Climate Change

The dirty truth about clean energy https://www.localfutures.org/the-dirty-truth-about-clean-energy/ May 25, 2022 by Carlos Zorrilla

instead of reducing overall energy consumption, the focus is on increasing ‘green’ energy consumption: electric vehicles, massive electric storage installations, solar ‘farms’ and monster wind turbines. More consumption to cure the cancer of overconsumption.... The elephant in the room few want to acknowledge is the destruction of people and the environment that will result from the hunger for so-called green energy minerals – mainly copper, cobalt, nickel and lithium.

The environmental degradation that accompanies mining will affect other key ecosystem services, such as purifying air and water, regulating stream and river flows, and reducing erosion and flooding.

Then there are the human rights violations that are so closely tied to mining. Many communities, whether indigenous or campesino, will not agree to relocate willingly.

The most important measures to take right now are to create red lines with local stakeholders in order to keep mining and other extractive industries out of these special sites. One of the most important is respecting the right of local populations to decide their own future. Consultations need to be genuine, and if consent is given for extractive activities, it needs to be done freely, without pressure and only after thoroughly knowing the proposed activities’ impacts. Sacred lands, biodiversity hotspots, native forests and habitats harboring endangered species must be off-limits to mining.

India finalises 13 activities under 3 heads for trading of carbon credits 
https://www.business-standard.com/article/economy-policy/india-finalises-a-list-of-activities-for-trading-of-carbon-credits-123021701088_1.html

India has also notified the National designated Authority for the Implementation of the Paris Agreement (NDAIAPA) in May 2022.

Overall 13 activities have been finalised under three heads – GHG mitigation activities, alternate materials, and removal activities.

The final list for GHG mitigation includes areas like renewable energy with storage (only stored component), solar thermal power, off- shore wind, green hydrogen, compressed biogas, emerging mobility solutions, high end technology for energy efficiency, sustainable aviation fuel, use of best available technologies, tidal energy, high voltage direct current transmission in conjunction with the renewable energy projects.

Green ammonia received final approval as an alternative material for removal activities, carbon capture utilisation and storage."

MANIFESTO FOR AN ECOSOCIAL ENERGY TRANSITION FROM THE PEOPLES OF THE SOUTH https://fpif.org/manifesto-for-an-ecosocial-energy-transition-from-the-peoples-of-the-south/ By Peoples of the Global South | February 9, 2023  In this Manifesto for an Ecosocial Energy Transition from the Peoples of the South, we hold that the problems of the Global – geopolitical – South are different from those of the Global North and rising powers such as China. An imbalance of power between these two realms not only persists because of a colonial legacy but has deepened because of a neocolonial energy model.

The “clean energy transitions” of the North have put even more pressure on the Global South to yield up cobalt and lithium for the production of high-tech batteries, balsa wood for wind turbines, land for large solar arrays, and new infrastructure for hydrogen megaprojects... The Global North has pushed for more trade and investment agreements with the Global South to satisfy its need for resources, particularly those integral to “clean energy transitions.”....Governments of the South, meanwhile, have fallen into a debt trap, borrowing money to build up industries and large-scale agriculture to supply the North. To repay these debts, governments have felt compelled to extract more resources from the ground, creating a vicious circle of inequality.

..Minor changes in the energy matrix are not enough. The  entire energy system must be transformed, from production and distribution to consumption and waste. Substituting electric vehicles for internal-combustion cars is insufficient, for the entire transportation model needs changing, with a reduction of energy consumption and the promotion of sustainable options...As activists, intellectuals, and organizations from different countries of the South, we call on change agents from different parts of the world to commit to a radical, democratic, gender-just, regenerative, and popular ecosocial transition that transforms both the energy sector and the industrial and agricultural spheres that depend on large-scale energy inputs. 

We warn against  an energy transition led by corporate megaprojects..l.
We call on the peoples of the South to reject false solutions that come with new forms of energy colonialism, now in the name of a Green transition.

we demand the payment of the ecological debt. This means, in the face of the disproportionate Global North responsibility for the climate crisis and ecological collapse, the real implementation of a system of compensation to the global South.
We reject the expansion of the hydrocarbon border in our countries—through fracking and offshore projects..
We similarly reject “green colonialism” in the form of land grabs for solar and wind farms, the indiscriminate mining of critical minerals, and the promotion of technological “fixes” such as blue or grey hydrogen. Enclosure, exclusion, violence, encroachment, and entrenchment have characterized past and current North-South energy relations and are not acceptable in an era of ecosocial transitions.
We demand the genuine protection of environment and human rights defenders
We denounce international trade agreements that penalize countries that want to curb fossil fuel extraction. We must stop the use of trade and investment agreements controlled by multinational corporations that ultimately promote more extraction and reinforce a new colonialism.

The report highlighted how the sea level, in turn, has risen over the years. Thermal expansion explained 50% of sea-level rise between 1971 and 2018 and human activities were what most likely drove the increase since 1971. The average rate of sea level rise increased from 1.3 mm per year between 1901 and 1971, to 1.9 mm per year between 1971 and 2006. Between 2006 and 2018, this rose again to 3.7 mm per year. As per the WMO, the sea level rise has been 4.5 mm per year between 2013 and 2022. https://science.thewire.in/environment/sea-level-is-rising-and-will-continue-to-do-so-wmo-report/ 

According to the report, the threat from sea level rise is a “major economic, social and humanitarian challenge”. Several low lying small islands and countries that have huge coastal populations such as the Netherlands, Bangladesh, India and China would be most affected.

“Several big cities on all continents are threatened,” it read. The cities the report lists here includes Mumbai in India too. Others include Shanghai, Bangkok, London and New York. The Deccan Herald reported that Mumbai would be the most affected, with the sea level rise impacting 998 buildings and 24 km of road length in the city.

by AATHIRA PERINCHERY

15/02/2023