Monthly Archives: September 2014

On trial today – Thailand’s food workers’ rights

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Four criminal and civil prosecutions have been filed against me since 2013 by Natural Fruit Company Ltd, an exporter of tinned and concentrate pineapple and member of NatGroup.

More prosecutions were threatened last week also by the Thai Pineapple Industry Association (TPIA), whose President owns Natural Fruit, after an international solidarity campaign.

The first criminal trial in these cases, together carrying a maximum prison sentence of 8 years and a US$10m damages claim, starts today, 2nd September 2014.

But I am indeed not a criminal. I am just a 34 year old British migrant rights defender and researcher working in Thailand for a decade now. During this time, I simply tried to empower and defend migrant workers, particularly from Myanmar. I feel I can contribute uniquely and effectively on this issue.

In my mind, I have two greatest achievements in my life so far. First is supporting the founding and growth of the Migrant Worker Rights Network (MWRN), a Myanmar worker funded and managed migrant organisation that continues to make me proud and happy.

Second is organising Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s 2012 visit to Myanmar migrants in Mahachai, Samut Sakhon Province, at the office of MWRN.

Natural Fruit Company determined to punish me

Given my character and area of work in defending and empowering migrant workers, I have disputed with many people. Particularly employers, official, brokers and companies. But beyond some expression of discomfort by those on the receiving end, sometimes of public denunciations when companies or people didn’t respect migrants’ rights and continued to refuse to do so, I never faced many problems.

I began to work more closely with Thai industry, particularly the food industry. I have even acted as a migration advisor for a number of major food export companies since the beginning of 2014.

However, this situation changed after the launch in January 2013 of a Finnwatch report on working conditions in Thai tuna and pineapple processing factories that exported to Finland and other Western countries. It exposed appalling practices including forced and child labour, unlawfully low wages, excessive overtime, abuse by managers and unsafe working conditions.

Although I only researched the report and did not publish it, Natural Fruit Company Ltd – Thailand’s biggest exporter of pineapple products – decided to harass me over the report and its findings. I was an easy target as I live in the region.

It took a while to understand and adjust to the situation I was in. My future life and decisions and movements became restricted by Natural Fruit Company’s private actions.

Once the Attorney General approved the first of 3 criminal charges against me in June 2014, I was detained in a cell prior to being granted bail, actually paid for by the Thai seafood industry – which has committed to working with Finnwatch to improve migrant working conditions.

From then on, my passport was confiscated by the Court as I was a perceived flight risk, even though I returned to Thailand from where I lived in Myanmar just to fight the cases. Now the Thai government and courts formally will decide my fate.

This cloud has a silver lining – for the food workers

My prosecution made me realize however that every perceivably negative situation can be seen in a positive light. The increasingly high profile nature of the judicial harassment against me has proven to be beneficial in contributing to achieving more effectively just those goals of increased rights and access to justice for migrants in Thailand that I have worked hard to achieve for so many years.

My harassment is being used effectively by me, consumer groups, trade unions and rights groups as a means of increasing awareness and interest of consumers and importers of Thai products on the systematic nature of migrant exploitation in Thailand and the link to trade, export and corporate social responsibility. With more awareness surely comes more pressure for positive change and then eventually the change itself.

Already United Nordic, the giant Nordic buyer, has spoken out against the Thai food industries actions in prosecuting me. Now the Ethical Trading Initiative has followed suit, and more support is on the way. Natural Fruit’s actions are impacting negatively on Thailand’s reputation and its economy, not only itself.

At least 10% of Thailand workers are vulnerable migrants

For almost 3 decades, Thailand’s export orientated economy has been dependent on millions of overseas migrants, particularly from Myanmar and Cambodia. These generally impoverished low skilled workers fled from military dictatorships or economic stagnation.

They make up at least 10% of the labour market in Thailand, if not more. Increasingly these vulnerable workers make up the majority of workers in low skilled labour intensive food export and other industries.

Exploitation of migrants by employers, officials and brokers is widespread and systematic in Thailand. Thai migration policy has always been a shambles, devoid of long term planning and the rule of law. Corruption and abuse of power are all encompassing features of the migration system here, every day experiences for the workers themselves.

For this reason, in 2014 Thailand fell to Tier 3 on the US government’s trafficking in persons (TIP) annual report. Migrants are generally silent in the face of abuse and oppression. To stand up and defend their rights, to fight for better conditions, would risk their lives.

Abuse is widespread in export industries

Abuse experienced by migrants in Thailand, often treated as second class citizens or walking ATMs, extends to many export markets. Consumers across the world should be increasingly aware of this. The abuse extends beyond fishing, seafood and pineapples, those products whose abusive supply chains have already been well publicized.

Abuse against migrants is also present in the poultry, fruit, vegetable and rubber industries. Even more now, migrants are working and facing abuse in Thailand’s retail, food and beverage and tourism industry too. This abuse needs publicizing and addressing also.

There are good employers, good companies and good conditions within some labour intensive export industries in Thailand. It’s important to stress this point and promote these ‘good apples’.

But in my experience, these good, ethical and respectable companies are in the minority. Selfish business attitude, appalling treatment of workers, particularly migrants, as machines or commodities to use for personal profit too often trumps respect and rights.

It’s time for change in Thailand, and it’s time for consumers, purchasers and retailers to take a stand against abuse of workers, particularly migrants, that is ongoing. It’s time for Thai industry to face the reality of the situation, address challenges they face, weed out bad guys and promote the good guys.

Our retailers must take a lead – and pay more for ethical produce

Respecting workers rights should also be rewarded and paid for. Lowest priced products can contribute to abuse so we all may have to pay more. Importantly, large retailers or purchasers may need to make less, manufacturers to provide workers more. Workers deserve a share of the profit of their hard work.

Whatever happens in my own personal criminal prosecutions, only time will tell. The past few weeks have shown me however that I am not alone in my campaign to address migrant conditions in Thailand, whatever may happen. Indeed I have never felt alone in the battle either.

Unions, rights groups, consumers and even now purchasers and buyers of Thai products, as well as sectors of Thai industry itself, have come out to support my work and the principles I fight for. I have a strong and committed group of colleagues on the ground here too.

 

 

Andy Hall is an investigator and campaigner on migrant workers’ rights in Thailand, one of the world’s major exporters of tropical fruits and fish to worldwide markets. He blogs at andyjhall.wordpress.com/.

The Finnwatch report: Cheap has a high price.

 

 






From rich to poor – what happens in the soil?

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What happens with plants, microbes and animals during soli transition from mull to mor? Find out in the Early View paper “Coordination of aboveground and belowground responses to local-scale soil fertility differences between two contrasting Jamaican rain forest types” by David Wardle and colleagues. below is their summary of the study:

There is much interest in understanding how long term decline in soil fertility, in the absence of major disturbance, drives ecological processes, or ‘ecosystem retrogression’. However, there are few well–characterized systems for exploring this phenomenon in the tropics. We studied two types of montane rain forest in the Blue Mountains of Jamaica that occur in patches adjacent to each other and represent distinct stages in ecosystem development, i.e., an early stage with shallow organic matter (‘mull’ stage) and a late stage with deep organic matter (‘mor’ stage). We measured responses of soil fertility and plant, soil microbial and nematode communities to the transition from mull to mor, and assessed whether these responses were coupled. For soil abiotic properties, we found this transition led to declining soil nitrogen and phosphorus, and reduced availability of phosphorus relative to nitrogen; this led to a shorter and less diverse forest. The resulting litter from the plant community entering the soil subsystem contained less nitrogen and phosphorus, resulting in poorer quality litter entering the soil. We also found impairment of soil microbes (but not nematodes) and an increasing role of fungi relative to bacteria during the transition. These results show that retrogression phenomena involving increasing nutrient (notably phosphorus) limitation can be important drivers in tropical systems, and are likely to involve aboveground–belowground feedbacks whereby plants produce litter that is less nutritious, impairing soil microbial processes and thus reducing the release of nutrients from the soil needed for plant growth. This type of feedback between plants and the soil may serve as major though often overlooked drivers of long term environmental change.

Pictures: Characteristic ‘mull’ forest (top left) and uppermost soil layer with significant mixing of organic material and mineral soil (bottom left); and characteristic ‘mor’ forest (top right) with uppermost soil layer consisting of a thick layer of organic matter (bottom right). Over time the ‘mull’ soil transitions to ‘mor soil’, characterized by less available nutrients and reduced availability of nitrogen relative to phosphorus; this in turn has important consequences for the vegetation and quality of litter that is returned to the soil.

 

 

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On trial today – Thailand’s food workers’ rights

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Four criminal and civil prosecutions have been filed against me since 2013 by Natural Fruit Company Ltd, an exporter of tinned and concentrate pineapple and member of NatGroup.

More prosecutions were threatened last week also by the Thai Pineapple Industry Association (TPIA), whose President owns Natural Fruit, after an international solidarity campaign.

The first criminal trial in these cases, together carrying a maximum prison sentence of 8 years and a US$10m damages claim, starts today, 2nd September 2014.

But I am indeed not a criminal. I am just a 34 year old British migrant rights defender and researcher working in Thailand for a decade now. During this time, I simply tried to empower and defend migrant workers, particularly from Myanmar. I feel I can contribute uniquely and effectively on this issue.

In my mind, I have two greatest achievements in my life so far. First is supporting the founding and growth of the Migrant Worker Rights Network (MWRN), a Myanmar worker funded and managed migrant organisation that continues to make me proud and happy.

Second is organising Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s 2012 visit to Myanmar migrants in Mahachai, Samut Sakhon Province, at the office of MWRN.

Natural Fruit Company determined to punish me

Given my character and area of work in defending and empowering migrant workers, I have disputed with many people. Particularly employers, official, brokers and companies. But beyond some expression of discomfort by those on the receiving end, sometimes of public denunciations when companies or people didn’t respect migrants’ rights and continued to refuse to do so, I never faced many problems.

I began to work more closely with Thai industry, particularly the food industry. I have even acted as a migration advisor for a number of major food export companies since the beginning of 2014.

However, this situation changed after the launch in January 2013 of a Finnwatch report on working conditions in Thai tuna and pineapple processing factories that exported to Finland and other Western countries. It exposed appalling practices including forced and child labour, unlawfully low wages, excessive overtime, abuse by managers and unsafe working conditions.

Although I only researched the report and did not publish it, Natural Fruit Company Ltd – Thailand’s biggest exporter of pineapple products – decided to harass me over the report and its findings. I was an easy target as I live in the region.

It took a while to understand and adjust to the situation I was in. My future life and decisions and movements became restricted by Natural Fruit Company’s private actions.

Once the Attorney General approved the first of 3 criminal charges against me in June 2014, I was detained in a cell prior to being granted bail, actually paid for by the Thai seafood industry – which has committed to working with Finnwatch to improve migrant working conditions.

From then on, my passport was confiscated by the Court as I was a perceived flight risk, even though I returned to Thailand from where I lived in Myanmar just to fight the cases. Now the Thai government and courts formally will decide my fate.

This cloud has a silver lining – for the food workers

My prosecution made me realize however that every perceivably negative situation can be seen in a positive light. The increasingly high profile nature of the judicial harassment against me has proven to be beneficial in contributing to achieving more effectively just those goals of increased rights and access to justice for migrants in Thailand that I have worked hard to achieve for so many years.

My harassment is being used effectively by me, consumer groups, trade unions and rights groups as a means of increasing awareness and interest of consumers and importers of Thai products on the systematic nature of migrant exploitation in Thailand and the link to trade, export and corporate social responsibility. With more awareness surely comes more pressure for positive change and then eventually the change itself.

Already United Nordic, the giant Nordic buyer, has spoken out against the Thai food industries actions in prosecuting me. Now the Ethical Trading Initiative has followed suit, and more support is on the way. Natural Fruit’s actions are impacting negatively on Thailand’s reputation and its economy, not only itself.

At least 10% of Thailand workers are vulnerable migrants

For almost 3 decades, Thailand’s export orientated economy has been dependent on millions of overseas migrants, particularly from Myanmar and Cambodia. These generally impoverished low skilled workers fled from military dictatorships or economic stagnation.

They make up at least 10% of the labour market in Thailand, if not more. Increasingly these vulnerable workers make up the majority of workers in low skilled labour intensive food export and other industries.

Exploitation of migrants by employers, officials and brokers is widespread and systematic in Thailand. Thai migration policy has always been a shambles, devoid of long term planning and the rule of law. Corruption and abuse of power are all encompassing features of the migration system here, every day experiences for the workers themselves.

For this reason, in 2014 Thailand fell to Tier 3 on the US government’s trafficking in persons (TIP) annual report. Migrants are generally silent in the face of abuse and oppression. To stand up and defend their rights, to fight for better conditions, would risk their lives.

Abuse is widespread in export industries

Abuse experienced by migrants in Thailand, often treated as second class citizens or walking ATMs, extends to many export markets. Consumers across the world should be increasingly aware of this. The abuse extends beyond fishing, seafood and pineapples, those products whose abusive supply chains have already been well publicized.

Abuse against migrants is also present in the poultry, fruit, vegetable and rubber industries. Even more now, migrants are working and facing abuse in Thailand’s retail, food and beverage and tourism industry too. This abuse needs publicizing and addressing also.

There are good employers, good companies and good conditions within some labour intensive export industries in Thailand. It’s important to stress this point and promote these ‘good apples’.

But in my experience, these good, ethical and respectable companies are in the minority. Selfish business attitude, appalling treatment of workers, particularly migrants, as machines or commodities to use for personal profit too often trumps respect and rights.

It’s time for change in Thailand, and it’s time for consumers, purchasers and retailers to take a stand against abuse of workers, particularly migrants, that is ongoing. It’s time for Thai industry to face the reality of the situation, address challenges they face, weed out bad guys and promote the good guys.

Our retailers must take a lead – and pay more for ethical produce

Respecting workers rights should also be rewarded and paid for. Lowest priced products can contribute to abuse so we all may have to pay more. Importantly, large retailers or purchasers may need to make less, manufacturers to provide workers more. Workers deserve a share of the profit of their hard work.

Whatever happens in my own personal criminal prosecutions, only time will tell. The past few weeks have shown me however that I am not alone in my campaign to address migrant conditions in Thailand, whatever may happen. Indeed I have never felt alone in the battle either.

Unions, rights groups, consumers and even now purchasers and buyers of Thai products, as well as sectors of Thai industry itself, have come out to support my work and the principles I fight for. I have a strong and committed group of colleagues on the ground here too.

 

 

Andy Hall is an investigator and campaigner on migrant workers’ rights in Thailand, one of the world’s major exporters of tropical fruits and fish to worldwide markets. He blogs at andyjhall.wordpress.com/.

The Finnwatch report: Cheap has a high price.

 

 






Danish Navy helps Faroe Islanders kill 33 pilot whales

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Following their arrest on Saturday for attempting to prevent the slaughter of 33 pilot whales in the Faroe’s annual ‘grindadrap’ cetacean slaughter, 14 crew members have been released.

However three small boats seized by the Royal Danish Navy are being held as ‘evidence’ until the crew returns to court at the end of the month.

A total of 14 volunteer crewmembers of Sea Shepherd’s pilot whale defense campaign Operation GrindStop 2014 arrested on Saturday in the Faroe Islands have been released.

In a sneaky legal move, the six land crew are appearing in court today – but the eight boat crew have been given a court date of 25th September – and their three boats are being held until then as evidence denying their use to disrupt the hunt until then.

All video and still camera data cards were also taken by police as ‘evidence’ and are still being held.

The members of the onshore team led by Sea Shepherd USA and the offshore team led by Sea Shepherd France were arrested as they attempted to protect a pod of 33 pilot whales from the brutal mass slaughter known as the ‘grindadrap’ or ‘grind’.

Sea Shepherd was on the scene immediately, but as the pod was driven in from very close to shore, there was little time to prevent the slaughter. The panicked pilot whales thrashed in the water and could be heard screaming in pain as the water turned red with blood.

Denmark’s navy to the defence of whalers

As an EU member Denmark is subject to laws prohibiting the slaughter of cetaceans, however it has supported the Faroese whale slaughter by sending the Royal Danish Navy to defend the ‘grind’, working alongside alongside Faroese police.

Denmark’s Navy seized three Sea Shepherd small boats – Loki, the Mike Galesi, and the B.S. Sheen (sponsored by actor Charlie Sheen) – and their crew were arrested and flown to Torshavn by Royal Danish Navy helicopter.

“The 14 brave, dedicated volunteers who risked their own safety to put themselves between a pod of pilot whales and their killers have been released today”, said Sea Shepherd Founder Captain Paul Watson.

The volunteers, he added “are not criminals, but heroes. It is Denmark, an ‘anti-whaling’ EU member nation, that has acted in blatant defiance of the law by protecting this heinous massacre of whales.”

Whale flesh dumped at sea and onshore

The whale killers also left pilot whale meat and fins to rot on the ground – undermining numerous PR claims that the hunt is carried out for subsistence and that no part of the killed cetaceans goes to waste.

At the whale processing facility on Sunday, Sea Shepherd volunteers discovered discarded whale flesh, as well as tiny fins that appear to be from babies taken from their mother’s wombs, simply left as garbage. The crew described the stench in the area of the discarded flesh as “unbearable”.

Sea Shepherd also recently discovered discarded whale flesh from a slaughtered pod of beached bottlenose whales dumped at sea by the Faroese whalers, capturing images and footage with its drone force.

Pregnant female, infant and juvenile whales are often killed in grind hunts, as the Faroese whalers wipe out entire pods and generations at a time.

Sea Shepherd has led the opposition against the slaughter of cetaceans in the Faroe Islands since the 1980s. Launched in June, Operation GrindStop 2014 is Sea Shepherd’s largest Faroe Islands campaign to date.

The multi-national land and sea-based campaign features hundreds of volunteers who will be present in the Faroe Islands over the course of four months to defend pilot whales and other species of small cetaceans from the brutal and archaic mass slaughter.

Last weekend’s slaughter was the first grind hunt to take place in the more than 80 days that Sea Shepherd has patrolled the islands. The campaign spans the traditionally bloodiest months of the hunt season.

 

 

Volunteers needed: Sea Shepherd is seeking additional volunteers to join the team in the Faroe Islands for the last month of campaign. Volunteers please complete and submit the application at Grindstop 2014 On-Shore Crew Application by 10th September at 5pm EST.

Oliver Tickell edits The Ecologist.

 






Liberation is our birthright! Palestine stands with Ferguson

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Police brutality, oppression and murder against Black people in the US, and against Latinos, Arabs and Muslims, people of color and poor people, has never been merely ‘mistakes’ or ‘violations of individual rights’ but rather are part and parcel of an integral and systematic racism that reflects the nature of the political system in the US.

Every time a crime is committed against Black people, it is explained away as an ‘isolated incident’ but when you see the massive number of ‘isolated incidents’ the reality cannot be hidden – this is an ongoing policy that remains virulently racist and oppressive.

The US empire is built on racism, colonialism and genocide

The US empire was built on the backs of Black slavery and the genocide of Black people – and upon settler colonialism and the genocide of indigenous people. The people of Ferguson are resisting, in a long tradition of Black resistance, and we support their legitimate resistance to racist oppression.

As people in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Arab World see the brutality of the United States outside its borders, these communities confront its racist and colonial oppression within the borders of the US. The two are inextricably linked.

We also see US exploitation and plunder of people’s resources around the world. And inside the United States, Africans, Latinos, Filipinos, Afghans, Arabs who have suffered war and imperialism at the hands of the United States outside its borders are the same communities who face criminalization, brutality, exploitation, isolation and killings and murder at the hands of the state.

We see the targeting of migrants and refugees inside the US after their countries have been ravaged by imperialism, war and exploitation by the same ruling forces.

The mass incarceration of Blacks and Palestinians

Mass imprisonment and incarceration has been a central tool of racist control in the United States. One out of every three Black men in the US will be imprisoned. Every 28 hours a Black person is killed by the state or someone protected by the state.

Palestinians know well the use of mass imprisonment to maintain racist domination and oppression and breaking the racist structures of imprisonment is critical to our liberation movement. We salute Mumia Abu-Jamal and all of the political prisoners of the Black liberation movement in US jails and call for their immediate freedom.

Since the earliest days of the Black movement in the US, from slaves revolting for freedom to the civil rights movement and beyond, Black people, organizations and movements have faced severe state repression, targeting, incarceration and killings at the hands of the state.

US domestic intelligence agencies such as the FBI, who target Palestinian and Arab communities for state repression, have for years focused on attacking Black movements, leaders and communities as a central project.

In Ferguson and the West Bank, we are living under siege

Racism, poverty and oppression are the predominant scene faced by oppressed nations and communities in the United States. Black people in the United States are in fact under siege.

And just as we demand the end of the siege on our Palestinian people, in Gaza and everywhere, we demand an end to the siege of institutionalized racism and oppression in education, jobs, social services and all areas of life, and support the Black movements struggling to end that siege.

When we see the images today in Ferguson, we see another emerging Intifada in the long line of Intifada and struggle that has been carried out by Black people in the US and internationally.

The Palestinian national liberation movement salutes the Black liberation movement, and has learned so much from the experiences of Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, Frederick Douglass, the Black Panthers, Sojourner Truth, and generations of Black revolutionaries who have led the way in struggling for liberation and self-determination.

The struggle inside the United States is an integral part of the struggle against imperialism – in fact it is central, as it is taking place ‘in the belly of the beast.

A single movement: Blacks, Indigenous peoples, Palestinians

This is also the case for the struggle of Indigenous peoples and nations throughout North America, where settler colonial powers have been built through land theft and genocide, yet where indigenous people have always resisted and continue to resist today.

Every victory inside the United States and political achievement by popular movements and liberation struggles is a victory for Palestine and a victory for a world of human liberation.

Those who think that the fate of people in the United States lies with the ruling class parties, the Republicans and Democrats, until the end of time, are living in an illusion. So too are those who believe Palestine can find freedom by seeking alliances or guarantees by those who oppress Black people.

The Black struggle is leading the world in the struggle for an alternative political system that will bring US empire to defeat. We know that this will happen only through struggle, through organization of people, emerging from uprisings and communities rising in anger against injustice.

The anti-racist movement and anti-Zionist movement are not and cannot be separated. Fighting against racism means fighting capitalism. Fighting against capitalism means fighting for socialism.

We must extend and deepen our solidarity

In light of the police murder of the martyr Michael Brown and the ongoing struggle in Ferguson, Missouri, in the United States, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine salutes and stands firmly with the ongoing struggle of Black people and all oppressed communities in the United States.

The Front encourages all Palestinians, and especially our Palestinian community in the United States, to continue and intensify their efforts in support of the Black liberation movement, from joining actions in support of Ferguson and in honor of Michael Brown, to long-term and sustained joint struggle and mutual solidarity with the Black movement.

There are long histories of this work, and it is critical for all of our communities to expand and deepen our links of struggle and solidarity.

The PFLP sends its revolutionary greetings, its solidarity message and its salutes to the struggling people of Ferguson on the front lines confronting US empire, and to the generations upon generations of Black struggle.

Our Palestinian liberation movement is part of one struggle with the Black liberation movement. This has been a position of principle for the Front since its founding. We reaffirm this stand today and will always do so until both of our peoples – and our world – are liberated.

 

 

Khaled Barakat is a Palestinian writer and activist whose voice is frequently heard via the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.

This article is based on an interview with Khaled Barakat published by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine: ‘PFLP salutes the Black struggle in the US: The empire will fall from within‘.

 






We must protect our seas!

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I’ve just completed the first long-distance swim in the seven Seas of the ancient world. I’ve experienced some things I will never forget. And seen some things I wish I could erase from my memory, but which will haunt me for the rest of my days.

I will never forget the people I met along this journey, the literally hundreds of people from all walks of life who helped us and supported us and jumped in the sea to swim with us, just to be part of this mission, just for their love of the sea.

And then there are the things I would rather forget. Such as the sea floor under me as I swam the Aegean, which was covered with litter. I saw tyres and plastic bags, bottles, cans, shoes and clothing – but absolutely nothing that qualifies as ‘sea life’.

Turtles and jellyfish – but where were the sharks?

In the Arabian Sea I swam through vast shoals of turtles, which was spectacular. They do belong there. But so do many, many other fish species, and those were nowhere to be seen.

I never saw any fish bigger than the size of my hand, in any of the seven Seas. The larger ones had all been fished out.

The Black Sea was full of jellyfish. This is not a good thing, because they don’t belong there – they were brought in with the ballast on visiting ships and wrought havoc on an ecosystem that was already unbalanced.

In the entire four weeks I did not see one shark, anywhere.

As I was about to jump in the water for the Red Sea swim I asked the boat’s skipper whether I should keep a look out for sharks. He told me not to worry, because the sharks have all been fished out. That’s exactly what does worry me. A healthy ocean is an ocean with sharks.

Suddenly, the Red Sea came to life

But I did see something astonishing in the Red Sea. It was when I swam through a Marine Protected Area, and experienced a sea as it was meant to be: rich and colourful, teaming with abundant life.

And then, just two kilometres on, outside of the protected area, the picture changed again. There was no coral and there were no fish. It looked like an underwater desert.

If I had needed more proof that Marine Protected Areas really work, that was it. Everything I knew about how MPAs allow marine life to recover, how they protect and restore fish stocks, how they provide income-generating livelihoods for local people, how they boost ecotourism and ensure long-term sustainability, was all there in front of me.

Many of the people I met along the way have experienced it too. They have seen their seas changing. They know that there is a serious problem. And they have seen that the problem is reversible, IF we take urgent action and create Marine Protected Areas.

Thinking ahead

There’s a reason we ended our final North Sea swim at the Thames Barrier. It’s a highly symbolic example of foresight and visionary design. When it was built 30 years ago, its engineers had no idea how crucial it would be. They thought it would be used two or three times a year.

But this last winter it was used 48 times. Where would London be today without the Thames Barrier? In a word: underwater.

I don’t want to imagine what the world will be like in 30 years time if we don’t protect our marine resources today.

The world’s waters are changing. The seas and oceans are in a state of crisis. And we rely on these seas and oceans – all of us on this planet, wherever we live – for our very livelihood.

I am well aware that the world is caught up in a number of serious global political and humanitarian crises right now. It is certainly not my intention to trivialise any of these. But in focusing solely on the current state of global hyper-conflict, we run the risk of losing sight of something that is going to affect our children and grandchildren.

Protecting resources fosters peace

The biggest risk the world faces right now is what is being done to the environment, and a large part of that is what’s happening in our seas.

When Desmond Tutu came to wish me well at the outset of this expedition, he reminded me of something fundamental. He reminded me that so many of the world’s conflicts are over resources. When we fail to protect our resources, we set the stage for conflict. But when we protect our resources, we foster peace.

I dream of a peaceful world of well-managed Marine Protected Areas, protecting our coastlines and extending across our high seas. Of abundant oceans teeming with fish, big and small, with turtles and whales and sea-birds. Oceans filled with sharks.

Now is the time to make that dream happen. To reverse the rampant devastation of our marine resources, to provide them safe havens that allow them to regroup and recover.  Too many species are dying out, hunted to near extinction, slipping through our fingers, like sand.

Let’s stop fighting. And start giving our seas a fighting chance.

 

 

Lewis Pugh is an ocean advocate and a pioneer swimmer. In 2010 he was named a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum and in 2013 he was appointed Patron of the Oceans by the United Nations Environment Programme. http://lewispugh.com

This article was originally published on Lewis’s blog.

 






Scotland’s double first: tidal array and twin-bladed offshore wind turbines

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The Crown Estate has committed to invest nearly £10 million into the MeyGen Ltd tidal power development.

The 398MW project in the Inner Sound of the Pentland Firth, Scotland, will require some £50 million of funding for its first phase.

Investors also include Atlantis Resources Ltd, the Department of Energy & Climate Change, and Scottish Enterprise.

The location is both highly challenging and promising due to the fast water speeds, according to the Crown Estate.

“The Inner Sound tidal array project has the potential to play a crucial role in advancing technology and developing essential construction and operating experience on the path towards larger commercial schemes around the UK and worldwide.”

A long term comittment to unlocking the tidal resource

Rob Hastings, Director of Energy and Infrastructure, The Crown Estate said: “We have been a major player in the development of the offshore renewable energy industry for over 10 years.

“Our commitment to this investment is part of our strategy to explore the potential of tidal stream energy on a commercial scale with a project that offers a crucial stepping stone on the path towards unlocking the nation’s tidal energy potential over the long term.”

The Estate has so far leased over 40 sites for tidal current and wave projects, and has now started the first leasing process for tidal range projects. New seabed rights agreed this summer include:

  • Six new wave and tidal current demonstration zones across the UK.
  • Five new wave and tidal current sites, each with the potential to deliver a project of between 10 and 30 MW.

The Crown Estate is legal owner and manager of the UK’s territorial seabed, giving it a key role in the development of the country’s offshore renewable energy assets. It is also promoting the development the offshore wind, with up to a £100 million of investment.

Two-bladed wind turbines

The Crown Estate has also agreed terms with Forthwind Ltd, a subsidiary of 2-B Energy, for the UK’s first offshore demonstration of two 6MW two-bladed turbines on the seabed at Methil in Scotland.

Two-bladed designs at this scale are a major innovation for the offshore wind industry and the deployment offshore of the turbines at Methil will be the first in the world of its kind.

The company will first build a full-scale onshore prototype in the Netherlands ahead of the two offshore machines planned for Methil, which are anticipated for deployment in 2016 subject to planning consent.

Achieving significant cost reductions

For offshore wind to flourish it’s essential to develop new technologies as costs are roughly double those of onshore wind, making it unaffordable for large scale deployment at current prices.

It’s also considered desirable to move the main focus of wind development out to sea to avoid the environmental problems associated with onshore wind; and because the offshore wind resource is far greater, with higher wind speeds.

Mikael Jakobsson, chief operating officer for 2-B Energy said: “We hope that through this offshore development and demonstration step, and following the completion of our first on-shore demonstrator in early 2015, to be able to validate significant cost reductions in future offshore wind deployment.”

In addition to two-bladed turbine design, 2-B Energy are seeking to further reduce costs by integrating wind turbine technology with innovations in grid and access systems, the installation process and a new operational strategy.

Huub den Rooijen, Head of Offshore Wind at The Crown Estate said: “In order to fully unlock the potential of offshore wind over the long term, it is vital that opportunities are made available to test and demonstrate innovative and emerging technology platforms to bring down costs and secure the UK’s position as a global leader in offshore wind technology.

“We look forward with interest to seeing the technology mature.”

 






Fracked off – natural gas victims flee Colorado’s toxic air

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A general contractor in Colorado’s Grand Valley, Duke Cox says the first time he became aware that drilling for gas might be a problem was back in the early 2000s when he happened to attend a local public hearing on oil and gas development.

A woman who came to testify began sobbing as she talked about the gas rigs that were making the air around her home impossible to breathe.

“There were 17 rigs in the area, at that time”, Cox says. “And they were across the valley, so I wasn’t affected. But she was my neighbor.”

The incident led Cox to join the Grand Valley Citizens Alliance, a group of activists concerned about drilling policies in his area on Colorado’s Western Slope. Within months he became the group’s President and public face.

And as fracking for gas became more common across the state, he has found more and more of his time taken up with the cause. “We are ground zero for natural gas and fracking in this country”, he says.

His claim is not hyperbole in many respects. Scientists in Colorado are publishing alarming studies that show gas wells harm those living in close proximity, and dozens of stories stretching back over a decade have documented the ill effects of natural gas drilling on Colorado’s citizens.

In response to public unease, the state has created a system to report complaints of oil and gas health effects. The subject has become so acute that it consumes Colorado’s politicians and electorate, who have been squaring off on multiple ballot initiatives to limit where companies can drill, in order to provide a buffer between gas wells and people’s homes.

Don’t mention the tax subsidies!

But there’s one fact the industry would like to hide from the public (but uses in its lobbying of Congress): much of the drilling activity in Colorado would never happen were it not for generous tax subsidies.

Four years ago, the American Petroleum Institute concluded that gas development would fall dramatically in the Rocky Mountain region without certain tax breaks to make development economically viable.

While precise figures for subsidies specific to Colorado are difficult to derive, a recent report by Oil Change International shows that subsidies to the fossil fuel industry continue to grow in value as the fracking boom has hit its stride.

At the national level, the report shows over $21 billion in federal and state subsidies that taxpayers provided to the fossil fuel industry in 2013. The use and value of these subsidies have increased dramatically in recent years-a product of the ‘all of the above’ energy policy.

“They are profitable because of tax breaks”, says Cox.

Scientific alarm

Studies published in leading scientific journals continue to document the potential harm to people living close to gas wells. In 2012, a Colorado nonprofit called The Endocrine Disruption Exchange published the results of gas well air samples tested for chemicals.

The study found several hydrocarbons at levels known to affect the endocrine system and lower the IQ scores of children exposed while they were fetuses.

Last February, researchers with the Colorado School of Public Health and Brown University released a study that discovered that children born close to gas wells had a 30% greater chance of congenital heart defects and a higher incidence of neural tube defects.

The study was met with criticism from Colorado’s Chief Medical Officer … a perhaps unsurprising reaction from a state official appointed by a governor with well documented strong ties to the oil and gas industry.

The criticism follows a pattern of reactions from government officials throughout the country, pushing back against a growing mountain of evidence of fracking’s ill effects.

Learning from Tobacco

Lisa McKenzie, a Research Associate at the Colorado School of Public Health and one of the Colorado study’s authors, acknowledges the study’s limitations and uncertainties. “We would like to go back and get a look at the type of exposures these women had during the first trimester of pregnancy”, she says.

Unfortunately, she has not been able to expand on her publicly-funded research, thus far.

Chuck Davis, a political scientist at Colorado State University, compares attempts by the fossil fuel industry and industry allies to highlight scientific uncertainty to similar strategies tobacco companies undertook in order to underplay health risks.

In both tobacco and the oil and gas industry’s cases, the presence of some form of ‘doubt’ around the science of the impacts of their industries (whether real or contrived) helps the industry continue practices that experts believe to be harmful.

In another example of this strategy, the Colorado public health office again highlighted scientific uncertainties after officials at Valley View Hospital in Garfield County reported an increase in anomalies in fetuses carried by women living close to gas wells.

After state investigators found no common cause to explain the fetal anomalies, Wolk seemed to dismiss legitimate concerns by local public health officials. “People have to be careful about making assumptions”, Wolk told the Denver Post.

Meanwhile, residents of Colorado continue to see new health impacts, and fracking continues at pace in their communities. Many of these residents don’t see the uncertainty state officials continue to push.

Lives ruined beyond repair

When a New York Times reporter went to Garfield County three years ago, the paper published a video on residents complaining of air problems caused by natural gas rigs.

“We’re gonna pack up. We’re leaving”, said Floyd Green, a welder who had lived in the County for the past three years. “We’re moving back East, and we’re having to start completely over.”

Green detailed several symptoms his family experienced, forcing them to leave the area. “We constantly smell the fumes from the condensate tanks which cause headaches, sometimes nausea. Diarrhea, nosebleeds, muscle spasms.”

A link to the video can be found at Frack Free Colorado, which has a webpage devoted to “Colorado’s Affected People”. Green is just one of many people who allege problems from natural gas including Susan Wallace Babbs, of Parachute and Karen Trulove of Silt.

While these individuals were once actively speaking out about the dangers of fracking, their voices have fallen silent. Phone numbers have become disconnected and addresses no longer current.

“They sign nondisclosure forms or move away”, says Tara Meixsell, who lives on a ranch outside New Castle. “Very few win lawsuits. Some sign gag orders, but more just move away, lose everything, and marriages crumble.”

Get out while you can …

Meixsell was featured in the documentary ‘Split Estate‘ and she wrote ‘Collateral Damage‘, a book that chronicles the lives of those affected by gas development.

She became involved around 8 years ago, she says, after she drove out to a nearby ranch to buy hay that was selling for about half of market price. When she got there, the reason for the discount quickly became clear.

The owners were two professionals who had bought a ranch to raise cows, but they soon found their land surrounded by gas rigs, making it impossible for them to breathe the air. After fighting for a year, Meixsell says they were told by their lawyer to give up and move away.

“They were leaving the ranch and didn’t need the hay”, says Meixsell. And it’s not the first time she’s witnessed such events. “When I hear these ranchers come to the state house and testify, ‘My husband and I bought 20 acres and it’s our dream home.’ It’s like a broken record to the politicians because they’ve heard it all before.”

Cox agrees, adding that many of the people he met after first becoming aware of the problem have signed nondisclosure agreements with companies or moved away. In fact, he moved from his former house to an area with little gas development, but the companies are now moving in. “It’s the same old, same old”, he says.

Taxpayers funding a dangerous environmental experiment with their own health

When Meixsell talks about how bad gas development has been to the health of people in Colorado, she does not mince words. “We’re guinea pigs”, she says.

But this experiment of exposing people to toxics released by natural gas development would not occur without billions in subsidies from the federal and state governments. In a recent report,

Oil Change International has found that federal subsidies for production and exploration for fossil fuel subsidies have grown by 45%, from $12.7 billion to a current total of $18.5 billion. Much of the increase comes from intensified production.

“At a time when scientists are telling us that oil and gas production is unsafe for our communities and also our climate as a whole, it’s simply irrational to continue pumping billions of taxpayer dollars to this industry via increased subsidies”, says David Turnbull, Campaigns Director of Oil Change International.

“Despite dire warnings from academics and communities sounding the alarm, these subsidies somehow continue today.”

The White House has estimated that the subsidy for accelerated depreciation of natural gas distribution pipelines was $110 million in 2013. This subsidy allows companies to deduct higher levels of pipeline depreciation costs upfront, providing a financial benefit to the companies.

Or, as the American Gas Association itself puts it, depreciation helps to “encourage the expansion and revitalization of the natural gas utility infrastructure.”

Colorado also kicks in financial support. The state currently supplies additional gas production subsidies in the form of sales tax exemptions, allowing industry to escape Colorado’s 2.9% sales tax.

“The rest of the country doesn’t get it”, says Cox. “[Natural gas] is not a clean fuel. But the word is getting out, and they are starting to lose the fight.”

 

 

Take action: help put an end to fossil fuel subsidies and extreme energy extraction.

Paul Thacker is an American journalist who specializes in science, medicine and environmental reporting. He has written for Science, Journal of the American Medical Association, Salon.com, and The New Republic, and Environmental Science & Technology, and is currently on assignment with Oil Change International.

Postscript: Read more about the current state of Colorado fracking in our recent blog post.

This article was originally published by Oil Change International, the second in a series of ‘subsidy spotlights’ highlighting the real-word impacts of fossil fuel subsidies.

Read the first subsidy spotlight on the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.

 






Scotland’s double first: tidal array and twin-bladed offshore wind turbines

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The Crown Estate has committed to invest nearly £10 million into the MeyGen Ltd tidal power development.

The 398MW project in the Inner Sound of the Pentland Firth, Scotland, will require some £50 million of funding for its first phase.

Investors also include Atlantis Resources Ltd, the Department of Energy & Climate Change, and Scottish Enterprise.

The location is both highly challenging and promising due to the fast water speeds, according to the Crown Estate.

“The Inner Sound tidal array project has the potential to play a crucial role in advancing technology and developing essential construction and operating experience on the path towards larger commercial schemes around the UK and worldwide.”

A long term comittment to unlocking the tidal resource

Rob Hastings, Director of Energy and Infrastructure, The Crown Estate said: “We have been a major player in the development of the offshore renewable energy industry for over 10 years.

“Our commitment to this investment is part of our strategy to explore the potential of tidal stream energy on a commercial scale with a project that offers a crucial stepping stone on the path towards unlocking the nation’s tidal energy potential over the long term.”

The Estate has so far leased over 40 sites for tidal current and wave projects, and has now started the first leasing process for tidal range projects. New seabed rights agreed this summer include:

  • Six new wave and tidal current demonstration zones across the UK.
  • Five new wave and tidal current sites, each with the potential to deliver a project of between 10 and 30 MW.

The Crown Estate is legal owner and manager of the UK’s territorial seabed, giving it a key role in the development of the country’s offshore renewable energy assets. It is also promoting the development the offshore wind, with up to a £100 million of investment.

Two-bladed wind turbines

The Crown Estate has also agreed terms with Forthwind Ltd, a subsidiary of 2-B Energy, for the UK’s first offshore demonstration of two 6MW two-bladed turbines on the seabed at Methil in Scotland.

Two-bladed designs at this scale are a major innovation for the offshore wind industry and the deployment offshore of the turbines at Methil will be the first in the world of its kind.

The company will first build a full-scale onshore prototype in the Netherlands ahead of the two offshore machines planned for Methil, which are anticipated for deployment in 2016 subject to planning consent.

Achieving significant cost reductions

For offshore wind to flourish it’s essential to develop new technologies as costs are roughly double those of onshore wind, making it unaffordable for large scale deployment at current prices.

It’s also considered desirable to move the main focus of wind development out to sea to avoid the environmental problems associated with onshore wind; and because the offshore wind resource is far greater, with higher wind speeds.

Mikael Jakobsson, chief operating officer for 2-B Energy said: “We hope that through this offshore development and demonstration step, and following the completion of our first on-shore demonstrator in early 2015, to be able to validate significant cost reductions in future offshore wind deployment.”

In addition to two-bladed turbine design, 2-B Energy are seeking to further reduce costs by integrating wind turbine technology with innovations in grid and access systems, the installation process and a new operational strategy.

Huub den Rooijen, Head of Offshore Wind at The Crown Estate said: “In order to fully unlock the potential of offshore wind over the long term, it is vital that opportunities are made available to test and demonstrate innovative and emerging technology platforms to bring down costs and secure the UK’s position as a global leader in offshore wind technology.

“We look forward with interest to seeing the technology mature.”

 






Fracked off – natural gas victims flee Colorado’s toxic air

Leave a reply




A general contractor in Colorado’s Grand Valley, Duke Cox says the first time he became aware that drilling for gas might be a problem was back in the early 2000s when he happened to attend a local public hearing on oil and gas development.

A woman who came to testify began sobbing as she talked about the gas rigs that were making the air around her home impossible to breathe.

“There were 17 rigs in the area, at that time”, Cox says. “And they were across the valley, so I wasn’t affected. But she was my neighbor.”

The incident led Cox to join the Grand Valley Citizens Alliance, a group of activists concerned about drilling policies in his area on Colorado’s Western Slope. Within months he became the group’s President and public face.

And as fracking for gas became more common across the state, he has found more and more of his time taken up with the cause. “We are ground zero for natural gas and fracking in this country”, he says.

His claim is not hyperbole in many respects. Scientists in Colorado are publishing alarming studies that show gas wells harm those living in close proximity, and dozens of stories stretching back over a decade have documented the ill effects of natural gas drilling on Colorado’s citizens.

In response to public unease, the state has created a system to report complaints of oil and gas health effects. The subject has become so acute that it consumes Colorado’s politicians and electorate, who have been squaring off on multiple ballot initiatives to limit where companies can drill, in order to provide a buffer between gas wells and people’s homes.

Don’t mention the tax subsidies!

But there’s one fact the industry would like to hide from the public (but uses in its lobbying of Congress): much of the drilling activity in Colorado would never happen were it not for generous tax subsidies.

Four years ago, the American Petroleum Institute concluded that gas development would fall dramatically in the Rocky Mountain region without certain tax breaks to make development economically viable.

While precise figures for subsidies specific to Colorado are difficult to derive, a recent report by Oil Change International shows that subsidies to the fossil fuel industry continue to grow in value as the fracking boom has hit its stride.

At the national level, the report shows over $21 billion in federal and state subsidies that taxpayers provided to the fossil fuel industry in 2013. The use and value of these subsidies have increased dramatically in recent years-a product of the ‘all of the above’ energy policy.

“They are profitable because of tax breaks”, says Cox.

Scientific alarm

Studies published in leading scientific journals continue to document the potential harm to people living close to gas wells. In 2012, a Colorado nonprofit called The Endocrine Disruption Exchange published the results of gas well air samples tested for chemicals.

The study found several hydrocarbons at levels known to affect the endocrine system and lower the IQ scores of children exposed while they were fetuses.

Last February, researchers with the Colorado School of Public Health and Brown University released a study that discovered that children born close to gas wells had a 30% greater chance of congenital heart defects and a higher incidence of neural tube defects.

The study was met with criticism from Colorado’s Chief Medical Officer … a perhaps unsurprising reaction from a state official appointed by a governor with well documented strong ties to the oil and gas industry.

The criticism follows a pattern of reactions from government officials throughout the country, pushing back against a growing mountain of evidence of fracking’s ill effects.

Learning from Tobacco

Lisa McKenzie, a Research Associate at the Colorado School of Public Health and one of the Colorado study’s authors, acknowledges the study’s limitations and uncertainties. “We would like to go back and get a look at the type of exposures these women had during the first trimester of pregnancy”, she says.

Unfortunately, she has not been able to expand on her publicly-funded research, thus far.

Chuck Davis, a political scientist at Colorado State University, compares attempts by the fossil fuel industry and industry allies to highlight scientific uncertainty to similar strategies tobacco companies undertook in order to underplay health risks.

In both tobacco and the oil and gas industry’s cases, the presence of some form of ‘doubt’ around the science of the impacts of their industries (whether real or contrived) helps the industry continue practices that experts believe to be harmful.

In another example of this strategy, the Colorado public health office again highlighted scientific uncertainties after officials at Valley View Hospital in Garfield County reported an increase in anomalies in fetuses carried by women living close to gas wells.

After state investigators found no common cause to explain the fetal anomalies, Wolk seemed to dismiss legitimate concerns by local public health officials. “People have to be careful about making assumptions”, Wolk told the Denver Post.

Meanwhile, residents of Colorado continue to see new health impacts, and fracking continues at pace in their communities. Many of these residents don’t see the uncertainty state officials continue to push.

Lives ruined beyond repair

When a New York Times reporter went to Garfield County three years ago, the paper published a video on residents complaining of air problems caused by natural gas rigs.

“We’re gonna pack up. We’re leaving”, said Floyd Green, a welder who had lived in the County for the past three years. “We’re moving back East, and we’re having to start completely over.”

Green detailed several symptoms his family experienced, forcing them to leave the area. “We constantly smell the fumes from the condensate tanks which cause headaches, sometimes nausea. Diarrhea, nosebleeds, muscle spasms.”

A link to the video can be found at Frack Free Colorado, which has a webpage devoted to “Colorado’s Affected People”. Green is just one of many people who allege problems from natural gas including Susan Wallace Babbs, of Parachute and Karen Trulove of Silt.

While these individuals were once actively speaking out about the dangers of fracking, their voices have fallen silent. Phone numbers have become disconnected and addresses no longer current.

“They sign nondisclosure forms or move away”, says Tara Meixsell, who lives on a ranch outside New Castle. “Very few win lawsuits. Some sign gag orders, but more just move away, lose everything, and marriages crumble.”

Get out while you can …

Meixsell was featured in the documentary ‘Split Estate‘ and she wrote ‘Collateral Damage‘, a book that chronicles the lives of those affected by gas development.

She became involved around 8 years ago, she says, after she drove out to a nearby ranch to buy hay that was selling for about half of market price. When she got there, the reason for the discount quickly became clear.

The owners were two professionals who had bought a ranch to raise cows, but they soon found their land surrounded by gas rigs, making it impossible for them to breathe the air. After fighting for a year, Meixsell says they were told by their lawyer to give up and move away.

“They were leaving the ranch and didn’t need the hay”, says Meixsell. And it’s not the first time she’s witnessed such events. “When I hear these ranchers come to the state house and testify, ‘My husband and I bought 20 acres and it’s our dream home.’ It’s like a broken record to the politicians because they’ve heard it all before.”

Cox agrees, adding that many of the people he met after first becoming aware of the problem have signed nondisclosure agreements with companies or moved away. In fact, he moved from his former house to an area with little gas development, but the companies are now moving in. “It’s the same old, same old”, he says.

Taxpayers funding a dangerous environmental experiment with their own health

When Meixsell talks about how bad gas development has been to the health of people in Colorado, she does not mince words. “We’re guinea pigs”, she says.

But this experiment of exposing people to toxics released by natural gas development would not occur without billions in subsidies from the federal and state governments. In a recent report,

Oil Change International has found that federal subsidies for production and exploration for fossil fuel subsidies have grown by 45%, from $12.7 billion to a current total of $18.5 billion. Much of the increase comes from intensified production.

“At a time when scientists are telling us that oil and gas production is unsafe for our communities and also our climate as a whole, it’s simply irrational to continue pumping billions of taxpayer dollars to this industry via increased subsidies”, says David Turnbull, Campaigns Director of Oil Change International.

“Despite dire warnings from academics and communities sounding the alarm, these subsidies somehow continue today.”

The White House has estimated that the subsidy for accelerated depreciation of natural gas distribution pipelines was $110 million in 2013. This subsidy allows companies to deduct higher levels of pipeline depreciation costs upfront, providing a financial benefit to the companies.

Or, as the American Gas Association itself puts it, depreciation helps to “encourage the expansion and revitalization of the natural gas utility infrastructure.”

Colorado also kicks in financial support. The state currently supplies additional gas production subsidies in the form of sales tax exemptions, allowing industry to escape Colorado’s 2.9% sales tax.

“The rest of the country doesn’t get it”, says Cox. “[Natural gas] is not a clean fuel. But the word is getting out, and they are starting to lose the fight.”

 

 

Take action: help put an end to fossil fuel subsidies and extreme energy extraction.

Paul Thacker is an American journalist who specializes in science, medicine and environmental reporting. He has written for Science, Journal of the American Medical Association, Salon.com, and The New Republic, and Environmental Science & Technology, and is currently on assignment with Oil Change International.

Postscript: Read more about the current state of Colorado fracking in our recent blog post.

This article was originally published by Oil Change International, the second in a series of ‘subsidy spotlights’ highlighting the real-word impacts of fossil fuel subsidies.

Read the first subsidy spotlight on the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.