Stephen Nash is a tall, burly Canadian, with a flowing white beard and a wry sense of humour. He introduces himself as someone who is often mistaken for Santa Claus. But he is a veteran wildlife specialist who has caught deadly snakes in his native country and has handled many other vicious creatures. As he notes, "I have been bitten, scratched and impaled over the past 32 years!" He once hosted our very own Romulus Whitaker, who started the Snake Park in Chennai and now runs a Crocodile Park outside it.
Nash heads the Capacity Building Unit at the secretariat of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) in Geneva. The convention has been in operation for 33 years and fuses wildlife and trade issues with a legally binding instrument to achieve conservation and sustainable use. In other words, it tries to ensure that under no circumstances should smuggling endanger wild fauna and flora.
Tackling illegal trade at customs
At a workshop organised by the World Customs Organisation at the sprawling campus of the National Academy of Customs, Excise and Narcotics (NACEN) in Faridabad (May 18-22), he briefed customs officials from several Asian countries on the objective of CITES, and how to handle threatened animals and plants. One can well imagine the consternation of customs officials who unsuspectingly open a consignment and have to deal with poisonous snakes, spiders and countless other pesky creatures
Endangered species are divided into three categories. Appendix I - this is a favourite category in UN parlance, since it also refers to industrialised countries in the Kyoto Protocol on climate change - are the most threatened, and international commercial trade in this category (as distinct presumably from exchange or research), is generally banned. This covers some 530 animals and 300 plants. Appendix II lists species that are not necessarily threatened with extinction, but for which trade must be controlled to avoid any such denouement. This is obviously a bigger category, covering 4400 animals and more than 28,000 plants. The third and last category comprises some 255 animals and 7 plants which countries ask CITES to help them protect.
India is most interested in the enforcement of CITES to curb the smuggling of tiger parts to China and other countries in South-East Asia, where people believe that these have curative properties. Indeed, while there is a great deal of controversy over who is responsible for the disappearance of tigers in this country - whether poachers (foreign or national or both) and/or tribals living within national parks and sanctuaries - there is no doubt that, were there to be effective surveillance by the customs at land, sea and airports, the trade would be considerably curbed. Just the sharing of information and better monitoring and coordination by the customs authorities of countries in this region would work wonders.
UNEP has launched the Green Customs Initiative to control what it terms "environmental crimes", among which the turnover in the trade in flora and fauna is estimated to range from $5 to $20 million a year. However, two of the biggest traded items - timber and fish - aren't covered by the treaty because these are not on the endangered list. The Faridabad workshop was to inform and instruct top customs officials from the region about different environmental treaties, most of which deal with harmful chemicals, and how the customs has a major role to play in compliance and enforcement.
Protecting plants
Readers may look somewhat askance at the need to protect plants. However, one has only to consider the enormous value to humans of many plants - as food, fuel and fibre, among other uses. We derive all our foodgrains from five or six staple plants, but there is no telling how many more there are, undiscovered in the wild, which can feed millions across the world. The threat of such plants dying out before they are even identified is similar to precious libraries of original manuscripts being burnt before anyone has read them.
Even today, some 30 per cent of all pharmaceuticals are derived from plants, although genetic engineering may gradually lower the proportion. In India, ayurveda is under serious threat because species are disappearing. Conservationists refer to rare plants in West Africa from which a substance several times sweeter than sugar can be extracted, but scientists have not yet been able to commercially exploit it.
During the protracted controversy over the Silent Valley hydel plant in Kerala in the early 'seventies, wild varieties of rice were discovered in Palghat district which possessed genes to withstand attacks of the brown plant hopper, a deadly pest which was devastating tracts of the dwarf Taichung varieties of rice grown throughout South and South-East Asia. Rice geneticists "married" genes from these Palghat (and Sri Lankan) varieties to the new dwarfs and the new variety was able to withstand the pest. This provides a glimpse of the tremendous value of wild plants.
Cultural beliefs
The tiger is particularly problematic for India because it is an iconic animal - so much so that the celebrated BBC Indian wildlife TV series, hosted by Valmik Thapar a few years ago, was titled Land of the Tiger. The CITES website (www.cites.org) in fact has a photograph of a majestic tiger on the prowl. The problem is compounded by the fact that Thailand has started breeding tigers on farms in order to "harvest" them for medicinal purposes.
In 2002, the Sri Racha (a corruption of 'Raja') Tiger Zoo sold 100 tigers - originally bred from a Royal Bengal pair - to Sanya Love World in China. They were widely alleged to have been bred there in captivity and slaughtered from time to time to be sold for their meat in Love World's restaurant. The Chinese denied this, since it would have violated CITES which only permits exchange of animals between zoos or for scientific purposes. Customs officers in many parts of the world may in future have to decide whether a particular consignment is genuinely from a farmed animal or has been poached.
Many conservationists like Nash take a pragmatic view of such trade and believe it can help assuage the seemingly insatiable demand for such animal parts. However, this should in no way come in the way of proper education of people who hanker over such products for purely traditional and usually irrational reasons. There is an almost exact parallel when it comes to Indian wildlife with the whale shark, one of the largest fish in the world, whose fins were cut off by fishermen off the Gujarat coast and shipped to South-East Asia for the renowned delicacy, shark's fin soup, a favourite on auspicious occasions. The helpless beasts were left to die in the ocean after their fins were cut off.
Fortunately, after a furore by Indian conservationists, this senseless slaughter and trade has been banned. The irony is that the fins actually don't impart any flavour to soup, which has to be augmented by species like abalone, but consumers blindly follow tradition.
Regulating the trophy trade
Nash told India Together that certain countries in east and southern Africa have issued a restricted number of hunting permits to cull old black rhino males. This serves two purposes: first, it earns the country a considerable amount of foreign exchange because the heads of these magnificent beasts are highly valued as trophies all over the wealthy world. Second, according to Nash, it eliminates old males and thereby helps to improve the genes of the species - a modern-day variant of "survival of the fittest"! However, Kenya has objected to this on the ground that smugglers who poach such rhinos in that country can attempt to export them through neighbouring countries by producing fake hunting licences.
Closer home, Pakistan has issued a restricted number of hunting licences - around six a year - to hunt the markhor goat, its national animal, which exists in the high Himalaya. US customs, have however, once confiscated such a trophy, assuming that it was poached, which is understandable when it comes to any rare species. Such concessions will always enrage die-hard conservationists, even as others argue that it raises revenues to protect the goats, restricts the number of licences to a manageable limit and thereby cuts down, if not eliminates, poaching. The jury is still out, but the common sense approach would be devote sufficient manpower and resources on protecting such species, which will reinforced by much stricter customs vigilance.
It should be noted that the original treaty regarding wild trophies was the London Convention of 1903, which was to govern hunting game in Africa and India. Times have changed and no civilized person today should be flaunting the heads, tusks or skins of animals from exotic corners of the world as some form of conquest, or even a form of neo-colonialism.
CITES, however, doesn't govern only living animals and plants but tusks and skins of dead animals as well. India has two such items - one as an import and the other which was both and import and export.
Jewellery made from red coral has been in existence for 5000 years, but the trade has dropped as smuggling is under surveillance. In 1984, some 450 tonnes were seized, which went down to 40 tonnes in 1990. Between 1990 and 2005, only an estimated 28 to 54 tonnes in all have been seized. From the Middle Ages, coral found its way from Rome (presumably harvested in the Mediterranean) to India. From the 17th century, there was a flourishing trade between Naples and Marseilles to India and West Africa. However, it is extremely difficult for customs officers to distinguish between three types of red coral, of which only Corallium is very rare and expensive.
The other item, which goes back some aeons, is ivory. Contrary to popular belief, ivory doesn't only consist of elephant tusks but also those of the narwhal (a long-toothed Arctic whale), killer and sperm whale, warthog, hippos and walrus. Cave paintings from the Cro-Magnon era depict people hunting mammoths for their tusks. The first ivory masterpiece in historical records is an arch which dates back to 2000 BC in Egypt. Even more surprisingly, such tusks are being recovered from the icy wastes in the extremities of the globe. In Alaska, carvings out of fossilized walrus ivory are in fact permitted today. Tusks of mammoths, which became extinct 16,000 years ago, are sought after.
However, faced with the dire threat to herds of African elephants, which declined by a half between 1970 and 1985, 119 countries at a CITES meet in 1989 decided to ban hunting elephants. African elephants are more sought after than their Indian counterparts because their tusks are bigger (as, indeed, are the elephants themselves). Indian craftsmen were far more adept at carving such tusks and till the ban, used to import African ivory. Most of this trade is now prohibited. There is some unhappiness in East and southern Africa, where herds are in fact increasing and the ban is sometimes thought of as a western imposition, without any concession to the revenue it could earn for poor countries in that part of the continent.
Sometimes, even with endangered species, truth can be stranger than fiction. In the current crisis over climate change, the sight of a lone polar bear struggling to keep afloat on a tiny ice floe has become the iconic image that goads countries and individuals to take action before it is too late. According to Nash, however, of 27 polar bear populations in the Arctic, 26 are actually increasing
Friday, June 26, 2009
River basin studies: A half-hearted attempt
The Expert Appraisal Committee (EAC) on River Valley and Hydroelectric Projects of the Ministry of Environment and Forests of the Government of India has recently approved the Terms of Reference for conducting basin level studies of the Bichom and Lohit river basins in Arunachal Pradesh. The EAC has been constituted under the EIA notification 2006 to examine projects that apply to the Ministry for environmental clearance.
According to the TOR, the basin studies envisage "providing optimum support for various natural processes and allowing sustainable activities undertaken by its inhabitants". The Bichom and Lohit basins are among the river basins in the Himalayas where massive plans for building large dams and developing hydropower are being rolled out. More than a hundred projects with installed capacities totalling to 54,000 MW are at various stages of planning and implementation just in the state of Arunachal itself.
Often, a large number of dams are planned on single rivers or in single basins. For example, in the Lohit basin, a cascade of six projects totalling to 7918 MW are being planned, all within a length of 86 kms.
The need for basin studies
Such cascade-type development or a number of dams in a single basin raise the critically important issue of cumulative impacts. Often, the impact of all projects taken together is much greater than the sum of impacts of individual projects. Unfortunately, cumulative impacts are hardly ever assessed, as individual projects are planned and evaluated separately. One of the strongest criticisms against the recent plans of dam building has been the complete lack of any assessment of the carrying capacity - what level of development, and in particular the number of dams a basin can sustain - and of the totality of impacts of the number of dams and projects in the basin.
Indeed, when the impact assessment of even individual projects is patchy at best and often farcical, it would be too much to expect a proper cumulative impact assessment.
Against this background, the decision to undertake basin level studies in the Lohit and Bichom are welcome steps in the right direction. The TORs of the basin studies indicate that wide-ranging and extensive examination has been called for, as is necessary for any such study. The TORs call for "inventorisation and analysis of the existing resource base and its production, consumption and conservation levels, determination of regional ecological fragility/sensitivity based on geo-physical, biological, socio-economic and cultural attributes, review of existing and planned developments as per various developmental plans, and evaluation of impacts on various facets of environment due to existing and planned development."
The studies are to then assess the stress/load due to various activities and suggest environmental action plans that can involve preclusion or modification any activity and measures. Unfortunately, the good part ends with this. The way the studies have been structured ends up defeating the very purpose of carrying them out.
A self-defeating exercise
First and foremost, the basin studies have been effectively de-linked from the implementation of the projects as there is no requirement that the projects be conditional to the findings of the basin studies. Neither is there any explicit stay on the consideration and implementation of any of the projects pending the studies.
Logically, the basin studies should suggest what level of development, including hydropower projects, the basin can sustain. The projects should be planned based on this. However, the current planning and decision making turns this on its head. The numbers, locations, capacities, types and other details of the projects have already been decided. Many of these projects have already been allotted to (mostly) private developers who already have or would soon be approaching the Ministry for environmental clearance. In Bichom basin, the 600 MW Bichom (or Kameng) project is already under construction.
It is clear that the Expert Appraisal Committee understood this issue. The Minutes of its meeting dated 15 and 16 December 2008 record that "The committee noted that the study will be completed in two years and M/s WAPCOS has been entrusted with the job. In case, any project on this basin is submitted during this study period for environmental clearance, how the outcome of the study will help to take a decision could not be clarified." The obvious solution is to put on hold the projects till the studies are done. However, what the Committee decided is that "the report may be submitted within six months by reducing the TOR and the study should focus only on hydroelectric projects."
Thus, studies that would need about two years are to be done in six months (later this was extended to nine) with reduced TORs. How the outcome of such truncated studies would help rational environmental decision making is a question. It is clear that the environmental objectives have been sidelined with an eye to build as many dams as possible.
The TOR for the studies does state that they can recommend the "preclusion of any activity", which presumably means that they can call for any or some of the hydropower plants not to be built. In reality, such an outcome is highly unlikely, as is seen from the reluctance to explicitly put on hold the projects in the basin pending the results of the study. While the Committee has from time to time discussed with concern the possible impacts of large number of projects in a single basin, it has fallen shy of taking the right, but hard decision when actually dealing with the problem
For example, the Lohit basin study was originally envisaged and put forward as a condition while granting clearance for pre-construction activities to the Upper and Lower Demwe projects in March 2008. But the Minutes of the EAC meeting of July 2008, while discussing the basin study note that "Environmental Clearance to Demwe Upper and Demwe Lower HE Project should not be linked up with the completion of basin study." These two projects add up to 3430 MW, a full 43 per cent of the total 7918 MW planned in the basin.
Further, considering that the studies are to be paid for by the project developers - in proportion to the size of the projects they have been allotted - the conflict of interest is clear.
An earlier such basin study - to determined the carrying capacity of the Teesta basin in Sikkim, initiated in 2001 - at least had a condition that no project will be considered for environmental clearance till the carrying study is completed. That study took over five years. However, the MoEF violated its own condition and accorded clearance to several projects even before the study was completed. On the other hand, based on the recommendations of the study, the MoEF has asked the Sikkim Government to drop five hydropower projects above Chungthang, and restrict the height of those below it. This shows that findings of such studies are likely to require significant rethinking of dam building plans in the river basins.
Neeraj Vagholikar, who is with the environmental organisation Kalpavriksh and has studied dam projects in the North-East since 2001 says about the Bichom and Lohit studies: "The reluctance to put on hold individual project clearances till comprehensive river basin studies are completed puts a question mark on the utility of the entire exercise. Moreover, the river basin studies will now be much shorter exercises instead of the comprehensive ones envisaged earlier, which are necessary for proper environmental decision-making. It appears that the Bichom and Lohit studies are more likely to be used to create a justification for the large scale hydropower development already planned than protect the ecological integrity of these river basins. One of the two key outcomes proposed for the studies - to provide sustainable and optimal ways of hydropower development - is a clear indication that the environmental objectives are of secondary importance."
The silver lining to this is that the second key outcome specified by the TOR is to "assess requirement of environmental flow during lean season with actual flow, depth and velocity at different level". It is significant that the Committee has recognised the importance of environmental flows, the flows necessary to maintain the ecological existence of the river, an issue that is increasingly being acknowledged as critical to sound river basin planning. One has to wait and see if the studies would have the independence to recommend preclusion or modifications to some of the hydropower projects if this is found necessary to maintain environmental flows, and if so, whether such recommendations could be implemented.
While there are several other important issues with the basin studies not discussed here, there is one that is essential to point out. The TORs for the basin studies lay out in detail many parameters that need to be studied, field data that needs to be collected, but fail to require that the local communities be consulted and involved in the process. This is a major shortcoming, and an indicator that the studies are reinforcing the technocratic approach instead of a participatory one that is the essence of environmental decision-making.
Conclusion
The basin studies for Bichom and Lohit are examples of a good initiative gone awry. The Committee's recognition of the need for basin studies is a welcome step. It is clear that this is an acknowledgement of issues of cumulative impacts and carrying capacity that activists, researchers, academics, dam affected people and others have been consistently raising for the last many years. At the same time, it does not go to the logical conclusion and hence has become self-defeating.
What the Committee needs to do is to re-define the TORs for the studies allowing them the two years that the committee itself feels are necessary, and redesigning them to require meaningful participation of local communities and civil society. Meanwhile it should put the projects in the basin on hold, and make them conditional to the findings of the study. If this is done, it will be a significant step in the direction of environmentally sustainable and holistic approach to development
According to the TOR, the basin studies envisage "providing optimum support for various natural processes and allowing sustainable activities undertaken by its inhabitants". The Bichom and Lohit basins are among the river basins in the Himalayas where massive plans for building large dams and developing hydropower are being rolled out. More than a hundred projects with installed capacities totalling to 54,000 MW are at various stages of planning and implementation just in the state of Arunachal itself.
Often, a large number of dams are planned on single rivers or in single basins. For example, in the Lohit basin, a cascade of six projects totalling to 7918 MW are being planned, all within a length of 86 kms.
The need for basin studies
Such cascade-type development or a number of dams in a single basin raise the critically important issue of cumulative impacts. Often, the impact of all projects taken together is much greater than the sum of impacts of individual projects. Unfortunately, cumulative impacts are hardly ever assessed, as individual projects are planned and evaluated separately. One of the strongest criticisms against the recent plans of dam building has been the complete lack of any assessment of the carrying capacity - what level of development, and in particular the number of dams a basin can sustain - and of the totality of impacts of the number of dams and projects in the basin.
Indeed, when the impact assessment of even individual projects is patchy at best and often farcical, it would be too much to expect a proper cumulative impact assessment.
Against this background, the decision to undertake basin level studies in the Lohit and Bichom are welcome steps in the right direction. The TORs of the basin studies indicate that wide-ranging and extensive examination has been called for, as is necessary for any such study. The TORs call for "inventorisation and analysis of the existing resource base and its production, consumption and conservation levels, determination of regional ecological fragility/sensitivity based on geo-physical, biological, socio-economic and cultural attributes, review of existing and planned developments as per various developmental plans, and evaluation of impacts on various facets of environment due to existing and planned development."
The studies are to then assess the stress/load due to various activities and suggest environmental action plans that can involve preclusion or modification any activity and measures. Unfortunately, the good part ends with this. The way the studies have been structured ends up defeating the very purpose of carrying them out.
A self-defeating exercise
First and foremost, the basin studies have been effectively de-linked from the implementation of the projects as there is no requirement that the projects be conditional to the findings of the basin studies. Neither is there any explicit stay on the consideration and implementation of any of the projects pending the studies.
Logically, the basin studies should suggest what level of development, including hydropower projects, the basin can sustain. The projects should be planned based on this. However, the current planning and decision making turns this on its head. The numbers, locations, capacities, types and other details of the projects have already been decided. Many of these projects have already been allotted to (mostly) private developers who already have or would soon be approaching the Ministry for environmental clearance. In Bichom basin, the 600 MW Bichom (or Kameng) project is already under construction.
It is clear that the Expert Appraisal Committee understood this issue. The Minutes of its meeting dated 15 and 16 December 2008 record that "The committee noted that the study will be completed in two years and M/s WAPCOS has been entrusted with the job. In case, any project on this basin is submitted during this study period for environmental clearance, how the outcome of the study will help to take a decision could not be clarified." The obvious solution is to put on hold the projects till the studies are done. However, what the Committee decided is that "the report may be submitted within six months by reducing the TOR and the study should focus only on hydroelectric projects."
Thus, studies that would need about two years are to be done in six months (later this was extended to nine) with reduced TORs. How the outcome of such truncated studies would help rational environmental decision making is a question. It is clear that the environmental objectives have been sidelined with an eye to build as many dams as possible.
The TOR for the studies does state that they can recommend the "preclusion of any activity", which presumably means that they can call for any or some of the hydropower plants not to be built. In reality, such an outcome is highly unlikely, as is seen from the reluctance to explicitly put on hold the projects in the basin pending the results of the study. While the Committee has from time to time discussed with concern the possible impacts of large number of projects in a single basin, it has fallen shy of taking the right, but hard decision when actually dealing with the problem
For example, the Lohit basin study was originally envisaged and put forward as a condition while granting clearance for pre-construction activities to the Upper and Lower Demwe projects in March 2008. But the Minutes of the EAC meeting of July 2008, while discussing the basin study note that "Environmental Clearance to Demwe Upper and Demwe Lower HE Project should not be linked up with the completion of basin study." These two projects add up to 3430 MW, a full 43 per cent of the total 7918 MW planned in the basin.
Further, considering that the studies are to be paid for by the project developers - in proportion to the size of the projects they have been allotted - the conflict of interest is clear.
An earlier such basin study - to determined the carrying capacity of the Teesta basin in Sikkim, initiated in 2001 - at least had a condition that no project will be considered for environmental clearance till the carrying study is completed. That study took over five years. However, the MoEF violated its own condition and accorded clearance to several projects even before the study was completed. On the other hand, based on the recommendations of the study, the MoEF has asked the Sikkim Government to drop five hydropower projects above Chungthang, and restrict the height of those below it. This shows that findings of such studies are likely to require significant rethinking of dam building plans in the river basins.
Neeraj Vagholikar, who is with the environmental organisation Kalpavriksh and has studied dam projects in the North-East since 2001 says about the Bichom and Lohit studies: "The reluctance to put on hold individual project clearances till comprehensive river basin studies are completed puts a question mark on the utility of the entire exercise. Moreover, the river basin studies will now be much shorter exercises instead of the comprehensive ones envisaged earlier, which are necessary for proper environmental decision-making. It appears that the Bichom and Lohit studies are more likely to be used to create a justification for the large scale hydropower development already planned than protect the ecological integrity of these river basins. One of the two key outcomes proposed for the studies - to provide sustainable and optimal ways of hydropower development - is a clear indication that the environmental objectives are of secondary importance."
The silver lining to this is that the second key outcome specified by the TOR is to "assess requirement of environmental flow during lean season with actual flow, depth and velocity at different level". It is significant that the Committee has recognised the importance of environmental flows, the flows necessary to maintain the ecological existence of the river, an issue that is increasingly being acknowledged as critical to sound river basin planning. One has to wait and see if the studies would have the independence to recommend preclusion or modifications to some of the hydropower projects if this is found necessary to maintain environmental flows, and if so, whether such recommendations could be implemented.
While there are several other important issues with the basin studies not discussed here, there is one that is essential to point out. The TORs for the basin studies lay out in detail many parameters that need to be studied, field data that needs to be collected, but fail to require that the local communities be consulted and involved in the process. This is a major shortcoming, and an indicator that the studies are reinforcing the technocratic approach instead of a participatory one that is the essence of environmental decision-making.
Conclusion
The basin studies for Bichom and Lohit are examples of a good initiative gone awry. The Committee's recognition of the need for basin studies is a welcome step. It is clear that this is an acknowledgement of issues of cumulative impacts and carrying capacity that activists, researchers, academics, dam affected people and others have been consistently raising for the last many years. At the same time, it does not go to the logical conclusion and hence has become self-defeating.
What the Committee needs to do is to re-define the TORs for the studies allowing them the two years that the committee itself feels are necessary, and redesigning them to require meaningful participation of local communities and civil society. Meanwhile it should put the projects in the basin on hold, and make them conditional to the findings of the study. If this is done, it will be a significant step in the direction of environmentally sustainable and holistic approach to development
Awarded in haste, withheld
Some things make no sense whatsoever. On 12-13 June 2009, Vedanta Alumina Ltd (VAL), a world metals and mining giant was to receive the 2009 Golden Peacock Environment Management Award at Palampur, Himachal Pradesh (see here for more). The World Environment Foundation (WEF) and Institute of Directors are the two institutions behind the award. There is no way to understand this except as disregard - knowing or otherwise - of Vedanta's reputation.
A little education, then, for the benefit of these two institutions. In 2007, the Norwegian Council of Ethics had assessed its parent company Vedanta Resources and its Indian subsidiaries Sterlite Industries, Madras Aluminium Company (MALCO), Bharat Aluminium Company (BALCO), and Vedanta Alumina to judge whether the group was in breach of the council's Ethical Guidelines for investment. Following this, the Council had withdrawn its fundng, citing severe environmental damage and human rights violations linked to the group's operations in India.
While this was happening, a challenge to Vedanta's mining operations in Niyamgiri Hills in Orissa was pending before the Supreme Court of India before the forest bench. A monitoring body set up by this bench - as part of the T N Godavarman Thirumulpad v/s Union of India case - the Central Empowered Committee had recommended against the grant of approvals as the company had a history of irregularities in seeking both forest and environment clearances both for its refinery operations in Lanjigarh and proposed mining in Niyamgiri Hills of Orissa. Also critical was a strong movement against the mining by the Dongaria Kondh tribal community for whom Niyamgiri is a revered hill and deeply connected with their lives and livelihoods (see this earlier article).
The Supreme Court bench relied the Norwegian report even more than that of its own committee, and stated that it could not take the risk in handing over the mining operations to Vedanta. But the court, unexpectedly, had no qualms in allowing Sterlite Industries, Vedanta's subsidiary to work out a Special Purpose Vehicle with the Government of Orissa and Orissa Mining Corporation work out the best formula for mining. This was November 2007. (see here and here). All the modalities were discussed in court, and as an inexplicable formula the court granted its approval to Sterlite to mine in Niyamgiri Hills, subject to some conditions on 8 August 2008. It did not matter perhaps, that just about a month before in July 2008, the Martin Currie Scottish Trust Fund of Scotland also withdrew its 2.37-million-pound investment in Vedanta. This too was on the grounds of environmental and human rights violation by the company (see here).
Violations in other states
But Vedanta's stories don't start and end in the state of Orissa. Moving further to Tamilnadu there are two very stark and clear instances of the violations by Vedanta's subsidiaries. Sterlite's coppert smelter plant in Tuticorin is surrounded by fly ash and gypsum dumps. There are few villagers around who raise their voice against the air and water pollution being caused by the plant operations. There are days, says a local villager who did not want to be named, when they cannot open their windows due to the pollution, and some have chosen to live away due to the health hazards. This was verified around the site during inspection and discussions in May 2008 by Corporate Accountability Desk and Kalpavriksh members.
Official reports of the Ministry of Environment and Forests and the Supreme Court Monitoring Committee (SCMC) on Hazardous Waste Management in the years 2004 and 2005 respectively, also point to the violations by the plant. The SCMC report states amongst other things, "The industry, as reported to the SCMC during the visit, is also emitting sulphur dioxide far in excess of the permissible standards particularly when the sulphuric acid plant is not operating. "
In the Kolli Hills of Tamilnadu, Vedanta's subsidiary MALCO was pushed to suspend its illegal mining operations in November 2008. This was following a petition filed in the Madras High Court by Piyush Sethia of Speak Out Salem presenting evidence that its bauxite mines had no permission under various environmental laws. Kolli Hills are part of the extremely biodiverse Eastern Ghats ecoregion, also dominated by primitive tribal groups. The hills are said to be guarded by Kollipavai, the local deity. (see here).
In Chhatisgarh it is the turn of BALCO. There is photographic evidence of 2007 of the overflow of red mud over the embankment which has spread down the side of a rivulet nar the Balco-Vedanta aluminium complex . In the mines at Kawardha-Daldali (district Kawardha) bauxite mines, there are pictures of 2007 where trucks are running on dirt roads spreading huge amount of dust in and around the area.
There is more. A public hearing for the environmental clearance for the expansion of the Lanjigarh refinery in Orissa took place amidst stiff opposition at Belamba village on 24 April 2009. Locally affected people had highlighted that the existing plant was already polluting the area around and it was causing severe health problems to both humans and animals (See video at this link). The public hearing had to be left incomplete by the concerned authorities, due to strong protests.
Jurors challenged
Today, over 170 organisations and individuals have come together to highlight all of this and much more to the Golden Peacock jury members, what they did not see, or chose to ignore. (See list of Jury members here). A letter embedded with various weblinks or email attachments with research studies, photographs and videos has been sent to the jurors, officials of WEF as well as India's newly elected Minister for Environment and Forests, Jairam Ramesh.
In all, this submission is no less than a comprehensive dossier attempting to highlight various well researched reasons to withdraw the award to the company and at same time initiate strong action. Addressed to the jurors, the letter seeks, "As jurors, you would have to explain how you chose to award a company that in the words of the Norwegian Government's Council of Ethics is clearly involved in "human rights violations." The dossier lays out a torrid controversy of fraud and financial malpractices shrouding this company. We hope, as jurors and persons of eminence, you would have the good sense to preserve your integrity by dissociating yourselves from this company in particular, and the Golden Peacock Awards, in general."
On 12 June, the Himalaya Niti Abhiyan (HNA) and activists from different parts of the country organised a protest outside the awards ceremony at Palampur, in tandem with the submission to the jury member with signatories from across the country. HNA also sent a letter dated 9 June to the Chief Minister of Himachal Pradesh requesting him to refrain from participating in the award ceremony. The letter also clearly rejects the sanctity of the award and it being conferred to Vedanta.
Following the furore, the jury has withheld the announcement of the award. Its members now contend that the full facts about the company were not brought to their attention earlier. Pending a second examination of the facts, it was announced that the award would be held back. None of the Himachal State government officials who were to attend the award ceremony did so.
A little education, then, for the benefit of these two institutions. In 2007, the Norwegian Council of Ethics had assessed its parent company Vedanta Resources and its Indian subsidiaries Sterlite Industries, Madras Aluminium Company (MALCO), Bharat Aluminium Company (BALCO), and Vedanta Alumina to judge whether the group was in breach of the council's Ethical Guidelines for investment. Following this, the Council had withdrawn its fundng, citing severe environmental damage and human rights violations linked to the group's operations in India.
While this was happening, a challenge to Vedanta's mining operations in Niyamgiri Hills in Orissa was pending before the Supreme Court of India before the forest bench. A monitoring body set up by this bench - as part of the T N Godavarman Thirumulpad v/s Union of India case - the Central Empowered Committee had recommended against the grant of approvals as the company had a history of irregularities in seeking both forest and environment clearances both for its refinery operations in Lanjigarh and proposed mining in Niyamgiri Hills of Orissa. Also critical was a strong movement against the mining by the Dongaria Kondh tribal community for whom Niyamgiri is a revered hill and deeply connected with their lives and livelihoods (see this earlier article).
The Supreme Court bench relied the Norwegian report even more than that of its own committee, and stated that it could not take the risk in handing over the mining operations to Vedanta. But the court, unexpectedly, had no qualms in allowing Sterlite Industries, Vedanta's subsidiary to work out a Special Purpose Vehicle with the Government of Orissa and Orissa Mining Corporation work out the best formula for mining. This was November 2007. (see here and here). All the modalities were discussed in court, and as an inexplicable formula the court granted its approval to Sterlite to mine in Niyamgiri Hills, subject to some conditions on 8 August 2008. It did not matter perhaps, that just about a month before in July 2008, the Martin Currie Scottish Trust Fund of Scotland also withdrew its 2.37-million-pound investment in Vedanta. This too was on the grounds of environmental and human rights violation by the company (see here).
Violations in other states
But Vedanta's stories don't start and end in the state of Orissa. Moving further to Tamilnadu there are two very stark and clear instances of the violations by Vedanta's subsidiaries. Sterlite's coppert smelter plant in Tuticorin is surrounded by fly ash and gypsum dumps. There are few villagers around who raise their voice against the air and water pollution being caused by the plant operations. There are days, says a local villager who did not want to be named, when they cannot open their windows due to the pollution, and some have chosen to live away due to the health hazards. This was verified around the site during inspection and discussions in May 2008 by Corporate Accountability Desk and Kalpavriksh members.
Official reports of the Ministry of Environment and Forests and the Supreme Court Monitoring Committee (SCMC) on Hazardous Waste Management in the years 2004 and 2005 respectively, also point to the violations by the plant. The SCMC report states amongst other things, "The industry, as reported to the SCMC during the visit, is also emitting sulphur dioxide far in excess of the permissible standards particularly when the sulphuric acid plant is not operating. "
In the Kolli Hills of Tamilnadu, Vedanta's subsidiary MALCO was pushed to suspend its illegal mining operations in November 2008. This was following a petition filed in the Madras High Court by Piyush Sethia of Speak Out Salem presenting evidence that its bauxite mines had no permission under various environmental laws. Kolli Hills are part of the extremely biodiverse Eastern Ghats ecoregion, also dominated by primitive tribal groups. The hills are said to be guarded by Kollipavai, the local deity. (see here).
In Chhatisgarh it is the turn of BALCO. There is photographic evidence of 2007 of the overflow of red mud over the embankment which has spread down the side of a rivulet nar the Balco-Vedanta aluminium complex . In the mines at Kawardha-Daldali (district Kawardha) bauxite mines, there are pictures of 2007 where trucks are running on dirt roads spreading huge amount of dust in and around the area.
There is more. A public hearing for the environmental clearance for the expansion of the Lanjigarh refinery in Orissa took place amidst stiff opposition at Belamba village on 24 April 2009. Locally affected people had highlighted that the existing plant was already polluting the area around and it was causing severe health problems to both humans and animals (See video at this link). The public hearing had to be left incomplete by the concerned authorities, due to strong protests.
Jurors challenged
Today, over 170 organisations and individuals have come together to highlight all of this and much more to the Golden Peacock jury members, what they did not see, or chose to ignore. (See list of Jury members here). A letter embedded with various weblinks or email attachments with research studies, photographs and videos has been sent to the jurors, officials of WEF as well as India's newly elected Minister for Environment and Forests, Jairam Ramesh.
In all, this submission is no less than a comprehensive dossier attempting to highlight various well researched reasons to withdraw the award to the company and at same time initiate strong action. Addressed to the jurors, the letter seeks, "As jurors, you would have to explain how you chose to award a company that in the words of the Norwegian Government's Council of Ethics is clearly involved in "human rights violations." The dossier lays out a torrid controversy of fraud and financial malpractices shrouding this company. We hope, as jurors and persons of eminence, you would have the good sense to preserve your integrity by dissociating yourselves from this company in particular, and the Golden Peacock Awards, in general."
On 12 June, the Himalaya Niti Abhiyan (HNA) and activists from different parts of the country organised a protest outside the awards ceremony at Palampur, in tandem with the submission to the jury member with signatories from across the country. HNA also sent a letter dated 9 June to the Chief Minister of Himachal Pradesh requesting him to refrain from participating in the award ceremony. The letter also clearly rejects the sanctity of the award and it being conferred to Vedanta.
Following the furore, the jury has withheld the announcement of the award. Its members now contend that the full facts about the company were not brought to their attention earlier. Pending a second examination of the facts, it was announced that the award would be held back. None of the Himachal State government officials who were to attend the award ceremony did so.
Thursday, June 25, 2009
JBIC eyes stake in Indian infrastructure projects
Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC), the international wing of the Japan Finance Corporation (JFC), a policy-based financing institution, is planning to pick up stake in Indian infrastructure projectsBesides providing export finance to Indian companies to source goods and services from Japan, JBIC is engaged in a phased programme for equity investments in infrastructure and environment projects.
There is a proposal for investment in an Indian power project, said Hiromichi Miyamato, representative (India, Nepal, Sri Lanka & Bhutan) on the sidelines of a seminar on emerging markets here On Thursday.
He, however, did not elaborate on the investment size and the name of the company behind the project. For any project to become eligible for investment from JBIC, a Japanese company must put in money (equity) into the project.
The Indian government has estimated that it would require $500 billion for infrastructure projects across various segments such as power, telecom, roads until 2012.
So far, JBIC has made equity investments in China Eco fund and a power project in Singapore, a company official said.
JBIC’s current exposure to India is in the form of loans and guarantees. The value of its outstanding loan portfolio was $1.1 billion, while it has extended guarantees of about $380 million, he said.
Meanwhile, senior officials from state-owned National Thermal Power Generation company, met Hiroshi Watanabe, president and chief executive of JBIC, for semi-commercial loan for capital expenditure under Leading Investment to Future Environment (LIFE).
The Japanese funding agency has set a target of lending $5 billion in two years under LIFE for projects involving clean power generation, energy efficiency improvement, water and urban transportation.
On the level of scope for investment flow from Japan, the JBIC official said interest has picked up from April. Investments had slowed down in the past six months as the global financial crisis intensified after Lehman Brothers’ collapse in September 2008.
JBIC is providing guarantees for Samurai Bonds, a yen-denominated bond issued by a non-Japanese firm or institution in order to encourage the use of Asian funds for regional needs, tap global markets and vitalise Samurai bond markets.
There is a proposal for investment in an Indian power project, said Hiromichi Miyamato, representative (India, Nepal, Sri Lanka & Bhutan) on the sidelines of a seminar on emerging markets here On Thursday.
He, however, did not elaborate on the investment size and the name of the company behind the project. For any project to become eligible for investment from JBIC, a Japanese company must put in money (equity) into the project.
The Indian government has estimated that it would require $500 billion for infrastructure projects across various segments such as power, telecom, roads until 2012.
So far, JBIC has made equity investments in China Eco fund and a power project in Singapore, a company official said.
JBIC’s current exposure to India is in the form of loans and guarantees. The value of its outstanding loan portfolio was $1.1 billion, while it has extended guarantees of about $380 million, he said.
Meanwhile, senior officials from state-owned National Thermal Power Generation company, met Hiroshi Watanabe, president and chief executive of JBIC, for semi-commercial loan for capital expenditure under Leading Investment to Future Environment (LIFE).
The Japanese funding agency has set a target of lending $5 billion in two years under LIFE for projects involving clean power generation, energy efficiency improvement, water and urban transportation.
On the level of scope for investment flow from Japan, the JBIC official said interest has picked up from April. Investments had slowed down in the past six months as the global financial crisis intensified after Lehman Brothers’ collapse in September 2008.
JBIC is providing guarantees for Samurai Bonds, a yen-denominated bond issued by a non-Japanese firm or institution in order to encourage the use of Asian funds for regional needs, tap global markets and vitalise Samurai bond markets.
Poll Finds Support for Action on Global Warming
With major legislation pending in the House, most Americans support government action on climate change – but with an eye on how it works and what it costs
In principle, support is there: Three-quarters in this ABC News/Washington Post poll favor government regulation of greenhouse gases, and 62 percent feel that way even if it raises prices. But fewer support a so-called "cap-and-trade" system – central to current efforts – especially as cost impacts rise.
Click here for PDF with charts and questionnaire.
Overall, 52 percent support cap and trade, down 7 points from a year ago, led by a 14-point drop among political independents, the crucial center of political consensus. Forty-six percent of independents now favor cap and trade, on par with Republicans.
Asked another way, support's at 56 percent overall if cap and trade significantly lowered greenhouse gases while raising electric bills by $10 a month. But at $25 a month, it drops to 44 percent, with 54 percent opposed. Specifically among independents, 58 percent favor cap and trade at $10 – but just 43 percent at $25.
A cap and trade system would have the government issue permits limiting the amount of greenhouse gases companies could emit; they could buy and sell these permits depending on their emission needs. A vote on the measure could come as early as Friday.
The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the proposed bill would cost an average of $175 annually per household (about $15 a month); the Environmental Protection Agency puts it at $80-$111 per year (averaging $8 monthly). But congressional Republicans have warned of $3,100 in annual price increases.
President Obama, who urged passage of the legislation at a news conference Tuesday, holds majority approval on handling global warming, 54 percent. But that's down from 61 percent in April, amid some slippage for the president on several issues.
The change, again, occurred chiefly among independents, from 62 percent approval for Obama on global warming in late April to 52 percent now
Likely cognizant of cost concerns, Obama focused Tuesday not on cap and trade but rather on what he said would be cost savings and other gains produced by the legislation, saying it would "spur new energy savings," "reduce our dependence on foreign oil" and reduce pollution, all positive attributes in public opinion.
G8 – Obama is scheduled to take the issue to the international stage at a meeting of world leaders on climate change to be held next month in Italy immediately after the G8 economic summit there. On this, too, there's persuasion ahead: While most Americans support U.S. action, even if unilateral, this also has declined in the past year.
In a July 2008 poll, 68 percent said the United States should take action on global warming, regardless of whether other industrial countries, such as China and India, take similar steps. Today, 59 percent still hold that view – a majority, but less of one. (The decline was led by a 13-point drop in this view among Democrats, 12 points among women.)
Of the rest, 20 percent say the United States should act only if other countries do as well; 18 percent say it should not act at all.
GROUPS – There is strong partisanship on all these measures; for example, 69 percent of Democrats say the United States should act unilaterally, if necessary, on global warming; that drops to 59 percent of independents and 45 percent of Republicans.
Among other groups, there's a notable difference by age: Seniors are 10 points less apt than adults under 65 to favor government regulation of greenhouse gases overall; 10 points less apt to support it if it raises prices; and again 10 points less apt to back cap and trade. Support for cap and trade peaks, at 65 percent, of under-30s.
Costs, meanwhile, are particularly important to less well-off Americans. Among those making less than $50,000 a year, support for regulating greenhouse gas emissions drops by 17 points (from 75 percent to a still-majority 58 percent) if it raises prices; support if it costs $10 a month is 49 percent; and at $25, just 35 percent.
METHODOLOGY -- This ABC News/Washington Post poll was conducted by telephone June 18-21, 2009, among a random national sample of 1,001 adults, including landline and cell-phone-only respondents. Results for the full sample have a 3.5-point error margin; click here for a detailed description of sampling error. Sampling, data collection and tabulation by TNS of Horsham, Pa.
In principle, support is there: Three-quarters in this ABC News/Washington Post poll favor government regulation of greenhouse gases, and 62 percent feel that way even if it raises prices. But fewer support a so-called "cap-and-trade" system – central to current efforts – especially as cost impacts rise.
Click here for PDF with charts and questionnaire.
Overall, 52 percent support cap and trade, down 7 points from a year ago, led by a 14-point drop among political independents, the crucial center of political consensus. Forty-six percent of independents now favor cap and trade, on par with Republicans.
Asked another way, support's at 56 percent overall if cap and trade significantly lowered greenhouse gases while raising electric bills by $10 a month. But at $25 a month, it drops to 44 percent, with 54 percent opposed. Specifically among independents, 58 percent favor cap and trade at $10 – but just 43 percent at $25.
A cap and trade system would have the government issue permits limiting the amount of greenhouse gases companies could emit; they could buy and sell these permits depending on their emission needs. A vote on the measure could come as early as Friday.
The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the proposed bill would cost an average of $175 annually per household (about $15 a month); the Environmental Protection Agency puts it at $80-$111 per year (averaging $8 monthly). But congressional Republicans have warned of $3,100 in annual price increases.
President Obama, who urged passage of the legislation at a news conference Tuesday, holds majority approval on handling global warming, 54 percent. But that's down from 61 percent in April, amid some slippage for the president on several issues.
The change, again, occurred chiefly among independents, from 62 percent approval for Obama on global warming in late April to 52 percent now
Likely cognizant of cost concerns, Obama focused Tuesday not on cap and trade but rather on what he said would be cost savings and other gains produced by the legislation, saying it would "spur new energy savings," "reduce our dependence on foreign oil" and reduce pollution, all positive attributes in public opinion.
G8 – Obama is scheduled to take the issue to the international stage at a meeting of world leaders on climate change to be held next month in Italy immediately after the G8 economic summit there. On this, too, there's persuasion ahead: While most Americans support U.S. action, even if unilateral, this also has declined in the past year.
In a July 2008 poll, 68 percent said the United States should take action on global warming, regardless of whether other industrial countries, such as China and India, take similar steps. Today, 59 percent still hold that view – a majority, but less of one. (The decline was led by a 13-point drop in this view among Democrats, 12 points among women.)
Of the rest, 20 percent say the United States should act only if other countries do as well; 18 percent say it should not act at all.
GROUPS – There is strong partisanship on all these measures; for example, 69 percent of Democrats say the United States should act unilaterally, if necessary, on global warming; that drops to 59 percent of independents and 45 percent of Republicans.
Among other groups, there's a notable difference by age: Seniors are 10 points less apt than adults under 65 to favor government regulation of greenhouse gases overall; 10 points less apt to support it if it raises prices; and again 10 points less apt to back cap and trade. Support for cap and trade peaks, at 65 percent, of under-30s.
Costs, meanwhile, are particularly important to less well-off Americans. Among those making less than $50,000 a year, support for regulating greenhouse gas emissions drops by 17 points (from 75 percent to a still-majority 58 percent) if it raises prices; support if it costs $10 a month is 49 percent; and at $25, just 35 percent.
METHODOLOGY -- This ABC News/Washington Post poll was conducted by telephone June 18-21, 2009, among a random national sample of 1,001 adults, including landline and cell-phone-only respondents. Results for the full sample have a 3.5-point error margin; click here for a detailed description of sampling error. Sampling, data collection and tabulation by TNS of Horsham, Pa.
Putting a financial spin on global warming
Promoting responses to global warming as an economic opportunity — rather than as a pollution problem that needs to be solved through regulation — has long been championed by a tiny think tank in Oakland, California.
Climate change is a potential environmental disaster — but it's also potentially an economic opportunity. President Obama spoke of it in economic terms Tuesday when he urged the House of Representatives to pass legislation that wo"The nation that leads in the creation of a clean energy economy will be the nation that leads the 21st century global economy," he said. "That is what this legislation seeks to achieve. It is a bill that will open the door to a better future for this nation. And that is why I urge members of Congress to come together and pass it."
Promoting responses to global warming as an economic opportunity — rather than as a pollution problem that needs to be solved through regulation — has long been championed by a tiny think tank in Oakland, Calif.
The Breakthrough Institute
The Breakthrough Institute doesn't look like much — just a few offices in a shared suite in downtown Oakland.
There are only five people on staff. On a recent day, they were outnumbered by an incoming crop of seven freshly minted college graduates, who showed up for their summer internships.
Michael Shellenberger, 37, and Ted Nordhaus, 43, founded the Breakthrough Institute in 2002.
Shellenberger tells the interns that environmental groups — like the ones he used to work for — are going about it all wrong. By urging Congress to cast carbon dioxide as a pollutant that needs to be controlled, he says, they will constantly swim against the tide of public opinion.
"We're stuck in this kind of poor paradigm for dealing with climate change, this pollution paradigm," he says, "not because environmentalists are failures, but actually because they were so successful. The Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act, the cap and trade on acid rain — these things worked really well."
Pushing Innovation, Not Regulation
But reducing carbon dioxide is a different story. It's not just a nuisance byproduct, like the sulfur in coal that contributes to acid rain. Carbon dioxide is unavoidable when we burn coal, oil and natural gas. So getting rid of it means either capturing it at great expense, or regulating fossil fuels into oblivion.
In theory, regulation will force companies to develop cleaner alternatives as the price of carbon pollution grows. But Shellenberger says that'll never work.
"When was the last time human beings modernized our energy sources by making older power sources more expensive?" he asks the interns. "And, of course, by now you probably know that the answer is never."
Personal computers didn't take off because there was a tax on typewriters, he says. And the Internet didn't sprout up because the government made telegraphs more expensive.
"So is there a better way to do this? Well, we think that there is. It's very simple: It's that we need to make clean energy cheap worldwide."
China will never stop burning its massive reserves of coal unless there's something cheap to replace them, he argues. And the United States isn't likely to stop burning coal, either, he says.
Shellenberger and Nordhaus argue that the best way to develop those clean technologies is to increase federal energy research tenfold, and to create a project akin to the Apollo mission to the moon. But a massive increase in federal energy research spending is not a popular idea at the moment.
"There's this idea that the government shouldn't be involved in technology, the government shouldn't be picking winners and losers," Shellenberger says. "Which is sort of a funny thing to say. It's kind of like, well, why not? And when hasn't the United States government been involved in picking technology winners and losers?"
He points to the computer industry as just one example of something that came into being because of deliberate federal investments.
Tapping Into Americans' Love Of Invention
Nordhaus and Shellenberger weren't always technology advocates. They met as young adults, trying to save redwood trees on the California coast. Working as pollsters and strategists, they spent a lot of time figuring out what motivates people. That led them to rethink how to frame global warming as an issue.
"The things that will drive or not drive action have nothing to do with how well you understand how fast the polar ice caps are melting," Nordhaus says.
A sense of doom or shame only motivates a small segment of the public — and puts off the rest, he says. Instead, their research shows that people are motivated when the issue is presented as an opportunity to revolutionize energy technology.
"In fact, not only is it popular, but voters get excited about it," Shellenberger says. "If you go and talk to folks in the Rust Belt, in Ohio, or you talk to people in Silicon Valley, you talk to people in New York, Americans love that. And they love that, I think, for reasons that are really specific to the national character, which is: That's what Americans do; we invent stuff. That is so much part of who we are. It just seems crazy that we wouldn't put that at the center of our policy agenda."
Critics Say There Isn't Time
The downside of this is that global warming is a looming crisis, and critics say their solution offers no timetable for action and no assurances that technologies will be ready before the world tips into a dangerous new state. So they often hear that their approach is a distraction.
"Well, I say, look in the mirror here," Nordhaus says. He says the pollution paradigm isn't succeeding either. Most countries aren't keeping the lofty promises they made in international climate talks. And the 1,200 page climate legislation now before Congress is so full of escape clauses and giveaways, it's not clear what exactly it will achieve. One thing it won't do is substantially increase federal research dollars.
Nordhaus and Shellenberger rail against the bill in the blogosphere. And they're trying to get attention on Capitol Hill.
Taking Their Agenda To The Capitol
A few days after our interview, we meet up again in front of the Dirksen Senate Office Building.
They came to town with a simple plea: The government needs to spend more money — not less — to develop radical new energy technologies, and to help bring those to market.
On this day, they're accompanied by Peter Teague from the left-leaning Nathan Cummings Foundation — the Breakthrough Institute's main funder. Teague is pleased with what Shellenberger and Nordhaus have achieved to date.
"The president has adopted their language, their message, the story they helped to develop," Teague says. "The next stage in the development of all of this is for the actual reality of the policy to reflect the glowing, wonderful, positive, visionary rhetoric."
Turning Obama's rhetoric on energy opportunity into a fundamentally new approach to climate change will require a massive political shift. And that's the breakthrough that the Breakthrough Institute is hoping to achieve.
Climate change is a potential environmental disaster — but it's also potentially an economic opportunity. President Obama spoke of it in economic terms Tuesday when he urged the House of Representatives to pass legislation that wo"The nation that leads in the creation of a clean energy economy will be the nation that leads the 21st century global economy," he said. "That is what this legislation seeks to achieve. It is a bill that will open the door to a better future for this nation. And that is why I urge members of Congress to come together and pass it."
Promoting responses to global warming as an economic opportunity — rather than as a pollution problem that needs to be solved through regulation — has long been championed by a tiny think tank in Oakland, Calif.
The Breakthrough Institute
The Breakthrough Institute doesn't look like much — just a few offices in a shared suite in downtown Oakland.
There are only five people on staff. On a recent day, they were outnumbered by an incoming crop of seven freshly minted college graduates, who showed up for their summer internships.
Michael Shellenberger, 37, and Ted Nordhaus, 43, founded the Breakthrough Institute in 2002.
Shellenberger tells the interns that environmental groups — like the ones he used to work for — are going about it all wrong. By urging Congress to cast carbon dioxide as a pollutant that needs to be controlled, he says, they will constantly swim against the tide of public opinion.
"We're stuck in this kind of poor paradigm for dealing with climate change, this pollution paradigm," he says, "not because environmentalists are failures, but actually because they were so successful. The Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act, the cap and trade on acid rain — these things worked really well."
Pushing Innovation, Not Regulation
But reducing carbon dioxide is a different story. It's not just a nuisance byproduct, like the sulfur in coal that contributes to acid rain. Carbon dioxide is unavoidable when we burn coal, oil and natural gas. So getting rid of it means either capturing it at great expense, or regulating fossil fuels into oblivion.
In theory, regulation will force companies to develop cleaner alternatives as the price of carbon pollution grows. But Shellenberger says that'll never work.
"When was the last time human beings modernized our energy sources by making older power sources more expensive?" he asks the interns. "And, of course, by now you probably know that the answer is never."
Personal computers didn't take off because there was a tax on typewriters, he says. And the Internet didn't sprout up because the government made telegraphs more expensive.
"So is there a better way to do this? Well, we think that there is. It's very simple: It's that we need to make clean energy cheap worldwide."
China will never stop burning its massive reserves of coal unless there's something cheap to replace them, he argues. And the United States isn't likely to stop burning coal, either, he says.
Shellenberger and Nordhaus argue that the best way to develop those clean technologies is to increase federal energy research tenfold, and to create a project akin to the Apollo mission to the moon. But a massive increase in federal energy research spending is not a popular idea at the moment.
"There's this idea that the government shouldn't be involved in technology, the government shouldn't be picking winners and losers," Shellenberger says. "Which is sort of a funny thing to say. It's kind of like, well, why not? And when hasn't the United States government been involved in picking technology winners and losers?"
He points to the computer industry as just one example of something that came into being because of deliberate federal investments.
Tapping Into Americans' Love Of Invention
Nordhaus and Shellenberger weren't always technology advocates. They met as young adults, trying to save redwood trees on the California coast. Working as pollsters and strategists, they spent a lot of time figuring out what motivates people. That led them to rethink how to frame global warming as an issue.
"The things that will drive or not drive action have nothing to do with how well you understand how fast the polar ice caps are melting," Nordhaus says.
A sense of doom or shame only motivates a small segment of the public — and puts off the rest, he says. Instead, their research shows that people are motivated when the issue is presented as an opportunity to revolutionize energy technology.
"In fact, not only is it popular, but voters get excited about it," Shellenberger says. "If you go and talk to folks in the Rust Belt, in Ohio, or you talk to people in Silicon Valley, you talk to people in New York, Americans love that. And they love that, I think, for reasons that are really specific to the national character, which is: That's what Americans do; we invent stuff. That is so much part of who we are. It just seems crazy that we wouldn't put that at the center of our policy agenda."
Critics Say There Isn't Time
The downside of this is that global warming is a looming crisis, and critics say their solution offers no timetable for action and no assurances that technologies will be ready before the world tips into a dangerous new state. So they often hear that their approach is a distraction.
"Well, I say, look in the mirror here," Nordhaus says. He says the pollution paradigm isn't succeeding either. Most countries aren't keeping the lofty promises they made in international climate talks. And the 1,200 page climate legislation now before Congress is so full of escape clauses and giveaways, it's not clear what exactly it will achieve. One thing it won't do is substantially increase federal research dollars.
Nordhaus and Shellenberger rail against the bill in the blogosphere. And they're trying to get attention on Capitol Hill.
Taking Their Agenda To The Capitol
A few days after our interview, we meet up again in front of the Dirksen Senate Office Building.
They came to town with a simple plea: The government needs to spend more money — not less — to develop radical new energy technologies, and to help bring those to market.
On this day, they're accompanied by Peter Teague from the left-leaning Nathan Cummings Foundation — the Breakthrough Institute's main funder. Teague is pleased with what Shellenberger and Nordhaus have achieved to date.
"The president has adopted their language, their message, the story they helped to develop," Teague says. "The next stage in the development of all of this is for the actual reality of the policy to reflect the glowing, wonderful, positive, visionary rhetoric."
Turning Obama's rhetoric on energy opportunity into a fundamentally new approach to climate change will require a massive political shift. And that's the breakthrough that the Breakthrough Institute is hoping to achieve.
US Government Scientists Call For Urgent Action on Global Warming
Several top U.S. government climate change scientists released a new report on Tuesday warning that the effects of global warming will become more severe unless the Obama administration takes action quickly. For years, scientists have talked about the threat of rising sea levels on remote tropical islands and melting ice in the polar regions. But a new report by the U.S. Global Climate Research Program makes the threat of global warming personal. "Climate change is happening now and it's happening in our own backyards, and it affects the kinds of things people care about," said Jane Lubchenco.Jane Lubchenco is the head of the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. She says the report presents scientific evidence that will inform policy making.The report, compiled by more than 30 scientists at 13 U.S. government agencies, describes climate-related changes that are happening in the United States.Tom Karl, was a principal author of the report."U.S. average temperature has risen by 1.5 degrees Fahrenheit over the past 50 years," said Tom Karl. "We've had more rain coming in heavy downpours that can lead to flooding. Less winter precipitation is falling as snow, more as rain."The report, commissioned by the White House, uses climate models to project what will happen if action is not taken to reduce the carbon dioxide emissions that most scientists say cause global warming.It predicts increasingly deadly heat waves, and higher incidents of asthma and diseases transmitted through the water and by insects and rodents.Jerry Melillo, an author and director of the Ecosystems Center at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Massachusetts, says U.S. coastlines are under particular threat of rising sea levels and stronger hurricanes.He points specifically to the U.S. coast along the Gulf of Mexico, where seven of the nation's 10 biggest seaports are located and two-thirds of all U.S. oil imports are transported."Vital energy and transportation infrastructure will be at risk with expected sea level rise and associated storm surge," said Jerry Melillo.The report says the most severe affects of climate change can be avoided if action is taken swiftly to reduce heat-trapping gasses. Not everyone is convinced. William Gray, a professor emeritus at Colorado State University's Department of Atmospheric Science, is one of the skeptics.He says some scientists are placing too much emphasis on the role of greenhouse gases in climate change."There's no way they can warm the way the models say they do warm," said William Gray.Gray says the rising temperatures are caused by natural fluctuations in the oceans' salinity levels. "I think this whole thing in 10, 15, 20 years as we look back on this, and as we learn more, we'll see that this was a great exaggeration," he said.Scientists are not the only people debating climate change. The U.S. Congress is considering legislation on how to tackle the problem. And international negotiators from 182 nations are working on a roadmap to fight global warming. Negotiators have to come up with a plan to replace the Kyoto Protocol on greenhouse gas emissions by December, when they present their proposal at a United Nations conference in Copenhagen.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)