New America Media - Environment

How Toxic is Black Hair Care?

2012-02-02T09:00:00Z

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“Take the kinks out of your mind,” intoned Marcus Garvey, founder of the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA), “instead of out of your hair.”

As founder of the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA), Garvey refused advertisements for products to lighten the skin and straighten the hair of African Americans in The Negro World, the UNIA’s newspaper. That was “back in the day” – between 1918 and 1933 – when the paper had a circulation estimated at close to 200,000 per week.

During the 1960s, Black Power and Black Pride proponents ushered in “naturals” and “afro” hairstyles. In between shouts of ‘Right On’ and ‘Power to the People,’ many of these proponents declared that the hair straightening process was damaging to the brains of African Americans. Though speaking figuratively, from a literal standpoint they may have actually been on to something.

Since the 1970s, when America’s environmental movement created unprecedented awareness of the damage humans were doing to planet Earth and to ourselves, there has been little if any media attention or research on the possible connections between African American beauty salons, the personal care products utilized primarily by Black women and adverse health outcomes, specifically in the area of reproductive health.

Fact Box
The chemicals found in common African-American hair products are known as estrogen and endocrine-disrupting chemicals or EDCs. Although comprehensive research is ongoing, many of these chemicals are believed to be linked to reproductive effects and birth defects, breast cancer, heart disease, cognitive disorders, premature puberty and altered immune function, to name a few. Chemicals found in Common African American Hair Products such as straighteners/relaxers (perms), detanglers, colorants, shampoos and conditioners (Estrogen and endocrine-disrupting chemicals or EDCs) Sodium Hydroxide (Lye) and Calcium Hydroxide (No Lye) Diazolidinyl Urea DMDM Hydantoin Propylene Glycol Diethanolamine Monoethanolamine Triethanolamine Sodium Lauryl Sulfate or Sodium Laureth Sulfate Hydroquinone Colorants and Synthetic Colors labeled as D&C and/or FD&C

But that has begun to change.

In May of 2011, Dr. Mary Beth Terry and others authored a study, the findings of which showed that African-American and African-Caribbean women were more likely to be exposed to hormonally-active chemicals in hair products.

Terry’s study, “Racial/Ethnic Differences in Hormonally-Active Hair Product Use: A Plausible Risk Factor for Health Disparities,” published in the Journal of Immigrant Health, found that the African-American African Caribbean women surveyed used products that contained chemicals -- commonly referred to as endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs) -- linked to various reproductive and birth defects, breast cancer and heart disease.

Most recently, a team of researchers led by Dr. Lauren Wise of Boston University’s Slone Epidemiology Center found strong evidence indicating that African-American women's hair relaxer use increases the risk for uterine fibroid tumors by exposing Black women to various chemicals through scalp lesions and burns from the products.

Fibroids are non-cancerous growths that develop in or just outside a woman’s uterus/womb from normal uterine cells that begin to grow abnormally. Although fibroids are fairly common, African-American women tend to get them two to three times as often as white women and experience more symptoms from them, such as prolonged and heavy menstrual flow, difficulty conceiving a child, and instances of pain during menses and intercourse.

Wise’s team also found that women who got their first menstrual period before the age of 10 were more likely to have uterine fibroids. The researchers followed more than 23,000 pre-menopausal African-American women from 1997 to 2009 and published their study, “Hair Relaxer Use and Risk of Uterine Leiomyomata in African-American Women,” online in the Jan. 10, 2012 edition of the Journal of American Epidemiology.

Researchers have also posited that a link exists between the early onset of puberty in Black girls and Black hair care products. In a study of 300 African-American, African-Caribbean, Hispanic and white women in New York City, the reported age when these women experienced their first menstrual period (menarche) varied from age 8 to age 19. However, the African-Americans were more likely to use hair products and reached menarche earlier than other racial/ethnic groups.

Dr. Tamarra James-Todd of Boston’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital is the lead author of “Childhood Hair Product Use and Earlier Age at Menarche in a Racially Diverse Study Population,” published online in the June, 2011 Annals of Epidemiology. The study specifically sighted the use of hair oils and hair straightening (‘perm’) products and the onset of early menarche in the women.

According to figures from the Black-Owned Beauty Supply Association, African-Americans are estimated to spend between $7 billion and $9 billion dollars per year on hair and beauty products. The potential costs to our health, however, have yet to be adequately quantified.

Natural Beauty and Calls for Regulation

Black women today who strive to take Marcus Garvey’s admonition to heart are in a better position than their sisters of the past. Research focusing on the products used in African-American beauty salons (and homes) is increasing; and while the findings are showing links to adverse health outcomes primarily amongst Black women, there exists an increased motivation for natural, less toxic beauty products, as well as calls to more stringently regulate the personal care product industry.

In Los Angeles, Black Women for Wellness (BWW), a Leimert Park-based, grassroots health and wellness advocacy organization, has produced a ‘green chemistry’ booklet entitled “Black Going Green,” which is a part of their “Green Chemistry Initiative.”

The 28-page booklet, geared toward African American women and girls, lists the chemical ingredients and possible health risks of everyday household and personal beauty products, and provides many healthy and environmentally-friendly alternatives.

Readers will find information on products and chemicals such as relaxers, detanglers, shampoo and conditioner; nail polish and lipstick.

“In order to make better choices and be more critical consumers, we understood that arming Black women - the primary caretakers in our communities - with reliable information was key,” said Nourbese Flint, Program Director at Black Women for Wellness (BWW) and project coordinator for the booklet. “This is one small step to help Black women make the kinds of choices that are critical to increasing our communities’ health and well-being,” said Flint.

Also as part of its Green Chemistry Initiative, the organization has organized a “Beauty Salon Campaign” to conduct research among African American beauty salons that explores possible connections between products utilized primarily by Black women and possible reproductive health disparities.

According to BWW Executive Director Jan Robinson-Flint, the project, still in the data-gathering stage, is doing a survey of beauty supply stores, beauty salons, barber shops and wig shops within a one-mile radius of the organization’s Leimert Park-based headquarters – approximately 60 stores in all.

“We asked the owners and the stylists what were the products that they were using? And from those products what we did was create a list of the top ten chemicals … and then looked at the impact of those chemicals because they’re toxins on our health and well-being. Anytime you look at any statistics for Black women, you’ll find that we are at the top,” said Robinson-Flint.

BWW plans to rate the chemicals in terms of how toxic they are once the results of their research are made public.

Another component of BWW’s Green Chemistry Initiative is an Activist and Advocate Academy organized with the goal of “developing a cadre of women and youth working with the African American and Black community to increase information and education on Green Chemistry issues… [and to] increase the voices of African American women and girls with environmental justice issues as they impact our health and well being.”

Dera Baskin, a midwife and health educator, attended the academy in 2011 with the purpose of learning how reproductive and environmental justice intersect and to find out what the common citizen can do to change the situation.

As a ‘birth worker,’ Baskin said many of the families she works with are not aware of the exposure to chemicals in their home environments and how they can reduce or remove them. “All in the name of beauty and looking cute … we are damaging our bodies and [our] ability to bring forth healthy babies … we often buy products because of the brand, smell, what it will do aesthetically without thinking about what it will do long term. I wanted to be able to learn and share accurate information with people who look like me,” she said.

Black Women for Wellness is a member of the National Healthy Nail And
Beauty Salon Alliance, which works to raise the profile of salon worker health and safety issues primarily in the Asian/Pacific Islander community. Along with the Bay Area-based California Healthy Nail Salon Collaborative, the group has provided testimony before congressional committees in Washington, DC, regarding concerns of African-American salons and their clients.

Saffiyah Edley, the owner of Los Angeles-based Luv Mi Kinks told the ‘Salon Worker Health and Safety Congressional Briefing’ in Washington, DC, last May that a truly ‘natural hair care industry’ is needed “where hair product manufacturers can’t hide behind harmful ingredients.” Edley said that “… Awareness is needed for stylists and clients around the harm that may be caused by using certain products. But what’s needed the most is that manufacturers must take responsibility for products on the market today that they are making and take out harmful chemicals.”

In addition to helping to organize the Congressional Briefing, the Oakland, CA-based California Healthy Nail Salon Collaborative, along with the Environmental Finance Center (EFC), has also produced a “Naturally Healthy Hair Guide” to highlight sustainable alternatives for hair care.

The multicultural/multiethnic publication gives an explanation of five basic hair textures: wavy, tightly coiled, straight, very curly, and grey hair, which is included because of its different growth pattern and occasional difficulty in managing.

The guide also provides tips on natural hairstyles for men, women and children such as braids and pony tails, natural curls and crimps, and the use of a flat iron for straightening. Natural care techniques mentioned in the guide include Avocado or Olive Oil hair conditioners, using Witch Hazel for dandruff and Sunflower Oil for moisturizing and tips for “greening” hair salons.

A project of the Environmental Protection Agency, the EFC seeks to build green economies and foster sustainable communities in the U.S. by working with government and industry, communities, and Native American Tribes.

The partnership between grassroots groups, business and government will be necessary for success.

Says Saffiyah Edley, “There are safer alternatives, but we need regulation in order to really push them forward.”

Thandisizwe Chimurenga is a Los Angeles-based writer and a 2011-2012 New America Media Environmental Health Justice Fellow. Thandi is also the conductor of the CyberGround Railroad, “Black Los Angeles’ News and Views Source,” a community journalist and a founder and host of Some of Us Are Brave, a Black women’s public affairs show on KPFK-Pacifica Los Angeles.

Vast Majority of Latino Voters are Pro-Conservationist, Poll Finds

2012-01-30T21:45:00Z

En Español

A new poll shows that Latino voters in six inland western states have strong pro-conservationist views, in some cases stronger than their white counterparts.

The 2012 Colorado College State of the Rockies Conservation in the West poll found that Latino voters in the region nearly unanimously – 94 percent -- view national parks, forests, monuments and wildlife areas as an essential part of their state’s economy.

The bi-partisan survey, released today, polled 2400 voters in Arizona, Colorado, Montana, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming, and was conducted by Lori Weigel of Public Opinion Strategies and Dave Metz of Fairbank, Maslin, Maullin, Metz & Associates. The poll was funded by the Hewlett Foundation.

Pollster Dave Metz said the survey dispels the notion that ethnic communities, particularly hard hit in the economic downturn, are “more willing than others to let the environment take a back seat to economy.”

Of the 336 Latino voters polled, 87 percent said they believe it is possible to protect land and water and have a strong economy with good jobs at the same time, compared to 78 percent of the general public.

The poll also shows Latino voters in the region want more “public investment” in conservation efforts, Metz said.

“A solid majority of Latinos, even facing state budget problems, [want the state to] invest in land, water, and state parks,” he said. “Latinos believe those resources make important contributions to the state economy.”

Overall, Latino voters were most concerned about cuts to funding for state parks and environmental protections.

Maite Arce, executive director of the Hispanic Access Foundation based in Washington, D.C., said she wasn’t surprised by Latino voters’ strong pro-conservationist beliefs, and says it is in line with their cultural values.

“For Latinos, family is really critical, health is really critical,” she said. “There’s just a strong connection in our heritage to the outdoors, wildlife, land, air. I think the experience of grandfathers and grandmothers [back] in home countries…are definitely still ingrained in who we are. [It’s] the connection to the land.”

Latino voters also expressed strong concern for air and water pollution, including the impact of oil and gas drilling on the environment, compared to the general public. The sentiments help to explain high levels of support among Latinos for federal clean air and water protections, and the development of renewable energy.

All respondents showed strong support for clean air protections under the U.S. EPA, but support among Latino voters was even stronger (81 percent versus 70 percent for the general public).

Eighty percent of Latino voters want America to wean itself off coal, oil and gas, and expand the use of renewable energy such as solar and wind, compared to 65 percent of the general public.

The poll also found that Latino voters were more likely than other respondents to view renewable energy as a jobs creation engine. Seventy-eight percent of Latino voters agreed that renewable energy like solar and wind will create new jobs in their state, compared to 68 percent for the general public.

“Four out of five [Latino voters] see the job creating potential of renewable energy,” said pollster Dave Metz, during a telephone media briefing on Monday.

Arce says she was surprised by the strong support Latino voters showed to designate public lands to national monuments. Nearly three-fourths of Latino voters in the region held this belief.

“We definitely have heard Hispanics want to know more about parks and monuments,” said Arce. “[There’s] not enough awareness about the local monuments.”

Latino voters in the poll also tended to be younger than other respondents, suggesting a growing political influence in the region, Metz said.

“The Latino population as a whole is overwhelmingly younger,” Metz said. “[And for] registered voters, it is a younger population. It’s indicative of where the region is headed. This is a rising segment of the electorate.”

In Thailand, Elephant Sashimi is All the Rage

2012-01-30T09:00:00Z

SAN FRANCISCO -- In Asia, there's an ongoing irony that deepens as the natural world dwindles to the size of a parking lot. Wild animals, once revered and assigned all kinds of spiritual meaning, are increasingly ending up as the main entree.

The tiger, for instance, that fierce and terror-inducing king of the jungle, is no longer feared so much as coveted: as a rug, as jewelry made of fangs, as a quixotic dish, or as medicinal products made from its various parts - bones and penis and gall bladder - thought to improve man's sexual prowess.
But nowhere is the irony as deep as it is in Thailand, where the regal elephant is now being served up alongside the tiger: on a fanciful diner's plate.

According to a recent Associated Press article, a new taste for elephant meat has sprung up in mega-modern Thailand.

Traditional poaching for male elephant tusks has evolved, with a growing taste for their meat driving hunters to begin targeting female and baby elephants as well. Not exactly a traditional Thai delicacy, the emergence of an army of nouveaux riches across East Asia has fueled ever-more garish culinary trends.

Elephant sashimi, now apparently all the rage, is part of a mindset at once boastful and shallow - if it's the last elephant, then I will show my friends that I can afford it.

So here's the irony: The Asian elephant is still a revered cultural icon in Thailand, gracing bas-reliefs of temples and ancient paintings of battle scenes, but it is fast disappearing. The country whose civilization was more or less built on the elephant's back is now turning its back on the animal.

Indeed, the elephant once served as both builder and war machine: carrying logs and rocks and uprooting trees to build palaces and temples, while fighting countless wars bedecked in the armor of a warrior.

Within Buddhism, Thailand’s state religion and a binding force across much of the region, the elephant remains sacred. According to legend, a white Elephant appeared in the dream of Queen Maya, holding a white lotus flower in its trunk. She later gave birth to the historical Gautama Buddha, Siddhārtha.

Alas, sacred is quickly cast off for cold hard cash. An elephant penis can now fetch as high as $1,000 and a pair of tusks as high as $63,000. Though illegal, poaching has now reached what environmentalists are calling a "crisis point."

At the beginning of last century there were more than 100,000 wild elephants in existence. One hundred years later the population has plummeted to less than 3,000.

Classified as an endangered species, the Asian elephant is expected to disappear from the wild altogether around 2050, if not sooner.

But while poaching is particularly abhorrent, there are other reasons behind the elephant’s disappearance, including deforestation.

For domesticated elephants in Thailand, deforestation means no more jobs. Logging in Thailand's forests has long relied on the strength of the powerful pachyderms. An elephant can pull half its weight and carry 600 kilos on its back. In hilly countryside where roads are small and inaccessible to trucks, an elephant is indispensable for the timber business. But logging is all but illegal now in Thailand, and the domesticated elephant, it seems, is out of luck.

An average elephant weighs 11,000 pounds, and consumes more than 26 gallons of water and 440 pounds of food a day. That's why their owners consciously curb breeding among the captive beasts, bringing down their number even farther.

Many owners, left with no other choice, have now turned their elephants into urban beggars. For the wild elephant conditions are even worse.

Only about 15 percent of the country is still forestland, and those patches are widely scattered. Many wild elephants resort to raiding farms for crops, where they are often shot or poisoned by subsistence farmers. In the story of miserable beast pitted against impoverished human it’s a no brainer who comes out on top… with fork in hand.

Man has conquered everything but himself. The wild is now what we call a reserve, the wilderness nowhere but within. In a world where even the sacred is devoured, one can't help but wonder what are the chances for other species on the endangered list.

NAM editor Andrew Lam is author of "East Eats West: Writing in Two Hemispheres," and "Perfume Dreams: Reflections on the Vietnamese Diaspora." His next book, "Birds of Paradise," is due out in 2013.

Image provided by http://www.shutterstock.com/

Tigers: Man-Eaters Eaten by Man

2012-01-20T08:35:00Z

Once in a while tigers make international news, like the white tiger in Las Vegas that mauled illusionist Roy Horn of Siegfried & Roy, or the one that killed a teenager at the San Francisco Zoo. Most of the time, though, the news is about tigers being eaten by man.

The latest involves a restaurateur in Hanoi arrested for selling tiger meat. She has been arrested before and served time in jail, but the trade proves too lucrative – $1,000 per 100 grams of tiger meat -- to give up, especially now that there are but a few tigers left in the wild. For poachers a tiger could fetch as much as $10,000, and its meat, organs, bones, and skin are sold in restaurants and specialty shops for 10 times the price. As the tiger population dwindles, demand for tiger is at an all-time high.

Indeed, if there is a cultural matrix in East Asia, it is the longing for what the Chinese call Ye-Wei, or “wild taste.” A decade ago, I visited Vietnam's border with China at Lang Son. I watched as hundreds of Vietnamese carried baskets of monkeys, pangolins, snakes, and a variety of exotic birds in rattan cages. On the way back, their baskets held electric fans, water pumps, rice cookers, farm tools, TVs, VCRs, jeans and T-shirts. As one young man put it, "I can always sell forest animals to China. They buy everything we have. They have a big appetite for wild taste." 

The once ferocious tiger has been reduced to a mere commodity, to be farmed and poached, collected for its parts, and made into balms, pills, soaked in wine. Statistics on the amount of wildlife being eaten are not known, but there are some local guesses. The China Wildlife Conservation Association estimates that in Guangdong province alone, 50 tons of wild frogs, 1,000 tons of snakes, and several thousand tons of wild birds are consumed in stores and restaurants each year, not to mention badgers, bats and other mammals.

It certainly isn't practical, but neither are our eating habits. According to Jared Diamond in his book Guns, Germs and Steel, an acre of land can feed 10 to 100 times more people through farming than through hunting and gathering. Wild animals that haven't already been tamed thousands of years ago, Diamond noted, will not be tamed now, because of their relatively low nutritional value compared to the time and resources necessary for domestication.

Ye-Wei is therefore a culture of nostalgia, a way of life born of necessity long ago that is taking on renewed vigor in a modern, materialistic East Asia. Viagra, after all, works better than tiger penis, but if you can afford a tiger penis you are the king of the modern jungle. Those monkeys sitting on the Vietnamese porters' backs are there because a growing army of nouveaux riches with disposable income want them. A pound of civet cat sells for around $12, or 10 percent of an average worker's monthly salary; monkey meat brings four times more. In Vietnam, nearly three out of four tigers are killed for Chinese medicinal purposes. A poached tiger therefore can save a poor farmer and his family from a life of destitution.

Once the tiger hunted man. Now it has become high-end gourmet food. As it is, there are far more tigers now living in parks and zoos and farms than in the wild, where fewer than 5,000 Siberian tigers live in the northern steppe and some 4,500 Bengal tigers live in the wilderness of South Asia. The captive population of 12,000 tigers in the United States is estimated to rival that of those that still live in the wild.

We burden wild animals with anthropomorphic fantasies, and slay them because we covet or fear what we think they represent. The lion is courageous, the snake is evil, the owl wise, the fox cunning and the tiger -- the tiger, above all -- is majestic, elegant, full of prowess and grace. It inspires awe.

Alas, the tiger's grip on our imagination is also the force that drives it toward its own extinction.

Andrew Lam is author of "East Eats West; Writing in Two Hemispheres," and "Perfume Dreams: Reflections on the Vietnamese Diaspora."

Image provided by Shutterstock

Nebraska Rancher: Keystone Pipeline Decision Shows ‘Courage’

2012-01-19T12:05:00Z

Editor’s Note: Pres. Obama announced Wednesday that his administration is denying a permit to TransCanada to construct a controversial Canada-to-Texas oil pipeline that would carry tar sands from the north to refineries along the Gulf Coast. The White House previously said it had planned to table the decision until after the November elections, but was forced to make a decision earlier under pressure from Congressional Republicans.

In a statement, Obama said: “As the State Department made clear last month, the rushed and arbitrary deadline insisted on by Congressional Republicans prevented a full assessment of the pipeline’s impact, especially the health and safety of the American people, as well as our environment. As a result, the Secretary of State has recommended that the application be denied. And after reviewing the State Department’s report, I agree.”

Environmental groups waged a fierce campaign against the Keystone XL, forming alliances with residents in the six states along the proposed pipeline’s route. Nebraskans, in particular, were at the center of the debate, with ranchers, farmers, and rural residents joining forces with environmentalists to avert the contamination of their water supply and land.

New America Media's environment editor Ngoc Nguyen spoke with Randy Thompson, a Nebraska rancher who has been a leading voice in mobilizing communities against the construction of the Keystone pipeline.

What do you think about the White House’s recent decision?

It’s somewhat astounding to me. The turn of events… what has happened in the last few months. I would give the State Department credit. They came out to Nebraska and all the other states and held hearings. They must have listened to our concerns.

The people of Nebraska came out in full force, filled the hearing rooms, expressed our concerns about this project. They listened to what we had to say. I thank the president… he has listened as well.

Nebraskans have really mobilized against this pipeline. Tell us about the different people who got involved. Would you consider yourselves environmentalists?

It was a very diverse group – I’m in the agricultural, farming, ranching and livestock business all my life. I’m a conservative person. Many other landowners are the same way. We joined forces with Bold Nebraska, which is more of a progressive group. All had a common cause and we all worked side by side. I worked with environment people, and have a new respect for them as they do … for us.

It’s been a tremendous experience for all of us to work together. We all had the common cause -- our state, water supply and natural resources. I’m very proud of our citizens here in Nebraska.

What were your concerns about the pipeline going through your backyard?

I had two major concerns. First of all – I don’t like the idea of a foreign corporation coming into our country and taking land away from U.S. citizens when they are not willing to give up land, a foreign corporation threatening to take your land though the use of eminent domain. If you’re a pipeline company you can take this land even if people don’t want to give it up. Fortunately, that has been changed through a special session [of state legislature].

The second concern is contamination of our water supply in Nebraska. This pipe was going to be buried in the ground, four feet deep on our land. Submerged in our water supply, because our water table is so high that when they bury it four feet, it would be sitting in water. Any kind of a leak would go into our water supply…Several miles of pipeline would be laid in that kind of situation here in Nebraska. We can’t risk our water supply, so oil [companies] can make large profits exporting oil.

Tell us something about yourself and the geology here. We’ve heard a lot about the Sandhills – describe them and what they mean to you as a Nebraskan and a rancher.

My family settled in Northern Kansas way back when my grandfather came out west in a covered wagon. I lived there until I was 6 years old, and then we moved to Nebraska. I’ve been in the livestock business all my life…I’ve been a farmer, rancher and worked in the livestock marketing business. For the last 14 years, I’ve been a cattle buyer. I buy replacement cattle for farmer feeders and feed yards. That’s pretty much what I’ve done all my life. I have six grandchildren, two boys, and I’ve been married for 43 years.

I guess a most accurate description [of the Sandhills], it’s like the surface of the moon with some grass growing on it. There are sand deposits created by glaciers thousands of years ago and they are large sand dunes and over the years, grass established on the Sandhills. That’s another big concern. During the construction phase of the pipeline, they would have to strip off vegetation of an area 110 feet wide. Ranchers have done all kinds of conservation [to keep the grass]. [Without it, the] wind blows sand…[and creates] great big craters…pretty soon you have unusable land.

Were you political before? How would you describe your politics – who do you favor among the GOP presidential candidates?

I’m 64 years old, and I have never spoken with a politician, until three years ago. [I had] absolutely nothing to do with politics, any kind of movements. I was just busy running a business and raising my family. That’s been kind of an eye-opening thing. Getting involved with politicians, seeing the process work, it’s been disappointing to me.

I would say definitely, I guess just frankly I was never an Obama supporter. I did not vote for him, but I think I am going to this time. To me he’s shown some real courage, standing up to big oil companies on this project. So many of our Republicans are puppets for the big corporations…

I’m a little pissed off at Republicans...well just the fact that they want to just ram this pipeline through. I guarantee that if it was coming through their backyard, they would take a different stance on this.

Do you agree with what some, including Republicans, are saying, that killing Keystone means killing jobs?

I look at it this way. Look at the actual estimate done by the State Department. [The pipeline would have] created 4,000-6,000 jobs total. I’m a Republican. [House speaker John] Boehner spouting off about how the project created hundreds of thousands of jobs is absolute nonsense. And in a few months these jobs would be gone. The pipeline would be in the ground and water supply for the rest of my life and my grandchildren’s lives, so, I mean, that’s not a good tradeoff for me.

Do you think this is the last of the Keystone XL pipeline?

The Republicans have made it pretty well known they will do an end-run around the president. [They are] in the process of writing some kind of legislation [to] take that decision away from the president is my understanding…that Congress would actually take that decision back from the president.

It’s disappointing that some of our Nebraskan legislators -- senators and representatives -- were part of the group that wanted to rush the president, to rush this decision forward. We’ll have to keep pressure on those guys to do what is right here.

Few Keystone XL Jobs Would Go to Residents on Pipeline Route

2012-01-13T09:00:00Z

Editor's Note: TransCanada, the company that wants to build a Canada-to-Texas oil pipeline, says the project will generate tens of thousands of jobs, while environmental advocates say it will create just a fraction of that number. Pres. Obama has delayed a decision to give final approval to the pipeline -- a move some say could derail the project altogether. InsideClimate News' Lisa Song reports that low unemployment rates along the proposed pipeline's route means few workers would benefit.

The proposed Keystone XL pipeline has been publicized as a major jobs creator, but recent unemployment figures indicate that few of those jobs will go to people who live along the project's route.

According to the latest data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the 57 counties in the pipeline's path have some of the nation's lowest unemployment rates. And since most of the construction jobs will go to skilled union laborers, only a fraction of the local people who are looking for work would likely qualify for those positions.

If approved, the crude oil pipeline would cross six states—Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas—on its way from the tar sands mines of Alberta, Canada to refineries on the U.S. Gulf Coast. According to November data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, unemployment rates in the majority of the counties along the route were between 2.0 and 5.7 percent, much lower than the national rate of 8.7 percent. (The lowest national unemployment rate in the past 20 years was 4.0 percent in 2000.)

Only six of the Keystone XL counties had unemployment rates at or above the national rate of 8.7 percent.

"There's no question that some communities are much better off than others," said Shawn Howard, a spokesman for TransCanada, the company that wants the build the pipeline. "That's fortunate for them."

TransCanada is "aware of the importance of hiring local," he said. "We hire as many [local] contractors and service providers as we can."

Residents along the route of another TransCanada pipeline told InsideClimate News that they didn't see much in way of employment or increased revenues for restaurants and other local services. That pipeline, simply called Keystone, began operating in 2010 and runs through some of the same states—South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas and Oklahoma—as Keystone XL.

Dan Holub, a Marion County, Kan. commissioner, said the project did little for his constituents. "They promised us all kinds of jobs. And when it came down to construction, they were all union jobs."

Local truckers and heavy equipment operators were turned away because they didn't belong to a union, Holub said.

In South Dakota, the Keystone crosses Raymond and Lillian Anderson's farm near the town of Langford (pop. 300). The Andersons oppose the pipeline because they fear an oil spill could someday contaminate their water and land. And they say the project brought few benefits to the local economy.

"[TransCanada] came through and promised [Langford] all kinds of money…at the most they bought 20 meals," Lillian Anderson said. "They had their own repair truck, they had their own gas truck, their [own] food."

She and her husband know of only three people in their two-county region who were hired for the project.

The Andersons' neighbor Kent Moeckly said the construction workers drove cars with license plates from Arkansas, Wisconsin, Kentucky, Minnesota and Florida—"everywhere but here."

"I'd say 95% of the [workers] were from out of state," Raymond Anderson said.

The Andersons assumed most of the local jobs went to Aberdeen, a city of 26,000 about an hour's drive from Langford. But Aberdeen Mayor Mike Levsen said he doesn't know of a single Aberdeen resident who was hired for the project.

In 2009, while TransCanada was building the first Keystone pipeline, Aberdeen's unemployment rate was just three percent. Few people were looking for jobs, and those who did had trouble keeping them, Levsen said. In fact, Aberdeen's local wind turbine manufacturer was struggling to find qualified workers—many who applied either failed the drug test or simply stopped showing up to work, he said.

"When you consider that, it [becomes] more apparent that the pipeline company wouldn't find welders or people with the skills they need," Levsen said.

Aberdeen did receive some economic benefits from the first Keystone: TransCanada used the city as a staging ground for one of its construction crews. During the summer of 2009, more than 300 construction workers shopped, ate and lived in Aberdeen.

Some of the workers rented houses and trailers, Levsen said. Others stayed at the local campground. "Mainly we had to accommodate a few hundred young to middle-aged men…I'm sure it was an economic boost somehow, [but] the value is overstated."

City attorney Adam Altman compared the experience to hosting extra tourists. The overall effect on Aberdeen was "minimal," he said.

Levsen estimates that the workers brought in an extra $20,000 in sales tax, with most of the money going to bars, gun shops and men's clothing stores. "We're glad they were here, but it's not like [it was] a boom town economy."

Click here for a chart that lists job figures and unemployment rates in the 57 counties on the Keystone XL route.

Professor, Youths Track Climate Change Globally

2012-01-10T10:50:00Z

The human race has been considered a race of hunter–gatherers. Groups that lived inland hunted wild animals and when the opportunity presented itself, they fished in lakes and rivers. Alternatively, groups that lived by a coast relied far more heavily on fish from the ocean, naturally leading to the formation of villages near rivers that led to oceans to maintain a food supply.

In America, climate change is commonly, and simply, viewed as hot summers and cold winters. However, for some groups that have maintained the hunter–gatherer lifestyle, climate change is potentially devastating.

Western Washington University professor Lauren McClanahan recently experienced the effects of climate change in Alaska, Mongolia, and Sri Lanka first-hand.

Alaska

“One of my former students at Western got a job up in Alaska. She was on Nunivak Island in a tiny town called Mekoryuk. […] She invited me to come up and visit the school she was teaching at, and when I got there, I wondered, ‘Why are all the buildings crooked? Why are all the boardwalks wavy?’ ”

McClanahan’s former student revealed that the permafrost that the boardwalks and buildings were built on was melting for the first time, causing structural damage to the town.

While in Mekoryuk, McClanahan began a project that would take her further than she ever imagined. “I’m a real strong believer in inviting student voice into the curriculum, and I like to do that, obviously, through writing because I’m an English major at heart. So I got the kids writing about these changes that the warming climate was having on their village, and then we got the idea, ‘a picture is worth a thousand words,’ so why don’t we ‘art’ this up a little bit and include pictures with the writing that the students are doing? Then we took it a step further and thought, ‘Well, as long as we’ve got pictures, let’s go ahead and do some multimedia.’ ”

McClanahan began making audio and video recordings around Mekoryuk, focusing primarily on the effects of climate change on the small town. It wasn’t long before her class project inspired her to work with more communities in the Lower Kuskokwin region of Alaska.

“I sent out an e-mail to all the principals in the Lower Kuskokwim School District. Right away, I got a response from Walter Betz. He invited me to come to his school and work with his kids, and at the same time, one of my student-teachers in Western wanted a rural student teaching experience.”

It just so happened that McClanahan’s student received an opportunity to teach at Kwigillingok School, the same school that Betz was the principal of. McClanahan took the trip.

It was in Kwigillingok where McClanahan met three teenagers, Kira, Adrianna, and Corey, who would help her to create her first multimedia outreach to educate others about the devastating effects of climate change on other regions of the world.

She was particularly taken with Corey’s connection to his surroundings and his culture’s connection to nature. “Corey, […] he kept saying ‘Let them understand that what they do down where they live has a direct impact on us, up here, where we live.’ ”

The culmination of McClanahan’s time in Alaska included numerous photos and a multimedia video, with quotes from the teenagers and images from their hometown. The video can be found on YouTube.
In the video, the three teenagers are heard giving their opinions on some of the events they’ve noticed regarding climate change in their tiny fishing village. Corey’s words are a reality that he and his culture must face.

“The world is changing. It’s getting warmer and warmer. Ice is melting everywhere, even underground. The melting of the permafrost causes hills, houses, and other buildings to sink. Permafrost is a section in the ground where everything is frozen. It melts and refreezes around the year, but lately, there’s been more melt than freeze. … If we don’t do something, we could lose this beautiful land that we’ve lived in for thousands of years, forever.”

Many scientists support these concerns.

“We’re talking about carbon that’s in soil, just like in your garden where there’s compost containing carbon slowly breaking down. But in permafrost, it’s almost stopped because the soil is frozen,” said ecologist Edward Schuur, from the University of Florida, who recently headed a study that found an alarming increase in the rates of melting permafrost.

“As that soil warms up, that carbon can be broken down by bacteria and fungi, and as they metabolize, they are releasing carbon and methane, greenhouse gases that cause warmer temperatures.”

Sri Lanka and Mongolia

Following the eye-opening trip to Alaska, McClanahan decided to expand her project to other regions.
“I have a friend who works at an international school, so I got hooked into the Sri Lanka trip and [as for] Mongolia, Bellingham just became sister cities with Tsetserleg, Mongolia.”

McClanahan first traveled to a small town in Sri Lanka called Hikkaduwa, where a warm and welcoming climate exists year long.

Due to the humidity and high temperatures of Sri Lanka, the land meets very different climate change problems than those in Alaska.

“They still haven’t recovered from the tsunami that hit back in 2004. There were still storefronts that were abandoned and just, you know, just rubble everywhere. … They had hundreds of people who died.”

The problems for Sri Lanka don’t end there. The average temperature in Sri Lanka has risen about two degrees centigrade over the last 40 years.

“Already there are early signs of the impact, which would assume serious proportions by 2025,” Professor Mohan Munasinghe, vice-chairman of the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, said in an interview with the Inter Press Service. “But unfortunately if the developed world doesn’t do anything to mitigate the impact, there’s little Sri Lanka can do.”
In Mongolia, McClanahan learned something unexpected. “The kids told me about this phenomenon called zud. […] It’s a phenomenon where the winters are so cold and the snow is compacted so hard that the livestock can’t root through to the grass and eat, and there’s mass die-offs of livestock, which is particularly harmful for nomadic families because they depend on their livestock for everything.”

While zud has always existed in Mongolia, the past dozen years have seen not just the worst zud in 30 years, but several that have crippled livestock and killed more than 50 million animals. There is growing concern that the culprit for the increase in zud occurrences could be due to climate change in the region.
That’s not the only climate-related problem faced by Mongolians that McClanahan noticed.

“The second thing is water. Their drought is becoming an issue in central Mongolia, and the streams and the rivers that I saw — not only were they not moving as fast as they should be — they were so polluted. Plastic bottles are the main instigators. There are plastic bottles everywhere.”

Pollution, McClanahan argued, is an example of how humans can adversely affect their environment, damaging the natural flow of rivers and wildlife.

McClanahan’s argument is not whether humans could or should control climate change, but rather that humans have impacted it and need to see whether that impact is for the better or for the worse. (end)

To view the video McClanahan made with students, visit www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4qPa2xIU4o. For more information about the Blue Sky Project, read next week’s issue of Northwest Asian Weekly.

Jeffrey Osborn can be reached at info@nwasianweekly.com.

Ecuadorean Columnist on Chevron, Money and Nature

2012-01-10T00:09:14Z

Columnist Milagros Aguirre writes for Quito's ElComercio.com that the decision in the 18-year case against the Chevron Corporation marked the end of what she calls "the trial of the century." An appeals court in Ecuador upheld an $18 billion ruling against Chevron last week for Texaco's oil pollution in the Amazon rainforest some 20 years ago. Chevron bought Texaco in 2001.

But Aguirre writes that the idea of selling a rainforest in the first place -- putting a price on something that is priceless -- is a troublesome notion. "The day they put a price on a national park, there was no more romance, no more romantic scenery, no more pure love of nature," she writes.

The dispute over who wins and who loses, she adds, now seems to matter more than the forest itself. She adds that the money will surely lead to divisions and jealousy.

But the trial has also put a few cards on the table, Aguirre writes. The trial led to changes in Ecuador's environmental laws. "Thanks to the trial, no company would dare to do what they did in the '70s and '80s (or would they?)," she wonders. The trial has also uncovered corruption. "The trial of the century uncovered the worst of each side," she writes.

Now that the decision has been made, she concludes, the fight will begin over the money and power. It wouldn't be a bad idea, she writes, to take the money that will be paid for past environmental injustices, and use it to buy up the rest of the park, to guarantee the rights of the earth and the water. That, she writes, would be a happy ending to the trial of the century.

Massive Disaster Relief for Victims of Typhoon Sendong Launches

2011-12-26T17:40:52Z

Redwood City, Calif. – ABS CBN Foundation International launches an international disaster relief effort for the victims of Typhoon Sendong in Mindanao island, the southern region of the Philippines, through Sagip Kapamilya. Tax deductible monetary donations are now being accepted to provide immediate aid. Cheques can be made to “ABS CBN Foundation International: Typhoon Sendong” and sent to the nonprofit’s offices at 150 Shoreline Drive, Redwood City, California 94065. Donors can also contribute online via www.abscbnfoundation.org.

On Sunday, Typhoon Sendong brought more than a month of average rainfall within 12 hours to Northern Mindanao, the Visayas and Palawan. Hard hit are the southern coastal cities of Cagayan de Oro and Iligan. Unaccustomed to major storms, river systems and homes specifically in these two cities were massively destroyed. Raging waters have put the toll at 927 killed and hundreds more missing, as reported today by ABS CBN News. Most of the dead are women and children.

Typhoon Sendong is now considered the world’s deadliest storm for 2011.

While mass graves are being dug for its casualties, survivors continue to ask for help. Body bags, food, water, medicine, blankets, kerosene lamps, etc. are urgently needed in evacuation centers where the ABS CBN Foundation volunteers are stationed.

“Typhoon Sendong is especially devastating to all of us because it affected some of our poorest families just a few days before Christmas,” said J. Robbie Fabian, President of the ABS CBN Foundation International. “We will be on the ground until more missing persons are brought to safety and all our survivors are given immediate attention. As always, the commitment of Sagip Kapamilya is long-term community rehabilitation.”

The Sagip Kapamilya—Typhoon Sendong campaign appeals to the global community to assist the Filipino people in this time of dire need. To address the urgent needs on the ground in the quickest possible way, and because shipments of in-kind goods take 45 days to arrive in the Philippines, ABS CBN Foundation International will only accept monetary donations at this time. ABS CBN Foundation International is committed to remit 100% of donations to the Philippines within 24 hours of the donation.

Philippine Flood Disaster was Foretold

2011-12-19T21:00:00Z

MANILA--The flash flooding that killed more than 600 in the cities of Cagayan de Oro and Iligan on Mindanao island in the Philippines was foretold three years ago, but the warning was dismissed by lawmakers as “too alarmist.”

Environmentalists said a simulation of the effects of extreme weather events from climate change such as saltwater intrusion, sea level rise and intense tropical cyclones, showed that major Philippine cities, including Cagayan de Oro and Iligan, were at risk of massive flooding. The simulation of the effects of extreme weather phenomena was drafted in 2009 by the Philippine Imperative for Climate Change (PICC), WWF and Filipino scientists.

Jose Ma. Lorenzo Tan, chief executive of the World Wide Fund for Nature-Philippines (WWF), said Monday the events in Northern Mindanao over the weekend mirrored the prediction. “It was an exact fit,” Tan said.

“At best, this might provide a very rough indicator of areas that may be more vulnerable to sea level rise, storm surge, saltwater intrusion or a combination thereof,” the group’s presentation said.

Nereus Acosta, who headed the PICC and currently serves as the presidential adviser for environment, said the simulation showed that the coastal cities of Cagayan de Oro and Iligan in Northern Mindanao would be ravaged by massive floods from the overflow of river basins and sea level increase.

Mountain range, coast

“Cagayan de Oro and Iligan are vulnerable because they sit near mountain ranges and are coastal areas,” Acosta said. “It would really hit where it hit now.”

The simulations showed water from the sea and the Cagayan River overflowing to cover large parts of the two cities. In Cagayan de Oro, the most affected was the western side, the same area that bore the brunt of Tropical Storm “Sendong.”

In Iligan City, the floods would encroach on the city, according to the simulation. This happened last weekend, Acosta said.

Scoffed at

Acosta and Tan said their findings were scoffed at when it was shown to lawmakers three years ago. “They said I was being too alarmist,” Acosta said.

Tan said people should be rightly alarmed by the PICC report. “This is the reality,” he said.

The head of the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRRMC) said the huge volume of water that Sendong dumped on Northern Mindanao was unexpected.

“The people did not expect this and the government also did not expect this, that we will have 181 millimeters of rain. This is not in the path of typhoons,” NDRRMC Executive Director Benito Ramos said on Sunday.

Illegal settlers

Ramos said he saw from his helicopter ride with Defense Secretary Voltaire Gazmin that most of the victims lived along the river.

“There are many illegal settlers. I hope the city government did not authorize them to construct houses beside the river,” Ramos said.

Ramos said many of the victims did not heed the weather bureau’s warning about the storm.

An official of the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (Pagasa) said the rains brought by Sendong were not the main cause of the floods in Iligan and Cagayan de Oro.

“It’s the topography. The water came from the mountains that’s why it happened so fast,” said Pagasa Deputy Administrator Flaviana Hilario.

“This was not caused by just a simple rain,” she added.

Floods due to rains accumulate slower, according to Hilario. Pictures from the field showed the flood carrying logs, heavy rocks and plenty of mud, an indication that the water came from the mountains, she said.

Local Official Blames Illegal Logging for Floods in Southern Philippines

2011-12-18T23:40:00Z

MANILA, Phils. -- Rampant illegal logging activities in the mountains of northern Mindanao may have caused the heavy flooding during the onslaught of tropical storm Sendong [International name: Washi] last Friday evening to early Saturday, a local official said Sunday.

Mayor Vicente Emano of Cagayan De Oro City, one of the areas heavily affected by the storm, said the disaster that hit his constituents could have been prevented if illegal logging activities in the mountains surrounding the city were stopped a long time ago.

“Palagi na ho akong nagsasalita na ihinto itong illegal logging pero hanggang ngayon hindi pa rin nahihinto. Nagpapatuloy pa rin (I have always spoken out, demanding a stop to illegal logging but until now, it has not been halted...It still continues.),” he said in an interview over GMA News TV.

He added that the dwindling forest cover in the area could no longer prevent rainwater from the mountains from flowing downstream to rivers, causing flash floods in low-lying areas.

“Hindi naman gaano kalakas ang ulan dito. Ang nangyari nito, ‘yung buhos n'ung ulan doon sa bundok, nag-flash flood. Pagdating dito, bigla na lang laki ng ilog namin… Ang nangyayari rito, wala na nakakapigil na mga kahoy sa tubig galing sa bundok (The rain was not that strong. What happened here was, that rainfall landed on the mountains and created flash floods. When the water came down to our province, the rivers swelled...What happened was there were no longaer any trees to help absorb the flood waters,)” Emano said.

Emano proposed that a moratorium on all logging activities in northern Mindanao should be declared after the disaster caused by Sendong, which killed more than 300 people, many of them children.

A total of 332 people have been confirmed dead due to flash floods caused by Sendong, based on latest data from the National Disaster Risk Reduction Management Council (NDRRMC) as of Sunday afternoon. The Philippine National Red Cross, however, has already pegged Sendong’s death toll to 521.

Last February, President Benigno Aquino III declared a total log ban in the country, but illegal logging activities continue in northern Mindanao.

The Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) office in the region said last month that it was able to confiscate some P4 million worth of timber from illegal loggers in the area from February to November this year.

Philippine Floods: Deadly Mix for Disaster

2011-12-18T20:02:24Z

The absence of a flood warning, high tide, darkness and a false sense of security proved disastrous for people of northern Mindanao when Tropical Storm “Sendong” came over the weekend.

Add illegal logging, rapid urbanization and mining, and the result was deadly for residents of Cagayan de Oro and Iligan cities, government and Red Cross officials said.

Entire villages were washed away, homes flattened, bridges broken and vehicles upended.

The death toll from the flash floods on Sunday rose to at least 711 in Mindanao. Hundreds remained missing.

The Philippine Red Cross (PRC) said it was a combination of factors that led to the tragedy.
“It’s unusual for Mindanao; a month’s worth of rainfall fell in only a few hours; people were already asleep; the storm hit pineapple plantations that don’t absorb water; it was high tide and waterways were heavily silted. It was unprecedented and overwhelming,” said PRC secretary general Gwendolyn Pang.
In Cagayan de Oro, the bodies, many bloated and bluish and frozen in grotesque poses, continued to pile up in funeral homes. Senior Supt. Gerardo Rosales, city police chief, said 474 bodies had been recovered. A total of 482 persons remained missing.

Officials said 214 died in Iligan, 15 in Bukidnon, five in Compostela Valley and three in Zamboanga del Norte.

The government and the Red Cross appealed for help to feed, clothe and house more than 35,000 people huddled in evacuation centers as soldiers battled to recover bodies.

Presidential spokesperson Edwin Lacierda said that President would fly to the devastated areas on Tuesday. Read more here.

NYC Public Schools Compete to Become Greenest

2011-12-13T09:00:00Z

NEW YORK -- At M.S. 88 in Prospect Park, Brooklyn, hundreds of school children – most of them from sixth to eighth grade – poured into the auditorium on Friday morning. Their lesson for the day: saving energy.

“Turning the lights off is an important step,” said Kristin Compton, a pony-tailed 11-year-old girl, who sounded nervous as she spoke on the stage before the crowd. Her science teacher and three fellow students stood beside her.

“I unplug the computers before leaving the classroom,” said Angel Aguilar. With sense of pride in his voice, the 13-year-old added that he does the same thing at home after using his video games.

And when the school principal on a microphone asked who cares about saving energy and helping the environment, almost all the kids raised their hands in unison. The noise escalated in the auditorium.

These kids were among those taking part in a pilot program that facilitates the greening of their schools and communities. There are 30 participating public schools, including M.S. 88, across the city.

Led by Solar One, a nonprofit environmental education organization, in partnership with the Department of Education, the program – the Green Design Lab – aims to help Mayor Michael Bloomberg achieve his goal of cutting energy consumption in city buildings by about a third by 2017.

New York City has more than 1 million students in its public school system, housed in 1,200 buildings. Schools account for a quarter of the city’s energy use.

Last Friday, Solar One and city officials announced the launch of a public school-wide competition that will award a total of $30,000 to schools that can achieve the most energy savings by next April.

“You’re not just helping your school, but also your neighborhood,” said New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, adding that it’s powerful when young people can tell their parents and older siblings about conserving energy.

“You—students—are the key to success,” said Chris Collins, executive director of Solar One.

Touted as a first-of-its-kind environmental project in K-12 public schools, the program -- bringing together school principals, teachers, custodians and janitors -- brings highly trained educators into schools two days a week to provide hands-on environmental education on topics such as air quality, water, food or materials.

The project started last year with 10 participating schools. It has now grown to 30.

“We’d like to have 150 schools over the next three years,” Collins said.

Collins said participating schools can also benefit from cost savings from reducing their energy use. He said teaching about energy efficiency and reducing carbon footprint offer opportunities to improve students’ science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) skills.

John Shea, CEO of the NY Department of Education’s School Facilities, described the program as a great avenue for students to green their schools and, ultimately, become young ambassadors of environmental change.

He recognized some roadblocks ahead.

“The sustainability of this effort is very difficult. We may see some drop-offs, and that’s why we are trying it for a year,” Shea said. “It may be easy to achieve behavioral change for a month, but for a lifetime it would be challenging.”

Yet, Claudia Campoverde, a seventh-grader who was sitting with her two friends at the back of the auditorium, was up for the challenge.

“I’m going to make it a habit to turn off the lights when no one is in the room, and I won’t be scared to remind others in the class,” she said. “I just don’t want to waste our electricity anymore.”

Nepal Climate Loans Violate 'Polluter Should Pay' Principle

2011-12-09T09:00:00Z

Climate talks in Durban, South Africa are set to wrap up this weekend. While reports show that pariticpating nations have agreed to a massive fund to help poorer countries cope with climate-related issues, in Nepal protestors say a plan to offer loans in the form of Climate Investment Funds will drive one of the world's pooresrt countries deeper into debt, without addressing its climate needs.

KATHMANDU--Nepal will implement five projects with $110 million sanctioned by the controversial Climate Investment Funds (CIFs), ignoring protestors who say this least developed country merits grants rather than climate loans.

The money--$50 million in grants and $60 million in credit--will be disbursed through the Asian Development Bank, International Finance Corporation (IFC) and the World Bank through four years as the projects start early next year, Nepal’s environment secretary Krishna Gyawali said.

One of Eight Developing Countries

Nepal is among eight developing countries that were offered CIFs under either the Clean Technology Fund or the Strategic Climate Fund (SCF). Other potential CIF recipients were Bangladesh, Bolivia, Cambodia, Mozambique, Niger, Tajikistan and Zambia.

In May 2009, Nepal’s first Maoist government agreed to participate in the Pilot Programme for Climate Resilience (PPCR), developed under the SCF.

Besides the environment ministry, the nodal agency for implementing the projects, other stakeholders include relevant ministries, the National Planning Commission and the Federation of Nepalese Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FNCCI).

In 2010, a new government led by the communists identified four priority areas where the funds would be spent.

Building climate resilience of watersheds in mountain eco-regions is top priority. It will focus on communities living in watershed areas significantly vulnerable to climate change.

A second priority is responding to climate-related hazards through early warning systems, as well as developing insurance.

The other two components are mainstreaming climate risk management in development, and building climate-resilient communities through private-sector participation.

Later, at Nepal’s request, a fifth project was added to build the climate resilience of endangered species.

Climate Loans Add “Insult to Injury”

However, several nongovernmental organizations, trade unions, legislators from ruling parties and civil society members are campaigning against the climate loans, saying they add insult to injury.

"Developed countries must provide unconditional financial support on adaptation to countries vulnerable to climate change to build their resilience," said Keshab Thapa, program coordinator at Local Initiatives for Biodiversity, Research and Development.

Thapa said climate loans violate both the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, where developed countries have committed adaptation support to vulnerable countries, as well as Nepal’s own policy on climate change, the National Adaptation Programme of Action (NAPA).

With NAPA requiring 80 percent of the funds of any adaptation program to flow directly to the community level, the PPCR in Nepal, Thapa said, violates the principle of country and community ownership.

He also objects to the private-sector participation component, to be effected through IFC and FNCCI.

"The PPCR proposes to lend money to private-sector companies which will never achieve community resilience," he told IPS. "Private companies are often happy to use the loan money for their own benefit, simply looking at the scheme of interest and repayment; they are often totally unaware of climate change, adaptation, resilience and the principle of equity and justice."

With Nepal being at medium risk of debt distress and spending eight percent revenue to repay foreign debts, protesters say climate loans will burden the taxpayer with additional debt.

"We petitioned two earlier prime ministers against taking climate loans and are following it up with the current one," said Hari Parajuli, secretary of the All-Nepal Peasants’ Federation, an umbrella of 22 organizations that has participated in public rallies against the PPCR.

"Nepal has one of the lowest greenhouse-gas emission levels in the world due to its low industrialization," Parajuli added. "It also has forests covering nearly 40 percent of its land. Yet, the developed countries that cause pollution are now seeking to make Nepal take loans and pay them interest."

Parajuli said the protests are also against the involvement of the World Bank.

"We don’t regard it positively," he said. "It is not service-oriented but works for profit."

Corruption Fuels Fears

The growing corruption charges against ministers and government officials have also fuelled fears about the climate loans.

"Past precedents make us fear that new loans may not be utilized properly," said Madan Lall Shrestha, an academician at the Nepal Academy of Science and Technology. "Before taking a new loan, the old ones should be reviewed first."

A parliamentary committee on finance and labor relations has also criticized the government, saying it should ask for grants, not loans.

"Climate loans go against the polluters-should-pay principle," said Sunil Pant, a legislator. Pant has been campaigning against climate loans in parliament and advocating the idea of a grant.

"Climate change cannot be mitigated by putting poor nations in deeper debt, especially when the problem is generated by the wealthy nations," he stated. "Rich countries emit huge amounts of carbon and then hypocritically impose debt and loans on the poor countries they take resources from, creating deeper poverty.

"We are calling on the wealthier nations to compensate Nepal and the rest of the world for the damage and environmental destruction they have caused that threatens us all."

The World Bank, one of the targets of public criticism, says it is merely the fund- disbursal instrument.

"Whether or how the available resources are used to address urgent financing and knowledge gaps is entirely up to Nepal," said Christine Kimes, the bank’s acting country manager for Nepal. "Concerns regarding climate financing in Nepal should therefore be discussed with the government," Kimes added.

As for the government, officials defend the decision to take the loan.

"The apex body on climate change, the Climate Change Council headed by the prime minister, approved of the funding, provided it was used on priority sectors like agriculture, biodiversity and renewable energy to enhance productivity," said Gyawali. "Besides, it is a remarkably concessional loan."

The $60 million loan has to be repaid in 40 years with a 10-year grace period. Also, Gyawali said, there is no interest, only a 0.10 percent service charge to be paid semi- annually.

But the protesters say they have not given up.

"Civil society organizations will closely monitor the use of the PPCR grant and loan," said Thapa. "They will also continue lobbying to prevent further climate loans."

SC Edison, Tribes Fight Over Revenues from Shuttered Coal Power Plant

2011-12-06T17:40:00Z

SAN FRANCISCO -- The Mohave coal-fired power plant in Laughlin, Nevada shut down in 2005, but it’s still generating millions of dollars in revenue for its majority owner Southern California Edison. A fight is currently underway in California over who should benefit from those revenues – anyone other than Southern California ratepayers -- and how those proceeds should be distributed.

Locked in the fight -- which has been winding through the state’s Public Utilities Commission (PUC) for the last five years -- are the utility, the Navajo Nation, the Hopi Tribe, the Sierra Club and other environmental organizations.

“This is a first of its kind [case] in the country and whenever there is a precedent set, it’s worth a lot more than the money,” said Andy Bessler, southwest field organizer with the Sierra Club based in Flagstaff, Arizona.

The shuttered coal-fired power plant continues to generate revenue through the sale of sulfur dioxide (SO2) allowances on an emissions market, where facilities can trade pollution credits in order to comply with federal clean air rules, similar to a “cap and trade” mechanism proposed to deal with greenhouse gases.

The total value of the proceeds from the sale of SO2 credits from Mohave total $3.5 million.

Earlier this year, the PUC ruled that it did have the jurisdiction to dictate where the proceeds from the sale of the credits should go. It is currently considering a range of proposals from Edison, tribal leaders and Native and non-Native environmental groups.

Southern California Edison spokesperson Gil Alexander said the company’s position is that the proceeds from the sale of SO2 allowances are a “customer asset.”

“The allowances should be subject to sale by SCE and all of the net sale proceeds should be credited to SCE customers through rates…,” the utility said in a filing to state regulators.

In separate proposals, the Navajo Nation, the Hopi Tribe, and members of the Just Transition Coalition say they want the agency to take into account the devastating environmental impact to tribal lands and people from operating the Mohave station, and the economic losses from its shut down.

Native environmental groups say the coal industry has devastated tribal communities by contaminating and depleting waterways and springs, littering the land with waste sites, pushing people off their land, and jeopardizing the health of tribal members.

The coal to power the Mohave plant came from the Black Mesa mine in Arizona located on Navajo and Hopi lands. The coal was transported via a 275-mile pipeline carrying a coal slurry – a mixture of water and pulverized coal –across state lines. Water for the coal slurry came from Navajo and Hopi aquifers.

“No one wants to be told what to do with their money, that you have to give your money back to the tribe, [as a way to provide] some kind of restitution and restoring justice for Mohave’s legacy,” said Bessler of the Sierra Club, a member of the coalition. “The PUC and everyone understand that… they understand the justice part of it. The challenge is the mechanism of how to handle these sulfur dioxide allowances. There hasn’t been a question of who do these allowances belong to.”

Bessler says the coalition’s proposal focuses on two options for distribution of the proceeds in a way that benefits tribal communities: Fund a California-based renewable energy project with shared tribal ownership or site a SC Edison project on tribal lands that benefits tribal interests.

The Navajo Nation said the suspension of Mohave caused “severe job losses, income losses, and widespread poverty,” in a filing to regulators.

Wahleah Johns, who co-directs the Black Mesa Water Coalition, a grassroots organization of Native American and non-Native activists in Flagstaff, said the idea behind the petition by tribal and environmental groups was to come up with a transition plan to help offset the economic pain of a power plant closure. Her organization is part of the coalition.

“The process has been lengthy but to give that perspective is important for us,” she said. “For [the PUC] to recognize, there has been an injustice to our communities.” And, she said, it underscored that there was no transition plan in place to help workers or the local economy when Mohave shut down.

“I don’t know if workers were compensated,” she said.

Navajo leaders would like to use the revenues to help break ground on new transmission lines and large scale solar and wind projects in Arizona and New Mexico, according to PUC documents.

The Navajo Nation became the first tribe in the nation to pass green jobs legislation. Passed in July of 2009, the Navajo Green Economy Act establishes a commission and fund to spur green jobs, but it still has no funding.

Johns says her organization is pressing forward by developing its own small-scale solar project.

“It’s important to diversify our local economy with local green entrepreneurial projects, and build capacity in our communities, because we don’t see any type of support for our people today,” she said.

Navajo leaders say potential partnerships with Edison to develop the projects could benefit the utility’s customers by supplying renewable energy to California.

“SCE is opposed to the JTC [Just Transition Coalition] proposal and the Tribes' proposals because they would have no benefit to SCE customers,” the utility said in an emailed response. “SCE already has a very aggressive program of purchasing renewable energy, which the Tribes can participate in if they can develop an eligible project, like any project developer.”

According to PUC filings, the total number of allowances per year from Mohave is around 52,000 per year. As majority owner of Mohave (56%), SCE’s share is approximately 30,000 allowances per year, Alexander said. SCE has purchased SO2 allowances through 2041.

The Sierra Club’s Bessler said that when the coalition petitioned the PUC over the distribution of the proceeds, the pot of money, based on the value of the SO2 credits at the time, was estimated at $20 million, but now they are worth much less, because the value of the allowances have plummeted.

The value of sulfur dioxide allowances under the EPA’s Acid Rain program has declined, because there’s a glut of credits on the market, according to an industry source. The reason for the surplus is that facilities are now meeting even more stringent SO2 benchmarks set under a different EPA program that addresses the transport of air pollution across state lines.

The facilities are emitting less of the pollutant, requiring the purchase of fewer allowances to meet the federal rules. In January of 2005, the value of allowances was about $700/ton. Allowances are currently worth about .75 cents/ton, according to Evolution Markets, a brokerage firm that specializes in the emissions and carbon trading markets headquartered in New York.

The declining value of SO2 allowances on the market calls into question the viability of tapping pollution credits as a source of revenue to provide a “just transition” when plant closures affect local economies.

“We’re not totally pleased with how this has turned out, but at least we have a shot at something,” Bessler said. “It’s the law of diminishing returns.”