http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2014/oct/15/colombian-farmers-sue-bp-british-court

Being called one of the largest cases in environmental legal history, over 100 Colombian farmers are suing BP (called Equion Energia there) due to the damage that the oil pipeline (Ocensa, laid in the 1990s) has caused them. They claim that they did not fully understand the contracts and that they were never fully compensated. Since this is the first time BP is being sued from overseas, it could open up a whole mess of trouble with other developing countries. The Colombian farmers want to show evidence that the pipeline caused “severe soil erosion and sedimentation of fields and water sources, reduced vegetation coverage and areas for pasture, and blocked water sources.” This case seems to overlap conceptions that we’ve talked about in class (environmental justice, capitalism, globalism, consumerism, fossil fuels); if successful, we might be seeing more claims like this to come. As of now, I suppose we have to wait… but what impact do you think a win or lose for these Colombians farmers might signify?

For those of us who live in the Northeast, an eye should be glued to the people we put in power and their stance on environmental issues. In the gubernatorial  race in Connecticut, candidate Tom Foley’s lack of a position on the causes of climate change caused a great uproar. Foley is quoted saying “It doesn’t matter, it’s happened,” Foley said of climate change during a debate Thursday night in New London. Foley has also expressed that connecticut on its own will not be able to change global warming. But I, and most of the able minded people of this world believe that change has to start somewhere, so why not here? All I have to say is, choose wisely Connecticut.

http://www.courant.com/politics/capitol-watch/hc-environmental-groups-bash-tom-foley-on-climate-change-20141017-story.html

I remembered Drew said something in class about a breakthrough in Hydrogen renewable energy. The two sources that I found below are exactly what he was talking about. The new findings may very well in the next decade put renewable energy at the forefront of the fuel industry.

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/345/6202/1326.abstract?sid=5f0a71b8-de9d-48b9-b4d0-e436349dd866

http://www.natureworldnews.com/articles/9051/20140916/cheap-green-energy-possible-with-hydrogen-breakthrough.htm

What they discovered is a new more efficient way to  first get hydrogen and then use it for energy. This new method would almost entirely take fossil fuels out of the picture because electricity would not be needed anymore to generate the energy to start electrolysis which is the process of separating hydrogen from water by shocking it. Up until now electrolysis could only be initiated through energy intensive processes. Nevertheless, now they have this new super redox mediator liquid that can now complete electrolysis at a very low power level; lower than what we currently do to generate electricity. This is finding is possibly world changing because it may make hydrogen fuel cheaper than any form of fossil fuel. Price has always been the issue with renewable, but with this breakthrough that may be changing.

This video does a brilliant job of defining where the blame lies in the exploitation of our resources. There is no doubt there are more powerful forces at hand, but this a recurring theme in history.

The cunning men at the top use all sorts of tactics, whether it be fear, religion or media to get people to follow them.

People have given up what truly matters, and given into a religion of consumerism. They compensate their lack of values for STUFF. What people once owned, the stuff now owns the people.

How do we stop this system?

This article states that the Pentagon sees climate change as an immediate threat to national security, with increased risks from terrorism, infectious disease, global poverty and food shortages.  The Pentagon is implementing new strategies to help with rising sea levels, extreme weather, draughts and food shortages.  They are saying that the lack of water in the Middle East can be related to the increased extremists groups.  These extremist groups have seized water supplies to gain control and power.  The Pentagon’s increased emphasis on the national security threats of climate change is aimed in part at building support for a United Nations agreement, to be signed next year in Paris, that would require the world’s largest producers of planet-warming carbon pollution to slash their emissions, while increasing aid to help the world’s most vulnerable populations adapt to the effects of global warming. http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/14/us/pentagon-says-global-warming-presents-immediate-security-threat.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&version=HpSum&module=second-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0

Killing the Lorax: 900 Environmental Activists Slain in the Past 10 Years | Inhabitat – Sustainable Design Innovation, Eco Architecture, Green Building

This article talks about a study that revealed more than 900 environmental activists were killed as a direct result of their work defending environmental and land rights between 2002 and 2013.  Latin America and Asia-Pacific have been particularly hit hard and these numbers might even be low because of the shortage of information available.  It is amazing that I have not heard more about this, but governments and big business have the money and resources to cover things up.  I find this relevant to our class discussion about terrorism.  The harm against humans is not done by the environmentalist but it is done to them.  Money and power can do horrible things and then place the blame on others who do not deserve it.

Nuclear fuel comes in the form of enriched uranium, which naturally produces heat as uranium atoms split. The heat is used to boil water and produce steam, which drives a steam turbine that spins a generator to create electricity.

http://science.howstuffworks.com/japan-nuclear-crisis1.htm

In March of 2011, Japan suffered the largest earthquake in modern history, which triggered a 9.0 tsunami and destroyed the backup diesel generators that powered the water coolant pumps of the country’s Fukushima-Daiichi nuclear facility. These pumps circulate water through the reactor to remove decay heat. Uncirculated, the water temperature and pressure continued to rise and the reactor radiation began to split the water into oxygen and volatile hydrogen. This resulted in hydrogen explosions, which breached the reactor building’s steel containment panels. If water continued to boil off, a meltdown would have almost certainly occurred. Therefore, the operators decided to flood the reactors with seawater because seawater ruins the reactors. Although the situation could have been much worse, there was an increase in release of radiation, which has led to a massive amount of radioactive water.  After nuclear crisis of 2011, all 48 of Japan’s commercial nuclear reactors were shut down.

http://science.howstuffworks.com/nuclear-power5.htm

Now, 3 years later, Japan’s nuclear regulatory agency declared that an atomic power plant is safe to operated. The two reactors at the Sendai power plant on the southern island of Kyushu are the first to be certified as safe enough to restart. Final decision on whether to restart the plant will be decided in December by the prime minister. Public opinion polls show that the public remains skeptical about the safety of the plants and the governing liberal democratic party to ensure that safety. It makes sense that after a nuclear crisis such as the one in 2011, the public may be skeptical of restoring the plants to operation and although the agency is stating that safety regulations will be higher than ever, it doesn’t appear that they are taking public concern completely into consideration- especially considering the Sendai plant is in a volcanic area.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/11/world/asia/japanese-nuclear-plant-declared-safe-to-operate-for-first-time-since-fukushima-daiichi-disaster.html?_r=0

If, like me, you don’t know much about nuclear energy, here is a website that briefly outlines it!

http://www.nnr.co.za/what-is-nuclear-energy/

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/burning-rage/

This report offers a much different light in which we see the group Earth Liberation Front. This is the view main stream media offers, “the burning rage of a dying planet.” It does not even discuss the definition of terrorism and whether or not these people should be named as terrorists, it just comes out and labels them as so. 

The video also talks a lot about Animal Liberation Front, which is a sister group to the ELF. The ALF has been known to videotape themselves breaking into research labs, where they destroy years of painstaking work and free captive animals.  Even as they do these things, the ALF describes themselves as non-violent.

My question is what is violence to you? I always grew up thinking that violence was hurting anything, including property. The ALF and ELF however claim that arson is not a form of violence, as long as no living thing is getting hurt.

The climate march that took place two weeks ago was a public display of how large and concentrated the climate change movement has become. Protests like this are strong indicators to the rest of the world what the common perception of climate change has become. Nevertheless, for all the good the climate change march has done to spread awareness, it has also reignited the people and organizations that believe climate change is either fake, or over-exaggeration. In this article by Dave Wakefield, CEO for a metal fabrication company, he does not necessarily deny that climate change does not exist, but instead states that climate change intervention is an attack on American capitalism. For the mid-west audience he is writing for this may strike harder, but blaming climate change for hurting capitalism is idiotic because capitalism/ rapid economic growth is essentially what caused climate change. Wakefield’s belief that the climate change march was an assault on capitalism scares me.

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/oct/02/ban-uranium-mining-grand-canyon-arizona-court

Here’s a short article that I thought might boost some hope (and critical thought)!

In 2012, the US interior secretary Ken Salazar created a 20 year ban on new mining claims and mine development (without permits) across 1 million acres of public lands around the Grand Canyon. When it was recently questioned by a mining industry lawsuit as “unconstitutional”, the US district court for Arizona upheld the ban by saying that Salazar had the authority to protect a national treasure.

Uranium mining in the area would threaten aquifers and streams and release toxic waste. For example, one picture in the article is captioned with the fact that although one uranium mine stopped functioning in 1969, it still is contaminated with radioactivity. On the other hand, the ban itself is projected to stop 26 new uranium mines and 700 exploration projects from being developed.

Although this article is fairly succinct, it elicits a lot of different ideas about policy and values. For example, some might see this as extremely cautionary since it stops development and the enhancement it would bring to the economy. Others yet might say that uranium mining is better than fracking or crude oil imports from Canada; after all, another post on the blog stated that some environmental groups are now embracing nuclear energy. In terms of preservation, the fact that this ban was upheld seems almost dreamlike. Is the only way to continue preservation to promote national symbolism of the environment? If this was anywhere else besides the Grand Canyon, would the ban have been upheld?