World congress of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) calling for reforms to the International Seabed Authority (ISA). “Deep seabed mining is an avoidable environmental disaster,” said one expert on global ocean policy.
Featured image: A pair of fish swim near the ocean floor off the coast of Mauritius. A motion calling for an end to deep sea mining of minerals was adopted at the world congress of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature this week. (Photo: Roman Furrer/Flickr/cc)
A vote overwhelmingly in favor of placing a moratorium on deep sea mineral mining at a global biodiversity summit this week has put urgent pressure on the International Seabed Authority to strictly regulate the practice.
The vast majority of governments, NGOs, and civil society groups voted in favor of the moratorium at the world congress of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) on Wednesday, after several conservation groups lobbied in favor of the measure.
“Member countries of the ISA, including France which hosted this Congress, need to wake up and act on behalf of civil society and the environment now, and take action in support of a moratorium.”
—Matthew Gianni, Deep Sea Conservation Coalition
Eighty-one government and government agencies voted for the moratorium, while 18 opposed it and 28, including the United Kingdom, abstained from voting. Among NGOs and other organizations, 577 supported the motion while fewer than three dozen opposed it or abstained.
Deep sea mining for deposits of copper, nickel, lithium, and other metals can lead to the swift loss of entire species that live only on the ocean floor, as well as disturbing ecosystems and food sources and putting marine life at risk for toxic spills and leaks.
Fauna and Flora International, which sponsored the moratorium along with other groups including the Natural Resources Defense Council and Synchronicity Earth, called the vote “a momentous outcome for ocean conservation.”
The motion called for a moratorium on mining for minerals and metals near the ocean floor until environmental impact assessments are completed and stakeholders can ensure the protection of marine life, as well as calling for reforms to the International Seabed Authority (ISA)—the regulatory body made up of 167 nations and the European Union, tasked with overseeing “all mineral-related activities in the international seabed area for the benefit of mankind as a whole.”
In June, a two-year deadline was set for the ISA to begin licensing commercial deep sea mining and to finalize regulations for the industry by 2023.
“Member countries of the ISA, including France which hosted this Congress, need to wake up and act on behalf of civil society and the environment now, and take action in support of a moratorium,” said Matthew Gianni, co-founder of the Deep Sea Conservation Coalition, in a statement.
The World Wide Fund for Nature, another cosponsor of the motion, called on the ISA to reject the deep sea mining industry’s claims that mining for metals on the ocean floor is a partial solution to the climate crisis.
“The pro-deep seabed mining lobby is… selling a story that companies need deep seabed minerals in order to produce electric cars, batteries and other items that reduce carbon emissions,” said Jessica Battle, a senior expert on global ocean policy and governance at the organization. “Deep seabed mining is an avoidable environmental disaster. We can decarbonize through innovation, redesigning, reducing, reusing, and recycling.”
Pippa Howard of Fauna and Flora International wrote ahead of the IUCN summit that “we need to shatter the myth that deep seabed mining is the solution to the climate crisis.”
“Far from being the answer to our dreams, deep seabed mining could well turn out to be the stuff of nightmares,” she wrote. “Deep seabed mining—at least as it is currently conceived—would be an utterly irresponsible and short-sighted idea. In the absence of any suitable mitigation techniques… deep-sea mining should be avoided entirely until that situation changes.”
Editor’s note: DGR supports local control of the land over settler colonial imperialism. We believe in Free Informed Prior Constent, consultation is not constent.
Locals celebrate after eleven years of grassroots action
Environmentalists are celebrating a victory over a proposed coal development in the Australian state of New South Wales (NSW) after 11 years of debate and community protests. The Independent Planning Commission (IPC) for the NSW Southern Highlands blocked the plans for the proposed mine, saying the potential impacts of the project were ‘too great to be reasonably managed, and the social risks to the community are high.’
Korean-owned Hume Coal proposed applied to build the coal mine in Berrima. The company argued that the mine would ‘create 300+ jobs for locals’.
The full IPC determination and background materials are available here. The review followed an earlier rejection by the Department of Planning, Industry and Environment.
The IPC identified a long list of issues raised by the project’s opponents, including:
…mine design; subsidence; groundwater drawdown; risks to surface water, including to Sydney’s drinking water catchment area; impacts to local biodiversity; greenhouse gas emissions; impacts to Aboriginal and historic heritage; amenity impacts; adverse impacts to existing industries, including tourism and agriculture; social impacts, including ongoing stress and disharmony associated with the Project; and land use compatibility.
According to the Lock the Gate Alliance, a national grassroots organisation concerned with risky coal mining, coal seam gas and fracking, the mine would have emitted a massive amount of greenhouse gasses:
If it had been built, the Hume Coal project would have been responsible for more than 106 million tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions over its lifespan.
There have been local concerns since permission was granted to drill exploration holes in 2010. High profile supporters over the years have included singers Leo Sayer, Cold Chisel’s Jimmy Barnes and actor Nicole Kidman, who owned one of the 424 properties that would have been affected by the mine.
This video has an interview with Sayer, a local resident in 2015:
Sayer also made a statement for the public inquiry in June 2021:
…the mine is a danger to health, clean air, farm produce, and the nature of the Southern Highlands and the peace and quiet of this historically natural area.
Jimmy Barnes, who is another longstanding local, also made a written submission.
There has also been opposition from local small business groups such as the Moss Vale Rural and Chamber of Commerce. Their president, restaurateur and farmer Brigid Kennedy, was very pleased with the result, arguing that it would give businesses hope.
I think I have held my breath for 10 years and I feel I can finally let it out. I am so excited — the community will be doing cartwheels down the Berrima main street. There has been a lot of tears over this, marriage break-ups, divorce — this has caused a great deal of anxiety. Hopefully it will help businesses struggling though COVID hang on and flourish.
Tweets by community members Seamus Byrne and Clare Press showed both the elation and growing frustration of many online:
The IPC found that the greenhouse gas emissions were not justified ‘when weighed against the relatively minor economic benefits’.
However, Nature Conservation Council Chief Executive Chris Gambian was concerned that the overall issue of climate change was not properly addressed by the IPC, arguing that no new mines should be approved in NSW:
Yes, the water impacts of this ill-conceived project were extremely risky. And yes, the mine should have been rejected for these reasons alone.
But the fact the IPC barely touched on climate highlights the deficiencies of the planning system in coming to grips with the greatest environmental hazard we face.
The decision has been hailed as a victory for local community action. Groups such as Battle for Berrima have been active on the ground as well as online. The group celebrated the win on their Facebook page.
We would love to be celebrating with you tonight. Throughout, we engaged with the government planning process respectfully. Thank you everybody for your support, donations, volunteering and commitment. Hopefully, once lockdown is over, we can celebrate together. A massive THANK YOU to everybody
Community activist Jenny Hunter’s Twitter thread details the hard work that many locals put in over the 11 years of campaigning:
After the decision, Peter Martin, president of Coal Free Southern Highlands, posted to their Facebook page :
It’s been a ‘knock down and drag out’ struggle for the local community against the Korean steel maker which has used every weapon in its arsenal to push the project through against the determined opposition.
…Given the serious climate issues that we all face, it would have been a dereliction of duty for the State Government to let a coal mining project like this proceed. Coal is clearly at the end of its useful life.
On June 23, a coalition of Sámi and environmentalist activists erected a protest camp in Nussir, the projected site of a gigantic copper mine in Sápmi, the traditional homeland of the Sámi people, northern Europe’s indigenous inhabitants. Today, Sápmi is divided by the borders of four nation states: Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Russia. None of these countries have censuses for the Sámi population, and reliable numbers are hard to come by. The use of the Sámi language, the electoral roll of the Sámi parliaments (there is one in each country), and self-identification are important criteria. Roughly, we can speak of about 70,000 Sámi in Norway, 20,000 in Sweden, 10,000 in Finland, and about 2,000 in Russia. For historical reasons, the Russian community is the most isolated.
Nussir lies on the “Norwegian side” of Sápmi, as it is called, near the town of Hammerfest. Mining has been a controversial issue in Sápmi for years. In Sweden, a strong protest movement emerged in 2013, objecting to the plans of opening an iron ore mine in Gállok. While the project is not off the table yet, the protests have caused the Swedish government to put a halt on it and promise a new investigation. This was a partial victory. The same can be said about the Nussir protests. Due to the protest camp and activists chaining themselves to machinery, work on the site has so far been impossible. More importantly, the company that was supposed to purchase the mine’s output, Aurubis, the world’s second-largest copper producer, terminated the “memorandum of understanding” with Nussir ASA in August 2020 due to concerns about “social corporate responsibility”. Whether Nussir ASA can find new investors after this prominent withdrawal remains to be seen.
Mining is not the only issue that threatens the Sámi’s control over their traditional lands and their livelihoods, most importantly reindeer herding and fishing. Wind farms are placed in what many still perceive as “uninhabited territory”, with the turbines making reindeer herding impossible for a radius of many miles. Hydropower plants are already scattered around Sápmi. The allegedly “uninhabited territory” is also used for military exercises, automotive testing, and, increasingly, geoengineering trials. In Finland, a proposed “Arctic Railway” would cut through traditional reindeer pastures. Along the Deatnu River, which marks the border between Norway and Finland over a stretch of more than 250 kilometers, fishing legislation favors the interests of non-Sámi cabin owners over those of traditional Sámi salmon fishers. In Sweden, clear cuts by the state-owned lumber company Sveaskog threaten the existence of the Forest Sámi and their reindeer herds. All over Sápmi, the crucial question of land ownership remains unresolved, with the governments of Sweden and Finland still refusing to sign the International Labour Organization’ Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention (commonly known as ILO 169), while the Norwegian government does not deliver on the promises of the 2005 Finnmark Act that, formally, transferred land ownership in the province of Finnmark to the majority Sámi population.
It is interesting to note that many of the named development projects are justified by citing “green energy” and “sustainability”. The planned mine in Nussir has been hailed as “the world’s first fully electrified mine with zero CO2 emissions”. Hydropower and wind power are praised as sustainable alternatives to fossil fuels. Railways as environmentally friendly means of transport. Even geoengineering shall, according to its proponents, help secure the future of our planet. The irony that, in Sápmi, a culture that has proven sustainable for thousands of years is threatened in the process seems to pass by these advocates of corporate environmentalism.
In Sápmi, people increasingly speak of a “green colonialism”. In a speech protesting mining projects, Marie Persson Njajta declared in April 2019: “We have to stop flirting with polluting industries and look at their consequences and their costs. We don’t want green colonialism. Sámi land shall not be exploited yet again, neither for wind power nor for metals to produce electric cars.”
It is ludicrous that, in 2021, there exists such an enormous gap between material justice for indigenous peoples and their symbolic integration into nation-states, which often implies cultural exploitation. At the same time, it is inspiring to see a generation of Sámi activists unwilling to accept this cynicism. Without recognizing the needs, knowledge, and guidance of indigenous peoples, social and climate justice movements will meet serious limitations.
“This is a win for wildlife and communities along the border, where the government has behaved as if the laws don’t apply,” said one environmental lawyer.
By KENNY STANCIL
Social and environmental justice advocates welcomed a federal judge’s ruling Monday that two U.S. agencies broke the law by not conducting an analysis of potential ecological harms associated with increased militarization along the U.S.-Mexico border.
Monday’s ruling (pdf) found that officials at both the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) violated the National Environmental Policy Act by failing to prepare an updated and detailed environmental impact statement for the U.S.-Mexico border enforcement program.
The court’s decision stems from a 2017 lawsuit filed by U.S. Rep. Raúl Grijalva (D-Ariz.) and the Center for Biological Diversity.
“This is a win for wildlife and communities along the border, where the government has behaved as if the laws don’t apply,” Brian Segee, endangered species legal director at the Center for Biological Diversity, said in response to the court’s decision. “This victory follows years of federal officials neglecting the environment and the health and well-being of borderland communities.”
While DHS and CBP officials argued that enforcement along the U.S.-Mexico border had not changed in the two decades since the agencies last submitted an environmental impact statement, the judge wrote that there are numerous “examples of expanding federal action in the form of border enforcement activity.”
The Center for Biological Diversity noted Monday in a statement that the 2001 review, which “was supposed to be updated every five years, but never has been… identified potential harm from border wall construction and other enforcement operations to wildlife and endangered species across four states from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico.”
“We hope the Biden administration takes a long overdue look at the wanton environmental destruction from border militarization.”
—Brian Segee, Center for Biological Diversity
According to the Center, U.S. security operations along the southern border have escalated over the past 20 years, including “off-road vehicle patrols, installation of high-intensity lighting, construction of base camps and checkpoints, wall construction, and other activities.”
Under the Trump administration, the group noted, federal agencies also “ramped up wall construction by waiving dozens of laws protecting the environment, public health, and safety.”
“Also since 2001, scientific understanding has advanced significantly regarding the potential harm from border walls and other border enforcement activities on wildlife and endangered species, including jaguars, ocelots, Mexican gray wolves, and cactus ferruginous pygmy owls,” the organization said.
Furthermore, “beyond jeopardizing wildlife, endangered species, and public lands, ongoing border militarization damages human rights, civil liberties, native lands, local businesses, and international relations,” added the Center. “Border militarization and the border wall impede the natural migrations of people and wildlife that are essential to healthy diversity.”
Although the court ruled that federal officials did not violate the Endangered Species Act, the judge wrote that there were “undisputed statements of fact which demonstrate that there was a large number of new or revised critical habitat designations for threatened or endangered species within the southern border enforcement corridor since 2001.”
Those designations by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the judge added, “constitute triggering events for which Defendants should have contemporaneously considered and evaluated the need for supplemental environmental analysis.”
In response, Segee of the Center for Biological Diversity said that “we’re disappointed the court stopped short of ordering a new environmental impact statement, but we hope the Biden administration takes a long overdue look at the wanton environmental destruction from border militarization.”
A subsidiary of the San Miguel Corporation, one of the largest companies in the Philippines, has proposed a $500 million hydroelectric project that will overlap with a national park on Panay Island.
Northwest Panay Peninsula Natural Park holds some of the central Philippines’ last stands of intact lowland rainforest, is home to endangered species including hornbills and the Visayan warty pig, and is a vital watershed for Panay and neighboring islands.
The project is still not approved, and a growing coalition of activists and local governments opposes the plan.
Update: On Aug. 10, the village governments of Naboay and Malay publicly released resolutions opposing the hydroelectric project, citing concerns about the project’s potential impacts on the Northwest Panay Peninsula Natural Park, municipal and agricultural water supplies, and the area’s indigenous Ati communities.
This article originally appeared in Mongabay. Featured image: Visayan warty pigs (Sus cebifrons) at a wallow in the Philippines. Image by Shukran888 via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0).
AKLAN, Philippines — Activists and local government officials in the central Philippines have lashed out at a recently announced plan to build a hydroelectric plant overlapping with a national park that’s home to rare and threatened species.
Strategic Power Development Corporation (SPDC), a subsidiary of Philippine mega conglomerate San Miguel Corporation, announced on July 13 its intention to build the $500 million, 300-megawatt pump-storage hydro facility in Malay municipality on the island of Panay. The project would include the construction of two dams and reservoirs, 9.6 kilometers (6 miles) of new roads, and the upgrade of 1.8 km (1.1 mi) of existing roads.
According to SPDC, the planned project near the confluence of the Nabaoy and Imbaroto rivers would consist of a 70-meter (230-foot) lower dam on the Naboay, with a 10.2-million-cubic-meter (2.7-billion-gallon) reservoir; and a 74 m (243 ft) upper dam with a 4.55-million-m3 (1.2-billion-gallon) reservoir extending to the Imbaroto. The company says the plant will provide energy to the regional grid to meet current and future peak demand, will support the local economy, and is part of President Rodrigo Duterte’s 2017-2040 Philippine Energy Plan.
Overall, the company says the complex would cover 122.7 hectares (303.2 acres), including 97.9 hectares (241.9 acres) of forest, of which 24.9 hectares (61.5 acres) are nominally protected land within Northwest Panay Peninsula Natural Park.
Significant biodiversity hotspot
Northwest Panay Peninsula Natural Park, which spans 12,009 hectares (29,676 acres) in the provinces of Aklan and Antique, was established in 2002 via a presidential proclamation. Home to critically endangered Visayan warty pigs (Sus cebifrons) and writhed-billed hornbills (Rhabdotorrhinus waldeni), as well as endangered Visayan hornbills (Penelopides panini), it has been locally recognized as a significant biodiversity hotspot since the 1990s.
The park holds some of the last remaining stands of primary lowland rainforest in the central Philippines, and serves as a key watershed providing potable water to Panay and neighboring islands.
Activists say the hydropower project puts water supplies for local communities at risk.
“The Nabaoy River is the lone source of potable water to nearby Boracay Island and to the residents of Malay,” said Ritchel Cahilig of the Aklan Trekkers Group. Boracay Island, separated from the park by a narrow strait, is a prime beach destination, recording 2 million tourist arrivals in 2019.
“I wonder how will they supply water to the residents especially during construction phase. During construction phase, for sure, large vehicles will be damaging the forest and the company seems do not have a clear alternative on how to restore what has been damaged,” Cahilig said.
The natural park is also home to a community of Indigenous Malay Ati people, who fish in the Nabaoy River and rely on the forests for sustenance.
Activists have also questioned the need for additional electrical capacity in the area. Citing reports from the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines, Melvin Purzuelo of the Green Forum-Western Visayas noted that from July 20-26, Panay Island’s average daily electricity consumption ranged from 345-364 MW, against existing capacity of 480 MW.
“It is clear now that a huge power supply is not needed at this time especially that the world is going through the COVID-19 pandemic,” Purzuelo said during a recent webinar.
Loss of local government support
SPDC’s proposal still requires approval from local governments and the Philippine Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR).
“The Malay [municipal government] have set a coordination meeting with the SPDC supposedly last August 2 to clarify issues involving the project but [the meeting] has been cancelled because of the COVID-19 pandemic,” Purzuelo said.
Local officials have distanced themselves from endorsing the proposal. In a phone interview, acting Malay Mayor Floribar Bautista said the SPDC had not approached him to discuss the details of the project since he assumed his post in July 2018.
“What I know is the project was endorsed by the previous administration. When I checked the documents, it’s lacking. It seems the project may have [been] railroaded. I could not endorse the project at this time since I do not know how the project would affect our town. All they have to do is to convince me if the hydro dam project is worth it,” he said.
The village of Nabaoy is also reportedly set to cancel its previous endorsement of the project, activists say. No official cancellation had been issued as of the time this article was published; but just as in the case of the Malay municipal government, the previous leadership of Nabaoy village had endorsed the project in the early months of 2018.
Without approval from the current local governments, the project can only push through with special permission from the DENR.
One nonprofit said the decision in a case brought by bushfire survivors “should send a chill through the state’s most polluting industries, including the electricity and commercial transport sectors.”
By JESSICA CORBETT
In a case brought by bushfire survivors against an Australian state’s environmental regulator, a court found Thursday that the government agency must take action to address the climate emergency—a first-of-its kind and potentially precedent-setting ruling for the fire-ravaged nation.
“This is a great day for environmental justice.”
—Chris Gambian, Nature Conservation Council
“It’s a really big win,” said Elaine Johnson, director of legal strategy at the Environmental Defenders Office (EDO), which represented Bushfire Survivors for Climate Action (BSCA). “It means [the New South Wales agency] has to do something to ensure there is protection against climate change.”
“The next 10 years are really critical,” Johnson told The Sydney Morning Herald, which noted that the ruling comes in the wake of a major United Nations climate report about what the future could hold without a global course correction. “We need rapid and deep emissions cuts.”
Though the government of Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has long faced pressure to take bolder climate action and a federal court in the country found in May that Environment Minister Sussan Ley has a duty to protect children and the environment from the climate emergency, Johnson said Thursday’s decision was the first in Australia to find that a government agency is required to address the global crisis.
“It’s breaking new ground,” she told the newspaper, adding that other Australian states could soon face similar legal challenges.
The landmark ruling in favor of survivors of the 2019-20 bushfires and earlier seasons came from Brian Preston, chief judge of the Land and Environment Court of New South Wales (NSW).
Preston ordered the NSW Environment Protection Authority (EPA) “to develop environmental quality objectives, guidelines, and policies to ensure environment protection from climate change” in the Australian state.
Though Preston found that the EPA has not fulfilled its legal duty to ensure such protection, he said the agency “has a discretion as to the specific content of the instruments it develops” and his order “does not demand that such instruments contain the level of specificity contended for by BSCA, such as regulating sources of greenhouse gas emissions in a way consistent with limiting global temperature rise to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels.”
The EPA had argued that it has already “developed numerous instruments to ensure environment protection in many ways, some of which incidentally regulate greenhouse gas emissions, such as methane from landfill,” according to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.
In a statement, the agency—which has 28 days to appeal—said it was reviewing the decision.
“The EPA is an active government partner on climate change policy, regulation, and innovation,” the agency statement said. “It is a part of the whole-of-government approach to climate change embodied by the NSW Climate Change Policy Framework and Net Zero Plan.”
The statement also highlighted the EPA’s involvement in “work that assists with and also directly contributes to” adaptation and mitigation measures, its support for industry “to make better choices,” and its recently released “Strategic Plan and Regulatory Strategy.”
Despite the judge’s decision to limit the specificity of his order for the agency to act, his ruling was still welcomed by survivors, their legal representation, and climate campaigners around the world.
“This is a significant win for everyone who has been affected by bushfires,” said BSCA president Jo Dodds, explaining that survivors have worked to rebuild their lives, homes, and communities that were devastated in recent years.
“This ruling means they can do so with confidence that the EPA must now also work to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the state,” she continued. “Global warming is creating the conditions that can lead to hotter and fiercer fires, and all of us need to work to make sure we’re doing everything we can to prevent a disaster like we saw during 2019 and 2020.”
As Johnson put it: “The EPA has discretion as to what they do but they have to do something and it has to be meaningful.”
“Greenhouse gases are the most dangerous form of pollution,” she told The Guardian. “An obvious response to this order would be to control greenhouse gases in the same way they do other pollutants in the environment.”
The nonprofit Nature Conservation Council said the court’s decision “should send a chill through the state’s most polluting industries, including the electricity and commercial transport sectors.”
“Most people will be astonished to learn the EPA has until now not regulated greenhouse gases,” said the council’s chief executive, Chris Gambian. “But that will now have to change.”
“This is a great day for environmental justice,” he declared, crediting BSCA “for having the courage to launch this case” and EDO for their convincing arguments.
Calling human-caused climate change “the most significant challenge our society has ever faced,” Gambian asserted that “allowing politicians to set greenhouse gas emission targets and controls rather than scientific experts has led us to the precipice.”
“These decisions are far too important to left to the politicians. These are issues of science and should not be hijacked by the political process,” he added. “We hope that today’s decision results in the effective regulation of greenhouse gas emissions and gets the state on track to net zero well before 2050.”
geoengineering trials. In Finland, a proposed “Arctic Railway” would cut through traditional reindeer pastures. Along the Deatnu River, which marks the border between Norway and Finland over a stretch of more than 250 kilometers, fishing legislation favors the interests of non-Sámi cabin owners over those of traditional Sámi salmon fishers. In Sweden, clear cuts by the state-owned lumber company Sveaskog threaten the existence of the Forest Sámi and their reindeer herds. All over Sápmi, the crucial question of land ownership remains unresolved, with the governments of Sweden and Finland still refusing to sign the International Labour Organization’ Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention (commonly known as ILO 169), while the Norwegian government does not deliver on the promises of the 2005 Finnmark Act that, formally, transferred land ownership in the province of Finnmark to the majority Sámi population.
