Protecting the
Planet... Updates and Extra notes... By weekly topics...
The entries are
arranged in chronological order, with oldest dates first.
For related web page –
air pollution - go to: protecting2
Week 2 continued: Cases
and industry: air pollution, soil/agriculture, bees.
1. #air quality new dangers from air pollution, car industry [+ coal and
oil industry]
2. #agriculture
- effects of soil degradation
and agriculture, [alternative farming methods]
3. #bees - decline of bees and insects, pesticides (especially
neonicotinoids). #lobbying
by industry
4. oil industry #oil and mining
(Not covered May 2021)
1. Air pollution. June 2020 – March
2021.
June 2020. Damian Carrington. Pandemic.
Two million
people in the UK with respiratory conditions such as asthma have experienced
reduced symptoms during the Coronavirus lockdown, according to the British Lung
Foundation.
A survey by
the charity of 14,000 people with lung conditions found one in six had noticed
improvements in their health. Among children, the figure was higher, with one
in five parents saying their child’s condition had been alleviated. Asthma sufferers in particular reported benefits, with one in four noting
relief.
There is growing evidence from around the world linking
increased Covid-19 infections and deaths to air pollution exposure. On Friday,
a cross-party group of MPs said air pollution must be kept at low
levels to help avoid
a second peak of infections.
Each year,
air pollution leads to tens of thousands of early deaths in the UK. More than a third of local
authorities in England have levels of fine particle pollution above the WHO’s
limit. Nitrogen dioxide, a pollutant produced largely by diesel vehicles, is at
illegal levels in 80% of urban areas.
The lockdown
led to traffic falling to 1955 levels while both fine particle and NO2
pollution fell by up to half in cities. The British Lung Foundation survey
found that more than 50% of people with lung conditions said they had noticed a
decrease in air pollution since the start of lockdown.
June 2020. Jonathan Watts. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/jun/07/blue-sky-thinking-how-cities-can-keep-air-clean-after-coronavirus on cities e.g. Oakland and Los Angeles,
Mexico City, and how keeping air clean.
Copenhagen
has the world’s most ambitious plan to cut emissions: carbon neutral by 2025.
This is pushing the Danish capital to go beyond the existing model of smart,
clean urban design and cycle-centred transport that has turned it into one of
the cleanest cities in the world.
in some
areas of the city “pedestrians have more space than bikes, and bikes have more
space than cars.” The city now vies with Amsterdam for being the most
bicycle-friendly city in the world. This means traffic lights with resting
bars that riders can hang on to without touching the ground, take-away coffee
containers designed for bikes, and groups that organise parent’s shifts for
schools runs on “minibus-like” bicycles that can take up to six children at a
time.
The chief
executive, Jean-Sebastien Jacques, was due to receive
$3.1m plus a long-term performance bonus of $1.8m in 2021. A parliamentary
inquiry into the destruction of the sites is ongoing. The sites belong to the
PKKP – Puuntu Kunti Kurrama and Pinikura since
2013.
Sep. 2020: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/sep/07/cutting-air-pollution-in-europe-cities-would-improve-health-of-poor-says-watchdog
(Fiona Harvey)
Sep 2020. Air pollution https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/sep/23/electric-cars-transport-train-companies George Monbiot
against ALL cars!
Oct 2020. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/oct/21/polluted-air-killing-half-a-million-babies-a-year-across-globe (Fiona Harvey)
Oct 2020. Dieselgate: In September 2015, the dieselgate scandal led to international outrage after the
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) revealed that many diesel-powered
Volkswagen (VW) vehicles had been fitted with a ‘cheat device’ that could detect
when the vehicle was being tested.
This meant
that vehicles being sold across the world were emitting nitrogen oxide (NO2)
pollution up to 40 times above the legal limit.
[The high
court agreed in April 2020 that the software is a cheat device]
it is
estimated that there are still 8.5 million diesel vehicles on UK roads that emit NO2 pollution
several times higher [than] the legal limit and so Leigh Day continues to fight
this case.
late last
year Leigh Day also became aware that Mercedes-Benz had been involved in
similar emissions-cheating practices.
the legal
system in the UK making it harder to fight this case.
‘Despite the fact that we have had a judgement from the court in the VW
case that finds that the software is a cheat device, our clients are still
being asked to pursue their claims for compensation through the courts.
‘In other
jurisdictions for example in the US, Mercedes has already had to pay $1.5bn
dollars to the EPA.
research published
just last month by Transport & Environment and
Greenpeace revealed
that a similar thing may be occurring with hybrid vehicles.
From airqualitynews.com interview with Shazia Yamin.
Aston Martin
have used a PR company to try to discredit electric
vehicles. (4th Dec):
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/dec/02/aston-martin-pr-firm-anti-electric-vehicle-study
12th Oct 2020. Hydrogen buses from edie news 11th Oct 2020.
Real-world
trials of the world's first hydrogen-powered double-decker bus officially
began in Aberdeen earlier this week. And perhaps the vehicles could become a common sight across
the UK in the coming years, as Birmingham City Council has partnered with
National Express to place an order for 20 of the same vehicles.
Manufactured
by Northern-Ireland-based Wrightbus, the buses can
travel up to 300 miles on a single tank of fuel and can be refuelled in less
than ten minutes. In the short-term, the environmental benefit of the buses
will be felt in terms of air pollution – they only emit water vapour. As the
UK’s hydrogen production decarbonises, the emissions associated with their fuel
will also fall. National Express West Midlands – which notably has a 2030
target to deliver a 100% zero-emission fleet - will begin introducing the buses
to its fleet from April 2021.
“It has
taken us two years to get to a point where we can ensure commercial viability
for this type of fuel cell technology and it is great news for our city and the
rest of the region,” Birmingham City Council’s
cabinet member for transport and environment Cllr Waseem
Zaffar said.
“This pilot
is a significant step towards our net-zero carbon target
and will provide Birmingham with a leading role in informing debate on
supportive policies for zero-emission public transport at a local and national
level.”
An inquest
will consider whether Ella Kissi-Debrah was killed by
air pollution (30th Nov).
Oct 2020. Exxon and CO2 emissions:
ExxonMobil plans to increase its annual carbon-dioxide pollution by
more than 20 million tons per year over the next five years, Bloomberg reports.
The
increases, which come from the company's own analysis of its direct emissions,
are equivalent to 17% of its current carbon pollution — about the yearly
emissions of the country of Greece — but account for only about one-fifth of
the total greenhouse gas pollution caused by burning Exxon's fossil fuel products. Unlike many European oil majors, Exxon has refused
to make efforts to curb its greenhouse
gas pollution. Earlier this year, Exxon was removed from the Dow Jones
Industrial Average and it is currently facing lawsuits from about a dozen
jurisdictions alleging it knew, withheld, and denied important information
about the impact of fossil fuel consumption on climate change. (See 5 below)
Oct. 2020. Oil industry and pollution: https://www.ecowatch.com/mauritius-oil-spill-damages-2648116836.html?rebelltitem=4#rebelltitem4
Oil spills make visible the huge price being paid by the environment,
wildlife and human communities for our reliance on fossil fuels. They are a
harsh demonstration of the fragility of our oceans. They are a sad reminder of
how urgent it is that we end our addiction to fossil fuels and make the
transition to alternative renewable energy sources.
On the 25th
of July the Japanese bulk carrier MV Wakashio —
chartered by Mitsui OSK and owned by Nagashiki
Shipping — struck a beautiful and irreplaceable coral reef on Mauritius'
southeast coast. The ship was sailing dangerously close to the reef, and ran
aground. Twelve days later, the ship began leaking heavy fuel oil, devastating
one of the most beautiful places in the world and ruining the livelihoods of
coastal communities.
Fossil fuel
use and the pandemic: 2nd Dec. 2020.
Shell,
greenwashing etc, from Desmog Dec 2020: https://www.desmog.co.uk/2020/12/08/shell-trial-dutch-court-over-failure-cut-emissions
Nov. 2020. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/nov/23/european-governments-failing-to-protect-citizens-from-air-pollution-data-reveals (Fiona Harvey)
417,000 premature deaths across Europe – including non-EU member states –
in 2018.
There have
been some improvements, but they fall short of the actions
needed from governments. The EEA found that 60,000 fewer people died
prematurely in 2018 than in 2009 from fine particulate matter pollution.
Emissions of
pollutants from vehicles have fallen, though not to the extent required, and
emissions from power plants have also tumbled as Europe has moved away from
coal power. But cutting emissions from domestic heating, including
wood-burning, and from agriculture – including ammonia from manure and fertilisers, which combines with other
pollutants in the air to form particulate matter – has proved more of a
challenge.
Governments
had failed to meet EU targets, the EEA said. Under EU rules, every member state
should have submitted a plan for bringing air pollution within health limits in
2018. However, Italy’s plan is still at draft stage, while Greece, Luxembourg
and Romania have yet to submit any plan.
The UK
government has pledged to bring in new guidelines on air pollution to replace its targets under the EU.
The framework legislation for these targets is contained in the environment bill, going through the committee stage
in parliament after a long delay. Any new targets will not be set until late
2022 at the earliest, however, after a consultation.
The UK
government was repeatedly found in court cases over
several years to have
breached EU air pollution limits and ministers were ordered by supreme
court judges to
come forward with plans for reducing air pollution that would meet the targets.
Dec. 2020. Fossil fuel use and the
pandemic:
12th Dec 2020. Shell, greenwashing etc, from Desmog: https://www.desmog.co.uk/2020/12/08/shell-trial-dutch-court-over-failure-cut-emissions
Jan. 2021. Fiona Harvey on Kwasi
Kwarteng, the business secretary:
Jan. 2021. Electric cars:
From desmog: https://airqualitynews.com/2021/01/19/new-ev-battery-can-go-from-0-60mph-in-just-3-seconds/
App that
saves money on charging: https://airqualitynews.com/2021/01/20/new-app-will-save-ev-drivers-hundreds-of-pounds/
Feb. 2021. Jaguar to make only electric
vehicles by 2025 (but Land Rover continues with IC until 2030):
https://www.edie.net/news/12/Jaguar-to-switch-to-fully-electric-vehicle-portfolio-by-2025/
9th Feb. 2021. Oliver Milman
- https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/feb/09/fossil-fuels-pollution-deaths-research
Air
pollution caused by the burning of fossil fuels such as coal and oil was
responsible for 8.7m deaths globally in 2018, a staggering one in five of all
people who died that year, new research has found.
Countries
with the most prodigious consumption of fossil fuels to power factories, homes
and vehicles are suffering the highest death tolls, with the study finding more
than one in 10 deaths in both the US and Europe were caused by the resulting
pollution, along with nearly a third of deaths in eastern Asia, which includes
China. Death rates in South America and Africa were significantly lower.
Research by Harvard University. More deaths than from smoking tobacco +
malaria. Chart online... Eastern Asia 30% +, Europe 16.8%
From New
Internationalist, May-June 2020: death rates per 100,000 in different parts of
the world:
America:
29.7; Europe: 36.3; Western Pacific: 102.8; Eastern Med: 125.0; South-East
Asia: 165.8; Africa:
180.9.
16th Feb. 2021. PM2.5 from wood-burners:
The new government statistics show that domestic wood burning in
both closed stoves and open fires was responsible for 38% of the pollution particles
under 2.5 microns in size (PM2.5) in 2019, the latest year for which data is
available. The report said PM2.5 emissions from this source had more than
doubled since 2003, to 41,000 tonnes a year, and increased by 1% between 2018
and 2019. Road traffic caused 12% of PM2.5 in 2019.
Just 8% of
the population is responsible for these PM2.5 emissions. (Archie Bland, 20th
Feb). Of those who had wood burners, 46% had them for aesthetic/tradition
reasons – and 46% were from social class AB. 24% had them to save money and 8%
out of necessity.
Stove
Industry Alliance says the figures are exaggerated, included other sources such
as garden fires, and don’t take into account eco-friendly models.
3rd March
2021. Zero Emissions Zone March 2021. Air pollution: https://airqualitynews.com/2021/03/09/oxford-zez-pilot-set-to-be-introduced-in-august-2021/
5th March 2021. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/mar/04/uk-has-broken-air-pollution-limits-for-a-decade-eu-court-finds Damian Carrington.
The UK has
“systematically and persistently” broken legal limits on toxic air pollution
for a decade, the court of justice of the EU (CJEU) has ruled.
Levels of
nitrogen dioxide, mostly from diesel vehicles, remain illegally high in 75% of
urban areas and on Thursday the court said the UK had failed to tackle the
problem in the shortest possible time, as required by law.
The case
began before the UK left the EU and the legal limits remain in UK law. The UK
could face financial penalties if it still fails to take action to comply. The
court also ordered the UK to pay the legal costs incurred by the European
commission. UK ministers had already been defeated three times in British
courts by environmental lawyers ClientEarth.
Dirty air
causes 40,000 early deaths every year in the UK and scientists think the
pollution is likely to be damaging every organ in the body. A landmark coroner’s report in
December found that illegal levels of air pollution had
contributed to the death of nine-year-old Ella Kissi-Debrah.
The government’s own research shows that clean air zones, where
charges are used to deter the most polluting vehicles from urban centres, are
by far the most effective action. But only one has been implemented, in London,
with others put on hold, delayed or rejected.
15th March 2021. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2021/mar/15/car-industry-lobbied-uk-government-delay-ban-petrol-diesel-cars
Carmakers
including BMW, Ford, Honda, Jaguar Land Rover and McLaren argued strongly
against a ban earlier than 2040, in written submissions to the government
obtained by the Guardian. They also said plug-in hybrid cars should be exempted
from the earlier deadline. Some of the claims made by the firms contradicted
findings by environmental campaigners....
Ministers
admitted in December they had relented on plans to ban hybrids in 2030, partly
because of the threat to British car factories, most of which produce hybrids.
Greg Archer,
UK director of Transport and Environment, a think-tank, said the industry was
scaremongering about the transition from fossil fuels and that the forecasts
for plummeting sales were “wholly pessimistic and unrealistic”... The debate
about the type of cars we will drive in the future is now over: they will be
battery electric.”
See also: oil industry 4. below.
2.
#agriculture and soil
Jan 2020. Changes due to
Brexit: New Agriculture Bill replaces
CAP:
1. from The Conversation Jan 2020, by Judith Tsouvalis and Ruth Little:
The
UK’s new Agriculture Bill has been called
“one of the most significant pieces of legislation for farmers in England for
over 70 years”. It could directly affect the
livelihoods of 460,000 people and determine the future of the 70%
of UK land area (17.4 million hectares) currently under agricultural
management. The bill sets out the UK’s approach to farming as it prepares to
leave the European Union, replacing the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) that
the UK has been part of since 1973.
At the
bill’s core is a shift away from direct payments to farmers based upon the
amount of agricultural land they manage. This was a feature of the CAP that was
heavily criticised as it pushed
up land prices, creating an entry barrier for younger farmers, and benefited
large landowners disproportionately. It also meant the farming of
unproductive land that otherwise
might have been turned into wildlife habitat.
Instead,
landowners will in future be paid to produce “public
goods”. These are things that can benefit everyone but bring no financial
reward to those who produce them, like clean air and water.
Over
the next seven years, farmers will move from the CAP regulations to a new
system of environmental
land management contracts. These will detail the terms and conditions under
which farmers and land managers will receive funding. Subsidies are expected to
be paid out from taxpayer funds at the same rate as the EU – about £3
billion a year – to enable landowners to deliver the public goods set out in
the UK government’s 25
Year Environment Plan and the Clean
Growth Strategy.
Achieving
these goals will seem rather daunting though. They include clean air and
plentiful, clean water, but also thriving wildlife, reduced risk from
environmental hazards such as flooding and drought, raising animal welfare
standards and enhanced beauty, heritage and opportunities to engage with the
natural environment.
One of
the big priorities of the bill is soil. Erosion rates from ploughed fields are between
ten and 100 times greater than rates of soil formation. As a result, the UK
faces a
crisis of food security within our lifetimes. The government will reward
farmers who protect and improve soil quality with measures like crop
rotation, and give ministers new powers to regulate
fertiliser use and organic farming.
Alongside
the Agriculture Bill is the new Environment
Bill, which will enshrine environmental principles in UK law after Brexit.
The UK will lose access to EU bodies that monitor and enforce environmental
laws, so the new
Environment Bill is essential for maintaining standards. With the EU
watchdog gone, setting up a new independent Office for Environmental Protection
has been proposed, but it’s
unclear how effective it will be in imposing the heavy fines necessary to
enforce standards.
Farmers
often feel isolated from the powers of government and daunted by the task of
delivering both agricultural productivity and environmental enhancements. The
Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra)
has at least committed to designing the new contracts in
close collaboration with farmers and land managers.
Finding ways to
engage those who will be most affected by the changes will be important for
ensuring the policy works on the ground. Landscape-scale solutions to
decarbonising agriculture and averting the climate crisis will
require huge changes. They won’t be possible without popular support.
But the
bill still lacks crucial detail. There are no
firm commitments to protect British farmers from cheap, low-standard
foreign imports, which is particularly important as the government seeks to
negotiate trade deals with countries whose standards are lower than Britain’s.
Building
a post-Brexit food and farming system that protects the environment won’t be
easy. There are exciting opportunities embedded in this bill. But restoring
land to health and guaranteeing food supplies will need proper engagement with
those who will be affected and a solid scientific
bedrock on which to build the government’s ambitious – but underdeveloped –
plans.
2. June 2020. Natalie Bennett on
proposed Bill: https://leftfootforward.org/2020/06/tory-plans-for-agriculture-after-brexit-let-down-farmers-and-the-planet/
3.
More on this:
https://theconversation.com/five-reasons-environmentalists-should-oppose-britains-agriculture-bill-141413
March 22nd 2020. Tim Lang interviewed by Jay Rayner.
We have a
fragile just-in-time food supply chain, a depleted agriculture sector that
produces only 50% of what we eat, production methods which damage environment
and health, staggering gap between rich and poor in terms of access to food. .
Obesity,
diabetes, heart disease – from food issue – drive NHS
spending.
At the heart
of this crisis is a British willingness to let a small number of corporations
dominate food retailing: just eight companies control 90% of our food supply.
“It’s the ‘leave it to Tesco’ approach,” he says. The prioritisation of price
has hollowed out UK agriculture, so that primary producers get the smallest
slice of the cake. “They get about 5% or 6% of the value of the food we buy.
They need double that. And that 50% self-sufficiency should be nearer 80%. Not
out of nationalism, but so we are in a position to contribute globally. We have
a default position of assuming someone else will feed us.”
“There is a
culture of British exceptionalism. We were the first industrial nation in the
18th century and then became the dominant imperial power in the 19th century
and pursued that as a way of feeding ourselves.”
In the
summer of 2019, then Defra secretary Michael Gove
announced he was establishing a national food strategy, which was broadly welcomed by the
food industry. He put his friend Henry Dimbleby, the
co-founder of the Leon healthy fast-food chain, in charge of the review, even
though he has no academic credentials in the field... “When the new agriculture bill was introduced
in January, it had
almost nothing about food,” he says.
Solution?
What’s Lang’s solution? It’s detailed and includes the introduction of a food
resilience and sustainability act, complete with legally binding targets.
National nutritional guidelines should become the basis for food procurement
contracts, both public and private. There should be an audit of food production
in the UK and the budget for public health should be doubled from £2.5bn of the
£130bn health budget to £5bn. It also proposes the creation of no fewer than
nine bodies or institutions, including a royal
commission to map a new set of “multi-criteria principles for the UK food
system”, a food resilience and sustainability council and a network of urban
and rural food and farming colleges.
Feeding Britain: Our Food Problems and How to
Fix Them by Tim Lang is published on 26 March (Pelican, £25).
19th July 2020. Letter Mark Measures. ‘decline in
farmland birds, catastrophic decline in insects and deteriorating soil health
are a consequence of poor crop rotations, excessive pesticide use and lack of
mixed farming.. away from reliance on finite reserves
of oil and phosphate fertilisers, routine use of pesticides... Organic and agro-ecological farming
uses legumes, diverse crop rotations and a focus on soil management. NT’s
Wimpole Hall farm has increased skylarks, and invertebrates and locks up 2,260
tonnes of CO2 each year. EU target: 25% organic land by 2030. UK should be more
ambitious.
July 2020.
Jon Henley: https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2020/jul/08/the-future-of-food-inside-the-worlds-largest-urban-farm-built-on-a-rooftop aeroponic
i.e. soil free. Nature Urbaine.
11th Aug. 2020. Uni of Essex in Colchester has developed a technique to
increase photosynthesis in plants – research published in Nature Plants – used
genetic manipulation to increase an enzyme in the (tobacco) plnat,
to introduce a new enzyme from cyanobacteria and a
protein from algae. This is different to GM manipulation banned in Europe says
Christine Raines, one of the authors.
Sep. 2020. Agriculture – fertilisers and
nitrous oxide (global warming):
https://www.ecowatch.com/synthetic-fertilizers-2647065829.html?rebelltitem=1#rebelltitem1 – recommends planting legumes
between crops to fix nitrogen in the soil (an old idea surely?!) also has links
to other articles on agriculture.
Oct 2020. Oatly
controversy, agriculture and climate change:
Jan 2021. ReutersEvents
– companies and food system:
https://www.reutersevents.com/sustainability/what-companies-can-do-fix-our-broken-food-system
Jan 2021. Hakai
magazine on aquaculture – several articles...
can it be made environmentally friendly?
https://www.hakaimagazine.com/features/big-fish-the-aquacultural-revolution/
Feb 2021. Farming & river pollution (Wil Crisp)
The
legislation, which was announced in November 2017, gives the Environment Agency
the power to prosecute or fine individuals and companies found to be polluting waterways with contaminated
runoff water, or acting in a way that creates a high risk of pollution.
Under the
legislation, fixed penalties of £100 or £300 can be issued as well as so-called
“variable money penalties”, which can be as much as £250,000.
The rules
were designed to combat agricultural pollution that is causing widespread environmental problems in
rivers.
But: “This legislation is being violated on a regular basis
across the country by farms and virtually nothing is being done to monitor it
or enforce it,” said Mark Lloyd, the chief executive of the Rivers Trust, a charity that works to protect Britain’s lakes and
waterways.
“Even when
the Environment Agency identifies breaches, they don’t have the resources to
follow up. All of the effort put into crafting the rules and consulting on this
issue has proven to be a complete waste of time.”
Figures
released by the Environment Agency in September showed, for the first time,
that no river had achieved good chemical status and only 14% were found to be
of a good ecological standard.
Runoff from
agriculture is the biggest single polluter of rivers, responsible for 40% of
damage to waterways, according to the same research.
Environment
Agency funding fell by 63% between 2009 and 2019, staff numbers by 25%, and
prosecutions of businesses by 88%, according to a report published in
October by the civil
society group Unchecked UK.
15th March 2021. WeMove
Europe email:
Genetic modification and patents on food:
No one should be able to own the exclusive right to grow and sell fruits
and vegetables. It
sounds obvious but this is what we fought to prevent for over four years. And
we won. Last year, the European Patent
Office (EPO) officially accepted that conventionally bred plants are not
patentable. [1]
But companies like Bayer-Monsanto, DowDupont, Heineken, and Carlsberg have found ways to undo
that win by finding legal loopholes to register new patents on melons or
barley. [2]
What they are doing is pretty sneaky: it’s called ‘technical topping’ and it’s a way to exploit
the loopholes introduced by the EPO. [3] While patents on conventionally bred
plants are prohibited, patents on breeding by means of genetic engineering,
including new methods such as genome editing can be patented. [4]
Now
companies can try to blur the distinction between conventional breeding and
genetic engineering. In practice, this means that seeds to make beer or melons
can still be claimed as an invention.
We already got the EPO to listen to us through a huge petition, filing thousands of
complaints against a patent on tomatoes, and a protest in Munich at the
Oktoberfest beer festival. [5]
3. Bees and
pesticides. Lobbying:
Oct. 2018. Glyphosate: Unearthed reveals lobbying by farmers
is funded by ‘Red Flag Consulting’
https://unearthed.greenpeace.org/2018/10/17/monsanto-red-flag-glyphosate-roundup-eu/
Jan. 2020 from
SumOfUs: Dow’s brain-harming pesticide chlorpyrifos
has been banned in Europe. Even after the European Food Safety Authority warned that this
neurotoxic chemical was a serious danger to human
health -- and especially children -- its makers lobbied hard to keep
it legal in the EU. But in the end, the EU listened to over
220,000 other SumOfUs members and passed a long-overdue ban on the
pesticide, effective at the end of this month!
Together with our partners in HEAL,
Generations Futures, Ecologistas en Acción and the Pesticide Action Network, we’ve made
Europe’s fruits and vegetables safer for kids to eat -- and proven to
Dow’s lobbyists that their millions are no match for our people power.
Feb. 2020. Damian Carrington pesticide industry profits.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/feb/20/firms-making-billions-from-highly-hazardous-pesticides-analysis-finds The world’s biggest pesticide
companies make billions of dollars a year from chemicals found by independent
authorities to pose high hazards to human health or the environment, according
to an analysis by campaigners.
The research
also found a higher proportion of these highly hazardous pesticides (HHPs) in
the companies’ sales in poorer nations than in rich ones. In India, 59% of
sales were of HHPs in contrast to just 11% in the UK, according to the
analysis.
The data
from Phillips McDougall, the leading agribusiness analysts, are from buyer
surveys focused on the most popular products in the 43 nations that buy the
most pesticides. It was obtained and analysed by Unearthed, a journalism group funded by
Greenpeace UK, and the Swiss NGO Public Eye.
The
pesticides market is dominated by five companies – Bayer, BASF, Syngenta, FMC and Corteva
(formerly Dow and DuPont). These companies sold $4.8bn of products containing
HHPs in 2018, making up more than 36% of all their income, according to the
analysis
Feb 2020, Carey Gillam: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/feb/18/science-shouldnt-be-for-sale-we-need-reform-industry-funded-studies-monsanto
‘News out of Europe last
week revealed that more than 20 scientific studies
submitted to regulators to prove the safety of the popular weedkilling
chemical glyphosate came from a large German laboratory that has been accused
of fraud and other wrongdoing… Amid a government investigation into the
Laboratory of Pharmacology and Toxicology (LPT), investigators representing
three European non-profit consumer advocacy groups are raising concerns about
the validity of the glyphosate studies generated by the Hamburg facility. No
significant concerns with glyphosate were found, according to the tests, three
of which looked for glyphosate-related mutagenicity. Monsanto and
other chemical companies needed those studies and others to submit to
regulators in order to obtain re-approval to sell glyphosate herbicide products
in Europe.
The Laboratory of Pharmacology and Toxicology
(LPT), which is accused of abusing test animals in addition to doctoring
data, was certified as adhering to “good laboratory practices.” But multiple
whistleblowers who worked in the lab have said that falsifying study results
was routine.
Harald Ebner, a member of the
German Parliament Bundestag, said the LPT laboratory “has obviously delivered
the desired results and swept unpleasant results under the carpet”. All LPT
scientific work must now be investigated, including the studies submitted to
help support glyphosate approvals in Europe, he
said.
When corporations pay for the research,
invariably the findings seem to support the safety of whatever products the
corporations are trying to sell.
Hundreds of studies done by US contract
laboratories in the 1970s, 80s and 90s were found to be fraudulent, including some tests used by Monsanto in
representations to the US Environmental Protection Agency regarding the
company’s glyphosate-based Roundup herbicide.
The allegations of fraud at the German lab
also add to evidence of Monsanto, which was bought by Bayer AG in 2018, influencing scientific studies into the safety of their products.
Internal Monsanto files obtained in litigation show multiple tactics were
employed by the company and industry allies to manipulate scientific papers
about its products, including using ghost-writing research papers and
secret funding front groups to support regulatory approvals.
See also March 2019: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/mar/09/spray-pray-is-roundup-carcinogenic-monsanto-farmers-suing:
“ Monsanto,
the corporation that produces Roundup. Monsanto, which was acquired by the
German pharmaceutical giant Bayer last year, is currently facing more than 9,000 lawsuits across the US from
plaintiffs, mostly former gardeners and agricultural workers who believe that
Roundup exposure caused their cancer.
Last summer, former school groundskeeper
Dewayne Johnson, who is terminally ill with non-Hodgkin lymphoma, won a landmark victory against the company
when jurors ruled that Monsanto had failed to warn him of the health risks
posed by Roundup.
In 2015, the International Agency for Research on
Cancer (IARC) ruled that glyphosate – the active chemical within Roundup
and many other popular weedkillers – was “probably carcinogenic”. However,
numerous other international agencies, including the European Chemical Agency and European Food Safety Authority (Efsa), continue to declare glyphosate as safe, and there
are many scientific studies which have found no association with cancer.
An estimated 6.1 billion kilos of glyphosate-based weedkillers were sprayed across gardens and fields
worldwide between 2005 and 2014 (the most recent point at which data has been
collected). That is more than any other herbicide, so understanding the true
impact on human health is vital.
The reason glyphosate was thought to be
completely safe for many years is that it works by
inhibiting an enzyme pathway behind plant growth, which does not exist in
humans. Since the introduction of Roundup-resistant GM food crops – genetically
engineered to resist glyphosate – in the mid-1990s, farmers in the US have been
able to use it in large quantities to get rid of weeds selectively, while in
the UK it is used as the weedkiller of choice,
outside of the growing season.
Last month, a high-profile collaborative study by three US
universities reported that individuals with particularly high exposures to
glyphosate-based herbicides, for instance those spraying it, could have a 41%
increased relative risk of developing non-Hodgkin lymphoma.
Multiple theories have been voiced as to why
this increased risk might arise, such as the idea that glyphosate may mimic the
behaviour of certain hormones. One study, by researchers in Thailand,
suggested that by doing so, even low levels of glyphosate could increase the
rate of breast cancer cell growth in petri dishes.
However, the trouble is, for every research
paper that purports to show a link between glyphosate-based herbicides and
cancer, there is another which finds the exact opposite. This hasn’t been
helped by the fact that many of the studies may not have been entirely
objective. “A lot of the studies backing glyphosate have been funded by
entities in a position to profit from the continuing sales,” Davoren says. “And many of those which point towards
significant risks are funded by groups who are either engaged in lawsuits
against the makers of glyphosate, or are in the position to benefit from sales
of glyphosate alternatives. So it gets very, very tricky.”
But even some of the largest independent
population-based studies have failed to find any sort of definitive proof. Last
year, a two-decade-long analysis of data of nearly 45,000 farmworkers who applied glyphosate-based herbicides to
their crops, conducted by the US National Institute of Health, showed no
association with non-Hodgkin lymphoma or overall cancer risk.
But one of the factors that have left
commentators suspicious of the potential toxicity of these herbicides has been
incidents of combative corporate behaviour. In the latest trial, Monsanto has
caused eyebrows to raise by obtaining a ban preventing attorneys
for the plaintiffs from presenting information regarding its alleged influence
on research.
My personal perception is that glyphosate has
become a symbol for the use of chemicals in agriculture and the way we produce
food in Europe,” says Dr Bernhard Url,
executive director of Efsa. “When science meets
values, things become complicated. So when politicians are confronted with the
opinion of Efsa that glyphosate is safe, they say,
‘No, I don’t want to hear that glyphosate is not carcinogenic because it
doesn’t fit into my world view. I want a world without agrochemicals and if
you, Efsa, tell us that glyphosate is safe to be
used, you must be corrupt.’”
March 2020. Damian Carrington. Monsanto:
Monsanto
secretly funded academic studies indicating “very severe impacts” on farming
and the environment if its controversial glyphosate weedkiller
were banned, an investigation has found.
The research
was used by the National Farmers’ Union and others to successfully lobby
against a European ban in 2017. As a result of the revelations, the NFU has now
amended its glyphosate information to declare the source of the research.
Monsanto was
bought by the agri-chemical multinational Bayer in
2018 and Bayer said the studies’ failure to disclose their funding broke its
principles. However, the authors of the studies said the funding did not
influence their work and the editor of the journal in which they were published
said the papers would not be retracted or amended.
Glyphosate
is sold by Bayer as Roundup and is the world’s most widely used weedkiller. The World Health Organization’s cancer agency,
the IARC, declared that glyphosate was “probably carcinogenic
to humans” in 2015
but several international agencies, including the European Food Safety
Authority (EFSA), subsequently came to opposite conclusions.
June 2020. Dicamba banned in US: https://www.ecowatch.com/federal-court-dicamba-epa-2646153359.html?rebelltitem=1#rebelltitem1
Sep. 2020. Bees: from SumOfUs, Honeybees Need
Your Help, Honey NPR.
2 April 2020.
'Truly
inexplicable': Why did four million bees die overnight in northern Italy? The Local.
17 August 2020.
Jan 2021. Neonics: from Ecowatch: https://www.ecowatch.com/neonic-pesticides-food-supply-2650056933.html?rebelltitem=2#rebelltitem2
Previous article:
https://www.ecowatch.com/bees-pesticide-uk-2649874911.html?rebelltitem=7#rebelltitem7 on the emergency approval of neonic
for sugarbeet:
In its
statement, Buglife said it was especially concerned
about a provision allowing farmers to destroy wildflowers around the beets and
a lack of information about plans to keep the pesticide from polluting rivers.
It noted that a similar application for emergency use was denied in 2018 due to
its potential impacts on bees.
"Nothing
has changed scientifically since the decision to ban neonics from use on sugar
beet in 2018, they are still going to harm the environment," Shardlow said.
Footnote:
greenwashing...
Adverts that
have been banned for greenwashing: Ryanair (claimed
lowest emissions), BMW (electric car not zero emissions), Ancol
Pet Products (dog waste bags not biodegradable), Shell (Canadian tar sands and
oil refinery in Texas not shown to be ‘sustainable’).
Next sections not covered in May 2021
course.
4. oil/mining etc:
No date: https://www.ecowatch.com/mauritius-oil-spill-damages- Oil spills make visible the huge price being
paid by the environment, wildlife and human communities for our reliance on
fossil fuels. They are a harsh demonstration of the fragility of our oceans.
They are a sad reminder of how urgent it is that we end our addiction to fossil
fuels and make the transition to alternative renewable energy sources.
On the 25th
of July the Japanese bulk carrier MV Wakashio —
chartered by Mitsui OSK and owned by Nagashiki
Shipping — struck a beautiful and irreplaceable coral reef on Mauritius'
southeast coast. The ship was sailing dangerously close to the reef, and ran
aground. Twelve days later, the ship began leaking heavy fuel oil, devastating
one of the most beautiful places in the world and ruining the livelihoods of
coastal communities.
Jan 2018. Deepwater
Horizon.
17th Jan 2018: BP has had to make another payout of
$1.7bn for the Deepwater Horizon disaster.
The total compensation is likely to be $65bn (£47bn). The total for 2017 is
$3bn (it expected only $2bn). Eight years after the disaster, BP has processed
nearly all the 390,000 claims made under the court-supervised settlement, and
hopes to complete the process in coming months.
The spill,
at the Macondo well in the Gulf of Mexico killed 11
people and affected fishing and tourism.
1st Nov 2018, Oil pollution - War and its impact
on the environment:
Michael
McCarthy, author of The Moth Snowstorm – Nature and Joy: damage to nature is
usually a secondary consideration – except for agent orange
spread on 12,000 sq miles of forest in the Vietnam war, or the mass oil
pollution from the Sea Island terminal in Kuwait during the Gulf war 1991. In
the second world war 60 million people or 3% of the world population (2.3
billion at the time) died... but the amount of shipping sunk in the battle of
the Atlantic was the equivalent of about 250 Brent Spar oil rigs (Greenpeace
forced Shell not to sink it but move it for breaking up). Professor Tim
Birkenhead of Sheffield University, in the journal British Birds, suggests the
war badly affected breeding of guillemots on Skomer
Island off the west coast of Wales. He estimates there were 100,000 individuals
in 1934, but only 4,856 in 1963, a reduction of 95%. Now the numbers have gone
up to 23,746. The worst decline was between 1940 and 1946, and oil pollution is
the most likely cause. The ocean is far less resilient than we have thought.
Sep 18th 2019. Bill McKibben writes of the link between oil and war, after missiles struck Saudi oil facilities over the weekend. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/sep/18/climate-crisis-oil-war-iraq-saudi-attack-green-energy
He Includes
this: ‘Thanks to great investigative reporting, we now know that the oil industry knew all about climate change decades ago, but instead of
acknowledging it and helping us move to a new energy future, they instead spent
billions building the scaffolding of deceit and denial and disinformation that
kept us locked in the present paradigm. Just as they have profited from
sea-level rise and Arctic melt, so they will profit from the war now starting
to unfold. (Right on schedule, the share prices of fracking firms and oil
majors all jumped perkily northwards on Monday morning.)
Sep 2019. Mining and the Oceans: from sumofus and
earthworks: - 220 million tonnes. That’s the appalling amount of toxic waste that
mining companies dump directly into our oceans, rivers and lakes every year.
A Credit Suisse-financed mining
company is about to dump 30 million tonnes of toxic heavy metals - Chrome. Nickel. Copper -and chemicals into a beautiful Norwegian protected fjörd -- a natural reserve for many salmon.
27th Jan 2020. Total: 14 French local authorities and several NGOs will take court action to order Total to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions. They will act under a French law the ‘duty of vigilance’ – large corporations must set out measures to prevent human rights violations or environmental damage arising from their activities. (Angelique Chrisafis)
27th Jan 2020. Oil and Climate change:
Total: 14
French local authorities and several NGOs will take court action to order Total
to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions.
They will act under a French law the ‘duty of vigilance’ – large
corporations must set out measures to prevent human rights violations or
environmental damage arising from their activities. (Angelique Chrisafis)
May 2020. Oil,
Troy Vettese (New Statesman) – in Pocket - peak oil
is the moment when conventional oil production can no longer be increased,
regardless of price. There remain plenty of hydrocarbons, but the world oil
market has changed over the past two decades as non-conventionals’
share has grown. “Conventional” oil conjures the 20th-century vision of
free-flowing gushers and pump-jacks. Non-conventionals
take novel hybrid industrial forms: bitumen strip-mines, “steam-assisted
gravity drainage’’, and kilometre-long horizontal drilling to inject cocktails
of water, sand, and unsavoury chemicals (ie hydraulic
fracturing). Non-conventional technologies have opened up vast new reserves in
areas far removed from the industry’s Middle Eastern heartland, but they are
dirty, expensive and, as the recent crash shows, unstable.
25th
Aug 2020. Rio Tinto destroyed a 46,000-year-old Aboriginal heritage
site Juukan Gorge, in Pilbara region, WA, despite 5
reports having identified the significance of the sites. An internal review was
carried out and identified ‘systemic failures in the cultural heritage
management system’ – but all that will happen is the boss and two other
executives will lose bonuses worth A$7m (£4m). (Calla Wahlquist, Guardian) The board’s non-executive directors
also agreed to donate 10% of their 2020 fees to the Clontarf
Foundation which supports Aboriginal education and employment.
The chief executive, Jean-Sebastien
Jacques, was due to receive $3.1m plus a long-term performance bonus of $1.8m
in 2021. A parliamentary inquiry into the destruction of the sites is ongoing.
The sites belong to the PKKP – Puuntu Kunti Kurrama and Pinikura since 2013.
Feb. 13th 2021. Oil (Sandra Laville)
Two Nigerian communities – from the Ogale and Bille communities - can bring claims for cleaning up oil
spills and for compensation against Shell and its Nigerian subsidiary in an
English court, supreme court judges have ruled. The
parent company – Royal Dutch Shell plc - is registered in London, so is
responsible for activities of SPDC (Shell Petroleum Company of Nigeria). The
communities have been fighting for 5 years – their lawyers are Leigh Day.
Extra
Notes for Week 2 class:
Week 2 extra
notes:
1. air
pollution:
June 2020. Two million people in the UK with respiratory conditions such as
asthma have experienced reduced symptoms
during the Coronavirus lockdown, according to the British Lung Foundation. The
lockdown led to traffic falling to 1955 levels.
But:
Nitrogen dioxide, a pollutant produced largely by diesel vehicles, is at illegal levels in 80% of urban areas.
Oct 2020. Dieselgate: are still 8.5 million diesel vehicles on UK roads that emit NO2 pollution
several times higher [than] the legal limit and so Leigh Day continues to fight
this case.
Oct 2020. Hydrogen: powering buses in Aberdeen
Nov 2020. Emissions from vehicles and power
stations have fallen, but domestic
heating, wood-burning, and agriculture not.
Jan 2021. Lobbying etc: Kwasi
Kwarteng received money from fossil fuel investors
March 2021. The UK has “systematically and
persistently” broken legal limits on toxic air pollution for a decade, the court of justice of the EU (CJEU) has
ruled.
Levels of
nitrogen dioxide, mostly from diesel vehicles, remain illegally high in 75% of urban areas and on Thursday
the court said the UK had failed to tackle the problem in the shortest possible
time, as required by law... The UK could face financial penalties if it still
fails to take action to comply
2. Agriculture & soil:
Jan 2020. The UK’s new
Agriculture Bill has been called “one of the most significant
pieces of legislation for farmers in England for over 70 years... a shift away
from direct payments to farmers based upon the amount of agricultural land they
manage. This was a feature of the CAP that was heavily criticised... Instead,
landowners will in future be paid to produce “public goods”. These are things
that can benefit everyone but bring no financial reward to those who produce
them, like clean air and water.
Achieving
these goals will seem rather daunting.. priority is soil. Erosion
rates from ploughed fields are between ten and 100 times greater than rates of
soil formation.
June 2020. Natalie Bennett: what should a bill be tackling? The
nature crisis: the collapse of
biodiversity and bio-abundance that has left the UK one of the most
nature-deprived nations on Earth. The obesity
and health crisis: associated with astonishing poor calorie-rich,
nutrient-poor diets. The dominance of
the supermarkets over what farmers can produce and what we all eat. Bill has ‘few commitments to action, and those commitments forced on the government by
political pressure’.
Also need safeguards on import standards.
Also on: agroecology – integrating ecological and social
principles into farming: uses legumes, diverse crop rotations and a
focus on soil management.
Bill doesn’t make this compulsory... lacks a commitment to organic agriculture ... protection for (especially
small) farmers which account for nearly half of our farms.
3. Bees etc.
Feb. 2020. Damian Carrington pesticide industry
profits... companies make billions of
dollars a year from... highly hazardous pesticides (HHPs) ... and In India, 59% of sales were of HHPs in
contrast to just 11% in the UK (from Unearthed).
March 2020. Controversy over Glyphosate – WHO
says it is probably carcinogenic but EFSA says it is safe... but why Monsanto
so aggressive over it? Also some studies found to be biased. Precautionary principle?
Sep 2020. 4 million bees died overnight in
northern Italy – mystery?
Jan 2021. Neonics approved for use on sugar
beet à protests, (to prevent damage from
virus), but not needed.
Summary of Key ideas:
The
precautionary principle.
The law says that when scientific evidence about an environmental or human
health hazard is uncertain and the stakes are high, precautionary
measures must be taken. From Jolyon Maugham
QC, Director of Good Law Project (email 8/9/20 (‘environment air
quality’ folder – includes appeal for funds).