Visitors might begin experiencing shortness of breath after one or two minutes inside artist Michael Pinsky’s Pollution Pods, but there’s nothing dangerous in the air in the pods.

Safe perfume blends and fog machines imitate the air quality of some of the world’s most polluted cities – London, Beijing, São Paulo, New Delhi – as well as one of the most pristine environments on earth, Tautra in Norway. 

Outside the pods, however, air pollution has been declared a public health priority by the World Health Organization (WHO).  Largely caused by the same burning of fossil fuels that is driving climate change, polluted air is poisoning nine out of ten of us and killing over seven million of us prematurely every year. Children are especially vulnerable: 600,000 children die prematurelyevery year from air pollution related diseases.

Air pollution 

As part of the BreatheLife Campaign, which mobilizes governments and communities to reduce the impact of air pollution on our health & climate, this viscerally powerful art installation will be installed at the COP25 climate summit.

Negotiators, observers and world leaders attending the summit will be encouraged to walk through the pods, which are being brought to Madrid by Cape Farewell, WHO, Clean Air Fund and Ministry of Ecological Transition, Spain.

Pinsky, said: “In the Pollution Pods, I have tried to distil the whole bodily sense of being in each place.  For instance, being in São Paulo seems like a sanctuary compared to New Delhi, until your eyes start to water from the sensation of ethanol, whilst Tautra is unlike any air you’ll have ever breathed before, it is so pure.”  

Visitors to the Pollution Pods at COP25 will experience the sensation of air pollution for a few minutes, but breathing toxic air is the reality for millions of people every day of their lives. 

Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of WHO said: “We need to agree unequivocally on the need for a world free of air pollution. We need all countries and cities to commit to meeting WHO air quality guidelines.”

Climate change

Throughout the life course, exposure to air pollution is a major risk for chronic heart and respiratory disease and can inhibit proper brain and lung development in children. 

A study by the Lancet showed that four million cases of childhood asthma every year, including 240,000 in the United States, could be caused by air pollution resulting from traffic fumes.   

Dr Maria Neira, WHO director of Public Health, Environmental and Social Determinants of Health, said: “The true cost of climate change is felt in our hospitals and in our lungs. The health burden of polluting energy sources is now so high, that moving to cleaner and more sustainable choices for energy supply, transport and food systems effectively pays for itself. When health is taken into account, climate change mitigation is an opportunity, not a cost”.

Teresa Ribera, Minister for the Ecological Transition of Spain, said: “Air pollution and climate change are the two sides of the same coin. The symbolic installation of the Pollution Pods at COP25 should remind everybody that we are negotiating for cleaner environments, cutting emissions and gaining better health for all.”

Jane Burston, Executive Director, Clean Air Fund, said: “The Clean Air Fund has projects in all four of the cities represented in the Pollution Pods. Air pollution has a terrible impact on people’s health in these cities and many more around the world – but the positive side is that reducing pollution can simultaneously tackle climate change and will save millions of dollars in healthcare costs and increase productivity.”  

This Article 

This article is based on a press release from Theresa Simon & Partners, working with Michael Pinksy. 

Climate change is taking centre stage in the election as party leaders face questions about how they will tackle the issue in a TV debate on Thursday night.

Parties will vie for the votes of those concerned about the environment in what, despite subjects such as Brexit and the NHS, has been dubbed by some as “the climate election”.

But Prime Minister Boris Johnson and the Brexit Party’s Nigel Farage look set to snub the hour-long Emergency On Planet Earth debate on Channel 4 News.

Protests

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, Liberal Democrat leader Jo Swinson, Scottish First Minister and SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon, Plaid Cymru’s leader Adam Price and Green co-leader Sian Berry (pictured) have agreed to take part.

Asked on Wednesday whether a Conservative minister, such as former environment secretary Michael Gove, could attend the Channel 4 debate instead of Mr Johnson, a spokeswoman for Channel 4 News said: “Michael Gove is not the party leader.”

Invitations to Mr Johnson and Mr Farage remained open, the programme said.

December’s General Election comes at the end of a year marked by mass protests and rising public concern over the climate and wildlife crises.

Despite this, the issue garnered only a brief mention in a head-to-head TV debate between Mr Johnson and Mr Corbyn earlier in the campaign.

Meat

A poll taken shortly before the election was called revealed the majority of people said climate change would influence how they voted.

Almost two-thirds agreed politicians were not talking about the issue enough in the run-up to the next national vote, the survey for environmental lawyers ClientEarth found.

The first leaders debate on climate change takes place in the wake of the latest warnings from UN experts of rising levels of climate-warming greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and the need for swift and dramatic cuts in emissions to avoid the most dangerous impacts of global warming.

Leaders are likely to face questions over the level of ambition and feasibility in their plans to cut greenhouse gas emissions in the UK to zero overall, and the date they have pledged to achieve it by.

Presenter Krishnan Guru-Murthy said leaders would be grilled on how people’s lives will have to change – whether it would involve giving up red meat, going on holiday or ending fast fashion.

Fairer

Plans to phase out petrol and diesel vehicles, cut the carbon from heating homes, plant trees and protect wildlife are also among the subjects they could be quizzed on.

Mr Guru-Murthy said: “This debate has been called for by hundreds of thousands of people from all sorts of different walks of life.”

He urged Mr Johnson, who has said he does not want to debate Ms Sturgeon because she cannot become prime minister, to change his mind, promising him he would get a fair hearing.

Rebecca Newsom, head of politics at Greenpeace UK, which backed a public petition to secure the debate, said: “The climate and nature emergency is a top concern for UK voters and an issue our politicians will have to put at the heart of their economic strategy for the foreseeable future.

“They must seize this opportunity for a greener and fairer future. The public will be looking to see who among the party leaders understands the gravity of the situation and has the policies and conviction to tackle it.”

This Author

Emily Beament is the PA environment correspondent.

Criminal charges have been dropped against climate change protesters who were arrested under a police order that was later ruled to be unlawful.

The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said 105 cases were being discontinued against Extinction Rebellion (XR) supporters who were detained during the action in October.

More than 1,800 people were arrested during the XR Autumn Uprising protest, which saw locations around central London, City Airport and the Tube network targeted.

Unlawful

Police initially made use of public order legislation, a section 14 order, to restrict the action to Trafalgar Square, and after repeated breaches went further, effectively banning XR protests from the capital.

High Court judges ruled that the effective ban was unlawful, paving the way for compensation claims against the Metropolitan Police.

The CPS said that 73 people charged with breaching the section 14 order, 24 charged with a breach and highway obstruction, and eight charged with stand-along highway obstruction would face no further action.

So far this year, policing protests by XR has cost the Metropolitan Police £40 million, nearly three times the annual budget of its Violent Crime Taskforce.

Raj Chada from law firm Hodge Jones and Allen said: “From the moment that the High Court ruled the Met Police’s ban was unlawful, this was an obvious consequence.

Demonstrations

“The CPS have dithered and delayed before bowing to the inevitable and only caused more anxiety and expense to our clients. “Anyone affected by this should contact us about a potential action against the police.”

A spokesman for the Metropolitan Police said: “Following careful consideration and further legal advice, the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) has decided it will not appeal the judgment in relation to conditions imposed on Extinction Rebellion ‘Autumn Uprising’.

“The MPS remains disappointed by the judgment, but of course respects the decision of the court. We have previously stated public order legislation needs updating.

“This case is the first time the legislation has been tested in such unique circumstances. It has highlighted that policing demonstrations like these within the existing legal framework can be challenging.

“The MPS will continue to carefully consider and review the use of this legislation during future demonstrations.”

This Author

Margaret Davis is the PA crime correspondent.

Labour is pledging to plant two billion trees by 2040 and create 10 new national parks as part of its plans to tackle the climate crisis.

Jeremy Corbyn is to commit on Wednesday to spending £3.7 billion in capital investment for the planting programme and habitat restoration if he wins the election.

Friends of the Earth welcomed the planting plan as “by far the most ambitious” of all the parties’ tree pledges, which are aimed at capturing atmospheric carbon to offset emissions. Corbyn attended a climate emergency rally in Falmouth, Cornwall, yesterday (pictured).

Nature recovery

Labour wants the 10 new protected parks to be added to the 15 existing ones during its first term if Mr Corbyn triumphs in the December 12 General Election.

Candidates include the Malvern Hills, Chiltern Hills, Lincolnshire Wolds, the North and South Pennines, coastal Suffolk and Dorset, the Cotswolds and Wessex.

Environmental degradation, potential for carbon sequestration and biodiversity net gain would be among the criteria for the areas to get the status.

Labour estimates the programmes would help create 20,000 of the one million green jobs it has pledged as part of a “green industrial revolution”.

While the plans focus solely on England, Labour wants to work with the devolved governments of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland to ensure “nature recovery networks” are extended across the UK.

Ambitious

Launching the “plan for nature” in Southampton, Mr Corbyn will try to paint Labour as the party for the environment in what he calls the “last chance” election to tackle the emergency.

“We’ll expand and restore our habitats and plant trees so that we can create natural solutions to bring down emissions and allow our wildlife to flourish,” the Labour leader is expected to say.

“Labour created the first national parks, and we’ll create 10 more, giving people the access to the green spaces so vital for our collective wellbeing and mental health.”

The Liberal Democrats have pledged to plant 60 million trees a year, equating to up to 1.2 billion by 2040, while the Tories have pledged half that.

Commenting on Labour’s announcement, Friends of the Earth tree campaigner Guy Shrubsole said: “This is by far the most ambitious tree-planting pledge we’ve seen from a political party.

Farmlands

“Tree cover in the UK needs to double as part of the fight against climate breakdown and this means adding three billion new trees, and fast.

“If sustained, Labour’s promised tree-planting rates would achieve this by 2050. While parties have been racing to make bigger trees pledges, it’s crucial to remember that trees will only help fix the climate crisis if emissions cuts happen at the same time.”

Labour said £1.2 billion from its green transformation fund would be spent on restoring natural habitats including woodland, grasslands, meadows, peat bogs and salt marshes in England.

A further £2.5 billion from the fund would be available for tree planting in national parks and in the National Forest as well as in publicly owned land such as parks and schools and in farmlands.

This Author

Sam Blewett is the PA political correspondent. Image:  Joe Giddens/PA Wire

The environment is under threat. A global scientific assessment this year highlighted the urgent crisis in biodiversity worldwide, with natural ecosystems diminished by 47 percent and many species facing imminent extinction.

The IPBES report recognized that “business as usual” will not do: a system change is needed.

But such change represents a threat to the profit-driven interests of the global corporate sector. For this reason, many corporations have sought ways to show that they are acting to address the environmental crisis, whilst maintaining unsustainable production methods and pursuing a model of endless, unstoppable economic growth. 

Natural capital

Through a process known as the financialisation of nature, corporations and political systems are redefining the environmental ‘problem’ into a ‘solution’ that can create even more economic profit, for their benefit. 

By reframing nature as “natural capital”, they are able to assign a price to it, in function of the “ecological services” it can offer—services such as carbon storage or water filtration.

Those who capture nature and its ‘services’ are able to then speculate with the prices, and compare the value of investing in nature with investing in other activities. This process reduces nature to its economic value alone, sidelining the social, cultural, political and even spiritual aspects of nature’s relationship with human societies.

The financialisation of nature takes on a particularly deceptive form in offsetting and biodiversity compensation schemes. These schemes allow companies and governments to pursue destructive activities—such as grabbing land from indigenous peoples and local communities or cutting down part of the rainforest—and claim that no damage is being done overall, as they have compensated the price of this destruction.

Compensation can be as simple as paying into a fund which promises to create or protect more nature elsewhere, or creating such an area themselves. 

Offsetting 

One such example is the Bujagali hydropower project in Uganda. The reservoir created by the Bujagali dam on the River Nile in 2012 flooded an area which had enormous ecological value, as well cultural and spiritual importance for the local Basoga indigenous peoples.

‘Comparably important’ waterfalls and river banks were set aside ‘in perpetuity’ as a biodiversity offset for the flooded area.

However, a few years later, the offset site in turn was to be flooded for another hydropower plant—with the offset needing to be offset.

On paper, any destruction has been offset, and no harm done. In reality, river banks along the Nile have been flooded, and many human right violations incurred in the process.

Compensation

A recent study by Friends of the Earth International reveals how policy makers advocate compensation and natural capital approaches as real solutions. Existing regulations based on limits and fines are increasingly turned into laws that provide offsetting and compensation options as legal solutions for environmental destruction. 

Such compensation schemes are promoted in international standards—such as the World Bank’s Performance Standard—or in national environmental legislation, in both cases giving the go ahead to destructive activities by companies that promise to offset or pay a compensation fee into a national fund designed for future ecological restoration.

These schemes are an important way for both corporate actors and politicians to ‘greenwash’ their activities—to maintain business as usual while still showing they are acting for the environment. 

Corporate gain

A complementary study Friends of the Earth International shows just how much the corporate sector stands to gain when legislation allowing offsetting is put in place at the national level.

Such legislation allows the legal approval of environmentally destructive activities which would otherwise not be allowed, especially access to land in protected areas. This approval further facilitates access to finance, especially as the International Finance Corporation (linked to the World Bank) and regional development banks approve projects more easily when they include offsetting. 

For example, the project to build a pipeline through Jasper National Park in Canada committed to offsetting, despite it not being a legal requirement. This commitment facilitated the licensing process and the project received approval without substantial environmental opposition. 

Equally, when corporations set aside land for future developments, it can end up being more profitable for them to leave it untouched and instead ‘cash in’ on the income gained from offsetting projects. 

On a wider social scale, such legislation aims to increase public acceptance for destructive activities. International conservation NGOs such as The Nature Conservancy or Flora and Fauna International offer compensation offset projects and lend corporations a positive, ‘green’ image—a well-known tactic of ‘greenwashing’.

The offsetting system relies on a huge body of research and development to keep it functional and credible: many think thanks, consultants, NGOs, academics, and accounting professionals earn their living thanks to financialization of nature processes. These actors will actively push to continue developing them, even as evidence of the ecological harm of these approaches mounts. 

Combatting financialisation 

It is fundamental that the environment, and those depending on and caring for it, are at the forefront of environmental management and related legislation.

Indigenous peoples and local communities are the best guardians of ecosystems: it is proven that areas where they organize territorial conservation using locally-relevant techniques are conserved better than national parks and private protected areas.  

We need strict legislation to counteract the consequences of deregulation, and ensure protection for the defenders of territories and human rights, who too frequently face persecution.

We need a binding treaty for corporations on human rights. We need a system change: reforming our economy to make sure that the needs of all are covered in a fair and community based manner, while stopping the greed of the few. 

This Author

Madeleine Race is a communications officer at Friends of the Earth International. 

Image: Ollivier Girard/CIFOR, Flickr.

“Nature for Sale” report coming soon.

The government has given permission to Drax Power Station in East Yorkshire to build the UK’s biggest gas power capacity.

The Secretary of State has given this green light to a project that will lock us into fossil fuel production for at least another two decades against the recommendation of their own planning inspectorate.

Read: ‘You burn our trees to power your homes’

This is blatantly a disaster for the climate and must be challenged. But this is only part of Drax’s story, and we must tell it all to tackle it at the root problems.

Environmental justice

Drax Power Station is also the world’s biggest burner of wood-based biomass. Falsely classified as renewable, this source of energy is on the rise across Europe – now making up two thirds of the EU’s renewable energy supply – with the majority of wood being sourced from the Southeastern US.

In states such as North Carolina, wood pellet companies such as Drax’s main supplier Enviva clear cut around 50 acres of forest a day to feed growing demand from across the Atlantic, and are planning a massive expansion.

Scratch below the surface more and we see that the majority of wood pellet mills and facilities constructed in the Southeastern US to feed biomass demands are clustered around certain areas and communities.

These communities are predominantly rural, predominantly of colour, and have a below state-average income. They are also likely to have already experienced some kind of pollution from nearby industry, be that energy, agriculture or transport. They are often known, for these reasons, as environmental justice communities.

A study from last year found that all wood pellet mills in North and South Carolina were located in environmental justice communities. Residents here, already subject to industrial pollution and economic depression, and which suffer from five times the asthma rate of the rest of the state, now face a tide of increased air and noise pollution and a loss of the forests they have grown up with. This alongside all the benefits the forests provide – water filtration, flood protection, and fresh, cool air.

Sense of community

These impacts are covered up by Enviva and Drax but are severe. Wood pellet facilities are known to release significant amounts of particulate matter, which cause a range of health issues from obesity to asthma.

Deborah Kornegay, lives 6-7 miles from Enviva’s Sampson County facility in North Carolina. She explained that this one facility increased particulate matter levels to 75 percent over pre-operation levels. Neighbour after neighbour has become reliant on inhalers, and are unable to sleep due to logging trucks barreling by every night.

The loss of the local environment has had a potent effect on the surrounding communities. James Woodley, who grew up in Northampton County, North Carolina, gave a heart-wrenching testimony recently, in which he described the importance of the local forests where he and his friends and family would visit when growing up – the fish would come and nibble at their feet when dabbled in the water: “Now the forests are gone, so is the sense of community”.

Woodley continued: “Dust is everywhere, and even people are breathing in dust and becoming sick from it. The roads where the trucks barrel through the community daily are damaged, and until they are fixed they are also dangerous.

“We fear for our children and pets being hit by a truck, if those kids or animals are on the road during the heavy truck traffic periods, which seems to be all the time. The noise from the facility, and the trucks barreling through the community, is constant, and a real nuisance. We hate living here, we have nowhere to go though. We just try to make it through day by day.”

Biodiversity hotspot

Why is this aspect of the story often lost? Because, as residents themselves say, companies such as Enviva deliberately pick the communities that are less able to fight back.

In fact, concerned citizens have been denied the ability to comment on newly proposed pellet mills in the past, despite Enviva being given more than enough time to make their case. No wonder these voices are never heard, if they are being systematically silenced.

Back to Drax. Why is it that last year, millions of tonnes of wood from a UN Biodiversity Hotspot was cut down and shipped 4000km overseas to be burnt in a UK power station, only to increase emissions? Why is it that communities on the sharp edge of environmental injustice are being marginalised further by an industry that, as Cindy Elmore rightly pointed out, is simply a continuation of British colonialism?

It is because Drax’s burning of coal, wood, and potentially now gas, is just a symptom of a wider model. The model that Drax operates is one that sees both forests and communities as their right to exploit. This model exacerbates existing injustices, rather than tackling them.

The model is always the same, whether it is the indigenous Shor of Siberia losing their villages and culture to coal imported by Drax, the communities of the South Eastern US losing their forests and health to wood imported by Drax, or any new communities overseas being displaced and broken apart by gas imported by a future Drax facility. The natural world and communities on the frontline are expendable. Big corporations are not.

False separation

This is why we cannot create a false separation between the environment and social justice. If the solutions are devised by the powerful, they will continue to be weak, and hurt the marginalised the most.

This has been the case with carbon offsetting for decades now, which industries still pretend will solve all our problems. It is why mega-mining companies are rushing to extract metals and minerals they claim are required for the renewable energy transition, but in fact are a smokescreen for continued human rights abuses.

This is why a burgeoning biomass industry, which destroys forests and biodiversity, harms the climate, and ravages communities, has taken off with barely any question from policymakers. It is why the people whose voices need to be centred are those that are most affected by these activities, not those committing them.

Drax is just a company clinging onto a model of the past that will not deliver climate justice. Time and time again it has proven that it is willing to open up new rounds of exploitation simply to survive, to keep burning. Now it wants to be the world leader in a technology that requires vast amounts of land, water and forests, just so it can stay in operation.

North Carolina is already on the frontline of the climate crisis and is said to be the birthplace of the environmental justice movement. The communities there should have the final say on the decisions that affect their livelihoods, not Drax. Otherwise, we risk repeating mistakes of the past over and over again. 

This Author 

Mark Robinson is a campaigner with Biofuelwatch, working to raise awareness of the negative impacts of industrial biofuels and bioenergy on biodiversity, human rights, food sovereignty and climate change. Biofuelwatch are currently campaigning to transfer over £1 billion in UK subsidies for biomass electricity towards genuinely renewable wind, wave and solar power.

Image: US Forest Service, Flickr. 

Right of Reply

“In the UK, biomass-generated electricity has already played an important role in helping to decarbonise the UK’s power system. In October, [Drax] published an updated sustainability policy and set up an Independent Advisory Board of scientists, academics and forestry experts. Drax only uses wood pellets from sustainably-managed working forests. Sustainable biomass supports healthy forest growth, biodiversity and absorbs more carbon than undermanaged forests. For example, in the US southeast, forest growth is almost twice as much as tree harvests since the 1950s, even though wood harvests have increased.”

Boris Johnson has been given the chance to make good on his word and lay in front of a bulldozer in opposition to the Heathrow expansion.

A bulldozer was brought to his Uxbridge and South Ruislip constituency on Tuesday to give the Prime Minister the chance to oppose the third runway at Heathrow Airport.

As mayor of London in 2015, Mr Johnson vowed to “lie down in front of those bulldozers” rather than see the airport expand.

Lose

Taking on Mr Johnson in Uxbridge and South Ruislip is Labour’s Ali Milani, who laid in front of the bulldozer in opposition to the expansion on Tuesday.

Mr Milani said the bulldozer was a visual representation of how Mr Johnson has let down the community.

“This is a symbolic moment for us and an important moment for us to remind residents that Boris Johnson has failed not only the people of Uxbridge and South Ruislip but great Britain more broadly,” he told the PA news agency.

“With the election just 17 days away we have a unique opportunity here to make history by unseating Boris Johnson and making him the first sitting prime minister to lose his own seat.”

Expansion

The Labour candidate said he was “extremely confident” he could unseat the prime minister.

“One of the reasons the third runway is so important to us is because the air we breathe is the worst in western Europe,” he said. “Boris Johnson doesn’t live here. He literally doesn’t breathe the same air as we do.

“He has lied to us on a consistent basis. We are confident on December 12 that we are going to make history by unseating a sitting prime minister.”

While the Labour Party has not clearly opposed or approved the Heathrow expansion plan in its manifesto, Mr Milani said as a local candidate he opposed the third runway.

Climate-wrecking

The Liberal Democrat for the nearby seat of Ruislip Northwood and Pinner, Jonathan Banks, also laid in front of the bulldozer on Tuesday.

He said the impacts of the airport expansion are “unacceptable”.

“When Boris Johnson said he was going to lie in front of the bulldozers he was just lying,” he told the PA news agency.

The bulldozer was placed on High Street in Uxbridge by Greenpeace. Political campaigner Sam Chetan-Welsh called on Mr Johnson to stop the “climate-wrecking” third runway.

Majority

“At the moment the prime minister is massively sitting on the fence on this issue,” Mr Chetan-Welsh said. “Show your commitment to stopping this climate-wrecking third runway.”

The Greenpeace campaign was briefly interrupted by Sarah Green, the Green Party candidate for Ruislip Northwood and Pinner, who was demanding HS2 be scrapped.

Ms Green unfurled a banner calling for the high speed rail to be abandoned and yelled “stop the HS2” during the Greenpeace campaign.

Mr Johnson is going into the General Election defending the smallest constituency majority for a prime minister in nearly 100 years.

He won the seat in 2017 with a majority of just 5,034. Mr Johnson has been the MP for Uxbridge and South Ruislip since 2015.

This Author

Dominica Sanda is a reporter with PA. Image: Greenpeace. 

Gardens that focus on combating climate change will take centre stage at next year’s Chelsea Flower Show, the Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) has said.

As it unveils the 2020 line-up for the world-famous show, the RHS said designers and growers were using the event as a platform to encourage a more environmentally sustainable future.

Award winning design duo Hugo Bugg and Charlotte Harris have designed a communal residential garden for show sponsor M&G, with a focus on forging “vital green space” in places that need them most.

Bamboo

Ms Harris said while more people were living in cities, and those cities are getting hotter with climate change, there was a “primal need for green space on a physical level, mental level, environmental level”.

The garden design has recycled and repurposed materials and sustainable elements such as permeable paving woven through it.

“The planting will be led by looking at resilient plants that are suitable for the climate challenges of urban spaces, mitigating the heat island effect, creating habitat, fixing nitrogen.

She said the garden would look at how to create “moments of joy and respite”, adding “it will be a very beautiful but urban space”.

Guangzhou China: Guangzhou Garden’ by Peter Chmiel and Chin-Jung Chen of Grant Associates also looks at a sustainable future city garden, with a woodland dell to clean the air, a pool to clean water and bamboo structures which represent homes for humans and wildlife.

Organic

In the face of global deforestation, the Facebook Garden: Growing the Future, by Chelsea gold medal winner Joe Perkins, focuses on increasing UK tree cover and the need for better woodland management as the climate changes.

Mr Perkins said living trees locked up carbon and prevented flooding, and were also a productive resource for timber, which also stores carbon.

“It’s about trying to open up the discussion about what a wonderful material it is, how resilient trees are for us and our cities, and also the importance of the management of that timber,” he said.

Every structure in the garden will be made from timber, including surfacing and walls, and will feature different types of wood, including UK-sourced and recycled timber.

Elsewhere at the show the Yeo Valley Organic Garden is using plants grown organically where possible to create a wildlife-friendly exhibit, and carbon used to make it will be offset at Yeo Valley’s farm in Somerset.

Sustainable

Designers are using wood for its carbon-storage potential and looking for ways to avoid concrete and cement, as well as focusing on UK sourced materials and plants, the RHS said.

A number of growers and nurseries exhibiting at the show this year have made environmental changes including going peat free and growing in biodegradable pots.

Rose Gore Browne, RHS Chelsea show manager said: “As gardens and horticulture are key to helping combat climate change, it is very encouraging to see a number of gardens addressing these issues and more designers and growers adopting suitable practices.”

She told the PA news agency: “With Chelsea, it’s a huge industry gathering and then we also have 160,000 interested gardeners coming through the door.

“So it’s an unrivalled platform in horticulture to demonstrate to visitors how they can be gardening more sustainably, and there’s no better way to do that than a show garden.”

She said sustainability was an important issue for the show itself, and the RHS is working with A Greener Festival, which helps events become more environmentally sustainable.

The RHS is hoping to get to the point where all power from onsite generators comes from biodiesel, while suppliers and contractors are pitching ways of serving takeaway food in reusable containers, she said.

This Author

Emily Beament is the PA environment correspondent.

The leading trade association for the UK offshore oil and gas industry has launched an attempt to defend the sector’s tarnishing reputation following growing calls from MPs to divest from fossil fuel companies in order to tackle the climate crisis.

In a letter sent to MPs on 29 October, before Parliament was dissolved, the trade body Oil & Gas UK (OGUK) sought to counter the mounting calls to divert investments away from fossil fuel companies.

The letter comes as a direct response to the October announcement that over 300 MPs have signed the Divest Parliament Pledge, calling on the trustees of the MPs Pension Fund to divest from fossil fuel firms.

Maximise extraction

OGUK represents around 400 organisations involved in upstream oil and gas extraction in the UK, including the international oil majors BP, Shell, Chevron and ExxonMobil, who alone are responsible for more than 10% of the world’s carbon emissions since 1965.

OGUK’s stated aim is to “strengthen the long-term health” of the industry.

In the letter, OGUK refers to its ‘Roadmap 2035: a blueprint for net zero’ and attempts to position the oil and gas sector as part of the solution in the transition to a net zero economy.

But its claims of being “unequivocally” committed to reducing carbon emissions contrast with recent analysis that shows the industry’s average capital expenditure on clean energy was only 1.3 percent in 2018.  

OGUK’s roadmap proposes no viable concrete measures to decarbonise the sector, while openly boasting about increased drilling activity and new investments to maximise extraction.

Running scared

Bill McKibben, co-founder of 350.org who initiated the global divestment campaign, said: “The fossil fuel industry is clearly running scared – because we are winning and our movement is forcing political leaders to understand that bold action against fossil fuels is required.

“OGUK’s feeble attempt to defend the industry to MPs is a dangerous form of climate denialism and barely masks the industry’s recent billion pound investments in new climate wrecking oil and gas projects.

“Our political leaders must work together to keep fossil fuels in the ground and bring about a global Green New Deal that invests trillions into a clean energy future to enable planet and people to thrive.”   

Caroline Lucas, Green Party candidate for Brighton Pavilion, who has championed the Divest Parliament initiative, said: “The oil and gas industry is desperately trying to greenwash their dirty business model, but MPs must not buy their spin about decarbonising. To make a net zero future reality, we must shift our money out of industries that pollute and into industries that are clean.

“The public are calling for decisive action on the climate emergency, and that means voting for MPs who will stand up to an industry which is pushing us over the climate cliff edge. The Green Party has long championed the transformation of the UK economy and energy system by 2030 through a radical Green New Deal.”

Increasing pressure

Globally, oil and gas companies have approved $50 billion for new extraction projects since 2018.

Divestment campaigners argue that funding these companies is morally wrong and fatally undermines progress in tackling the climate crisis. Investors have also been warned about major financial risks associated with overvalued carbon assets.

Celebrating successes around the world, the global divestment movement is now backed by more than 1000 funds worth over $11 trillion.

In a further sign of the industry’s struggle for survival, the UK government recently imposed a moratorium on fracking (extracting gas from shale rocks), following years of intense opposition by local communities and climate activists.

With high-profile divestment campaigns such as Divest Parliament, the youth climate strikes and growing public awareness of the climate emergency, political leaders are under increasing pressure to take tangible action on fossil fuels. Polling suggests that the climate will be a decisive issue for most voters at the general election in December.

This Author 

Marianne Brooker is The Ecologist’s content editor. This article is based on a press release from Divest Parliament. 

The Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) brings producers and processors together with manufacturers, retailers, banks, and NGOs, and has advocated a “multi-stakeholder approach” to reduce the environmental impact of the palm oil industry.

The RSPO presents a highly optimistic view of the sustainability of palm oil, and Darrel Webber, its chief executive, has said the body’s consensus-driven model is more geared towards “continuous improvement” than rapid change.

Even so, a new report from Greenpeace has underscored how little progress the palm oil industry has made in distancing itself from its ignoble track record of devastation and deforestation.

Forests on fire

But while palm oil’s grim environmental credentials draw increasing attention, another closely linked industry – paper – racks up ecological black marks with far less public notice.

The Greenpeace palm oil report focuses on Indonesia, where more than half of the world’s supply of palm oil is produced. While Indonesia is home to some of the most biodiverse tropical forests on Earth and a significant share of the world’s plant and animal species – including 10 percent of flowering plants, 12 percent of mammals, 15 percent of reptiles and amphibians, and 17 percent of birds – it also has one of the highest rates of deforestation, losing around one million hectares of forest early.

One of the main objectives of the RSPO has been to curb the fires linked with palm oil production.

The fastest and cheapest way for palm oil producers to clear land for oil palms has traditionally been to burn down the forests already occupying the land, to catastrophic effect: 80 percent of the fires in Indonesia are blamed on oil palm fields, and the country lost approximately 26 million hectares of tree cover (meaning 16 percent of its total forest land) between 2001 and 2018.

This burning destroys the diverse tropical forests but also releases gigatons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.

Damning findings

While the RSPO claims to hold its members to ‘environmental and social criteria’ in order to claim their products as sustainable, Greenpeace’s report has unmasked a much more somber reality. Despite intense criticism for purchasing palm oil linked to fires in Indonesia, many of the world’s largest food companies have failed to distance themselves from culpable producers. 

According to the group, global food brands such as Unilever, Mondelez, and Nestlé all bought palm oil linked to this year’s spate of fires in Indonesia, as did traders from Cargill, Golden Agri-Resources (GAR), and Wilmar.

Greenpeace found that all of the major companies it evaluated – despite being RSPO members – were linked to anywhere between 6,300-9,900 fire “hotspots” in 2019. Each had links to tens of producers facing government or judicial action over the fires they had set. 

Greenpeace’s report adds to a mountain of evidence surrounding the unsustainable palm oil sector, but while there’s no disputing the damaging effects of oil palm monoculture, another serial offender – paper – has quietly passed under the radar, despite the fact that many of the same companies are involved in its production.

Paper production has arguably just as big an environmental effect as palm oil. Even so, and despite the fact that the environmental damage caused by the palm oil and paper industries are being committed in the same places at the same time and on the same scale, paper has largely skirted public scrutiny. 

Sinar Mas

This reality puts the lie to the idea of a “paperless revolution.” Although per capita paper consumption is declining in the USA and Europe, consumption is simply shifting, rather than reducing, especially with companies looking for alternative biodegradable alternatives to single-use plastic.

According to the UN Food and Agricultural Organization, 35-40 percent of trees cut for industrial purposes become paper products. While some of this wood comes from ‘forestry practices’, much of it comes from unsustainable deforestation in places like Indonesia.

The overlap between the palm oil and paper industries is demonstrated clearly by the global forestry giant Sinar Mas, parent group of both palm oil trader GAR (spotlighted in Greenpeace’s report) and Asia Pulp and Paper (APP), Indonesia’s largest pulp and paper company.

Allegations surrounding the company’s role with the destruction of forests for pulpwood previously forced Greenpeace to cut ties with the company after several years of collaboration on sustainability initiatives.

Sinar Mas’ footprint extends far past the tropical forests of Indonesia, with environmental controversies reaching well beyond Asia to make themselves felt as far afield as Europe, Canada, and Brazil.

Bolsonaro connection 

To try to distance themselves from its name and negative associations, Sinar Mas’s operations in Canada, for example, are grouped under a Netherlands-based company called ‘Paper Excellence.’

While ostensibly different entities, both APP and Paper Excellence are owned by the family of Sinar Mas founder Eka Tjipta Widjaja, one of Indonesia’s richest men until his death early this year. 

Paper Excellence’s first Canadian purchase, in 2007, was a pulp mill in Meadow Lake in Saskatchewan. From there, Paper Excellence carried out a string of purchases of existing assets, taking aim at Canada and Brazil.

These acquisitions are purportedly part of the company’s strategy to ensure a steady supply of pulp for the production of paper and other products for customers in Asia. The company clearly sees the pristine forests in both Canada and Brazil as ripe for additional mills and production facilities. 

While Sinar Mas may have used a different name for its new markets, its subsidiaries do not appear to have changed their attitudes towards responsible forestry. In fact, one of Paper Excellence’s most recent claims to fame is its close relationship with the Bolsonaro family in Brazil, one of the worst global actors when it comes to protecting natural forests. 

Global conglomerates

While Western consumers are quick to speak out over deforestation in Southeast Asia, are we prepared to challenge global conglomerates once they start doing business in our own backyards?

The global outcry over palm oil has forced at least some action to clean up the palm oil supply chain. To save our planet’s tropical forests, it is high time to take action on paper as well.

This Author

Natasha Foote is an environmental journalist and writer, specialising in conservation and agriculture. She holds a BSc in Biological Sciences and an MA in Environment, Development and Policy.