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By Verner Wilson II
2018 was a breakthrough year for Arctic conservation work at the International Maritime Organization (IMO). I wrote partly about it in my previous blog. Aside from obtaining internationally recognized routing measures and shipping areas to be avoided (ATBA) in the Bering Sea, IMO also moved forward with regulations to ban the use of Heavy Fuel Oil (HFO) in the Arctic.
The United Nations shipping agency also moved to regulate climate-change causing greenhouse gas emissions in the international shipping industry, which is one of the largest emitters of carbon and other atmosphere pollutants. I look forward to continuing that type of work into 2019. And there will be plenty of opportunity for that, as there are a number of IMO subcommittee meetings that will consider pollution reduction and prevention measures. The people who I believe made some of the most significant differences in this work in 2018 were able to come to IMO with me last fall.
<p>It's not every day that elder <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/alaska">Alaska</a> Natives are heard and respected by leaders from around the world. Historically Alaska Natives were discriminated against. But not last October, when my respected Alaska Native elders George Edwardson from Utqiagvik and Delbert Pungowiyi from Savoonga traveled to London, England to tell the world about their decades of life in the Arctic.</p><p>Eager ears from every corner of the earth listened to their words of wisdom that week, when they attended the IMO's Marine Environment Protection Committee (MEPC) meeting as part of the delegation of my organization, <a href="https://foe.org">Friends of the Earth</a>. Representing the Native Village of Savoonga and Inupiat Community of the Arctic Slope (or ICAS, a consortium of eight Native villages on Alaska's Arctic Slope), they told the international delegates from over 173 nations about why it is important to protect the fragile Arctic environment. They told them their stories of growing up hunting and fishing on the Arctic ice. They spoke of their people who have depended on the bountiful <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/marine-life">marine wildlife</a> that has sustained them for thousands of years. <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/whales">Whales</a>, walrus, polar bears, seals and other Arctic wildlife can't speak to international leaders, but my two respected elders who have been sustained by these creatures could—and they sure did! They spoke for the <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/wildlife">wildlife</a> and fragile environment our indigenous people depend on amidst increased shipping in the region.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
</p><div id="7b646" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="GT1MK71576693494"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1053677471965634564" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Heavy fuel oil — the dirtiest fuel that can possibly be burned for shipping — is very persistent in the Arctic, ha… https://t.co/IZlQverQEb</div> — Friends of the Earth (@Friends of the Earth)<a href="https://twitter.com/foe_us/statuses/1053677471965634564">1540051260.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p></p><p>Every time they eloquently spoke during that busy week, I heard not just them—but also myself. I heard my ancestors, and future generations of Alaska Native <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/conservation">conservation</a> leaders. I believe that our Native values and desire to protect our home allow us to speak collectively as one. Thus, our Arctic Indigenous voices rise as one. I heard our collective voices as my elders Delbert and George spoke at the many events we participated in that week. I was surprised that even for their older ages (Delbert is in his late 50s and George is in his 70s), they had such dedication to tell their story. And the stamina to carry them through from dusk until dawn each day after traveling more than 24 hours to get there. And it was an assiduous week for us. Together, we spoke to dozens of international leaders at two events: at the IMO plenary itself, and at an evening reception at United Kingdom's Parliament building. We woke up at 5 a.m. one day to take a two-hour train ride to Southampton, UK where we spoke to Carnival Cruise Line's top executives at their UK headquarters as we urged them to take responsibility in the Arctic by not using HFO. We also spoke to more than a hundred students at Imperial College during an evening event, and reporters throughout the week. My elders George and Delbert were eager and ecstatic to talk to everyone they could to help protect the people and places where they are from.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image">
<img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8xOTE4NDM4MC9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY2MDUxNjkyMn0.NNPtLnkJoxhOh02brNolWo2IFsSPvn5V3IapjFCotjY/img.jpg?width=980" id="d5656" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="af60e0e7e22c50025ef580d2d63cb4ca" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image">
</p><p>If there is one thing I learned from that week, it was that I could count on my elders and people to continue their strong and passionate advocacy for our home. In 2018, Arctic indigenous voices stood up and began engaging in IMO deliberations. The <a href="https://www.arctictoday.com/call-phase-hfo-arctic-tops-list-afn-recommendations/" target="_blank">Alaska Federation of Natives</a>, <a href="https://fathom.world/press-release-inuit-circumpolar-council-calls-for-phase-out-of-heavy-fuel-oil-from-arctic/" target="_blank">Inuit Circumpolar Council</a>, <a href="https://www.tunngavik.com/files/2018/10/RSA-18-10-14-Heavy-Fuel-Oil-eng.pdf" target="_blank">Nunavut Tunngavik Incorporated</a> (or NTI, a Native organization in Nunavut, Canada) and the <a href="http://www.rcinet.ca/en/2018/09/18/greenland-joins-push-to-ban-heavy-fuel-oil-in-the-arctic/" target="_blank">government of Greenland</a> all passed statements urging IMO to ban the use of HFO. In 2019 other issues will be discussed, including the regulation of other pollutants like greywater, initiatives for ships to avoid marine mammals, and more. As we move into 2019, I look forward to continuing this work at the IMO's Pollution, Prevention and Response (PPR) subcommittee meeting in February 2019, as well as the Marine Environment Protection Committee (MEPC) in May. Despite the long trip to London and busy weeklong meetings, I know it will be worth it. My elders George and Delbert reminded me of why our work is worth it.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
</p><div id="bb2ea" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="BXDSKU1576693494"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="985954432423571456" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Landmark Agreement: Shipping Industry to Cut Emissions https://t.co/KyX9EuwB4I @NRDC @UCSUSA @SierraClub @greenpeaceusa</div> — EcoWatch (@EcoWatch)<a href="https://twitter.com/EcoWatch/statuses/985954432423571456">1523904829.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p></p><p><em>Verner Wilson II is a senior oceans campaigner with <a href="https://foe.org" target="_blank">Friends of the Earth</a>.</em><br></p>
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Deputy Secretary of the Interior David Bernhardt at a meeting regarding the Colorado River on Sept. 27, 2017. Bureau of Reclamation
By Emilie Karrick Surrusco
As 2019 begins, it's out with the old and in with the same old, same old. Scandal-ridden Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke released a brief farewell letter Wednesday in red marker. With Zinke's successor not yet named, David Bernhardt becomes acting secretary. The move swaps out one political insider closely aligned with deep-pocketed special interests for another.
Bernhardt, who became deputy secretary of the Department of Interior in August 2017, is "a walking conflict of interest" who served as the Interior Department's top lawyer under George W. Bush—and went on to a lucrative career as a legal adviser for timber companies, mining companies and oil and gas interests. Since returning to the Interior Department under Trump, he has quietly implemented policy decisions that benefit his former corporate polluter clients.
<p>"As Deputy Secretary and now as acting Secretary, David Bernhardt never intended to adhere to basic standards of ethics and accountability. Instead, he is hell-bent on continuing Zinke's work of dismantling bedrock environmental protections and selling off our <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/public-lands">public lands</a> to the highest bidder," said <a href="https://earthjustice.org/about/staff/martin-hayden" target="_blank">Martin Hayden</a>, <a href="https://earthjustice.org" target="_blank">Earthjustice</a> VP of policy and legislation. "This is business as usual for the Trump administration and Earthjustice will continue to fight them every step of the way."</p><p>The Interior Department is currently facing litigation from <a href="https://foe.org/" target="_blank">Friends of the Earth</a>, <a href="https://westernvaluesproject.org" target="_blank">Western Values Project</a>, and others for failing to release ethics documents under the Freedom of Information Act that could help explain why Bernhardt's former lobbying clients have received regulatory and policy decisions in their favor.<br></p><p>"It is noteworthy that many of the Deputy Secretary's former clients began receiving sudden and dramatic windfalls only months after his swearing in," the complaint reads. "By failing to respond to FOIA requests concerning Deputy Secretary Bernhardt, DOI has violated the law."</p><p>One month after Bernhardt took over as the No. 2 at Interior, the Bureau of the Land Management announced a change that made it easier for Cadiz Inc. to go forward with a controversial <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/water">water</a> project. Cadiz, a former client of Bernhardt's at the lobbying firm Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck LLP, has been trying for decades to push <a href="https://earthjustice.org/blog/2018-november/we-re-fighting-a-corporate-scheme-to-sell-the-mojave-desert-s-water" target="_blank">a dubious scheme</a> to sell possibly contaminated water from beneath the Mojave Desert in southern California. The plan would not only imperil the desert's fragile ecosystem, but also would endanger people who drink the water, which is <a href="http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-brooks-cadiz-project-water-mojave-desert-20170521-story.html" target="_blank">contaminated</a> with hexavalent chromium, <a href="https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/chromium-water-cancer/" target="_blank">a cancer-causing chemical</a>.</p><p>Now, thanks to the BLM's reversal of an Obama administration decision, Cadiz has cleared one legal hurdle that would allow them to build a pipeline to carry the water through the Mojave Trails National Monument to the Los Angeles area. </p><p>Bernhardt's old lobbying firm has already earned 200,000 shares of Cadiz stock for their involvement with the company, and stands to earn 200,000 more if the project is completed.</p><p>Bernhardt was also a <a href="http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-trump-bernhardt-20170517-story.html" target="_blank">lobbyist for</a> the Westlands Water District, a politically influential irrigation agency that has long battled the federal government on behalf of big <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/agribusiness">agribusinesses</a> in California's arid western Central Valley. Westlands has paid Bernhardt's firm <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/clientsum.php?id=D000058573&year=2016" target="_blank">$1.27 million in lobbying fees</a> since 2011. Its demands for increased water flows to farms <a href="http://earthjustice.org/features/the-california-drought" target="_blank">jeopardize endangered species</a> in the ecologically compromised San Francisco Bay-Delta Estuary, particularly in times of drought.</p><p>In October, President Trump signed a memorandum to review water regulations and speed up review of the rules about how water is pumped through the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, in order to facilitate more water allotments for Westlands' large commercial farmers.</p><p>"What's happened there is disgraceful," Trump said of California's water situation, <a href="https://www.sacbee.com/news/state/california/article220320230.html" target="_blank">according to the Sacramento Bee</a>. "They've taken it away. There's so much water, they don't know what to do with it, they send it out to sea ... They don't let the water come down into the Valley and into the areas where they need the water."</p><p>Westlands also is responsible for <a href="https://elr.info/sites/default/files/articles/15.10386.htm" target="_blank">an environmental disaster</a> in the early 1980s, when a half-finished irrigation canal built by the federal government carried tainted Westlands water directly into a wildlife refuge. Migratory birds were killed or hatched with birth defects caused by naturally occurring selenium and heavy metals in the water. A long-running legal battle over the disaster finally culminated in <a href="http://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-government/congress/article132508639.html" target="_blank">a proposed settlement</a> between the Interior Department and Westlands in 2015, which put the onus on Westlands to deal with the aftermath of the pollution while forgiving its roughly $375 million debt to the government. Bernhardt represented Westlands in the negotiation of the settlement, which is yet to be finalized. A <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/1769?q=%7B%22search%22:%5B%22hr1769%22%5D%7D&r=1" target="_blank">bill introduced</a> in the House of Representatives last year would require the Interior Department to implement the proposed settlement.</p><p>Another former client, the Independent Petroleum Association of America, benefited when Bernhardt oversaw proposed revisions to agreements for the management of sage grouse habitat across 10 Western states. The revisions eliminate protections for the imperiled bird in favor of petroleum development. And while the sage grouse is not listed as <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/endangered-species">endangered</a>, it has been protected by the Endangered Species Act, a law that Bernhardt has been dead set against since his time as the Interior Department's solicitor general in the early 2000s. </p><p>Bernhardt has continued his campaign against the Endangered Species Act since returning to the Interior Department, with proposals to allow regulators to consider the economic impacts in decisions about listing particular species, rather than just looking at available science. In a Washington Post op-ed authored by Bernhardt, he calls for "creative, incentive-based conservation" to bring "our government's implementation of the Endangered Species Act into the 21st century."</p><p>In a similar vein, Bernhardt has continued efforts to open the <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/arctic">Arctic</a> National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska to drilling. During his career as a lobbyist, Bernhardt represented the state of Alaska in controversial litigation that aimed to open the Arctic Refuge to development. Since assuming his position as deputy secretary, Bernhardt has described environmental review of drilling in America's largest wildlife refuge as "just nuts" and has led efforts to rush legally-required analysis of drilling in this pristine area. To this end, Bernhardt introduced a policy aimed at curtailing the National Environmental Policy Act—which dictates that all NEPA work must be completed within one year and be limited to 150 pages.</p><p>With his pro-polluter, anti-environment track record, Bernhardt is the wrong person to lead the federal department charged with natural resource conservation. We will work with our allies to continue to hold the Trump administration accountable in the courts.</p>
<p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
</p><div id="f4fb5" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="5NFYLL1576661823"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1074660755314597888" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Ryan Zinke, ‘Worst Interior Secretary in History,’ Resigns https://t.co/HpFY6O4qre #Publiclands #Ryanzinke #Politics https://t.co/bHbvDZSI6a</div> — Renewable Search (@Renewable Search)<a href="https://twitter.com/RenewableSearch/statuses/1074660755314597888">1545054064.0</a></blockquote></div>
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Advocates of labels for genetically modified food take part in the March Against Monsanto in Washington, D.C. Stephen Melkisethian / Flickr
By Andrea Germanos
Food safety advocates are expressing sharp disappointment with the final federal GMO labeling rule, released Thursday by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA).
While industry-friendly Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue asserted in a press statement that the new standard for foods produced using genetic engineering (GE or GMO) would boost "the transparency of our nation's food system" and ensure "clear information and labeling consistency for consumers about the ingredients in their food," groups like the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP)—and even food giants like Nestlé—say it does nothing of the sort.
<p>"It is obvious that this rule is intended to hide, not disclose, information about genetically modified foods," <a href="https://www.iatp.org/documents/usdas-gmo-disclosure-rule-designed-cover-up" target="_blank">said</a> IATP senior attorney Sharon Treat.</p><p>Among the concerns being raised is that the rule, <a href="https://www.iatp.org/documents/usdas-gmo-disclosure-rule-designed-cover-up" target="_blank">published</a> Friday in the Federal Register and with implementation set to begin in 2020, refers not to the widely recognized phrase "genetically-modified food" but rather "bioengineered (BE) food."</p><p>"USDA's prohibition of the well-established terms, GE and GMO, on <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/food/">food</a> labels will confuse and mislead consumers," <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2018/12/20/long-awaited-final-regulations-gmo-food-labeling-leave-millions-americans-dark" target="_blank">said</a> Andrew Kimbrell, executive director at the Center for Food Safety.</p><p>To make the disclosure, food producers have four options: text, a friendly-looking <a href="https://twitter.com/sustainableag/status/1076204084779249664" target="_blank">symbol</a>, an electronic or digital link, or a text message. <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2018/12/20/usdas-gmo-labeling-rule-keeps-consumers-dark-sake-big-ag-profits" target="_blank">According to</a> Food & Water Watch executive director Wenonah Hauter, the symbol suggests "to consumers the product is natural and sustainable, when genetically engineered foods are anything but."</p><p>The option for the use of electronic codes, meanwhile, discriminates against those without access to a smartphone, tablet, or reliable internet access, and while the companies would also need to provide a telephone number for a consumer to call, that is onerous, the groups say.</p><p>Moreover, <a href="https://www.nongmoproject.org/blog/americans-deserve-better-than-the-usdas-gmo-labeling-law/" target="_blank">says the NonGMO Project</a>, many products that deserve a label won't have to get one:</p><blockquote>Highly processed ingredients, many products of new genetic engineering techniques such as CRISPR and TALEN, and many meat and dairy products will not require disclosure. Animal feed is not covered by this law; meat, eggs, and dairy from animals fed a GMO diet will not require a disclosure.<br></blockquote><p>In light of such loopholes, Dana Perls, senior food and agriculture campaigner at Friends of the Earth U.S., <a href="https://foe.org/news/usda-releases-shoddy-gmo-labeling-rule/" target="_blank">summed up</a> the new rules as "a disaster."</p><p>"No one should be surprised that the most anti-consumer, anti-transparency administration in modern times is denying Americans basic information about what's in their food and how it's grown," <a href="https://www.ewg.org/release/ewg-gmos-many-foods-will-go-undisclosed-under-trump-s-final-gmo-rule" target="_blank">argued</a> Scott Faber, senior vice president of government affairs for the Environmental Working Group.</p><p>"At a time when consumers are asking more and more questions about the use of genetic engineering," Faber continued, "today's rule will further undermine the technology by sowing greater confusion among Americans who simply want the right to know if their food is genetically modified—the same right held by consumers in 64 other countries."</p>
<p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
</p><div id="30071" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="93B1KX1576663094"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1076237384440782854" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">The USDA has a new GMO label:
"This rule is filled with loopholes that will allow manufacturers to use digital cod… https://t.co/NKzvzydXXl</div> — Food & Water Watch (@Food & Water Watch)<a href="https://twitter.com/foodandwater/statuses/1076237384440782854">1545429962.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p></p>
<p><em>Reposted with permission from our media associate <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/2018/12/21/disaster-critics-pounce-trump-usdas-new-gmo-labeling-rule" target="_blank">Common Dreams</a>.</em><br></p>
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Encouraging news on the fight against plastic pollution! Europe is one step closer to banning some of the most common single-use plastics to help protect the environment and reduce marine litter.
Negotiators from the European Parliament and Council reached a provisional agreement on Wednesday to reduce use or eliminate plastic products such as cigarette butts, straws, bottles, cutlery and cotton buds. The European Commission—the EU's executive arm—first introduced the sweeping proposal in May.
<p>
If it becomes law, the directive "will reduce the environmental damage bill by €22 billion—the estimated cost of plastic pollution in Europe until 2030," said Belgian MEP Frédérique Ries, who helped lead the <a href="https://twitter.com/Frederiqueries/status/1075279306702708738" target="_blank">12.5-hour negotiations</a>, in a <a href="http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/press-room/20181219IPR22301/parliament-and-council-agree-drastic-cuts-to-plastic-pollution-of-environment" target="_blank">press release</a>.
</p><p>
The move would place the European Union as a world leader in slashing use of the material. Just yesterday, Britain's <a href="https://www.rss.org.uk/" target="_blank">Royal Statistical Society</a> highlighted that <a href="https://www.statslife.org.uk/news/4026-statistics-of-the-year-2018-winners-announced" target="_blank">90.5 percent</a> of all plastic waste has never been recycled, leaving the vast majority of this trash accumulating in landfills or the natural environment.
</p><p>
"Europe now has a legislative model to defend and promote at [an] international level, given the global nature of the issue of marine pollution involving plastics," Ries added.
</p><p>
The <a href="https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2018/12/19/single-use-plastics-presidency-reaches-provisional-agreement-with-parliament/" target="_blank">new rules</a> would ban throwaway plastics for which readily available and affordable alternatives exist, for instance:
</p><ul class="ee-ul">
<li>Plastic cutlery (forks, knives, spoons and chopsticks)</li>
<li>Plastic plates</li>
<li>Plastic straws</li>
<li>Food containers made of expanded polystyrene </li>
<li>Beverage containers made of expanded polystyrene</li>
<li>Cups for beverages made of expanded polystyrene</li>
<li>Products made from oxo-degradable plastic (plastics that oxidize into micro fragments, which contributes to microplastic pollution)</li>
<li>Cotton bud sticks made of plastic</li>
</ul><p>
Other measures are aimed at reducing the use of certain plastics:
</p><ul class="ee-ul">
<li>For plastic bottles, the most commonly littered items on European beaches, member states will have a collection target of 77 percent by 2025 and 90 percent by 2029.</li>
<li>Marking on wet wipe packaging that informs consumers of the presence of plastic and how it harms the environment.</li>
<li>Cigarettes and other tobacco products that contain filters with plastic—the second most littered item on Europe's beaches—will also need a marking on their packaging about the presence of plastic.</li>
<li><span></span>A binding target of at least 25 percent of recycled plastic for PET beverage bottles from 2025 onwards and at least 30 percent by 2030.</li>
<li>Producers will also have to help cover waste management and cleanup costs.</li>
</ul><p>
The provisional agreement reached Wednesday still needs formal approval by the European Parliament and the Council. Once that's secured, the directive will be published in the EU's Official Journal and the EU's 28-member states will have to transpose it after two years, according to a European Commission <a href="http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-18-6867_en.htm" target="_blank">press release</a>.
</p><p>
Environmentalists welcomed the deal but urged the lawmakers to go further in transitioning to sustainable alternatives.
</p><p>
"The EU deserves praise for being the first region to introduce new laws to reduce single-use plastics and slash plastic pollution in our fields, rivers and oceans," said Meadhbh Bolger, resource justice campaigner at <a href="http://www.foeeurope.org/" target="_blank">Friends of the Earth Europe</a>, on behalf of <a href="https://rethinkplasticalliance.eu/" target="_blank">Rethink Plastic</a> in a press release.
</p><p>
"What's less laudable is that the plastics lobby—backed up by some governments—was able to delay and weaken the ambition," Bolger added. "Citizens across Europe want to see an end to our throwaway culture and politicians have taken the first step. The time is ripe for Europe to transition away from single-use plastics to reusables."
</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
</p><div id="d09ef" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="49T2RN1576662598"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1075090364447498243" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">"You can have a reduced-plastic Christmas with the same amount of (or even more) style and fun!" #PlasticPollutes… https://t.co/LFk56Um15h</div> — EcoWatch (@EcoWatch)<a href="https://twitter.com/EcoWatch/statuses/1075090364447498243">1545156491.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p></p>
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The planned Liberty Project is an artificial gravel island to allow oil drilling in the Arctic. Hilcorp / BOEM
Conservation groups are suing the Trump administration to halt construction of a controversial oil production facility in Alaska's Beaufort Sea, the first offshore oil drilling development in federal Arctic waters.
Hilcorp Alaska received the green light from the Interior Department in October to build the Liberty Project, a nine-acre artificial drilling island and 5.6-mile underwater pipeline, which environmentalists warn could risk oil spills in the ecologically sensitive area, threaten Arctic communities and put local wildlife including polar bears at risk.
<p>
In the lawsuit filed Monday, the <a href="https://www.biologicaldiversity.org/" target="_blank">Center for Biological Diversity</a>, <a href="https://foe.org/" target="_blank">Friends of the Earth</a>, <a href="http://greenpeace.org" target="_blank">Greenpeace</a>, <a href="https://defenders.org/" target="_blank">Defenders of Wildlife</a> and <a href="https://www.pacificenvironment.org/" target="_blank">Pacific Environment</a>—all represented by the environmental law nonprofit <a href="https://earthjustice.org/" target="_blank">Earthjustice</a>—claim the administration's approval violated federal laws and ignores the causes and effects of <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change">climate change</a>.
</p><p>
"We can't let this reckless administration open the Arctic to offshore oil drilling. It threatens Arctic wildlife and communities and will only make climate chaos worse around the world," said Kristen Monsell, oceans legal director with the Center for Biological Diversity in a <a href="https://earthjustice.org/news/press/2018/lawsuit-challenges-approval-of-offshore-oil-drilling-project-in-the-arctic" target="_blank">press release</a>. "Liberty is the bad step down a very dangerous path. An oil spill in the Arctic would be impossible to clean up in a region already stressed by climate change."
</p><p>
The Arctic is warming at twice the rate of anywhere else on Earth, and the region's air temperatures in the past five years between 2014-2018 have exceeded all previous records since 1900, <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/arctic-report-card-2623081883.html" target="_blank">government scientists warned</a> in a report earlier this month.
</p><p>
<span></span>Ironically, <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/oil-arctic-offshore-drilling-2619918075.html" target="_self">the Liberty Project has already been delayed</a> because of the effects of climate change. The region's unusual warmth has resulted in unstable land-fast sea ice, meaning that the ice simply isn't thick enough to transport construction materials.
</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
</p><div id="de69c" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="T1GBFG1576662599"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1056261349808988161" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Arctic Oil Drilling Project Approved by Trump Administration @savethearctic #SaveTheArctic #BigOil https://t.co/M1F1xWZQKk</div> — EcoWatch (@EcoWatch)<a href="https://twitter.com/EcoWatch/statuses/1056261349808988161">1540667304.0</a></blockquote></div>
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Furthermore, when the administration approved the Liberty Project, it did not "account for climate-change impacts already happening in the Arctic like permafrost melt, sea-ice melt and increasing storms that make this an exceedingly dangerous prospect and increase the potential for oil spills," said Rebecca Noblin, staff attorney with Earthjustice, in the release.
</p><p>
"This danger is even more worrisome given Hilcorp's appalling record of safety and environmental violations," Kevin Harun, Arctic program director at Pacific Environment, noted in the release.
</p><p>
Last year, Hilcorp struggled to fix a <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/pipeline-leak-alaska-cook-inlet-2318088552.html" target="_self">natural gas leak from its underwater pipeline in Alaska's Cook Inlet</a>. For nearly four months, the ruptured pipeline released roughly 200,000 cubic feet of methane a day into the inlet.
</p><p>
Additionally, Hilcorp has been the <a href="https://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/press_releases/2017/offshore-drilling-02-15-2017.php" target="_blank">most heavily fined</a> oil company in Alaska in recent years, with state regulators writing "disregard for regulatory compliance is endemic to Hilcorp's approach to its Alaska operations."
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The Trump administration is <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/alaska-oil-gas-lease-sale-2623304775.html" target="_self">aggressively pursuing</a> Arctic oil and gas development. In October, Interior Secretary <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/ryan-zinke" target="_self">Ryan Zinke</a> touted Hilcorp's oil and gas project as part of his plan for "<a href="https://www.doi.gov/pressreleases/interior-approves-long-awaited-first-oil-production-facility-federal-waters-offshore" target="_blank">American energy dominance</a>."
</p><p>
"In a rush to drill for oil in Alaska's pristine Arctic coastlines, Donald Trump is flouting the law and endangering some of the most delicate coastlines in the world," said Marcie Keever, legal director with Friends of the Earth, in the press release. "This project is just one in a series of giveaways to oil companies looking to enrich their CEOs and investors on America's public lands and waters. Drilling for new oil off our shorelines and on our public lands, especially in the Arctic, puts the health of our children and their future on this planet into jeopardy."
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</p><div id="3599e" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="XN02EW1576662599"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1073628234959466496" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Wednesday's oil and gas lease sale in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A) yielded a "disappointing" retur… https://t.co/W0F7jvikZR</div> — EcoWatch (@EcoWatch)<a href="https://twitter.com/EcoWatch/statuses/1073628234959466496">1544807892.0</a></blockquote></div>
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Global Divestment Movement Celebrates Milestone: 1,000 Institutions With Nearly $8 Trillion in Assets Have Vowed to Ditch Fossil Fuels
13 December 2018
Business
The Overpass Light Brigade at Bascom Hall in Madison, Wisconsin on April 4, 2014. depthandtime / Flickr
By Jake Johnson
While the COP24 climate talks are at risk of ending without a concrete plan of action thanks in large part to the Trump administration's commitment to a dirty energy agenda, environmental groups on Thursday celebrated a major milestone in the global movement to take down the fossil fuel industry after the number of public and private institutions that have vowed to divest from oil, gas and coal companies surpassed 1,000.
<p>"When this movement started in 2012, we aimed to catalyze a truly global shift in public attitudes to the fossil fuel industry, and people's willingness to challenge the institutions that financially support it," May Boeve, executive director of <a href="https://350.org" target="_blank">350.org</a>, said in a <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2018/12/13/landmark-fossil-fuel-divestment-reached" target="_blank">statement</a>. "While diplomats at the U.N. climate talks are having a hard time making progress, our movement has changed how society perceives the role of fossil fuel corporations and is actively keeping fossil fuels in the ground."</p><p>According to 350, the institutions that have committed to divesting from fossil fuels hold nearly $8 trillion USD in combined assets. The 1,000th institution to vow to divest was Caisse des dépôts et consignations (CDC), which manages France's public sector savings, pensions and investments.</p>
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<small class="image-media media-caption" placeholder="add caption...">Celebrate 1000 divestment commitments and counting!</small>
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<p>Coinciding with the new milestone, 350.org published a <a href="https://gofossilfree.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/1000divest-WEB-.pdf" target="_blank">new report</a> (detailing the rapid growth of the fossil fuel divestment movement over the past several years as <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/climate-change">climate</a> science has made clear the necessity of immediately and boldly slashing carbon emissions <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/2018/10/08/un-experts-warn-climate-catastrophe-2040-without-rapid-and-unprecedented-global" target="_blank">to avoid global devastation</a>.<br></p><p>"Since 2012, the fossil fuels divestment campaign has grown faster than any previous divestment movement," the report notes. "From 181 institutions and $50 billion worth of assets committed to divestment at the end of 2013 to now more than 1,000 institutions with over $7.9 trillion in assets committed to divest from fossil fuels, we are slamming on the brakes of fossil fuel expansion."</p>
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</p><div id="782e7" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="G4N2711576661688"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1073236261241057288" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Investors worth $8 trillion are turning their backs on immoral and dangerous fossil fuel industry.
@gofossilfree m… https://t.co/s3xtarGRIs</div> — 350 dot org (@350 dot org)<a href="https://twitter.com/350/statuses/1073236261241057288">1544714439.0</a></blockquote></div>
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<p>"Momentum for divestment has only accelerated: pledges span 37 countries with over 65 percent of commitments coming from outside the United States, and now include major capital cities, mainstream banks and insurance companies, massive pension funds, faith groups, cultural, health and educational institutions—the institutions serving billions of people," the report continues.<br></p><p>"This is a major milestone for the movement for a just transition to a zero carbon, sustainable future for everyone," <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2018/12/13/1000-organisations-end-investment-fossil-fuel-companies" target="_blank">added</a> Ric Lander, divestment campaigner for <a href="https://foe.org/" target="_blank">Friends of the Earth</a>. "Behind almost every one of these commitments is a group of committed people fighting for climate action and they should be proud of their achievements. They've persuaded, protested and brought the inarguable evidence of their case to decision makers and won them over."</p><p>With the 1,000 institution landmark reached, 350 said the global movement's next ambitious goal is 2,020 divestments totaling $12 trillion in combined assets by 2020.</p><p>"For those investors who persist in engaging with the fossil fuel industry, despite mounting evidence of its failure to achieve anything, we ask them to change tack as the science and justice demands in this moment," 350's report concluded. "If companies are not on track to keep their reserves in the ground or play their part in meeting the 1.5°C target, investors must walk away. The clock is ticking on multiple carbon bombs around the world as we approach 2020."</p>
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</p><div id="3ec18" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="8YL3LA1576661688"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="834517277777264640" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Carbon Bubble Is Bursting as #Divestment Takes Hold https://t.co/IwXdH5loeN @MarkRuffalo @LeoDiCaprio @billmckibben @350 @greenpeaceusa</div> — EcoWatch (@EcoWatch)<a href="https://twitter.com/EcoWatch/statuses/834517277777264640">1487799398.0</a></blockquote></div>
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<p><em>Reposted with permission from our media associate <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/2018/12/13/global-divestment-movement-celebrates-vow-1000-institutions-nearly-8-trillion-assets?cd-origin=rss" target="_blank">Common Dreams</a>.</em><br></p>
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200+ Groups Call on Senate to Reject 'Pesticide Industry Loyalist' as USDA's Top Scientist
14 November 2018
Politics
Agricultural workers in Salinas, California. Michael Davidson / Flickr / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
By Andrea Germanos
Denouncing his "strong ties to corporate agribusiness and pesticide companies," more than 240 groups urged the Senate on Wednesday to reject the nomination of Scott Hutchins, President Donald Trump's pick for chief scientist at the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA).
<p>"The <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/tag/election-2018" target="_blank">election last week</a> demonstrates that people across the country are tired of this administration's dangerous anti-science, pro-industry agenda," declared Tiffany Finck-Haynes, pesticides and pollinators program manager with <a href="https://foe.org/" target="_blank">Friends of the Earth</a>. "We urge the Senate to listen to the American people and reject this pesticide industry loyalist who will put corporate profits over farmers, public health, and our environment."</p><p>If appointed Under Secretary of Agriculture for Research, Education, and Economics—a position with "<a href="https://qz.com/1332086/trump-nominates-dow-pesticide-executive-scott-hutchins-to-top-usda-post/" target="_blank">broad implications for the future of American agricultural science and policy-making</a>"—Hutchins would be the third Dow executive at the USDA, making the <a href="https://blog.ucsusa.org/karen-perry-stillerman/at-the-trump-usda-the-d-stands-for-dow" target="_blank">cozy relationship</a> between the Trump administration and the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/agribusiness">agribusiness</a> giant even more clear.</p><p>In a letter to Senate Agriculture Committee chairman Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) and ranking member Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.), the massive coalition opposed to Hutchins warns that by appointing someone that "spent over 30 years of his career working at Dow Agro Sciences with a focus on pesticides," the Trump administration has once more demonstrated its willingness to put its "unhealthy relationship" with Dow Chemical ahead of the "health and safety of the American public and our environment."</p><p>The letter from the coalition—which includes ActionAid USA, Family Farm Defenders and Interfaith Worker Justice—states:</p><blockquote>Scott Hutchins has a history of defending the toxic pesticide chlorpyrifos. In 2001, Hutchins expressed disappointment that Dow needed to limit uses of the pesticide, complaining that the Food Quality Protection Act (FQPA) put Dow's organophosphates under scrutiny.<br><br>Hutchins encourages growers to use pesticides, even when less toxic alternatives are available. In a 2006 presentation, Hutchins claimed, "Integrative Pest Management does/should NOT advocate avoidance of technology." While many practitioners of Integrative Pest Management view the practice as a way to significantly reduce synthetic pesticide use and utilize them as a "last resort," Hutchins has co-opted the term to encourage pesticide application.<br></blockquote><p>"Should Scott Hutchins gain control of USDA's research programs," the letter continues, "he could use the agency's infrastructure and grant making to advance his harmful vision of chemical intensive agriculture under the guise of ecologically sustainable practices."</p><p>According to Jim Goodman, board president of the <a href="http://nffc.net/" target="_blank">National Family Farm Coalition</a>, one of the signatory groups, "In nominating Scott Hutchins to the position of Chief Scientist at USDA, the Trump Administration has, again, proven that they are more interested in promoting the agenda and profit of industrial agribusiness over scientific integrity, the protection of public health, and the well-being of farmers, farm workers, and rural communities."</p><p>The Senate Agriculture Committee announced Tuesday that Hutchins' <a href="https://www.agriculture.senate.gov/hearings/nomination-of-mindy-brashears-naomi-earp-and-scott-hutchins" target="_blank">hearing</a> would be held Nov. 28.</p><p> <em>Reposted with permission from our media associate <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/2018/11/14/200-groups-call-senate-reject-pesticide-industry-loyalist-scott-hutchins-usdas-top" target="_blank">Common Dreams</a>.</em><em></em></p>
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It's Time to Stop Paying for Pesticides With Our Health: Organic for All Must Become the Norm
02 November 2018
Insights + Opinion
Peyri Herrera / CC BY 2.0
By Kendra Klein
A groundbreaking new study in the prestigious Journal of the American Medical Association reveals that you can cut your cancer risk by eating an organic diet. The findings are dramatic. In a study that followed nearly 70,000 people, those who ate the most organic food lowered their overall risk of developing cancer by 25 percent. The relationship was strongest for two types of cancer: participants who frequently ate organic had 76 percent fewer lymphomas and 34 percent fewer breast cancers that developed after menopause.
<p>This research confirms what is intuitive and supports what the President's Cancer Panel <a href="https://deainfo.nci.nih.gov/advisory/pcp/annualreports/pcp08-09rpt/pcp_report_08-09_508.pdf" target="_blank">told us</a> nearly a decade ago: reducing exposure to cancer-causing chemicals, including <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/pesticides">pesticides</a>, reduces your risk of cancer.</p><p>Here's why this is intuitive. First, we know that eating organic foods reduces our exposure to pesticides. Research has shown that the level of pesticides we can measure in people's bodies <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4590750/" target="_blank">drops significantly</a> within days of switching from a non-organic to an organic diet.</p><p>And second, we know that many of the pesticides commonly used on U.S. farms and found as <a href="http://www.whatsonmyfood.org/" target="_blank">residues on our food</a> are associated with cancers and a host of other <a href="https://www.beyondpesticides.org/resources/pesticide-induced-diseases-database/overview" target="_blank">health problems</a>, from ADHD and autism to infertility and Alzheimer's. </p><p>More than <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/exposurereport/index.html" target="_blank">90 percent</a> of Americans have detectable pesticides in our bodies. The food we eat is the most significant way we're exposed for those of us who don't work with pesticides at our jobs. Farmers, farmworkers and groundskeepers are most at risk of exposure, like Dewayne Johnson, who just won a <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/monsanto-cancer-lawsuit-california-2614497507.html">lawsuit against Monsanto</a> linking his occupational <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/glyphosate">glyphosate</a> exposure to his non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.</p><p>Some of us are more vulnerable than others. <a href="https://www.ewg.org/research/body-burden-pollution-newborns#.WpSaTIMbPeZ" target="_blank">Infants are born pre-polluted with pesticides</a> in the U.S., and nearly all children are exposed to pesticides through the foods they eat. Infants and children have unique susceptibilities to the harms of pesticides because their brains and bodies are developing so rapidly. Early life exposure can impact children for life. It can permanently decrease a child's IQ, increase the risk of autism or lead to cancers later in life. Another new study calls for a ban on all organophosphate pesticides, like <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/chlorpyrifos">chlorpyrifos</a>, because of their link to <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/organophosphate-ban-pesticides_us_5bcfd6bbe4b0a8f17ef1d420" target="_blank">brain damage in children</a>.</p><p>That's why the American Academy of Pediatrics says that "<a href="http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/pediatrics/early/2012/11/21/peds.2012-2758.full.pdf" target="_blank">children's exposure to pesticides should be limited as much as possible</a>."</p><p>Other studies have shown that decreasing the amount of pesticides we're exposed to by eating organic can improve our health. Like this recent <a href="https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/article-abstract/2659557?redirect=true" target="_blank">study</a>, which found that women who ate more organic food had a higher likelihood of getting and staying pregnant. And the Million Women Study in the UK, which found that women who ate more organic food had a <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/bjc2014148" target="_blank">21 percent lower risk</a> of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. </p><p>What these studies tell us is that <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E6KoMAbz1Bw" target="_blank">small exposures matter</a>—in other words, the amount of pesticides we consume as food residues matters. To understand why, consider the fact that scientists measure pesticides in our bodies at similar levels as drugs prescribed by doctors, like Ritalin. These small amounts of pesticides can act like drugs in our bodies, altering our brain development, hormones, immune systems and more. </p><p>And we're not exposed to just one pesticide at a time. When we eat non-organic food, we're exposed to a "cocktail" of different pesticides. Consider strawberries: the U.S. Department of Agriculture found that nearly one-third of non-organic strawberries had residues from <a href="https://www.ams.usda.gov/sites/default/files/media/2015PDPAnnualSummary.pdf" target="_blank">10 or more different pesticides.</a></p><p>Government regulations are inadequate to protect our health. Legal limits for the amount of pesticide residues on food are set as if we're exposed to just one pesticide at a time, but that is never the case. As this <a href="https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/es900713s" target="_blank">study</a> shows, approximately 40 percent of U.S. children are exposed to a cumulative amount of organophosphate pesticides from the food they eat and water they drink at levels that exceed benchmarks for neurological harm. What's more, emerging data show that certain combinations of pesticides can have <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/290804016_Synergy_The_Big_Unknowns_of_Pesticide_Exposure" target="_blank">synergistic impacts</a> greater than the effect of each individual chemical.</p><p>There are <a href="http://careygillam.com/articles/article/hold-the-plum-pudding-us-food-sampling-shows-troubling-pesticide-residues" target="_blank">more pesticides on our food now</a> than a decade ago. And we can't just wash these residues off—<a href="https://www.ams.usda.gov/datasets/pdp/pdpdata" target="_blank">even after being washed</a>, many foods still have detectable pesticides.</p><p>We are paying for this overuse of toxic pesticides with our well-being and our lives. The estimated environmental and health care costs of pesticide use in the U.S.—at levels that are legal according to government regulations—is estimated to be upwards of <a href="http://www.assobio.it/web16/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/pimentel.pesticides.2005update.pdf" target="_blank">$12 billion every year</a>. Meanwhile, the pesticide industry reaps over <a href="https://1bps6437gg8c169i0y1drtgz-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/wpallimport/files/archive/FOE_BuzzKillReport_7_web.pdf" target="_blank">$150 billion in profit</a> each year from pesticides and other agricultural technologies and spends tens of millions lobbying legislators and <a href="https://foe.org/resources/spinning-food-how-food-industry-front-groups-and-covert-communications-are-shaping-the-story-of-food/" target="_blank">misleading the public</a> about pesticides. What this amounts to is a chronic poisoning of the population for the financial gain of a few. </p><p>Our taxpayer dollars are being used to prop up this devastating system. Congress subsidizes chemical-intensive industrial agriculture to the tune of <a href="https://fairworldproject.org/fairness-for-small-farmers-a-missing-ingredient-in-the-u-s-farm-bill/" target="_blank">billions</a> of dollars a year, while organic programs and research are woefully underfunded. As one example, <a href="https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/82089420.pdf" target="_blank">less than one percent</a> of federal agricultural research dollars goes toward organic farming methods or other sustainable farming approaches.</p><p>It is high time we flip this system on its head and make organic food the standard for all people. </p><p>A recent United Nations report debunks the myth that pesticides are necessary to feed a growing world population and argues that each of us has the <a href="https://reliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.int/files/resources/1701059.pdf" target="_blank">right to food that is free of toxic pesticides</a>. And people living in farm communities should have the right to be free of exposure to toxic pesticides, starting with the children who live and go to school near farm fields where pesticides are sprayed and farmers and farmworkers who are exposed daily. </p><p>Those of us who can buy organic need to continue driving the <a href="https://ota.com/news/press-releases/20236" target="_blank">growth of organic food</a> in the marketplace. And, together, we need to fight for public policies that make organic a solution for all. This means <a href="https://foodtank.com/news/2018/06/farm-bill-opinion-conservation/" target="_blank">overhauling the Farm Bil</a>l, which will be up for renegotiation in 2019. In the meantime, some <a href="https://foe.org/resources/swarming-aisles-ii-rating-top-retailers-pesticide-reduction-organic-food-protect-pollinators/" target="_blank">food retailers</a> are taking steps in the right direction by increasing organic offerings and decreasing use of toxic pesticides in their supply chains.</p><p>The experiment in chemical-intensive agriculture that has metastasized across the world in the past 80 years must become a thing of the past. An organic food future is not only possible—it is essential.</p>
<p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
</p><div id="e6350" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="U18LBJ1576662983"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="749350723691933698" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Can Organic Farming Feed the World? https://t.co/Ojr5lw6vW1 @naturallysavvy @TheOrganicView</div> — EcoWatch (@EcoWatch)<a href="https://twitter.com/EcoWatch/statuses/749350723691933698">1467494109.0</a></blockquote></div>
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<p><em>Kendra Klein, Ph.D. is a senior staff scientist for <a href="https://foe.org/" target="_blank">Friends of the Earth</a>.</em><br></p>
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Trending
Caleb George / Unsplash
By Doug Norlen
This month the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released a startling report, which finds that severe impacts of climate change are happening much sooner than previously expected, and that countries must take far more aggressive actions to avoid the most catastrophic impacts. The report finds that the burning of fossil fuels must be curbed sharply.
<p>The harmful role Wall Street banks play in propping up fossil projects around the world is increasingly known. Yet there is much less awareness of the role major cities play when they place billions of dollars of their public funds into these same Wall Street banks. According to L.A. city records, as of July 2018, Los Angeles had banking and/or investment relationships with several Wall Street banks, many of which are notorious for their financing of fossil fuel and human rights debacles around the world, including JP Morgan Chase, Citi, Bank of America and Wells Fargo. </p><p>According to <a href="https://www.ran.org/bankingonclimatechange2018/" target="_blank">Banking on Climate Change</a>, a fossil fuel finance report card, between 2015 and 2017 these Wall Street banks collectively provided over $50 billion in financing for <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/tar-sands">tar sands</a>, ultra-deep <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/offshore-oil-drilling">water drilling</a>, coal mining, <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/coal">coal</a> power and liquid natural gas projects around the world. These projects contribute vast amounts of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, and many of them have severe local environmental, social and human rights impacts as well.</p><p>But in 2018, cities have more ethical options. Rather than investing the public's money in environmental and human destruction, cities can establish public banks. When properly structured and operated, public banks can prohibit the use of their funds for fossil fuel and other harmful projects. Instead, they can fund <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/renewable-energy/">renewable energy</a> and other green enterprises, affordable housing, education and low-cost loans to job-creating entrepreneurs—all while avoiding paying hundreds of millions of dollars in exorbitant fees to Wall Street banks.</p><p>The movement to establish public banks is growing nationwide. California is at the forefront, with efforts to pass state-wide legislation allowing establishment of municipal banks as well as campaigns to establish public banks in San Francisco, Oakland and other East Bay cities, Los Angeles and other municipalities.</p><p>When Los Angeles voters go to the polls next week, they will decide whether to approve Charter Amendment B, which amends the city's charter to enable it to take affirmative steps to establish a public bank. And Los Angeles is a great case study on the need for public banks. According to Public Bank L.A., the city maintains bank accounts with between $4 billion and $12 billion in cash, and manages up to $45 billion in investments through large commercial banks.</p><p>The enormous sum of public funds that L.A. entrusts to fossil fuel banks undercuts the climate leadership of city officials. For example, this past August L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti joined a coalition of hundreds of mayors across the country to <a href="https://www.lamayor.org/mayor-garcetti-and-climate-mayors-representing-407-cities-denounce-trump-administrations-proposed" target="_blank">condemn</a> Donald Trump's plans to weaken vehicle efficiency standards and rescind California's waiver right to set stronger greenhouse gas regulations. In December 2016, Garcetti joined other mayors to <a href="https://www.lamayor.org/mayor-garcetti-leads-%25E2%2580%2598climate-mayors%25E2%2580%2599-oppose-us-withdrawal-paris-agreement" target="_blank">denounce</a> Trump's decision to walk away from the <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/paris-agreement">Paris agreement</a>. The city council has shown progressive streaks on banking issues as well. In December 2017, the Council unanimously voted to enforce both federal and state Community Reinvestment Act ratings disqualifying Wells Fargo from submitting a Request for Proposal for the city's commercial banking services. And yet, the city still banks with Wells Fargo.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image">
<img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8xODc4NTc5MC9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY2Mjk3MjA2OX0.bdDNGsoH5OEZfrn4gr-iswJy_BJ4q-Mkt91exCYpJQc/img.jpg?width=980" id="cb0ff" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="41b3a8a40393b45de756cc0545117798" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image">
<small class="image-media media-caption" placeholder="add caption...">Activist calling for Wells Fargo to divest from Dakota Access Pipeline. </small><small class="image-media media-photo-credit" placeholder="add photo credit...">Joe Piette / Flickr / Creative Commons</small></p><p>If L.A. voters approve Charter Amendment B, the city will be one step closer to creating a municipal bank and redirecting its billions of dollars of public funds to environmentally sound, fiscally smart, sustainable community needs. In doing so, L.A. will serve as a beacon of progress to inspire the larger national movement to establish public banks.<br></p><p>For a sense of why Los Angeles so badly needs to approve Charter Amendment B, we've included descriptions of just a handful of the harmful projects Los Angeles is currently supporting by keeping its money in fossil fuel banks (based on publicly available information). Here is a sample of some of the projects that LA's banks support:</p><p>Dakota Access Pipeline (United States):</p><ul class="ee-ul"><li>Citi — $235 million in project finance</li><li>MUFG — $235 million in project finance</li><li>Wells Fargo — $120 million in project finance</li></ul><p>The <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/dakota-access-pipeline">Dakota Access Pipeline</a>, or DAPL, extends over 1,000 miles across several U.S. states, damaging Native American ancestral lands and water. Passing within just a half-mile of the Standing Rock Indian Reservation, the pipeline has destroyed sacred sites and threatens the tribe's drinking water with potential oil spills. Beginning in 2016, Native American water protectors, including Standing Rock Sioux tribal elders and members, led opposition to DAPL. Supported by thousands of allies, this grew into one of the largest and most iconic movements in the world to halt fossil fuel <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/pipelines">pipelines</a>. In response to peaceful, prayerful resistance, police from several states and agencies, members of the U.S. National Guard and armed private security forces used military equipment and tactics, including attack dogs, to intimidate, assault, arrest and otherwise commit grievous human rights abuses against water protectors and their allies. Opposition to the pipeline expanded far beyond the project site and supercharged the growing global movement against financial institutions that support fossil fuel projects.</p><p>Atlantic Coast Pipeline (United States):</p><ul class="ee-ul"><li>Bank of America — $673.5 million in corporate loans (13)</li><li>Citi — $673.5 million in corporate loans (14)</li><li>JP Morgan Chase — $648 million in corporate loans (15)</li><li>MUFG — $1.182 billion in corporate loans (16)</li><li>Wells Fargo — $673.5 million in corporate loans (17)</li></ul><p>The proposed 600-mile <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/atlantic-coast-pipeline">Atlantic Coast Pipeline</a>, running from West Virginia through North Carolina, is the third longest gas pipeline in production or in some phase of development over the past 20 years in the U.S. Trees have been cleared along the pipeline route and infrastructure development has begun. Although two lawsuits against the pipeline are now pending in federal and North Carolina courts, federal law allows pipelines to be constructed prior to the resolution of all litigation. The ACP was the only oil or gas pipeline to be on Donald Trump's list of 50 Priority National Security Projects prior to his election.</p><p>According to published reports, the central purpose of the ACP is to enter South Carolina and eventually reach Elba Island, Georgia where gas will be exported from a liquid natural gas facility now under construction. This recognition raises serious concerns regarding the use of eminent domain to take privately owned property for private gain instead of public use.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image">
<img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8xODc4NjYzMS9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYwMjQ0MzIzNX0.J0GH5QBDugFbF00ErR3WiD5AW7RIVWLvOJxDo94osj4/img.jpg?width=980" id="4c863" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="fc1722bcfc6e426b2ee2bf0a8409bfb2" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image">
<small class="image-media media-photo-credit" placeholder="add photo credit...">Pax Ahimsa Gethen / Flickr</small></p><p>The ACP threatens the livelihood of more than 30,000 indigenous peoples that live along the pipeline route. In May 2018, an alliance of community, statewide and national groups filed a complaint to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (<a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/epa">EPA</a>) Civil Rights Compliance Office, alleging that the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality discriminated on the basis of race and color in issuing permits and certifications to the ACP as part of the permitting process. In September 2018, environmental groups filed legal challenges in an appeals court against federal permitting agencies.<br></p><p>Kusile Power Station (South Africa):</p><ul class="ee-ul"><li>Bank of America — financial advisor</li><li>JP Morgan Chase — financial advisor</li><li>MUFG — part of 705 million euro corporate loan to South Africa's state power company, Eskom, to purchase boilers from Hitachi Power Europe for the Kusile coal power plant</li></ul><p>Once completed, the 4,800-megawatt Kusile coal plant in South Africa will be one of the largest coal plants in the world. The estimated annual greenhouse gas equivalent emissions of the plant—30 million tons—would increase South African energy sector emissions by 12.8 percent and the country's total contribution to climate change by 9.7 percent. South Africa already has the distinction of being among the top global greenhouse gas emitters per capita. The Kusile project area already exceeds permitted ambient levels of hazardous <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/air-pollution">air pollutants</a> that create soot and smog, which cause harm to respiratory, cardiovascular and nervous systems, leading to heart disease, cancer, stroke and chronic lower respiratory diseases, according to Physicians for Social Responsibility. If completed, Kusile will increase the cost of electricity for the poor and household consumers to compensate for Apartheid-era "special pricing agreements" that give large industrial users, which consume most of South Africa's electricity, guaranteed rates that are among the lowest in the world. The cost of Kusile, which in 2007 was estimated by Eskom to be 80 billion rand, had more than doubled to 172 billion rand by 2016. It is "expected to further strain Eskom's financial resources, and place upward pressure on Eskom's electricity price trajectory in the years ahead." In 2015 the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission charged Hitachi with violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act in connection with contracts to build Kusile and Medupi (another enormous coal plant in South Africa), resulting in a $19 million settlement.</p><p>Long Phu-1 Coal Plant (Vietnam):</p><ul class="ee-ul"><li>MUFG and JP Morgan Chase — among the lead financial arrangers, with potential combined $650 million in finance</li></ul><p>Long Phu-1 in Vietnam would emit an estimated 6.3 million tonnes of CO2 per year. As a "supercritical" coal power plant, Long Phu-1 is prohibited from being financed by most official government export credit agencies (ECA), including the U.S. Export-Import Bank. However, the former director of the EPA's Air Enforcement Division, Bruce Buckheit, revealed that the project consulting firm Environmental Resources Management doctored the coal plant's greenhouse gas emissions estimates to make Long Phu-1 appear to be a more efficient "ultra-supercritical" plant, which would be allowed under ECA coal financing restrictions. Analysis of Long Phu-1 by Friends of the Earth U.S. reveals that the project violates other international policies, including requirements to analyze alternatives, identify cumulative and associated risks and impacts, evaluate labor and working conditions, prevent pollution, protect community health, provide safety and security, and ensure biodiversity conservation. In February 2018, the New York Times reported that U.S. Export-Import Bank financing for Long Phu-1 had collapsed after it was revealed that project financiers included Vnesheconombank, a Russian bank that is on the U.S. government's sanctions list and is part of a federal investigation into possible collusion between the Russian government and the Trump presidential campaign. It was also reported that a top Long Phu-1 project official had been sentenced to prison for corruption. MUFG and JP Morgan Chase, like the U.S. Export-Import Bank, must also comply with U.S. sanctions. However, it remains unclear whether these banks continue to be potential financiers of Long Phu-1.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
</p><div id="319bd" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="AXJZ871576661973"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="996952236004700165" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">WATCH: 3 communities who stood up to Big Oil and won https://t.co/58BKMR6zGK #FossilFree https://t.co/dqOuksByOh</div> — 350 dot org (@350 dot org)<a href="https://twitter.com/350/statuses/996952236004700165">1526526910.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p></p><p><em>Doug Norlen is the economic policy program director for <a href="https://foe.org/city-angels-funds-hellish-fossil-fuel-projects/" target="_blank">Friends of the Earth</a>.</em><br></p>
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Greenpeace fracking protest in London's Parliament Square. DAVID HOLT / Flickr / CC BY 2.0
A string of small earthquakes were reported the town of Blackpool just days after fracking operations restarted in England after a seven year hiatus, raising concerns that the controversial drilling process could eventually trigger bigger temblors.
The British Geological Survey (BGS) detected five quakes since Thursday near the contentious Preston New Road site operated by UK shale gas firm Cuadrilla Resources.
<p>
Most of the earthquakes were at negative levels, meaning they were unnoticeable by residents. However, a 0.3-magnitude earthquake recorded on Friday hit amber on the government's monitoring scale, meaning Cuadrilla has to "proceed at caution,"
<a href="https://foe.org/" target="_blank">Friends of the Earth</a> Campaigner Rose Dickinson told <a href="https://metro.co.uk/2018/10/19/blackpool-hit-by-four-earthquakes-just-days-after-fracking-started-again-in-the-area-8056505/" target="_blank">Metro.co.uk</a>.
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<img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8xODc1MTUxNy9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYzNjI4MTUxM30.T_pd1SOu4PCIQM9MQgs_puqwXMTNEU2gP1-q8Un1ojg/img.png?width=980" id="c0a0e" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="27ece5a559f6312a1d17bfec601f58e3" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image">
<small class="image-media media-photo-credit" placeholder="add photo credit...">British Geological Survey</small>
</p><p>
Incidentally, fracking was halted at the Blackpool site in 2011 because of earthquakes. The largest had a magnitude of 2.3 and was felt locally.
</p><p>
<span></span>"Since hydraulic fracturing operations started at Preston New Road, near Blackpool, we have detected some small earthquakes close to the area of operations," BGS said, as quoted by the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/oct/20/minor-earthquakes-detected-near-cuadrilla-fracking-site-in-lancashire" target="_blank">Guardian</a>. "This is not unexpected since hydraulic fracturing is generally accompanied by micro-seismicity. The Oil and Gas Authority (OGA) has strict controls in place to ensure that operators manage the risk of induced seismicity."
</p><p>
The government has a traffic-light system that immediately halts operations if seismic activity exceeds 0.5 on the Richter scale.
</p><p>
"All of the earthquakes detected at Preston New Road so far are below the threshold required to cease hydraulic fracturing," BGS added.
</p><p>
Cuadrilla has shrugged off the minor seismic activity. It
<a href="https://twitter.com/seismo_steve/status/1053567456889978881" target="_blank">retweeted</a> a post from seismologist Stephen Hicks, who commented that Friday's 0.3-magnitude earthquake could "set a new world record for one of the world's smallest earthquakes that has been reported on by multiple media outlets."
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<img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8xODc1MTY2NC9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYxMjc5NTg2Nn0.YUqr4CMYwuPie_5Zb5jGOMcGvlKWLCsw95ZwvyUZ7sE/img.png?width=980" id="85e19" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="7275e8f1d2ab1d3997a431ba46f2e59b" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image">
<small class="image-media media-photo-credit" placeholder="add photo credit...">Twitter</small>
</p><p>
"The micro seismic events which have been recorded through the detailed monitoring Cuadrilla and the BGS are carrying out are successfully detecting events even at these very low levels," the company said, per the Guardian. "This is not an 'amber' incident under the traffic light system operated by the OGA as we were not pumping fracturing fluid as part of our hydraulic fracturing operations at the time and the seismic events remain under 0.5 local magnitude."
</p><p>
However, opponents said that the earthquakes are proof that fracking poses too many risks.
</p><p>
"Recent research by Stanford University shows that these tiny tremors can be indicators of bigger quakes to follow—like canaries in a coal-mine," David Smythe, emeritus professor of geophysics at the University of Glasgow, told Metro.co.uk.
</p><p>
"The problem for Cuadrilla is that if it carries on regardless, bigger earthquakes may well be triggered," Smythe continued. "To quote Cole Porter, 'There may be trouble ahead.' Cuadrilla's only safe option is to cease fracking."
</p><p>
With drilling underway, documents obtained by
<a href="https://unearthed.greenpeace.org/2018/10/09/uk-fracking-shale-tremor-earthquake-regulations-traffic-light-system/" target="_blank">Greenpeace's Unearthed</a> show that ministers are looking to weaken earthquake standards at fracking sites.
</p><p>
In a letter sent to Conservative MP Kevin Hollinrake in July, UK energy minister Claire Perry said the traffic-light system is "set at an explicitly cautious level but, as we gain experience in applying these measures, the trigger levels can be adjusted upwards without compromising the effectiveness of the controls."
</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
</p><div id="890e1" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="URZZ501576662666"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1053626060313714694" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Last week: @UE reveals ministers are looking at relaxing fracking earthquake rules
This week: Cuadrilla's Lancashir… https://t.co/swLRQ6HeSD</div> — Unearthed (@Unearthed)<a href="https://twitter.com/UE/statuses/1053626060313714694">1540039002.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p></p><p>
Earlier this month, a high court judge allowed drilling to restart in England despite years of anti-fracking protests and last-ditch legal bids.
</p><p>
Environmentalists warn that increased gas extraction not only jeopardizes the country's emissions reduction targets, it also skirts warnings from the UN's
<a href="http://www.ipcc.ch/" target="_blank">Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change</a> <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change-ipcc-report-2610866229.html" target="_self">report</a> that says we must reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 45 percent below 2010 levels by 2030 in order to limit warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial temperatures. </p>
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The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) logo. AlexCovarrubias, CC BY 2.5
By Steve Horn
While the oil and gas industry has lauded the new trade deal that may soon replace the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), a provision added by Mexico, along with its new president's plan to ban fracking, could complicate the industry's rising ambitions there.
The new agreement, known as the United States–Mexico–Canada Agreement (USMCA), has faced criticism as being tantamount to NAFTA 2.0—more of a minor reboot that primarily benefits Wall Street investors and large corporations, including oil and gas companies.
<p><a href="https://www.politico.com/story/2016/09/trump-clinton-come-out-swinging-over-nafta-228712" target="_blank">Mercilessly critiqued</a> by then-candidate <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/trump-watch/">Donald Trump</a> during the 2016 presidential campaign, NAFTA is now the second major trade deal kicked to the curb by now-President Trump. The other, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), was <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/23/us/politics/tpp-trump-trade-nafta.html" target="_blank">canceled days into</a> Trump's presidency.</p><p>After the most recent deal's announcement, the oil and gas industry offered praise for USMCA. The White House even pointed this out in a press release, highlighting a quote given by the U.S. industry's major trade group, the <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/american-petroleum-institute" target="_blank">American Petroleum Institute (API)</a>.</p><p>"We urge Congress to approve the USMCA. Having Canada as a trading partner and a party to this agreement is critical for North American energy security and U.S. consumers," <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/wtas-support-president-donald-j-trumps-successful-trade-negotiations-mexico-canada/" target="_blank">said Mike Sommers</a>, president and CEO of API. "Retaining a trade agreement for North America will help ensure the U.S. energy revolution continues into the future."</p><p>In its <a href="https://www.api.org/news-policy-and-issues/news/2018/10/01/api-applauds-trilateral-trade-agreement" target="_blank">own press release</a> declaring its support for USMCA, API further spelled out the parts of the deal it supports.</p><p>Those include "continued market access for U.S. natural gas and oil products, and investments in Canada and Mexico; continued zero tariffs on natural gas and oil products; investment protections to which all countries commit and the eligibility for Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) for U.S. natural gas and oil companies investing in Mexico; requirement that Mexico retain at least current level of openness to U.S. energy investment; additional flexibility allowing U.S. customs authorities to accept alternative documentation to certify that natural gas and oil have originated in Canada or Mexico upon entering the U.S.-Mexico Provision."</p><p><strong>Mexico's New NAFTA Energy Stance</strong></p><p>Within Mexico, too, things look promising for the oil and gas industry. Unlike the U.S. and Canada, Mexico has yet to experience a major oil and gas pipeline expansion or unconventional oil and gas extraction boom, a la hydraulic fracturing ("fracking") or <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/tar-sands">tar sands</a> production.</p><p>That could change, however, under Mexico's recently privatized energy market, and USMCA appears to have shored up the gains the oil and gas industry won when in 2013 Mexico's Congress voted to <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/2014/05/12/no-turning-back-mexico-looming-fracking-and-offshore-oil-and-gas-bonanza" target="_blank">open up its energy market</a> to international investment. Those energy reforms were <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/2015/08/07/hillary-clinton-state-department-emails-mexico-energy-reform-revolving-door" target="_blank">pushed </a>by the U.S. Department of State under then-U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.</p><p>Duncan Wood, director of the Mexico Institute at the Washington D.C.-based Wilson Center, explained how the USMCA would affect Mexico's new energy reality in an interview with the San Diego Union-Tribune.</p><p>"Mexico has come out of this with pretty strong protections for investors in the oil and gas sectors, as well as in telecom infrastructure, and that's good news for the future of the energy reform," explained Wood. "That's good news, even more so for those companies that have already invested in Mexico."</p><p>Mexico's recently elected president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, has yet to comment on the USMCA's energy-related provisions. But he <a href="https://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Mexico-President-Elect-AMLO-To-Eliminate-Fracking-20181006-0034.html" target="_blank">recently reiterated</a> that he will <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/2018/08/01/lopez-obrador-ban-fracking" target="_blank">implement a ban on fracking</a> during his time in office.</p><p>And Mexico landed a provision within USMCA saying that the country has "direct and inalienable ownership" of its <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/fossil-fuels">hydrocarbons</a>, which could complicate the multinational industry's expansion into the country going forward.</p><p>"The Mexican State has the direct, inalienable, and imprescriptible ownership of all hydrocarbons in the subsoil of the national territory, including the continental shelf and the exclusive economic zone located outside the territorial sea and adjacent thereto, in strata or deposits, regardless of their physical conditions pursuant to Mexico's Constitution," <a href="https://ustr.gov/sites/default/files/files/agreements/FTA/USMCA/08%20Recognition%20of%20Mexican%20Ownership%20of%20Hydrocarbons.pdf" target="_blank">reads USMCA's provision on this issue</a>.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image">
<img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8xODc0MDU2My9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYyMTg1ODQ0Nn0.G5unFtj5HXwBaVpKOPCV0wQdQxSCmD5ulFyzavooqC8/img.jpg?width=980" id="7d8a0" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="b8e8fd7f7089998193a79cdef9cce7bf" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image">
<small class="image-media media-caption" placeholder="add caption...">Andrés Manuel López Obrador as president elect of Mexico speaks during a press conference at Salon D'Luz on July 5, 2018 in Mexico City. </small>
<small class="image-media media-photo-credit" placeholder="add photo credit...">Carlos Tischler / Getty Images</small></p><p>For its part, <span style="background-color: initial;">API</span> believes it can potentially change López Obrador's mind on the issue. Aaron Padilla, senior adviser for international policy at <span style="background-color: initial;">API</span>, told The Washington Post that like the wind, political will often changes directions.<br></p><p>"The new president in Mexico has expressed some skepticism about energy reforms he has inherited from his predecessor," <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/trumps-usmca-delivers-big-wins-to-drugmakers-oil-companies-and-tech-firms/2018/10/02/2d68ad10-c66f-11e8-b1ed-1d2d65b86d0c_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.576c027745b4" target="_blank">said Padilla</a>. "Our member companies are looking to work constructively with him, but they are looking at the long term and understand politics can change in any country."</p><p>U.S. exports of natural gas to Mexico, though, will likely continue apace and expand under the new NAFTA. That is because, as Inside Climate News <a href="https://insideclimatenews.org/news/04102018/trump-trade-deal-climate-change-canada-mexico-pollution-outsourcing-nafta-usmca" target="_blank">reported</a>, the deal assumes exports of petroleum products into Mexico from the U.S. are in the public interest, which would expedite their approval on a de facto basis. </p><p><strong>Climate Change Unmentioned</strong></p><p>The words "climate change" barely get a mention in the report, as well. As The HuffPost reported, the word "climate change" <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/nafta-environment_us_5bb24486e4b0c7575967b819" target="_blank">does not appear</a> at all within the 31 pages of the deal's environmental section.</p><p>Doug Norlen, who does watchdog work on trade issues for the environmental advocacy group <a href="https://foe.org" target="_blank">Friends of the Earth</a>, has decried the deal.</p><p>"The agreement continues to give polluting transnational companies greater rights than governments and citizens. This agreement is an attack on our ability to hold Big Oil and Gas accountable for the damage they cause to our communities," <a href="https://foe.org/news/trumps-nafta-deal-great-big-oil-bad-global-climate-local-communities/" target="_blank">said Norlen in a press release</a> from the organization. "If this trade agreement moves forward, citizens in all three countries must continue our fight to protect the very food, air, and water our communities need to survive."</p><p>USMCA is not a done deal, however, and still must be approved by the legislative bodies in all three North American countries. If it goes into effect, the deal impacts <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2018/10/01/comparison-nafta-and-usmca-trade-agreements/1487163002/" target="_blank">$1.2 trillion worth of economic assets</a>.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
</p><div id="b4ab9" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="08VNCZ1576662659"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="955563259406573568" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">How NAFTA Is Making Our Food and Water Much Less Healthy https://t.co/TCSqAEJmPA @DeSmogBlog @Public_Citizen @SunFoundation</div> — EcoWatch (@EcoWatch)<a href="https://twitter.com/EcoWatch/statuses/955563259406573568">1516659009.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p></p><p><em>Reposted with permission from our media associate <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/2018/10/17/trump-new-nafta-big-oil-mexico-obrador" target="_blank">DeSmogBlog</a>.</em></p>
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A healthy vegan snack board of fruit, vegetables, dips, nuts and olives. Enrique Díaz / 7cero / Getty Images
By Chloë Waterman
As the Trump administration's dangerous deregulatory agenda leads us closer to climate catastrophe, cities, counties and businesses are stepping up to address the crisis. Last month, Gov. Jerry Brown and former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg released their "Fulfilling America's Pledge" plan, laying out the top climate strategies for subnational governments and businesses, at the Global Climate Action Summit.
<p>Unfortunately, their high-profile report omitted a major solution and a big component of the climate crisis: <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/food/">food</a> consumption.</p><p><a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/agriculture">Agriculture</a> produces an astounding <a href="http://getmoreeducation.org/Content/Modules/Module1/2_Garnett_Carbon_Emissions_and_Food_Miles.pdf" target="_blank">one-third</a> of all global greenhouse gas emissions. <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/meat-consumption">Meat</a> and dairy alone generate about <a href="http://www.fao.org/3/a-i3437e.pdf" target="_blank">half</a> of those food-related emissions—more than the combined tailpipe discharges from every plane, train, car, bus and boat around the world. We simply cannot meet our emissions reduction goals if we do not address meat and dairy consumption, even if all 10 strategies in the America's Pledge plan are successful. High meat-consuming countries like the U.S. must lead the way.</p><p>Combined, the world's top five meat and dairy companies <a href="https://www.iatp.org/new-research-shows-industrial-livestock-industry-creating-climate-crisis" target="_blank">create more emissions</a> than <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/exxon">ExxonMobil</a>, <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/shell">Shell</a> or <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/bp">BP</a>. According to a July <a href="https://www.iatp.org/emissions-impossible" target="_blank">report</a> from the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy and GRAIN, only two of the top 35 meat and dairy companies have made robust commitments to reduce their supply chain emissions. None of the nine U.S. companies on the list—Tyson Foods, Cargill, Hormel Foods, Perdue Farms and others—even report their supply chain emissions. </p><p>These nine companies produce most of their meat in Iowa, Texas, Arkansas, North Carolina and Georgia—states lacking progressive climate policies. However, the majority of their consumers live in New York City, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, Philadelphia and other cities. As centers of consumption, cities must confront their role in driving <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/factory-farming">factory farming</a>. </p><p>That's why a coalition of 45 public health and environmental organizations wrote an <a href="https://medium.com/@foodandclimatecoalition/how-we-are-still-in-cities-and-counties-can-include-food-in-climate-action-e67f54f88f5a" target="_blank">open letter</a> to the 280 cities and counties that are members of <a href="https://www.wearestillin.com" target="_blank">We Are Still In Coalition</a>, urging them to incorporate meat and dairy reduction into their climate strategies.</p><p>Project Drawdown—a climate change mitigation project initiated by Paul Hawken and worked on by a team of more than 200 scholars, scientists, policymakers and activists—names "plant-rich diet" as the fourth most impactful climate mitigation strategy, just after reducing <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/food-waste">food waste</a>, a related strategy also omitted by America's Pledge.</p><p> The most direct way cities, counties, universities and school districts can shift diets is by leveraging their massive purchasing power to buy more <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/vegetarian">plant-based foods</a>, measurably reducing their carbon footprint and improving health. For example, public schools serve seven <em>billion</em> meals a year. If every single public school swapped out a beef burger for a protein-rich veggie burger on the school lunch menu just once a month, it would save 1,407,533,657 pounds of CO<sub>2</sub>-eq, the equivalent of over 1.5 billion fewer miles driven.<br></p><p>In addition to public institutions slashing meat from their menus, the food industry must step up to the climate action plate. A <a href="http://www.mightyearth.org/meat-scorecard" target="_blank">recent report</a> from Mighty Earth found that 19 of the 23 top U.S. food companies have no commitments for mitigating the environmental impacts of their meat supply. Large restaurant chains, grocery retailers and foodservice management companies like <a href="https://www.realmealscampaign.org/" target="_blank">Aramark, Sodexo and Compass Group</a> should be tracking and reducing their supply chain carbon footprints and moving to plant-forward menus. </p><p> Climate-friendly diets are not only a high impact strategy—they are also cost-effective, making them an obvious place for cities, counties and businesses to focus their climate mitigation efforts. For example, a <a href="https://www.jhsph.edu/research/centers-and-institutes/johns-hopkins-center-for-a-livable-future/research/clf_publications/pub_rep_desc/balanced_menu.html" target="_blank">pilot analysis</a> of Health Care Without Harm's "Balanced Menus: Less Meat Better Meat" program found that four San Francisco Bay Area hospitals collectively saved about $400,000 per year. A 2017 <a href="https://foe.org/resources/shrinking-carbon-water-footprint-school-food/" target="_blank">analysis</a> from Friends of the Earth found that Oakland Unified School District saved $42,000 (and improved student meal satisfaction) by reducing the meat and dairy on their menus by 30 percent. </p><p>The Global Climate Action Summit took small steps toward realizing the value of shifting diets by announcing a new initiative to cut food sector emissions by 25 percent by 2030, including "Climate-friendly Diets" in its <a href="https://climatelandchallenge.org/" target="_blank">30x30 Forests, Food, and Land Challenge</a> and even serving plant-forward cuisine. Following the summit, California took a step of its own when Gov. Jerry Brown signed a bill making California the first state to require plant-based options in health care facilities and state prisons. </p><p>At the international level, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's <a href="https://ipcc.ch/news_and_events/pr_181008_P48_spm.shtml" target="_blank">report</a> released last week warned that the window for fending off the worst impacts of climate change is closing quickly and recommended "[limiting] demand for greenhouse-gas intensive foods through shifts to healthier and more sustainable diets." Yet, in contrast, America's Pledge missed a huge opportunity by omitting food consumption from the "Fulfilling America's Pledge" plan. </p><p>If we truly want to fulfill America's pledge and solve the climate crisis, we must move away from meat- and dairy-intensive diets. Cities, counties, states, businesses, universities, school districts and hospitals can lead the way by shifting toward plant-forward foods to change the main course of climate change and help rescue our ailing planet.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
</p><div id="22ef3" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="Z9BFO01576661894"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="983457106627096577" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Going Vegan Is the Best Thing You Can Do for the Planet, New Study Proves https://t.co/M1vtznpcll @ForksOverKnives @TheVeganSociety</div> — EcoWatch (@EcoWatch)<a href="https://twitter.com/EcoWatch/statuses/983457106627096577">1523309420.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p></p><p><em>Chloë Waterman serves as senior food campaigner at <a href="https://foe.org/" target="_blank">Friends of the Earth U.S.</a> where she implements policy and markets campaigns to advance a sustainable and just food system.</em></p>
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Trump’s NAFTA Replacement Ignores Climate Change, Favors Fossil Fuel Interests
02 October 2018
Politics
Oil Refinery in Corpus Christi, Texas along the Texas Gulf Coast. iStock / Getty Images Plus
After 14 months of negotiations, the U.S., Mexico and Canada agreed on a revised trade agreement Sunday that does not mention climate change or global warming, Canada's National Observer reported.
The deal, which still has to be approved by the legislative bodies of all three countries, is a replacement for the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which U.S. President Donald Trump had vowed to renegotiate or scrap altogether during his campaign.
<p>Environmental groups say that the new deal, which is called the United States Mexico Canada Agreement (USMCA), benefits <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/fossil-fuels" target="_self">fossil fuel</a> interests at the expense of the environment, and that the environmental section of the deal is weak on enforcement mechanisms. </p><p>"Trump's trade agreement with Mexico and Canada is a corporate giveaway intended to sharply limit the powers of government to protect people and the planet," <a href="https://friendsoftheearth.uk/" target="_blank">Friends of the Earth</a> director of economic policy Doug Norlen told the <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/nafta-environment_us_5bb24486e4b0c7575967b819" target="_blank">Huffington Post</a>. "This agreement is an attack on our ability to hold <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/big-oil" target="_self">Big Oil</a> and Gas accountable for the damage they cause to our communities."</p><p>Green groups are particularly concerned because one major improvement in the deal does not apply to oil and gas companies. NAFTA was criticized because the investor-state dispute settlement process gave corporations rights that overruled environmental protections, especially in Mexico, the country with the laxest environmental laws. The new deal limits those corporate rights for all but U.S. oil and gas companies undertaking government contract work in Mexico. These companies are still allowed to challenge local laws, which Mexican President-Elect Andrés Manuel López Obrador plans to strengthen.</p><p>"It's like saying, 'From here on, we're going to protect the henhouse by keeping all animals away, except for foxes, they're cool,'"<a href="https://www.sierraclub.org/" target="_blank"> Sierra Club</a> living economy program director Ben Beachy told the Huffington Post in a phone interview.</p><p>Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune further told the National Observer that the deal's environmental section was weak.</p><p>"For example, the text 'recognizes that <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/air-pollution" target="_self">air pollution</a> is a serious threat to public health,' but then fails to include a single binding rule to reduce the air pollution that NAFTA has exacerbated," he said. "Much of the language appears designed to greenwash the deal, not to rectify NAFTA's threats to <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/wildlife" target="_self">wildlife</a>, ecosystems, or clean air and water."</p><p>The language that does exist recognizes the importance of <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/forests" target="_self">forests</a> in providing "carbon storage" and commits signatories to "co-operate to address matters of mutual interest related to ozone-depleting substances" and to "take measures to prevent the pollution of the marine environment from ships."</p><p>It also scraps a NAFTA stipulation that Canada export a certain percentage of its energy production, something that groups like the <a href="https://canadians.org/" target="_blank">Council of Canadians</a> said stood in the way of the country's efforts to shift away from fossil fuels. </p><p>Finally, the deal includes a clause that could be interpreted as an acknowledgement of the <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/paris-agreement" target="_self">Paris agreement</a>. The deal says that signatories "recognize the importance of international agreements and other efforts to improve air quality and control air pollutants, including those that have the potential for long-range transport." As the National Observer pointed out, greenhouse gases could be interpreted as air pollutants. </p><p>Overall, however, green groups fear that the deal will weaken regulations, as it includes a provision allowing companies to challenge regulations before they are passed and to request existing regulations be repealed. </p><p>"We expect that, after Trump is out of office, we're going to have to work hard to re-regulate," Beach told the Huffington Post. "Even after Trump leaves office, Trump's NAFTA (revision) could extend his polluting legacy for years."</p>
<p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
</p><div id="2a05d" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="16FUKW1576661976"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1029070088782192640" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">America Burns From Climate Change While Trump Officials Attend Climate Denial Conference https://t.co/qC83M4EpkD… https://t.co/pHqWEVvfsE</div> — EcoWatch (@EcoWatch)<a href="https://twitter.com/EcoWatch/statuses/1029070088782192640">1534184403.0</a></blockquote></div>
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