by Deep Green Resistance News Service | May 29, 2012 | Climate Change
By Jeremy Hance / Mongabay
Last year global carbon dioxide emissions rose 3.2 percent to a new record of 31.6 gigatons, keeping the planet on track to suffer dangerous climate change, which could propel global crop failures, sea level rise, worsening extreme weather, and mass extinction. According to data from the International Energy Agency (IEA), China’s carbon emissions rose the most last year (9.3 percent) while emissions in Europe and the U.S. dipped slightly. China is the currently the world’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases, while the U.S. has emitted the most historically.
“When I look at this data, the trend is perfectly in line with a temperature increase of 6 degrees Celsius [11 degrees Fahrenheit] (by 2050), which would have devastating consequences for the planet,” Fatih Birol, economist with the IEA, told Reuters.
China’s massive growth in emissions last year was linked to higher coal consumption in the economically booming nation. In addition to China, India also saw a similar spike of 8.7 percent in its carbon dioxide emissions, pushing the nation to become the world fourth largest carbon emitter after China, the U.S. and the EU. Russia dropped to number five. Japan’s emissions increased 2.4 percent due to greater reliance on fossil fuel power after the nuclear disaster at Fukushima.
Both the U.S. and the EU saw slight declines in their emissions. U.S. carbon emissions dropped 1.7 percent due to a rise in natural gas over coal energy, a decline in oil use, and a warm winter, which reduced heating demands. The EU saw a drop of 1.9 percent due to slow economic growth and, like the U.S., a mild winter.
Even as China’s emissions continue to rise, the IEA points out that the nation has cut its carbon intensity (carbon emissions linked to GDP) by 15 percent since 2005. China recently announced it was investing $27 billion in renewable energies, energy conservation, and emissions reduction in 2012.
Still, nations worldwide are not doing near-enough to keep their pledge of not allowing global temperatures to rise 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above the 20th Century average warns the IEA.
“The new data provide further evidence that the door to a 2 degrees Celsius trajectory is about to close,” warned Birol in a press release.
Nearly half (45 percent) of the emissions reported by the IEA were linked to coal, 35 percent to oil, and 20 percent to natural gas.
Even as the IEA’s new data was released nations were finishing up another round of international climate talks in Bonn, Germany. However, these talks appeared to be the most acrimonious yet with discussion largely stalemated on procedural issues.
“It’s absurd to watch governments sit and point fingers and fight like little kids while the scientists explain about the terrifying impacts of climate change and the fact that we have all the technology we need to solve the problem while creating new green jobs,” Tove Maria Ryding, coordinator for climate policy at Greenpeace International, said in a statement.
by Deep Green Resistance News Service | May 16, 2012 | Biodiversity & Habitat Destruction, Colonialism & Conquest, Mining & Drilling, Worker Exploitation
By Jeremy Hance / Mongabay
According to a new report by Greenpeace, top U.S. car companies such as Ford, General Motors, and Nissan are sourcing pig iron that has resulted in the destruction of Amazon rainforests, slave labor, and land conflict with indigenous tribes. Spending two years documenting the pig iron trade between northeastern Brazil and the U.S., Greenpeace has discovered that rainforests are cut and burned to power blast furnaces that produce pig iron, which is then shipped to the U.S. for steel production.
“Despite attention to the problem over the years, little has been done and household consumer products in the U.S. can still be traced back to illegalities and forest destruction in the Amazon,” the Greenpeace report reads.
Brazil’s Carajás region is home to 43 blast furnaces used by 18 different companies, of which Viena is the largest. The blast furnaces depend largely on illegal camps that cut and burn rainforest for charcoal.
“These camps are built in a matter of days, located in difficult to access areas and, if shut down by authorities, frequently spring up again in another location. They are built next to wood sources, including illegally in protected areas and indigenous lands,” the report reads, noting that labor conditions in the area are often similar to slavery. Often forced to work seven-days-a-week in hazardous and toxic conditions, workers are fleeced of salaries by imaginary debts.
The massive pig iron production in the region has been actively promoted by the Brazilian government and financed in the past by the World Bank, the European Economic Community, and the Japanese government. However, such promotion has not kept the industry clean as Greenpeace documented several types of fraud, from running an operation without a license to creating fake companies to keep timber sources hidden. Not surprisingly, much of the fuel comes from illegal logging.
Greenpeace linked two of the largest pig iron companies, Viena and Sidepar, to a steel mill in the U.S. run by Severstal and from there to major car manufacturers like Ford, General Motors, BMW, Nissan, and Mercedes. Viena also exports its pig iron to Cargill, Environmental Materials Corporation, and National Material Trading, which in turn sells the steel to John Deere.
“Greenpeace’s research found Viena and Sidepar fueling their foundries with illegal charcoal connected to the region’s pandemic illegalities including slavery, illegal logging and deforestation, and invasions into indigenous lands,” reads the report.
Around 70-80 percent of the region’s forests have been lost already, with the bulk of it since pig iron production began in the mid-1980s. With forest running out in the region, loggers are now entering indigenous lands and conservation areas. Some indigenous tribes, such as the Awá and the Alto Rio Guamá, have lost over 30 percent of their land to the illegal loggers.
“Loggers flagrantly violate the law and bring in multiple trucks for hauling away timber and often enter indigenous lands well armed,” reads the Greenpeace report.
Despite this issue being in the media since 2006, companies have taken little action or responsibility according to Greenpeace.
by Deep Green Resistance News Service | May 15, 2012 | Biodiversity & Habitat Destruction
By Jeremy Hance / Mongabay
In 48 years wildlife populations in the tropics, the region that holds the bulk of the world’s biodiversity, have fallen by an alarming 61 percent, according to the most recent update to the Living Planet Index. Produced by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) and the Zoological Society of London (ZSL), the index currently tracks almost 10,000 populations of 2,688 vertebrate species (including mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, and fish) in both the tropics and temperate regions.
“Much as a stock market index measures the state of the market by tracking changes in […] a selection of companies, changes in abundance (i.e., the total number of individuals in a given population) across a selection of species can be used as one important indicator of the planet’s ecological condition,” the report reads.
Between 1970 to 2008, species abundance in the tropics fell by 44 percent on land, 62 percent in the oceans, and 70 percent in freshwater environments, culminating in an average loss of 1.25 percent every year since the baseline was set in 1970. Wildlife populations are declining due to a number of large-scale human impacts including ongoing deforestation, habitat degradation, overexploitation for food or medicine, pollution, agricultural, overfishing, invasive species, disease, climate change, dams, mining, and other industrial projects.
The report also examines impacts in particular regions. Wildlife populations in tropical Africa have dropped by 38 percent, by half in the Neotropics (Central and South America) by half, and by 64 percent in the Indo-Pacific (including India, Southeast Asia, Australia, and Pacific Islands). This is perhaps not surprising since the world’s highest deforestation levels are in Southeast Asia.”These declines reflect large-scale forest and other habitat loss across these realms, driven by logging, growing human populations, and agricultural, industrial and urban developments,” the report reads.In the Neotropics, recent years have seen amphibians decimated by a fungal disease. The disease, known as chytridiomycosis, is not only cutting populations down but also pushing dozens of species to extinction.
“This report is like a planetary check-up and the results indicate we have a very sick planet. Ignoring this diagnosis will have major implications for humanity. We can restore the planet’s health, but only through addressing the root causes, population growth and over-consumption of resources,” Jonathan Baillie, conservation program director with the Zoological Society of London said in a press release.
Biodiversity provides many services to global society, including pollination, carbon sequestration, food production, soil health, and life-saving medicines among others, although few of these ‘ecosystem services’ are yet recognized by the global market.
by Deep Green Resistance News Service | May 3, 2012 | Obstruction & Occupation
By Steve Lyttle / Charlotte Observer
Six people were arrested Thursday morning in Catawba County after a group of protesters from Greenpeace and three other organizations blocked a train from entering Duke Energy’s steam-powered plant in Catawba County by chaining themselves to the tracks.
The group aimed the protest at Duke Energy, for its use of coal-powered plants, and at technology giant Apple. Leaders of the action said they are protesting Apple because it is using Duke Energy power for the expansion of its data center at Maiden in Catawba County.
“The group was able to stop the train from passing by,” said Molly Dorozenski, a Greenpeace spokesperson.
The Catawba County Sheriff’s Office confirmed that arrests were made. According to reports from the scene, four people who had chained themselves to the tracks were taken into custody, along with two others at the scene.
The action came at the same time as Greenpeace demonstrators were outside Duke Energy’s corporate headquarters in Charlotte’s uptown, protesting during the company’s shareholders meeting.
Dorozenski said the incident began Thursday morning when a train carrying coal arrived at the Marshall Steam Station. She said four activists chained themselves to the tracks, to prevent the train from delivering coal. She said other protesters put the Apple logo on train cars, to show the group’s belief that Apple is profiting by Duke Energy’s use of coal.
Greenpeace contends the use of coal is creating an environmental hazard, and that coal mining is damaging to the ecology of the Appalachia region.
Joining Greenpeace in blocking the train were members of Radical Action for Mountain People’s Survival (RAMPS), Katuah Earth First! and Keepers of the Mountains Foundation, according to Greenpeace.
“Duke is using data center expansion in North Carolina, like Apple’s, to justify reinvesting in old coal-fired power plants and even worse — as an excuse to build new coal and nuclear plants,” said Gabe Wisnieweski, Greenpeace’s USA Coal Campaign director.
“The climate and communities throughout Appalachia and North Carolina are paying the price for Apple and Duke’s short-sighted decisions,” he added.
Read more from The Charlotte Observer:
by Deep Green Resistance News Service | May 1, 2012 | Biodiversity & Habitat Destruction
By Jeremy Hance / Mongabay
Six years after the Yangtze river dolphin (Lipotes vexillifer), or baiji, was declared “functionally extinct” by scientists, another marine mammal appears on the edge of extinction in China’s hugely degraded Yangtze River. In less than two months, 32 Yangtze finless porpoises (Neophocaena asiaeorientalis asiaeorientalis), a subspecies of the finless porpoise, have been found dead in Dongting and Poyang Lakes in the Yangtze, reports the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF).
The porpoises are suffering from many of the same impacts that pushed the baiji to extinction: illegal electrofishing, strikes by boat propellors, poisons, and possibly pollution and food shortages from lower water levels linked by officials to climate change. Autopsies show that at least two of the animals were killed by electrofishing and boat propellers.
“This tragedy shows that Yangtze finless porpoise is facing enormous challenges,” Lei Gang, head of WWF China’s Central Yangtze program, said in a press release. “The porpoise deaths illustrates that without effective measures to fundamentally reverse the trend of ecological deterioration, future of the incredible creature is far from certain. We have to act immediately.”
Researchers believe that around 1,000 Yangtze finless porpoises survive in the river with the population in dramatic decline. Currently, the IUCN Red List is evaluating the subspecies to see if the situation warrants classifying the population as Critically Endangered.
Breakneck development, including a series of dams, with little environmental regard has left the ecology of the Yangtze River in shambles. Aside from the baiji’s extinction, many of the river’s key species are vanishing. The Chinese paddlefish (Psephurus gladius), arguably the world’s biggest freshwater fish, is listed as Critically Endangered with only two fish confirmed since 2002. Scientists fear the fish may be soon gone for good, if not already, after a 2009 survey couldn’t find a single fish. In addition the Chinese alligator (Alligator sinensis), the Yangtze sturgeon (Acipenser dabryanus), and the Yangtze soft-shell turtle (Rafetus swinhoei) are all listed as Critically Endangered.
Still, a controversial new hydroelectric project, the Xiaonanhai Dam, is moving ahead despite concerns that it will finish off a number of the river’s endangered fish, many found no-where else in the world.
