shifted from North to South. While rich countries continue emitting GHGs, developing countries are now expected to ‘come clean’!

But no money for poor

At the GFANZ launch, Mark Carney claimed, “Make no mistake, the money is here, if the world wants to use it”. But developing countries are still waiting to see the promised US$100bn yearly to help finance their mitigation and adaptation efforts.

Following strong U.S. opposition at the Article 6 negotiations, developing countries failed to secure ‘international transfers of mitigation outcomes’, i.e., mandatory contributions to the Adaptation Fund from the proceeds of international emissions trading among parties to the PA.

The U.S. and European Union also successfully blocked a ‘loss and damage’ fund to finance recovery and reconstruction after climate disasters. Thus, Glasgow failed to deliver any significant additional climate finance for poor countries–for climate change adaptation as well as losses and damages.

https://mronline.org/2021/12/02/profiti ... straction/

It's really simple: we kill capitalism or it kills us.

[blindpig]

COP26 was a failure… the future is in our hands now
Posted Dec 13, 2021 by Simon Hanna

Originally published: Anti-Capitalist Resistance (December 2, 2021 ) |

The world is heating up because of fossil capitalism, and if it heats up much more than 1.5o C then the impact on the planet, animals, and human society will be catastrophic. The scientific consensus (beyond a few crank contrarians) is that human activity is causing global warming, so the liberal institution of the United Nations has organised a series of conferences (the Conference of Parties) to try and address the issue with the hope of preventing runaway climate change.

Despite the constant international meetings of politicians, NGOs, and business leaders, the planet continues to heat up with disastrous results for the climate. Massive forest fires blight countries around the world, whilst other succumbs to dangerous flooding. Ocean acidification threatens marine life and the permafrost in the Arctic is melting, releasing huge amounts of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.



South-eastern Amazonia is now so damaged by deforestation and ‘controlled burning’ to make space for farmland that it has become a net producer of greenhouse gases. We are perilously close to ‘feedback loops’ emerging where carbon and methane emissions from peat bogs and the permafrost accelerate to the point where they cannot be stopped, where planetary heating would continue even if all human pollution ceased.

With so much riding on the COP process, COP26 itself was a failure. The Glasgow Pact agreed on the final day saw some small steps forward, but they are the equivalent of a toddler learning to walk when we need to be sprinting.

Two essential issues were left without agreement: renewing targets for 2030 that will limit warming to 1.5o C, and an agreement on accelerating the phasing out of coal. A last-minute intervention by the Indian government watered down the final statement from phasing out coal to ‘phasing down’.

Blah, blah, blah

Even if an agreement had been reached that met the needs of the age, what guarantee would there be that it would be implemented? We live in a world of global liberal institutions passing all kinds of statements and declarations and pledges which are not made real. The UN Declaration of Human Rights remains only a piece of paper in many countries. Who can force the governments of the USA, Brazil, China, or India, or the major corporations of world capitalism, to do the right thing? There is no global government and indeed many people are deeply suspicious of such a thing.

The COP26 summit also pledged to end deforestation by 2030, but a similar pledge was made in 2014 at the New York summit and in the years afterwards deforestation actually escalated.

The Kyoto Protocols, the Paris Accords … every few years there is a climate summit where world leaders declare that finally, this time, something will be done.

Yet four days after the Glasgow summit finished, Joe Biden’s government sold off 80 million acres of the Gulf of Mexico for oil and gas exploration. China, meantime, is continuing to build more coal-fired power stations.

So why can’t they take the action that is needed?

It isn’t that no reforms are possible under capitalism that might ameliorate some aspects of environmental degradation. There have been concerted efforts at various times to ban forms of pesticides or regulate other environmentally damaging activities. When CFCs were found to be contributing to the hole in the ozone layer, they were banned worldwide under the Montreal Protocol. Acid rain was a frequently discussed environmental issue in the 1980s, but stronger emission controls on sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide have hugely reduced instances of it.

But at this point in the development of Late Capitalism we are not talking about a few chemicals or gases here and there, where limited reforms are possible. Capitalism replaced CFCs with something else that didn’t stop the production of aerosol cans, fridges, and air-conditioning. Acid rain has been much reduced in the West because the ‘dash to gas’ has largely displaced coal for electricity generation (though this has yet to happen in places like China and India). The automobile industry will be able to move slowly away from combustion engines towards electric cars (though that will involve an expansion of metals mining and extraction with its concomitant threat to indigenous peoples and biodiversity).

A question of scale

Global warming is an ecological threat on a wholly different scale. A common reaction to COP is to say, ‘Yes, the COP process isn’t great and has been a let-down, but it is the only game in town, so even a small step forward is better than nothing.’ The problem here is it doesn’t deal with the enormity of the problem of capitalism as an economic, social, and political system.

How do we really trust any elected government when we know they ultimately represent business interests before anything else? How can we trust major corporations when they have spent decades denying climate change, funding ‘science’ to disprove it, targeting climate activists, covering up their own role in carbon emissions, and so on? We know that oil and gas companies suppressed reports into global warming back in the 1970s (just as cigarette companies tried to do with cancer in the 1950s). We know that car companies cheat emissions tests. We know that Apple, Amazon, Google, Microsoft, and other major companies fund pro-business lobbying groups in the U.S. that are trying to kill climate change legislation in Congress. We know that DuPont spent a fortune trying to cover up the damaging impact of Teflon in its products and fought compensation payouts for over a decade. We know that when oil and gas companies do huge rebranding efforts or talk about their ‘environmental work’ it is usually greenwashing and that they spend only a tiny fraction of their profits on this.

The Western nations can claim that they are reducing carbon emissions, but this is hypocrisy because they have outsourced so much industrial production to countries like South Korea, China, Vietnam, and Bangladesh. China’s CO2 emissions are huge in large part because it is the factory of the world, producing consumer goods for the rest.

Socialists do not oppose poorer countries developing. Why should they live in poverty whilst so many live in relative luxury? But under capitalism, economic development comes at a huge cost of carbon emissions and environmental damage.



The Yamuna is a sacred river in India that is covered in toxic foam from industrial waste. China’s Yangtze–the world’s third longest river–has billions of tonnes of rubbish and toxic industrial and chemical waste poured into it every year. Around 55% of all plastic waste in the oceans comes out of the Yangtze–the price paid for mass industrialisation in China to feed the hungry beast of global capital.

The goods being produced are artificially cheap because capitalism externalises its costs, offloading expenses by cutting corners over workers’ safety, health care, and environmental protections. Degradation of the planet is built into the profit system. If the goods produced were priced at what they actually cost, then they would become prohibitively expensive for many consumers.

The problem isn’t that capitalists are slow to act; it is that they actively fight against policies and legislation that will harm their profits. It is in their nature. Capitalism is a system which privileges profit and the private property of the rich and their enterprises. It is incompatible with a more just and fair world. Only a complete shift of the global political economy away from market forces and profit will save us.

Reactionary forces

Climate change will bring about revolutionary ruptures but also the possibility of the worst reactionary impulses.

Whenever there are climate protests, social media is filled with people declaring their hatred for any activism which is trying to make the world a better place. They scoff at people like Greta Thunberg and claim that the real conspiracy is the climate scientists and the left who are trying to ‘fool us’ that global warming is caused by human activity. They think they are the ones speaking truth to power; but in reality they are only repeating the propaganda of Exxon, Shell, and BP, of the car and mining companies. They think they are being anti-establishment and brave, but they are cowards acting as shills for big business.

As the climate crisis grows, we will see the poison of nationalism spreading wider. Too often workers are held back by loyalty to this government or that boss, a false notion that somehow ‘our’ country comes first. In the world of Late Capitalism and runaway climate change borders won’t save us; in fact they will be used to divide us and turn us against each other. When a billion people are made climate refugees in the next two decades, the far right and nationalist demagogues in the richer nations will sow hatred and fear, making the refugees the enemies instead of the super-rich and the capitalist system which has led to this crisis.

Planetary heating is a global issue, but it will impact countries differently. Small Pacific islands and countries that exist on large river deltas like Bangladesh will be submerged. Populations will be forced to move. As arable lands flood and the seas become too acidic for fish, the price of food will rapidly climb. Drinking water will become scarcer.

Richer countries will be able to offset some of this at first, will be able to ‘protect’ their populations to a degree, but even then there will be a class divide between rich and poor which will only grow starker. In this context, ‘Our Country First’ will become a popular slogan, as desperate people fall on each other and demand that borders be closed and food be hoarded for those who can afford it.

The most reactionary forces will be those in power who claim to care, who claim to be ‘doing something’, when in fact they are lying to us. Perhaps they are lying to themselves as well? It is not our place to assess their mental state. They hope the impact of their (in)action will be to demobilise us, to convince us that things will be okay if there are a few demonstrations, a bit of lobbying here, a bit of pressure there. We cannot afford to be fooled by these professional liars.

A socialist strategy against climate change

Despite a global climate movement and the fact that the climate crisis is talked about every day in the media, we are still nowhere near being able to achieve the radical change that we need. There have been summits and mass demonstrations, climate emergency declarations and direct action protests, but they are only scratching the surface.

There is a trend on the left for ‘Green New Deal’ style politics. Essentially this involves a list of policies to be implemented by the state–more green technology, investment in green jobs, regulating or shutting down environmentally damaging industries. Whilst many of these policies are sound, they remain policies for a potential ‘left’ government, not a guide for people in the here and now. With the rise of the global authoritarian right there are many countries around the world that might not see a left government this side of 2030. What is needed is a guide to action for youth, indigenous people, and workers now.

Young people have shown the way with the student climate strikes. But young people alone cannot leverage enough power to force change. Only the working class can do that. We need to move from protests to a position where working people are taking control of their workplaces and a socialist movement is struggling for power against the politicians who serve the interests of the captains of industry.

Several indigenous struggles against extractive capitalism have happened across the world, often against pipelines being built through people’s lands. These struggles are important, as indigenous groups are often located in or near land rich in resources like oil. Support for these campaigns is central to an environmental fightback. The victory against the Keystone XL pipeline in 2021 shows what a concerted and focused resistance movement can achieve.



In September 2019, there was a global strike by workers in 185 countries. Greta Thunberg’s school strike movement called on workers to join and many did–from Pacific islands to India to Nigeria, Poland, Germany, and the USA. And it wasn’t just about global warming; it was also about toxic air quality in cities like Delhi and Lagos.

In February 2020, thousands of SEIU union cleaning workers in Minneapolis took strike action against their employers, major companies like Wells Fargo and United Health group. Among their demands was that their employers take action against climate change. On the strike rally the union provided simultaneous translation into Spanish, Somali, Vietnamese, Amharic, and Nepalese, reflecting the international nature of the working class on strike that day. U.S. unions said this was an example of ‘bargaining for the common good’.

No more strikes just about pay and conditions–our wages will be worthless on a planet which is dying. All our strikes have to be about the security of our communities, our planet, from rapacious, devastating capital.

An international class

This approach is exactly what Marx and Engels had in mind when they wrote: ‘Each new class which puts itself in the place of the one ruling before it, is compelled, merely in order to carry through its aim, to represent its interest as the common interest of all members of society, that is, expressed in ideal form, it has to give its ideas the form of universality, and represent them as the only rational, universally valid ones.’

The working class is the universal class. We are in every country, we are every nationality, gender, ethnicity, and sexual orientation. Nothing gets built, moved, sold, or serviced without our labour, and we can withdraw that labour in the interests of reclaiming the future from capitalism’s death cult. Not just withdraw out labour, but build a movement where we reorganise the world along genuinely democratic lines, a democracy in politics and in economic decision-making.

The starting point for socialists has to be that we fight for meaningful reforms in the here and now–and we mean actually implemented, not just ‘agreed to’. Deeds not just words are required. As such we fight for all the reforms we can to slow down the process of planetary disaster in the same way as we fight for improvements in pay and working conditions whilst accepting that these won’t end exploitation under capitalism.

But we know that this is a problem of the entire capitalist system. It is embedded in energy production and the demands of a profit-driven system that prioritises money-making over the needs of people and planet. Extractivism and fossil-based capitalism are central to capitalist production. Even if they wanted to change it without really threatening their profits, they wouldn’t be able to do it in time. This is why so many governments and corporations talk about 2050 as a target, not 2030–kick the can down the road and let someone else deal with it.

We know that if we are going to stop runaway global warming and restore a genuine equilibrium between humans and the earth, we need to get rid of capitalism. We cannot have human civilisation based on profit and greed–we need a democratically planned economy to ration our resources and ensure that we have a decent standard of life for all in a way that is sustainable. No more billionaires and no more billions scraping by on $2 a day.

Concerted work needs to be done within the trade unions and wider working class so that workers come to the fore of the movement against global warming. It is our work at the behest of the capitalists in the carbon economy which is destroying the planet. We can stop the wheels and gears of industry. We are the ones that can decide what economic activity happens.

Workers must demand a climate audit of all their work to find out what is the most polluting aspect of what they are made to do by their bosses. In Australia, for example, the trade unions are campaigning for green bans on environmentally damaging work. We need political demands on governments and bosses against industries that are destroying the planet. Those trade unions that prioritise airport expansion over the future of our world are not only undermining the fight but actively damaging the cause.

We need an emergency plan, on the scale of what happened during the COVID pandemic. Internationally coordinated action to phase out fossil-fuel energy production, expropriate major companies and agri-businesses, and make public transport free. This fight will take us right to the heart of capitalism, to the ‘rights of bourgeois private property’. All the legal, political, and economic arguments will be used against it. But this will only expose the huge contradiction between what we need and what capitalism is willing to do.

The fight to save the planet is a fight against profit, against the wealth and privilege of the rich, and against the very essence of capitalism itself.

The future

Once the capitalist class has been removed from power and the shift away from fossil fuels in the most polluting countries is complete, along with closure of the most environmentally damaging industrial and agricultural activities, we can begin the process of restabilising our relationship with the Earth. Marx talked about the metabolic rift between humans and their environment; he argued that we are not separate from nature but part of it, and that capitalism causes a break, a dislocation between people and planet, because it is a socio-economic system built on profit and accumulation, not on rational balance.

This is why arguments about growth and degrowth are not particularly helpful in the context of capitalism or ecological problems. It is true that capitalism is a system of perpetual growth. The bosses have to keep accumulating more capital and grabbing more market share from their competitors. As ecologist Edward Abbey memorably said, ‘Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell.’ It is also the ideology of capitalism.

But growth is often measured by methods like Gross Domestic Product, ways for economists to keep track of economic activity but useless for the rest of us trying to understand the world. The argument for degrowth is that there is too much damaging human activity (factories, shipping, transport, etc), so it will have to be reduced alongside our own consumption. We will have to consume less in order to maintain a zero-growth economy.

The problem with this argument is that it largely becomes a matter of individual responsibility–instead of a structural and social issue. But also, in many parts of the world more growth is actually required. Countries that have been systematically looted by the West and structurally ‘underdeveloped’ will need to be developed so people there can enjoy a decent standard of living. Moreover, if we want to move towards better insulated homes, better train transport links, and so on, then we will need to produce more of certain types of products. This will produce more carbon, but it will offset later emissions: it will be an investment in a more sustainable world. The reality we face is that we cannot create a world of equal development under capitalism.

As a strategy, socialists argue for reducing the most harmful economic activity and taking the economy out of the hands of the global corporations that can only act in thei r own interests. We counterpose a democratically planned economy run by working people.

Under a democratically planned global economy, we can decide what resources are needed where, not based on whether things are profitable, but on whether people need them or not. Since we can do so in a coordinated way, where cost is not the primary concern, we can factor in what carbons can be emitted to build transport links, better housing, and so on.

It is unlikely that we will be able to totally eliminate all carbon activity from our society, but we can massively reduce it, offset it, and decide where and when we might need to burn carbon. A proper planned economy means we will be able to decide what can be produced locally, regionally, or internationally in ways which are less harmful for the planet.

https://mronline.org/2021/12/13/cop26-w ... hands-now/

[blindpig]

Inegalitarian growth or just degrowth: the IPCC has opened the debate
Originally published: International Viewpoint by Daniel Tanuro (December 27, 2021 ) | - Posted Dec 28, 2021

Twenty-five years ago, “degrowth” was conceived by its proponents as a “buzzword” carrying a vague ideological charge: Serge Latouche and his supporters said they wanted to “change the way people think” in order to “get out of the economy and development”… Today, degrowth is once again being debated, but on the basis of more rigorous premises.

In the face of the climate catastrophe, many specialists no longer believe in the possibility of reconciling a reduction in CO2 emissions with an increase in GDP. According to them, the climate cannot be stabilised without reducing global energy consumption so drastically that it will inevitably lead to a reduction in the production of goods and services. This thesis obviously has implications in terms of societal choices–these specialists all insist on the need for a socially just degrowth–but its basis is scientific, not ideological.

Growth and the environment are incompatible

Let us begin by recalling the facts of the problem. In order not to exceed 1.5°C of warming, net CO2 emissions must be reduced by at least 50% by 2030 and by at least 100% by 2100. The authors of the IPCC’s Fifth Assessment Report (AR5, 2014, which served as the basis for the Paris Agreement) believed that this reduction would be compatible with economic growth: increased energy efficiency and the breakthrough of renewables should make it possible to decouple the evolution of GDP from that of CO2 emissions. Six years on, a relative decoupling has indeed begun in some developed countries. But absolute decoupling is impossible.

Indeed, increasing efficiency and deploying renewables requires huge energy-intensive investments and more than 80% of this energy is from fossil fuels. Consequently, the energy transition in a context of growth inevitably leads to more CO2 emissions. As these emissions must be reduced-not relatively but in absolute terms-the conclusion is unavoidable: the increase in GDP is in contradiction with the stabilisation of warming below 1.5°C.

Many specialists wanted to believe that this contradiction could be overcome by removing CO2 from the atmosphere, to compensate for the emissions. Two avenues have been put forward for doing this: 1) maximising natural CO2 uptake by planting trees; 2) inventing “negative emission technologies” (NETs) to remove carbon from the atmosphere and store it underground. Criticism of this strategy is not new, but so far the IPCC has not taken it into account. For example, all the scenarios tested in the 1.5°C Special Report (2019) relied on the possibility of “carbon offsetting”. But the tide seems to be turning. The voices of researchers who argue that this productivist option is contrary to the precautionary principle can no longer be ignored.

Very strong arguments

Their arguments are extremely robust. To reconcile GDP growth with respect for the 1.5°C target, some scenarios foresee removing up to 1,000 gigatonnes of carbon from the atmosphere by 2150. Twenty-five times the annual emissions! Tree plantations could only make a very modest contribution (the surface areas are limited) and above all a temporary one (trees absorb CO2 during growth and then emit it-and warming encourages fires). We should therefore rely mainly on TENs, in particular on “bioenergy with carbon capture and storage”. The principle of this is simple: burn biomass instead of fossil fuels, capture the CO2 released and bury it underground; as biomass grows by absorbing CO2, in theory, the atmospheric concentration of CO2 should drop… But in practice 1) we don’t know if it will work, the technology only exists in prototype form; 2) biomass would have to be planted over gigantic areas; 3) there will be competition with human food, biodiversity and fresh water supplies; 4) we are not sure that the CO2 would not leak out from underground.

A leading scientist officially told delegates at COP26 that beyond 1.5°C, the Earth risks becoming a “steaming planet”, with sea levels rising by thirteen metres or more [1]. It is foolish to bet on sorcerer’s tricks to avoid this cataclysm. But, as a result, a drastic and very rapid reduction in final energy consumption is the only alternative. At the same time, this economic decrease is obviously impossible without social and climate justice, i.e. without a radical reduction in inequalities and a radical improvement in the living conditions of the poorest 50% of humanity, in poor countries, but also in rich countries. This, in short, is the reasoning that is leading more and more scientists to advocate what might be called “just degrowth”.

Overconsumption by the rich, overproduction for the rich

The dominant idea in our societies is that growth and increased energy consumption are essential for employment and income-in short, for well-being. However, this idea is increasingly challenged scientifically. Beyond the satisfaction of basic needs (good food, good housing, comfortable clothing, an efficient health system, adequate mobility infrastructures), the utility of consuming more energy is actually decreasing very quickly. As a result, “high-income countries could reduce their biophysical impact (and their GDP), while maintaining or even increasing their social performance and achieving greater equity between countries,” write two researchers. The challenge, they argue, is to achieve “an equitable reduction in the flow of energy and resources through the economy, coupled with a concomitant securing of welfare.”1

Could human needs be better met by using much less energy overall, and by distributing it better? That’s the question. One element of the answer lies in the gap between the CO2 emissions of the richest 1% and those of the poorest 50% and the 40% of ’average’ income earners. Not only is this gap widening, but it will widen even more by 2030 as a result of government climate policies! Emissions reduction efforts will be inversely proportional to income!2

Governments keep saying that “we” must change our behaviour. But who is this “we“? “Consumption by the world’s richest households is by far the strongest determinant and accelerator of increased environmental and social impacts,” write researchers.3 We must therefore ban this overconsumption of luxury: private jets, superyachts, luxury homes, SUVs, etc. And, as all consumption presupposes production, we must also stop economic activities that aim above all at capitalist profit: weapons, advertising, obsolescence…

A good and comfortable life for all is possible

Other researchers start from the maximum amount of energy that each individual on Earth can use to respect the 1.5°C warming limit, and ask what needs can be met on this basis, and under what social conditions.4 The great interest of their approach is to show that the satisfaction of needs does not only depend on the amount of energy consumed but also on various socio-economic factors that determine the correlation between energy and needs. “Beneficial” factors better satisfy human needs while using less energy. These factors are: good public services, good democracy, less income disparity, guaranteed access to electricity and clean energy, a public health system and good trade and transport infrastructure. Growth and extractivism, on the other hand, are “detrimental” factors: more energy is spent to meet needs less well. For example, good public services increase life expectancy by reducing final energy consumption; extractivism reduces the former and increases the latter.

All such studies converge: comfortable living standards can be achieved across the globe with much lower per capita energy consumption than the rich and wealthy countries. The drivers of excessive energy consumption in these countries are: “a spiral of energy-intensive needs maintained by the logic of detrimental factors; luxury consumption and consumption inequalities; programmed obsolescence; overproduction/overconsumption; the race for profit; the expansion of necessary production due to the pressures of the financial system and extractive rents”. The problem is that the “detrimental factors are actively pursued” under the current regime, which is global. The solution must therefore be “systemic” and global as well: “a broader transformation (is) required to prioritise the satisfaction of human needs with little energy.”5

“Just degrowth” breaks through in the IPCC

The 5th IPCC report displayed an unwavering loyalty to the capitalist dogma of the market and competition, and therefore of growth: “Climate models assume fully functioning markets and competitive market behaviour”. This dogma is no longer tenable, as it is leading us to the abyss. The parts of the 6th report dealing with adaptation to global warming and emission reductions will be released in early 2022. The draft summary for policymakers of the emissions reduction report has leaked. It says: “In scenarios that consider a reduction in energy demand, the challenges of reducing emissions are significantly reduced, with less reliance on removing CO2 from the atmosphere, less pressure on land and lower carbon prices. These scenarios do not imply a decrease in welfare, but rather a provision of better services.6

To infer that the 6th IPCC report will take a stand against the market economy would be naive. The draft summary simply reflects the strength of the scientific arguments about the impossibility of reconciling GDP growth with limiting warming below 1.5°C. The IPCC does not make recommendations, it makes findings based on the best available science. Researchers working on “just degrowth” are now recognised by their peers. This is a victory against the hold of the capitalist ideology of “always more” on science. But it is the governments that decide the way forward. The summary of the report must be validated by them. You can be sure that they will do everything in their power to ensure that the above sentence is removed from the summary. Will they get satisfaction? We shall see. But in any case, the sentence will remain in the report, which belongs to the scientists alone!

No jobs on a dead planet

The recognition by the IPCC of “just degrowth” as an alternative to the capitalist competition-profit-growth dogma is a point of support in the struggle for another society. This should be of particular concern to the trade union movement. Until now, its leaderships have been banking on growth in the name of employment. They delude themselves about the possibility of a “just transition” to a “green capitalism”. In reality, there is no more green capitalism than there is social capitalism, and the “transition” is an illusion. Inequality is growing along with GDP. The bill for the ecological crisis will be high, and the owners intend to make the working classes pay for it. Faced with the growing threat of an ecological catastrophe that will also be an unprecedented social catastrophe, only struggles and the convergence of struggles can save us.

It is urgent that the world of labour engage much more actively with the youth, women, indigenous peoples and small farmers who are in the front line of the fight for the planet. This should involve a deep strategic reflection aimed at developing a programme of anti-capitalist and anti-productivist structural reforms. Such a programme would allow trade unionism to fertilise the idea of “just degrowth” with its own priorities, its own demands and its own aspirations. In particular, the public and collective retraining of workers in ecologically and socially useful activities (without loss of pay) and the massive and collective reduction of working hours.

Work less, work all, live better! There are no jobs on a dead planet. Losing one’s life to earn it by destroying our children’s planet is less than ever an acceptable option.

Translated by International Viewpoint. In French on ESSF. To be published on the site Gauche Anticapitaliste.

Notes:
↩ Lorenz T. Keyßer & Manfred Lenzen, Nature Communications, (2021) “1.5 °C Degrowth Scenarios Suggest the Need for new Mitigation Pathways” www.nature.com
↩ Oxfam International, 5 No vember 2021 “Carbon emissions of richest 1% set to be 30 times the 1.5°C limit in 2030”.
↩ Th. Wiedmann, M. Lenzen, L.T. Keyßer, J. Steinberger, Nature Communications (2020)11:3107 “Scientists Warning on Affluence”.
↩ “Socio Economic Conditions for Satisfying Human Needs at low Energy Use: an International analysis of Social Provisioning”. J. Vogel, J. Steinberger, D.W. O’Neil, WF Lamb, J. Krishnamukar. Global Environmental Change, 69 (2021).
↩ ibidem
↩ “El IPCC considera que el decrecimiento es clave para mitigar el cambio climático”, Revista Contexto, Juan Bordera & Fernando Prieto, 7/8/2021.

https://mronline.org/2021/12/28/inegali ... he-debate/

[blindpig]

Oregon coast (Photo: Saul Foster)

Warnings from the Far North
Originally published: Dissident Voice by Robert Hunziker (December 27, 2021 ) | - Posted Dec 29, 2021

Forces profound and alarming are reshaping the upper reaches of the North Pacific and Arctic oceans, breaking the food chain that supports billions of creatures and one of the world’s most important fisheries. 1

“Breaking the food chain that supports billions of creatures” is horrific to contemplate. It sends a powerful signal of trouble dead ahead. In that regard, scientists agree that what happens up North signals what’s in store to the South, and what’s happening up North is a gut-wrenching reality of life on a knife’s edge of catastrophe.

It’s never been more urgent and timely for the world to change its ways and abandon the current economic maelstrom that haunts all life on the planet. The pros and cons of capitalism’s experiment with neoliberal tendencies that enrich the few and bury the many should be debated in the context of strained resources throughout the biosphere, including all life forms. The GDP-to-infinity paradigm is barreling towards a wall of impending extinction. It’s already on a fast track.

In the aforementioned LA Times, aka The Times, article:

Kuletz, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife biologist who has been observing birds in Alaska since the late 1970s, said she’s never before seen the large-scale changes of recent years. In 2013, the dead birds did not show signs of being emaciated, but in 2017, hundreds to thousands more began to wash up dead on beaches with clear signs of starvation. 2

A team from The Times traveled to Alaska and spoke with dozens of scientists conducting field research in the Bering Sea and the High Arctic from whence they describe the harsh reality of a vastly/rapidly changing climate system that threatens basic food resources for marine life, as well as for humanity.

The fingerprints of anthropogenic global warming are all over the discernable shifts of sea life and/or loss of species captured in a whirlwind of unpredictability. According to boots-on-the-ground scientists in the far north, these radical shifts in the ecosystem have… “ramifications that stretch far beyond the Arctic. Moreover, the Bering Sea is one of the planet’s major fishing grounds.”

Janet Duffy-Anderson, a marine scientist who leads surveys of the Bering Sea for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Alaska Fisheries Science Center said:

Globally, cold-water ecosystems support the world’s fisheries. Halibut, all of the cod, all of the benthic crabs, lobsters, this is the majority of the food source for the world.

She emphasized the fact that the ripple effect of what’s happening in the far north could shut down fisheries as well as leave migrating animals starving for food, which, in fact, is already omnipresent. And, of concern: “Alaska is a bellwether for what other systems can expect.”

The top of the marine food chain is in deep trouble. Since 2019 hundreds of gray whales have died along North America’s Pacific coastline. Many of the whales appeared skinny or underfed.

Addressing the whale issue, another scientific study from a year ago stated:

It is now the third year that gray whales have been found in very poor condition or dead in large numbers along the west coast of Mexico, USA and Canada, and scientist have raised their concerns. An international study suggests that starvation is contributing to these mortalities.” 3

When the top of the marine food chain (whales) starve, it’s only too obvious that the lower levels are failing. This one fact is cause for serious concern and thus demands action by the leaders of the world to commit to a series of international studies of marine life and ocean conditions with recommendations on how to solve the anthropogenic cause of excessive greenhouse gas emissions.

Yet, it appears that as some species in the far north struggle, some do adapt and even thrive. Thus, there may be some tradeoffs on a slightly positive note, but still, it’s the emaciated animals en mass that cannot be overlooked. The fact of the matter, stated in The Times:

Data from a Bering Sea mooring shows the average temperature throughout the water column has risen markedly in the last several years: in 2018, water temperatures were 9 degrees above the historical average.

It should be noted that if overall global temperatures averaged 9 degrees above average, it would be “lights out” for terrestrial life.

Warmer waters appear to be at the heart of the problem, e.g., as the planet warms both humans and wildlife become more vulnerable to infectious diseases that were previously confined to certain specific locations and environments. Additionally, toxic algae that kills marine life thrives in warmer waters. Plus, marine animals do not naturally mature, and reproduce as waters warm far above historical averages. Furthermore, ocean acidification, caused by excessive CO2, is already threatening sea life by reducing carbonate, a key building block in seawater.

Only recently, a death march of extreme heat hit the Pacific. A study in Canada showed the enormous impact of heat, as an estimated one billion sea creatures off the coast of Vancouver died because of excessive ocean heat. According to professor Christopher Harley, University of British Columbia:

I’ve been working in the Pacific Northwest for most of the past 25 years, and I have not seen anything like this here. This is far more extensive than anything I’ve ever seen. 4

The oceans are suffering a triple whammy, and as a result scientists believe it is distinctly possible that life in the wondrous blue seas could be gone by mid century, unless humanity changes course. Overfishing, pollution, and climate change are battering the oceans. It’s all human-caused. The question then becomes, if humans have caused the onslaught, can they reverse it, or at least stop?

In all, it’s becoming only too apparent that to maintain life on the planet, the world economy needs to stabilize by massive reduction of greenhouse gases accompanied by flat-line economic activity, forget the death wish of GDP up and up “whatever percent every quarter,” which runs roughshod over the planet’s ecosystems. Worshipping GDP growth is akin to idolatry, and its moral corollary is greed. Maybe try worldwide socialism and see how that works for the planet’s life-sourcing ecosystems.

Not only that, but plain and simple, we’re running out of nature’s resourcefulness.

Today’s seas contain only 10% of the marlin, tuna, sharks and other large predators that were found in the 1950s… Overfishing puts the whole ocean ecosystem out of balance. 5

Of additional interest, the documentary Seaspiracy/Netflix by Disrupt Studios, March 2021 is an eye-opener on the goings-on of marine life, what’s left of it, in the oceans.

Museum scientists have studied past periods of climate change:

Research leader Prof Richard Twitchett says, ‘We have a really good idea of what oceans look like when the climate warms. It has happened to Earth many times before, and here in the Museum we have collections of fossil animals and plants that date back millions of years, so we can see how they responded. The rocks and fossils show us that as temperature increased in the past, oxygen levels fell and huge areas of the seafloor became uninhabitable. 2

The same oceans that nourished human evolution are poised to unleash misery on a global scale unless the carbon pollution destabilizing Earth’s marine environment is brought to heel. 6

Robert Hunziker (MA, economic history, DePaul University) is a freelance writer and environmental journalist whose articles have been translated into foreign languages and appeared in over 50 journals, magazines, and sites worldwide.

Notes:
1.↩ Susanne Rust, “Unprecedented Die-offs, Melting Ice: Climate Change is Wreaking Havoc in the Arctic and Beyond”, Los Angeles Times, December 17, 2021.
2.↩ Ibid.
3.↩ Mary Lou Jones and Steven Swartz -Aarhus University- “A Large Number of Gray Whales are Starving and Dying in the Eastern North Pacific”, ScienceDaily, January 22, 2021.
4.↩ “Heat Wave Killed An Estimated 1 Billion Sea Creatures, And Scientists Fear Even Worse”, NPR Environment, July 9, 2021.
5.↩ Katie Pavid, “Will the Ocean Really Be Dead In 50 Years?” Natural History Museum, London.
6.↩ “Oceans Turning From Friend to Foe”, Warns Landmark UN Climate Report, Agence France Presse, August 29, 2019.

https://mronline.org/2021/12/29/warning ... far-north/

[blindpig]

Fossil fuel cuts: Promises vs plans
January 4, 2022
Governments plan for over twice as much fossil fuel as required for limiting warming to 1.5°C


The fossil fuel production gap — the difference between global fossil fuel production projected by governments’ plans (red line) and those consistent with 1.5°C- and 2°C-warming pathways (blue and green lines), as expressed in carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions released when the extracted fuels are burned — remains large.

The Production Gap Report, published jointly by the United Nations Environmental Program and several major environmental research institutions, tracks the discrepancy between governments’ planned fossil fuel production and global production levels consistent with limiting warming to 1.5°C or 2°C.

Below, slightly abridged, is the Executive Summary of the recently released 2021 report. The full report can be downloaded here (pdf). https://productiongap.org/wp-content/up ... eb_rev.pdf

Key Findings

*Governments plan to produce more than twice the amount of fossil fuels in 2030 than would be consistent with limiting warming to 1.5°C. The production gap has remained largely unchanged since our first analysis in 2019.
*Global fossil fuel production must start declining immediately and steeply to be consistent with limiting long-term warming to 1.5°C.
*Most major oil and gas producers are planning on increasing production out to 2030 or beyond, and several major coal producers are planning on continuing or increasing production.
*G20 countries have directed more new funding to fossil fuels than clean energy since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.
International public finance for the production of fossil fuels from G20 countries and multilateral development banks (MDBs) has significantly decreased in recent years.
*Governments have a primary role to play in closing the production gap and in ensuring that the transition away from fossil fuels is just and equitable.

This report first introduced and quantified the “production gap” in 2019, finding that the world’s governments planned to produce far more fossil fuels than consistent with their Paris Agreement commitment to limit global warming. Two years on, with the climate crisis clearer and more urgent than ever, governments continue to bet on extracting far more coal, oil, and gas than is consistent with agreed climate limits.

Specifically, this report’s production gap analysis — the first full update since 2019 — finds that the world’s governments still plan to produce more than double the amount of fossil fuels in 2030 than would be consistent with limiting global warming to 1.5°C, and 45% more than consistent with limiting warming to 2°C. Collectively, although many governments have pledged to lower their emissions and even set net-zero targets, they have not yet made plans to wind down production of the fossil fuels that, once burned, generate most of those emissions.

The latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report issued an important call to action: we are running out of time to limit long-term global warming to 1.5°C or even 2°C. This report shows that doing so requires steep and sustained reductions in fossil fuel production and use. The world’s governments must take urgent action to close the production gap.

The report’s main findings are as follows:

As countries set net-zero emission targets, and increase their climate ambitions under the Paris Agreement, they have not explicitly recognized or planned for the rapid reduction in fossil fuel production that these targets will require. Rather, the world’s governments plan to produce more than twice the amount of fossil fuels in 2030 than would be consistent with limiting warming to 1.5°C. The production gap has remained largely unchanged since our first analysis in 2019.

Since the release of the first Production Gap Report in 2019, many governments have announced new, more ambitious greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reduction targets, including net-zero pledges. While this is a positive development, only a few fossil-fuel-producing countries have begun to grapple with how zeroing out global GHG emissions will affect their future coal, oil, and gas production.

According to our assessment of recent national energy plans and projections, governments are in aggregate planning to produce 110% more fossil fuels in 2030 than would be consistent with limiting global warming to 1.5°C, and 45% more than would be consistent with limiting warming to 2°C, on a global level. By 2040, this excess grows to 190% and 89%, respectively.

Collectively, governments are planning and projecting production levels higher than those implied by their emission reduction goals, as announced in their nationally determined contributions (NDCs) under the UN climate process and other climate policies as of mid-2020.

Global fossil fuel production must start declining immediately and steeply to be consistent with limiting long-term warming to 1.5°C.

However, governments are collectively projecting an increase in global oil and gas production, and only a modest decrease in coal production, over the next two decades. This leads to future production levels far above those consistent with limiting warming to 1.5°C or 2°C.

The production gap is widest for coal in 2030: governments’ production plans and projections would lead to around 240% more coal, 57% more oil, and 71% more gas than would be consistent with limiting global warming to 1.5°C.

Compared to global production levels under the 2°C-consistent pathways, governments’ production plans and projections would lead to 120% more coal, 14% more oil, and 15% more gas in 2030. The production gaps for all fuels grow much wider by 2040 under both temperature limits.

This disconnect could be even worse than our analysis implies. As explored in Chapter 2, our estimate of the size of the production gap depends on model assumptions and conceptions of how the low-carbon transition unfolds, such as how much carbon dioxide can be captured and stored or sequestered, and the trade-offs among different emission-reduction strategies. If carbon dioxide removal technologies fail to develop at large scale, or if methane emissions are not rapidly reduced, the production gap would be wider than estimated here. Furthermore, Chapter 2 shows that minimizing methane emissions from fossil fuel extraction and distribution alone is not a substitute for a rapid wind-down in fossil fuel production itself.

G20 countries have directed nearly USD 300 billion in new funds towards fossil fuel activities since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic — more than they have toward clean energy. In contrast, they have significantly decreased new international public finance for fossil fuel production in recent years; multilateral development banks (MDBs) and G20 development finance institutions (DFIs) holding a total of over USD 2 trillion in assets have adopted policies that exclude fossil fuel production activities from future finance.

The trajectory of fossil fuels will be shaped by the unprecedented levels of investment that many governments are now injecting into their economies, as part of their COVID-19 recovery efforts. Since January 2020, G20 countries have directed USD 297 billion of new public financial commitments towards fossil-fuel-consuming and -producing activities. Though governments have begun to shift more of their COVID-19 recovery spending to clean energy, they still spend more on support for fossil fuels.

While international public finance institutions continue to support fossil fuel extraction, distribution, and processing, there are promising trends: new public finance for the production of fossil fuels from MDBs and G20 countries has significantly decreased since 2017, and, increasingly, MDBs and G20 DFIs have policies that exclude future investment in these activities.

This report details the government strategies, support, and plans for fossil fuel production in 15 major producer countries. Most major oil and gas producers are planning on increasing production out to 2030 or beyond, while several major coal producers are planning on continuing or increasing production.

This report provides country profiles for Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, Germany, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Norway, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The profiles summarize each country’s stated national climate ambitions; available information on government views, projections, and support for fossil fuel production; and emerging policies and discussions towards a managed and equitable wind-down of production.

These countries have announced GHG emission reduction targets through their NDCs and, in some cases, have set net-zero goals. However, few have assessed, at least publicly, whether their projected fossil fuel production is consistent with the goals of the Paris Agreement. This focus on emissions alone ignores their roles and responsibilities in producing the predominant source of these emissions.

Moreover, the country profiles show that most of these governments continue to provide significant policy support for fossil fuel production, through tax breaks, finance, direct infrastructure investments, exemptions from environmental requirements, and other measures. As Figure ES.3 shows, most major oil- and gas-producing countries are planning on expanding production. For coal, some countries plan to reduce production while others still plan to continue or increase it. While some countries are beginning to discuss and enact policies towards a just and equitable transition away from fossil fuel production, these efforts have not yet affected the plans and strategies of major producing countries.

Verifiable and comparable information on fossil fuel production and support — from both governments and companies — is essential to addressing the production gap. Governments should strengthen transparency by disclosing their production plans in their climate commitments under the Paris Agreement.

While existing transparency initiatives have shed some light on fossil fuel production, the available information is incomplete, inconsistent, and scattered. Addressing the production gap requires governments to be far more transparent in their plans and projections for oil, gas, and coal production.

Governments have already committed to reporting climate-related information as part of the Paris Agreement. This reporting currently focuses on emissions goals, but governments could also include production plans and projections — and how these plans align with climate goals — in their NDCs, their long-term, low-emissions development strategies (LT-LEDS), and their progress reports on implementing and achieving their NDCs.

Governments can also mandate that investor- and state-owned fossil fuel companies disclose their spending, project plans, emissions, and climate-related financial risks in a way that is consistent across countries.

Governments have a primary role to play in closing the production gap.

In addition to strengthening measures to reduce the demand for fossil fuels, governments should also take actions to ensure a managed and equitable decline in production, such as the following:

*Acknowledge in their energy and climate plans that there is a need to wind down global fossil fuel production in line with the Paris Agreement’s temperature limits. This creates impetus and accountability for policy action.
*Chart the course towards a rapid, just, and equitable wind-down of fossil fuel production as part of overall decarbonization plans. Comprehensive efforts to wean countries off the use of coal, oil, and gas should be coupled with strategies to ramp down production to ensure a less disruptive transition.
*Place restrictions on fossil fuel exploration and extraction to avoid locking in levels of fossil fuel supply that are inconsistent with climate goals.
*Phase out government support for fossil fuel production. Governments can end subsidies and other support for production, exclude fossil fuels from public finance, and direct greater support towards low-carbon development.
*Leverage international cooperation to ensure a more effective and equitable global wind-down of production. A just, equitable, and effective transition will require greater international support for countries highly dependent on fossil fuel production and with limited financial and institutional capacity. Countries with greater capacity can lead the way.

https://climateandcapitalism.com/2022/0 ... sus-plans/

[blindpig]

Climate scientists: Ban solar geoengineering
January 17, 2022
‘The risks are poorly understood and can never be fully known’



The following open letter was issued by an international coalition of prominent scientists and governance scholars on January 17, 2022. It calls for an international treaty to outlaw attempts to reduce global heating by blocking sunlight from reaching earth.

Sixteen of the signatories are co-authors of Solar geoengineering: The case for an international non-use agreement, published simultaneously in the journal WIREs Climate Change. That paper concludes:

“Solar geoengineering is not necessary. Neither is it desirable, ethical, or politically governable in the current context. With the normalization of solar geoengineering research moving on with rapid speed, a strong political message to block these technologies is needed. And this message must come soon.”

OPEN LETTER

Solar geoengineering – a set of hypothetical technologies to reduce incoming sunlight on Earth – is gaining prominence in debates on climate policy. Several scientists have launched research projects on solar geoengineering, and some see it as a potential future policy option.

To us, these proliferating calls for solar geoengineering research and development are cause for alarm. We share three fundamental concerns:

First, the risks of solar geoengineering are poorly understood and can never be fully known. Impacts will vary across regions, and there are uncertainties about the effects on weather patterns, agriculture, and the provision of basic needs of food and water.

Second, speculative hopes about the future availability of solar geoengineering technologies threaten commitments to mitigation and can disincentives governments, businesses, and societies to do their utmost to achieve decarbonization or carbon neutrality as soon as possible. The speculative possibility of future solar geoengineering risks becoming a powerful argument for industry lobbyists, climate denialists, and some governments to delay decarbonization policies.

Third, the current global governance system is unfit to develop and implement the far-reaching agreements needed to maintain fair, inclusive, and effective political control over solar geoengineering deployment. The United Nations General Assembly, the United Nations Environment Programme or the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change are all incapable of guaranteeing equitable and effective multilateral control over deployment of solar geoengineering technologies at planetary scale. The United Nations Security Council, dominated by only five
countries with veto power, lacks the global legitimacy that would be required to effectively regulate solar geoengineering deployment.


Source: WIREs Climate Change, January 17, 2022

These concerns also arise with informal governance arrangements such as multi-stakeholder dialogues or voluntary codes of conduct. Informal arrangements face barriers to entry by less powerful actors and risk contributing to premature legitimization of these speculative technologies. Science networks are dominated by a few industrialized countries, with less economically powerful countries having little or no direct control over them. Technocratic governance based on expert commissions cannot adjudicate complex global conflicts over values, risk allocation and differences in risk acceptance that arise within the context of solar geoengineering.

Without effective global and democratic controls, the geopolitics of possible unilateral deployment of solar geoengineering would be frightening and inequitable. Given the anticipated low monetary costs of some of these technologies, there is a risk that a few powerful countries would engage in solar geoengineering unilaterally or in small coalitions even when a majority of countries oppose such deployment.

In short, solar geoengineering deployment cannot be governed globally in a fair, inclusive, and effective manner. We therefore call for immediate political action from governments, the United Nations, and other actors to prevent the normalization of solar geoengineering as a climate policy option. Governments and the United Nations should take effective political control and restrict the development of solar geoengineering technologies before it is too late. We advocate for an International Non-Use Agreement on Solar Geoengineering specifically targeted against the development and deployment of such technologies at planetary scale.

The International Non-Use Agreement on Solar Geoengineering should commit governments to five core
prohibitions and measures:

1.The commitment to prohibit their national funding agencies from supporting the development of technologies for solar geoengineering, domestically and through international institutions.
2.The commitment to ban outdoor experiments of solar geoengineering technologies in areas under their jurisdiction.
3.The commitment to not grant patent rights for technologies for solar geoengineering, including supporting technologies such as for the retrofitting of airplanes for aerosol injections.
4.The commitment to not deploy technologies for solar geoengineering if developed by third parties.
5.The commitment to object to future institutionalization of planetary solar geoengineering as a policy option in relevant international institutions, including assessments by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

An International Non-Use Agreement on Solar Geoengineering would not prohibit atmospheric or climate research as such, and it would not place broad limitations on academic freedom. The agreement would instead focus solely on a specific set of measures targeted purely at restricting the development of solar geoengineering technologies under the jurisdiction of the parties to the agreement.

International political control over the development of contested, high-stakes technologies with planetary risks is not unprecedented. The international community has a rich history of international restrictions and moratoria over activities and technologies judged to be too dangerous or undesirable. This history demonstrates that international bans on the development of specific technologies do not limit legitimate research or stifle scientific innovation. In addition, an International Non-Use Agreement on Solar Geoengineering could include exceptions for less dangerous approaches, for example by allowing the use of localized surface albedo-related technologies that pose few cross-regional or global risks.

In sum, an International Non-Use Agreement on Solar Geoengineering would be timely, feasible, and effective. It would inhibit further normalization and development of a risky and poorly understood set of technologies that seek to intentionally manage incoming sunlight at planetary scale. And it would do so without restricting legitimate climate research. Decarbonization of our economies is feasible if the right steps are taken. Solar geoengineering is not necessary. Neither is it desirable, ethical, or politically governable in the current context.

Given the increasing normalization of solar geoengineering research, a strong political message to block these technologies is required. An International Non-Use Agreement on Solar Geoengineering is needed now.

https://climateandcapitalism.com/2022/0 ... gineering/

[blindpig]

Chemical pollution around the world has exceeded the "planetary boundary"
20.01.2022

The mad bull of capital is rushing straight into the abyss

Experts from the Stockholm Center for Sustainable Development announced that human pollution has reached a level at which ecosystems can no longer maintain their stability. The Guardian reports about the catastrophic environmental situation.

Researchers believe that plastics and more than 3.5 thousand types of synthetic chemicals (including pesticides), as well as industrial compounds and antibiotics, pose the greatest danger. The stability of ecosystems has been maintained over the past 10 thousand years , but today the "planetary boundary" has been crossed, and chemical pollution can literally destroy existing natural mechanisms. For example, pesticides are extremely harmful to the insects that plants and animals depend on.

Production of chemicals has increased 50-fold since 1950 and is projected to triple by 2050. Safe deposition of toxic compounds emitted by industry and consumers into the environment becomes impossible.

The "planetary boundary" of chemical pollution is only one of the five boundaries identified by experts. The other four are: global warming, loss of biodiversity, destruction of wild habitats, and phosphorus and nitrogen pollution.

The type of management we are accustomed to will never solve environmental problems. The responsibility for the environment should be borne by large corporations producing hazardous products, not by consumers. Rich, not poor.

According to an Oxfam study, the rich pollute the atmosphere twice as much: the richest 1% of the world's inhabitants produced twice as much carbon monoxide as the poor. The 10% of the richest inhabitants of the Earth include citizens with an income of more than 35 thousand dollars ( 2.6 million rubles ) per year.

The growth in consumption is indirectly demonstrated by the data of the World Health Organization (WHO). According to WHO, between 1975 and 2016, the number of obese people increased by 200% . Significant growth has occurred in recent decades: from 1996 to 2016 - by 59% . Extensive processes have also affected other sectors of the world economy, including the rapidly developing chemical industry.

The cult of consumption is the basis of capitalism, the basis of the modern economic model. If humanity stops buying and consuming on an alarming scale, what will the founders of billion-dollar corporations produce endless new iPhones, clothes, household appliances, medicines, organic eco-products live on?

One way or another, the nature of our planet will not do well if humanity does not limit the mad bull of capital, rushing straight into the abyss.

https://www.rotfront.su/himicheskoe-zag ... semu-miru/

Google Translator

*********************************

Nicaraguan Farmers Seek Compensation from Chemical Corporations


File photo. The sign reads, "Dead by nemagon," outside U.S. Embassy in Managua, Nicaragua. | Photo: Twitter/ @ReporteNi

Published 24 January 2022

The lawsuit is filed before the French Justice because the United States courts refused to execute the sentences issued by Nicaraguan courts in 2002 and 2007.


On behalf of the families of 1,234 Nicaraguan farmers, lawyers Pierre-Olivier Sur and Clara Gerard-Rodriguez began on Monday a legal process in the Paris Court to claim compensation of US$1 billion from Shell Oil, Dow Chemical, and Occidental Chemical.

This unprecedented process accuses the world's largest chemical groups for the damage caused by their pesticides to Nicaraguan workers during the last decades of the 20th century.

The lawsuit is filed before the French Justice because the United States courts refused to execute the sentences issued in 2002 and 2007 by Nicaraguan courts, which forced these three companies to compensate workers who had been affected by a pesticide labelled Nemagon.

The Nicaraguan rulings showed that Shell Oil, Dow Chemical, and Occidental Chemical sold this product in the Central American country despite the fact that it had been prohibited in the U.S. since 1977 due to its harmful effects. Among the health effects suffered by banana workers are neurological problems, blindness, infertility, and prostate and liver cancers.

Years later, however, U.S. courts dismissed the Nicaraguan rulings, arguing that the local judges were suspected of corruption.


The meme reads, "Twelve banana plantation workers in Nicaragua sued the multinational Dole Food Company for the use of pesticides during the 1970s. The world around a banana: Bananas!"

"Corrupted by whom? The victims were penniless and they're all dead. This is a fight between David and Goliath," attorney Sur stressed in response to the U.S. judges' interpretation.

In order to obtain the payment of compensation based on the assets owned by the transnational companies, the farmers' lawyers based their claim on the "Exequatur," a legal principle that has been used previously to achieve recognition of a foreign sentence.

The plaintiffs' lawyers chose France because here a decision related to the Exequatur, which has been applied to divorce cases in French courts, implies its immediate execution in all the European Union since 2012. In addition, the Nicaraguan legal system is based on the Napoleonic Code, which is the civil liability mechanism applied in France.

https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/Nic ... -0010.html

*****************************************

Can we stop the insect apocalypse?
January 26, 2022
A brilliant account of the growing threat to insect life falls short on solutions



Dave Goulson
SILENT EARTH
Averting the Insect Apocalypse
HarperCollins, 2021

Reviewed by Ben Courtice

A book with a title referencing Rachel Carson’s seminal Silent Spring is a bold undertaking. But it had to be done. Despite the growth in awareness that Carson provoked, the actual destruction of the environment never stopped. DDT may have been mostly phased out, but now we have neonicotinoid insecticides which are continuing the relentless destruction of insect life and the food web that we all depend on.

It’s a bleak picture, and despite the increase in awareness since the 1960s, Goulson makes it pretty clear that its a vastly under-researched problem. I note that funding for ecological research has not fared well over recent decades, at the precise point when we needed it most. But there is enough data to be very concerned about plummeting insect numbers and probably many species going extinct without our even knowing it. Since insects are a vital foundation of ecosystems, as well as being fascinating, this is concerning on many levels. We rely entirely on healthy ecosystems for our own food, in the end.

The first three parts of the book develop this case, in a calm but impassioned way. They summarize why insects are crucial (and very cool), the current state of scientific research, and ethical and policy arguments succinctly and accessibly. All manner of threats to insect survival and diversity are covered, including city light pollution, herbicides, fungicides, invasive species and more.

I particularly enjoyed the coverage of controversial issues like bans on the herbicide Roundup (he explains the debate around this better than anything else I have read). He canvasses (and rightly dismisses) some of the wackier ideas out there (chemtrails) while, rightly or wrongly, suggesting a more precautionary approach to others (5G technology).

More broadly, and partly because of the important role insects play in supporting the biodiversity of everything else, this book is a great description of the broader crisis of biodiversity that the world finds itself in — something maybe more or less frightening than climate change, but acting in concert with it to create a crisis for the foundations of our ecology, economy and culture.

This far, the book is a dire but essential intervention into public debate. Were it to end there, I would give it five stars, and everyone concerned should read this far at least. The remaining two parts of the book highlight what I think are two main limitations – one contextual and surmountable, the other profound and revealing of broader problems with the response to environmental problems.

The concluding sections of the book focus on the technical ways that we can stop destroying insect biodiversity — in our cities, and in agriculture. There are some good discussions of environmental policy (land sparing vs land land sharing, for example) and the way our current systems could be altered. There are many sensible suggestions that I and many others familiar with the problems all broadly agree with, and which taken together, would go a long way to solving the problems.

However, the very UK focused nature of Goulson’s examples and recommendations make it a bit laborious for people elsewhere. We have to extrapolate to which elements apply in our situation and try to work out if they apply directly, or perhaps with alteration.

More problematic, I think, is the slightly parochial sense in which his solutions mostly ignore issues of international trade, debt and development. It’s impossible to solve our biodiversity or climate crises in one country; the legacy of colonialism and third world underdevelopment really needs to be considered more. Which brings me to the bigger problem.

The fundamental problem with book, in relation to its aim of Averting the Insect Apocalypse, is that Goulson completely ignores and sidesteps issues of political power and power structure, at both national and international levels. His remedies for people to pursue range through such radical steps as voting for the parties with the best policy, writing to your politicians, and things like installing “bee hotels” in your backyard garden (assuming you have one).

The problem is, these are the kinds of actions that people who care have been doing since Silent Spring came out, and things have only gotten worse in that time.

Perhaps some of his final recommendations could have been to find like-minded others and form a revolutionary cell, which can then go on to:

*study the history and theories of profound/revolutionary social change;
*study the nature of political and economic power in our capitalist society;
*analyze the history of colonialism and imperialism, and seek international alliances to strengthen those battling their legacy directly;
*link up with others to take action to reform and/or transform the current capitalist system in ways that directly attack its structural failings.

I could go on. Of course building a bee hotel in your backyard, or even having a chat with your MP over tea and biscuits, is much easier and no doubt seems more direct. But where is the evidence for these things making an impact on the scale we need? Why have these efforts failed for so long? If the problem was a lack of reasoned argument finding its target, I suspect the problem would have been solved many decades ago.

Goulson isn’t a political theorist, I guess, so I should note that I don’t find the things he does suggest particularly unhelpful in and of themselves. But conservationists need to get beyond liberal thinking that takes the status quo for granted.

Silent Earth is essential reading, but mostly the first three parts. Perhaps readers should go on from this to something like Magdoff and Foster’s What Every Environmentalist Needs to Know about Capitalism (Monthly Review Press, 2011).

https://climateandcapitalism.com/2022/0 ... pocalypse/

Quote box added.

I included this review for the section I quoted. This is a serious problem with the environmental community and scientific community, and what gets my goat and indeed what led me to Marxism was the unavoidable truth that after 50+ years since the 1st Earth Day we continue to slide into the abyss. Because action on an individual basis does little but engender a self-satisfied feeling that "I've done my part". No harm, but no gain either. I do a lot of those things because I enjoy doing them but have no illusion that I am in any way 'saving the Earth'. Only the mass action of the working class can stop the juggernaut of capitalist ecocide. The death cult of profit must be put aside, destroyed.

As always class considerations comes to the fore. Science and the environmental community are embedded in petty bourgeoisie historically and ideologically. And while nobody wants to surrender the little and shrinking class privilege which they have achieved I gotta wonder why the science does not lead to the obvious political conclusion. It seems a kind of jangled cognitive dissonance. They should take their part in leading the revolution, not standing by fretting that 'no one' listens to them.

“What matters is not to know the world but to change it.”
― Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks

I don't think Marx would mind.

[blindpig]

Overcoming climate nihilism and the duty of revolutionaries
Tina LandisJanuary 26, 2022 36 6 minutes read

Download PDF flyer https://flyer-generator.herokuapp.com/? ... sts/101557

Tina Landis is the author of the book Climate Solutions Beyond Capitalism.

There is no place on the globe at this point that is free from the impacts of climate change. You truly have to disassociate from reality to miss it. But most don’t understand that real solutions exist that could reverse the crisis in one generation, and are unaware of all the work to heal the planet that is already happening around the globe. Without the facts, it is easy to slip into a nihilistic view and think that there is no hope of solving this crisis, and in turn, disengage from the issue.

We are constantly bombarded with heartbreaking and terrifying images in the media of our deteriorating life support system. You rarely, if ever, see reports in the mainstream media on what is really being done to address the problem through projects that are restoring ecosystems, improving biodiversity, or significantly reducing greenhouse gas emissions. And due to U.S. imperialist policies mirrored in the media, you will never hear about the immense efforts happening in communist China to electrify transportation and expand renewable energy, whose energy sector currently has three times the gigawatt capacity from renewables than the United States.

And then there’s Hollywood that keeps churning out more and more post-apocalyptic stories about societal collapse, and most recently, the complete failure of the Biden administration to implement even minor climate actions.

All of these things — lack of education, the mainstream narrative, inaction from the government, and our lived experience on this planet — fuel climate nihilism. This nihilism within the broader society serves to maintain the status quo by demobilizing the population and diffusing demands for comprehensive action from the government.

Defeating nihilism

Before I began studying climate change and ways to solve it, I, like most others, had anxiety and fear around the issue. It’s understandable that many tend to avoid what seems an insurmountable crisis coupled with the pain and grief over what we are losing. Humanity does truly face an uncertain future, but much is happening to reverse this crisis, and much more needs to be done and can be done. We are not doomed to extinction.

But a nihilistic view on climate change hinders our collective ability to overcome the crisis. When not only the media focuses on the apocalyptic scenario, but we in our own conversations with each other do the same, we inadvertently weaken our collective power to overcome this very real and urgent crisis. By focusing on the negative, we reinforce a negative outcome.

This nihilistic view on climate that is pervasive in society is not accidental. Six corporate conglomerates controlled by the ruling capitalist elite own the majority of the media in all its forms. Ninety-eight percent of mainstream articles on climate change focus on the negative and are often a sensationalized version of the problem.

When solutions are discussed in the mainstream, it is in a way that only reinforces the overwhelm and disengagement that people feel. The solutions aren’t framed as a need for systemic change — which is in reality what is needed — but rather as an individual responsibility, i.e., drive an electric vehicle, buy “green” products, recycle, etc. Considering that the wealthiest 1% of society has a carbon footprint equal to 50% of the world’s poorest and that 71% of emissions since 1988 are tied to just 100 companies, these individual choices by the average person cannot affect the change that is needed.

This one-sided narrative that fuels nihilism is a win for the capitalists who prefer continued profits even at the expense of our survival. No matter how tragic an event, they will always find a way to make profits. Vaccine apartheid under COVID is just one example of this “disaster capitalism.”


Photo: Chesapeake Bay Program. (CC BY-NC 2.0)

There were two major issues that led me to write the book “Climate Solutions Beyond Capitalism.” One was the fear I saw in fellow organizers around the issue of climate change.

The other was the complete lack of analysis from a socialist perspective in academia and in most literature. There are lots of informative writings on the problem that point the finger at the corporate plunder of the planet as the cause. Some even explain the real solutions, but there is never an alternative path laid out to achieve this transformation. This leaves the reader at a loss of where to go, further fueling demoralization.

I was incredibly frustrated with my professors in the UC Berkeley program on sustainable management because the only solutions discussed were those that fit within the capitalist free market, i.e., carbon trading schemes, regulatory mechanisms, corporate incentives and consumer choices.

The international scientific community, including the thousands of climate scientists that contribute to the regular UN IPCC reports, convey these real solutions to rapidly transition off fossil fuels, stop environmental destruction and restore ecosystems. Many of these same scientists also point to the nature of the capitalist imperialist system as the cause, but they also fail to provide an alternative.

This limited analysis is largely a result of the long history of anti-communism, particularly in the United States, that to this day creates a misconception of what socialism is. And for those who may believe that socialism is the path forward, this anti-communist legacy often imposes a self-censorship that restricts the discussion safely within the dominant narrative for fear of being discredited in academic circles and never published.

Through my book, I sought to fill a void by providing an accessible resource on the problem and concrete achievable solutions by analyzing the issue from a socialist perspective beyond the restrictions of the narrative of the capitalist world order, and in turn hoped to inspire optimism and action.

The challenge and the way through

Very real and achievable solutions exist. There is no quick fix single solution. We must tackle the problem from many angles. And it will require work. It will take time and sacrifice from all of us. There will be setbacks and there will be losses. There are many things in the natural world that will never be the same again. But we can heal the planet and build a sustainable future for all life.

As organizers, the challenge is how can we lead our class in the struggle for liberation if we at the same time believe that humanity is doomed to extinction in the not too distant future? Climate change is and will continue to increasingly impact the lives of the working class and will exacerbate all the other hardships and oppressions that our communities face. The climate crisis in the near future could very well be the spark for a major upsurge of mass struggle. And we must be ready.

We, as revolutionaries, who have dedicated our time and energy and often decades of our lives to the struggle for the liberation of humanity, for socialism, have to overcome this nihilism if we are to successfully lead our class.

We cannot allow this nihilistic view on climate change to paralyze us. It is counter to the dialectical materialist view of the world that we espouse and it is not based on facts. Humanity does have the tools and knowledge and it is not too late, but many are misinformed. We can reverse climate change in one generation if we begin the transformation now. And if we wait, it will be harder, it will take longer, more will suffer, more species will be lost, but even then, we can still reverse course toward healing the damage and mitigating the impacts for future generations.

I challenge my fellow revolutionaries to face the climate crisis, educate yourselves, read “Climate Solutions Beyond Capitalism,” and seek support from comrades who understand the issue and hold optimism. We must learn about the solutions, be in discussions on the issue, and inspire our class into action as we do on so many other issues.

As revolutionaries, we are visionaries. How else could we fight for a socialist future without having a vision of a better world? Same goes for climate change. We must stop imagining the apocalypse and start imagining the eco-socialist future. It is key to getting there.

https://www.liberationnews.org/overcomi ... rationnews

I agree fully with this piece except for " We can reverse climate change in one generation if we begin the transformation now. ". Afraid that boat done sailed. It's gonna take longer, it's gonna be harder, and the longer we wait the longer and harder it gets. Which is no reason to throw up yer hands screaming "We're all gonna die!" but rather to get to work.


**************************************************


Department of Public Health and Primary Care – University of Cambridge

Climate inaction, injustice worsened by finance fiasco
Posted Jan 26, 2022 by Jomo Kwame Sundaram

Originally published: JOMO (January 24, 2022 ) |

KUALA LUMPUR: Many factors frustrate the international cooperation needed to address the looming global warming catastrophe. As most rich nations have largely abdicated responsibility, developing countries need to think and act innovatively and cooperatively to better advance the South.

Climate action

The world is woefully offtrack to achieving the current international consensus that it is necessary to keep the global temperature rise by the end of the 21st century to no more than 1.5°C (degrees Celsius) above pre-industrial levels two centuries ago.

The last Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report warns that temperatures are then likely to exceed 2.2°C. Many climate scientists fear many underlying interactions and feedback effects are still little known or poorly understood. Hence, they have not been factored enough into current projections.

Although the threat of global warming was scientifically recognized almost half a century ago, there has been much foot ragging since. Contrary to widespread belief, industrialized nations–the earliest and biggest greenhouse gas emitters –have actually held back much more adequate responses to the climate threat.

Although the UN’s 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro secured the international community’s commitment to sustainable development, actual progress since has been modest at best. Undermining multilateralism–particularly since the end of the Cold War around the same time–has certainly not helped.

By effectively killing the Kyoto Protocol, the U.S. has undermined the UN system and other multilateral initiatives not in its own interest since the first Cold War’s end. Consequently, most other signatory rich nations have not even tried to meet the Kyoto Protocol obligations they had signed up to.

Unsurprisingly, then Vice-President Al Gore–who presided over the U.S. Senate’s 95-0 vote against the Kyoto Protocol–did not stress climate change in his 2000 presidential campaign. His public advocacy against global warming only began after his political ambitions ended with his controversial loss to George W. Bush.

Likewise, President Obama did little against global warming during his first presidential term–e.g., at the 2009 Copenhagen UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Conference of Parties (COP)–before the U.S. actively shaped the 2015 Paris Agreement.

But, unlike Kyoto, the Paris deal is voluntary–i.e., not binding. Nonetheless, climate action was dealt yet another blow when President Donald Trump withdrew the U.S. in early 2017 before President Joe Biden brought the U.S. back in 2021.

Climate finance

To induce developing countries to accept binding new obligations at the 2009 Copenhagen COP, the European Commission President, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown all pledged U.S.$100 billion of climate finance annually–far from enough, but still a decent start.

But not even half this grossly inadequate, originally European commitment has actually been delivered. Other rich countries have generally given even less than the Europeans. All this is far short of what developing countries need to cope, worsened by requiring more aid to donor country export sales.

Most concessional climate finance since has been to mitigate climate change, with much less for adaptation. Worse, almost nothing has gone to help the typically impoverished victims of global warming for their cumulative ‘losses and damages’!

Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 13 seeks to combat climate change and its impacts. Meanwhile, current global warming continues to worsen the effects of accumulated greenhouse gas emissions by industrialized countries.

In December 2015, the Paris COP reached agreement on a range of voluntary promises. Yet, climate scientists agree that neither the binding Kyoto Protocol nor the voluntary Paris Agreement can keep global warming by the end of the century under 1.5°C.

Economic damage to developing countries due to global warming so far is currently assessed at more than double the better documented adverse impacts on rich nations. But its victims get little help adapting to the daunting consequences of climate change, let alone ‘compensation’ for irreversible ‘losses and damages’.

Meanwhile, ostensible climate finance book-keeping involves considerable ‘creative accounting’. Thus, such resources have been exaggerated in various ways–e.g., by citing numbers for ‘blended finance’ and other dubious arrangements.

Thus, official ‘overseas development assistance’ or aid funds have been abused to subsidize ‘greenwashing’ public-private partnerships–e.g., by ‘de-risking’ profit-seeking private investments presented to the public as ‘climate-friendly’.

Climate justice

More recently, ‘climate justice’ is increasingly being demanded, especially of Western nations–instead of mere ‘climate action’. Although the climate action approach claims to treat all countries equally, by ignoring existing inequalities and disparities, climate action inevitably deepens them.

Invoking justice implies equitable actions are needed to redress the unequal implications of climate actions–e.g., reducing energy generation and use–for the poor and the rich–both people and countries. Thus, without addressing the need for equitable sustainable development, climate action often worsens inequities.

Hence, while claiming to offer seemingly fair solutions, some climate action measures–e.g., simply raising carbon prices, and thus, fuel costs for all–will be unfair in impact. Instead, climate justice measures must equitably address global warming and other climate change challenges.

The challenge–from a sustainable development perspective–is to address climate change while improving living standards equitably, especially for the worse off. This requires widespread generation and use of affordable renewable energy–instead of using fossil fuels–to slow global warming.

But markets are not going to do so on their own. Hence, novel, including hybrid means and much more affordable transfer of relevant technologies are needed to rapidly promote renewable energy use and ecological adaptation to global warming without adversely affecting the worse off.

https://mronline.org/2022/01/26/climate ... ce-fiasco/

*************************************

Outrage in Peru following devastating Repsol oil spill

The devastating oil spill has polluted 1.7 million square meters of soil and 1.2 million square meters of ocean, tarred 21 beaches on Peru’s Pacific coast, and killed a vast variety of marine wildlife, besides incurring huge economic losses to fishing and tourism industries

January 25, 2022 by Tanya Wadhwa


Clean up operation under way in the coastal territories affected by the oil spill in the Ventanilla sea on January 20. Photo: Peruvian President’s Office /Twitter

Peruvian President Pedro Castillo, on January 24, assured that his administration will take all necessary actions to ensure that Spanish transnational company Repsol “comply with its criminal, civil and administrative responsibilities” for the oil spill in the Ventanilla sea last week. During a meeting with artisanal fishermen of the Chorrillos district affected by the spill, the head of state also recalled that “it is not the first time that Repsol has done this to the country,” and stressed that “it must be taken into account for future dealings that this company has to do with the State.”

Castillo also criticized the mainstream media for ignoring one of the largest oil environmental disasters in Peru, because it is the responsibility of a corporate company. “If this contamination were from the government, we would be in the pages (of newspapers) every day, on the screens (of television), but since it is the responsibility of these companies that are on the other side (right-wing), there is an absolute silence,” he stated.


Peruvian President Pedro Castillo visited the coastal territories affected by the oil spill in the Ventanilla sea on January 20. Photo: Peruvian President’s Office /Twitter

The president assured that his government defends the sea space that corresponds to the population of artisanal fishermen and will not allow it to be abused. In this regard, he announced that the National Fisheries Development Fund (FONDEPES) will be strengthened. He said that in the next session of the council of ministers “we will make the head of economy and finance scratch the pot to give greater opportunities to artisanal fishermen.”

Earlier on January 24, Prime Minister Mirtha Vásquez reported that the government was reviewing the contracts with Repsol to assess sanctions against its La Pampilla refinery for the disastrous spill. Vásquez said that some political leaders were calling on the government to suspend operations at La Pampilla’s facilities, cancel its contract or even expropriate it over the disaster, but emphasized that options were still being looked at.

“We are evaluating the legal aspects. We still cannot say whether their license is going to be suspended. Any company that carries out risky operations must assume responsibility for damages and the indemnity. They cannot argue that they are not responsible. They are, and therefore they have to think about the consequences,” she said in an interview with local radio station RPP.

Last week, environment minister Rubén Ramírez said that Repsol would face a fine of about 34 million USD. Ramírez informed that in addition to the fine, the company would have to pay for the clean-up operations and the compensation to hundreds of fishermen, hoteliers and restaurateurs who have lost income because of the disaster.

The oil spill

The massive spill of 6,000 barrels of crude oil occurred on January 15 when an Italian-flagged tanker Mare Doricum was unloading at Repsol’s La Pampilla refinery, situated 30km north of the capital Lima. Repsol blamed high waves triggered by the volcanic eruption in Tonga over a week ago for the incident, and denied claims of negligence. However, the Peruvian Navy stated that “the waves had nothing to do with the rupture of the oil infrastructure that preceded the spill,” reported El Comercio, adding that the navy technicians are conducting an in-depth investigation into what happened.

The devastating oil spill has polluted 1.7 million square meters of soil and 1.2 million square meters of ocean, tarred 21 beaches in four municipalities on Peru’s Pacific coast, and killed a vast variety of marine wildlife, besides incurring huge economic losses to fishing and tourism industries. Hundreds of dead fish, seals, and birds have washed up on the shore covered in oil. The spill has also endangered the ecosystem of two protected areas: the Islotes de Pescadores and the Zona Reservada Ancón.


President Pedro Castillo declared an environmental emergency after the oil spill. Photo: Peruvian President’s Office /Twitter

After visiting the affected areas in the Callao province on January 20, President Castillo described it as “one of the biggest ecocides ever on our coasts and seas.” He vowed to “sanction those responsible for the damage that tragically affects flora and fauna,” and stressed that his administration would never tolerate the corporate actions that “trample our ecosystems and the honor of our people with impunity.”

Government actions

On January 19, the day oil residue reached two beaches on the country’s Pacific coast, the Peruvian government condemned the slow response of the company, which apparently did not have a contingency plan in case of spills at the refinery. PM Vásquez said that Repsol misled authorities when it spoke of a minor spill of less than a barrel and did not issue public warnings so that the coastal population could take protective actions. As a quick response, the same day, the government formed a crisis committee, made up of the ministries of the environment, agriculture, defense, production, energy, and foreign affairs, to address and respond to the disaster in an organized manner.

On January 20, foreign minister Óscar Maúrtua requested technical support from international organizations, such as the Permanent Commission for the South Pacific (CPPS) and the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), to deal with the catastrophe. The same day, the Prosecutor’s Office opened an investigation into the alleged crime of environmental pollution near marine reserves against Repsol.

The same day, President Castillo declared national climate emergency and promulgated a supreme decree, prohibiting deforestation, indiscriminate use of aquifers, and other acts that are detrimental to nature, while promoting recycling, and the establishment of a low-carbon economy, among other measures to preserve natural resources and ecosystems.

On January 22, the government declared a 90-day environmental emergency in the affected coastal territories to guarantee sustainable management of the recovery work.

On January 24, a group of nine experts from the UN arrived in Peru to help address and mitigate the damage caused by the oil spill. The team will carry out an analysis of the social and environmental impacts of the disaster, and will support the authorities to manage and coordinate their response.


Citizen protests

During the weekend, on January 22 and 23, hundreds of Peruvians took to the streets in protest against Repsol, accusing it of “ecocide” and demanding it take responsibility for the ecological disaster.

On January 22, thousands of fishermen from the Ancón municipality marched through the streets of the municipality demanding that the company compensate them for the damage to the beaches, the sea, the fauna, and the flora that will prevent them from earning a living for a long time, due to pollution.

Meanwhile, a group of environmentalists staged sit-ins in front of the Spanish Embassy and the Repsol’s office in Lima, demanding that the transnational company comply with its obligations to the country, to the Peruvian people, and nature.

On January 23 once again, hundreds of citizens marched to the La Pampilla refinery in the Ventanilla municipality and demonstrated outside its gates demanding a speedy cleaning process of the affected areas and remediation of the contamination. The protesters highlighted that in 2013, Repsol was involved in another oil spill of a smaller volume, and was fined for not controlling or mitigating the damage.

The same night, Repsol’s head in Peru, Jaime Fernández-Cuesta, on national television admitted that the refinery could have reacted faster, but said that only the day after the spill they learned the full magnitude of the disaster. He insisted that a period of 10 days, given by the government, for the clean-up of the directly affected area is insufficient, and demanded that it be extended until the end of February. On behalf of the company, he regretted “not having adequately communicated” everything, but didn’t accept responsibility.

Meanwhile, the local press revealed that since 2015, Reposol incurred 32 environmental violations, but was only fined for three, of which only one was paid in full, according to the record of the Environmental Assessment and Enforcement Agency (OEFA).

https://peoplesdispatch.org/2022/01/25/ ... oil-spill/