… on a quiet day, I can hear her breathing

Category: politics

  • Statement on Carbon Capture

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    UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is set to announce a multi-million pound carbon capture scheme called Acorn. Carbon Capture has never worked and is instead a manufactured hoax by the oil and gas industry to enable themselves to continue profiteering and fekking the planet.

    Sunak must know this and is willing to waste more public millions further supporting the fossil fuel industry destroying the planet.

    https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/mar/30/government-gambles-on-carbon-capture-and-storage-tech-despite-scientists-doubts

    Scientists told the Guardian that an overdependence on CCS was ill-advised. More than 700 scientists have written to the prime minister asking him to grant no new oil and gas licences, describing CCS as “yet to be proved at scale”, and the UN secretary-general called on governments last week to stop developing oil and gas.

    Bob Ward, head of policy at the Grantham Institute, said CCS technology would be needed for certain industries, but that using it to enable the continued use of fossil fuels was a mistake. “What does not make sense is to carry on with further development of new fossil fuel reserves on the assumption that CCS will be available to mop up all the additional emissions. While the costs of CCS will come down, it will make fossil fuel use even more expensive, and it will not eliminate all the risks resulting from the price volatility and energy insecurity of fossil fuels. A successful and competitive economy in the future will be powered by clean and affordable domestic energy, not unreliable and insecure fossils fuels,” he said.

    “CCS is not required if the government moves to renewables as quickly as possible – especially as I am unaware of any CCS that works,” added Mark Maslin, professor of earth science at UCL.

    Kevin Anderson, professor of energy and climate at Manchester, said: “When it comes to energy emissions, the claimed prospect of CCS continues its long-established role in supporting the development of the oil and gas industry and in further delaying real cuts in emissions. Given the huge cost, very high-life cycle emissions and appalling record of working as promised, there is little, if any, merit in pursuing CCS as a major plank of UK energy strategy.”

  • Greta Thunbeg hits out at government’s Rosebank oil field plans as ‘out of touch with reality’

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    https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/b/greta-thunbeg-hits-out-government-rosebank-plans-out-touch-reality

    Climate activist Greta Thunberg speaking on the Pyramid Stage during the Glastonbury Festival at Worthy Farm in Somerset. Picture date: Saturday June 25, 2022.

    INTERNATIONAL climate activist Greta Thunberg condemned the British government as “out of touch with reality” today as she joined protesters in London against the Rosebank oil field.

    Campaigners gathered outside the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero against the proposed plans for the new site off the Shetland coast.

    The plans were originally expected to get approved before parliamentary recess this month but have been delayed over climate concerns.

    Ms Thunberg said that a decision by Energy Secretary Grant Shapps to approve oil and gas explorations at Britain’s largest site would be “deliberately destructive.”

    The Swedish activist said: “How can the British government even consider pressing ahead with new drilling when we can see what the burning of fossil fuels is doing to the climate and to people?

    “The extreme weather events being experienced around the world right now is just a taste of what’s to come if we don’t get off fossil fuels.”

    …

    https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/b/greta-thunbeg-hits-out-government-rosebank-plans-out-touch-reality

  • Gen Z for Change Leader Interrupts Biden Press Secretary to Demand Climate Action

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    Original article by Julia Conley republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

    Elise Joshi, executive director of Gen Z for Change, interrupted White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre at an event on July 27, 2023 to demand climate action from the Biden administration. (Photo: screenshot/Gen Z for Change)

    “Asking nicely hasn’t worked out,” said Elise Joshi as she stood up during the White House press secretary’s remarks.

    Shortly after U.S. President Joe Biden angered climate campaigners by failing to mention fossil fuels in his remarks about new protections for millions of people facing extreme heat, the executive director of a youth-led advocacy group decided to address the administration directly about officials’ refusal to end support for the planet-heating oil and gas industry.

    Elise Joshi, 21, stood up as White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre was addressing a crowd at an event hosted by the voter engagement group Voters of Tomorrow. The campaigner spoke about Gen Z for Change’s long-stated demand that Biden declare a climate emergency—a move that would unlock numerous resources to fight the climate crisis and expedite the shift away from oil and fossil gas.

    “Excuse me for interrupting, but asking nicely hasn’t worked out,” said Joshi. “A million young people wrote to the administration pleading not to approve a disastrous oil drilling project in Alaska, and we were ignored. So I’m here channeling the strength of my ancestors and generation.”

    An event staffer approached Joshi, but Jean-Pierre urged them to “let her talk,” allowing the campaigner to demand that Biden “stop approving new oil and gas projects and align with youth, science, and frontline communities.”

    When Joshi was finished speaking Jean-Pierre acknowledged that she had brought up the Willow project, an oil drilling operation that was approved on public land in Alaska this year. The project is expected to produce more than 600 million barrels of crude oil over the next three decades—releasing about 280 million metric tons of heat-trapping carbon emissions.

    Joshi also noted that the Biden administration has approved drilling projects at a faster rate than the Trump administration.

    As other Gen Z for Change campaigners called on the White House to “declare a climate emergency,” Jean-Pierre defended Biden’s record by saying he has “taken more action on climate change than any other president,” and said she would speak to Joshi privately after the event.

    “We can talk through all that he has done and all that he wants to do, and we can also listen to you,” said the press secretary.

    The White House can show it is listening to young people, said the advocacy group Sunrise Movement, by declaring a climate emergency.

    U.S. Rep. Maxwell Frost (D-Fla.), who has also called for far-reaching climate action and at 26 is the youngest member of Congress, applauded Joshi for speaking out.

    “I join the movement in asking the president to declare a climate emergency,” said Frost.

    Original article by Julia Conley republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

  • The news is full of it: Capitalist scum have trashed the planet

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    The news is full of it: July set to be the warmest month on record meaning that temperatures are running away or as UN chief Antonio Guterres said the planet is entering an “era of global boiling”.

    This is a result of Capitalism. Capitalists see nothing wrong with simply profiteering and disregarding the consequences of their actions: they’re more than happy to feck the planet and profit from it. That’s exactly how we’ve arrived here and – of course – why do you imagine that they’ll stop now? Capitalist scum like Lord Frost, Liz Truss, Rishi Sunak, Grant Shapps and Michael Gove will tell you that trashing the planet is a price worth paying to fatten their and their friends’ wallets.

    We need to snatch power from these planet-destroying Capitalist scum to have any meaningful climate action. It’s pointless voting Capitalist Conservative or the Red Capitalist Labour variety. We need to elect Greens and we need Greens to pull their fingers out ffs!

    16.25: Suggest that we abandon the electoral democratic route if the Capitalists further attack our planet. It’s a plutocracy not a democracy after all – why should we respect or be held to democratic norms?

  • Starmer is selling Labour to big business. In power he will do the same

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    https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/uk-labour-starmer-selling-party-tory-donors-pulling-strings

    Jonathan Cook

    Labour policy is shifting ever further rightwards. That won’t and can’t change as long as only tainted City money is filling the party’s empty coffers

    Image of Keir Starmer sucking up to the rich and powerful at the World Economic Forum, Davos
    Image of Keir Starmer sucking up to the rich and powerful at the World Economic Forum, Davos

    What has happened to Britain’s opposition Labour Party under Keir Starmer? The familiar adage “follow the money” helps make sense of the party’s policy shifts ever further rightwards.

    Labour plumbed new depths earlier this month when it conceded that, in power, it would maintain the government’s cap on child benefit, restricting financial help to the first two children in a family.

    The cap, one of the Conservatives’ most socially regressive measures, was denounced as “heinous” and “obscene” by shadow cabinet ministers after it was introduced. Even Starmer called it “punitive” when he was trying to win over Labour members in the 2020 leadership vote.

    Hundreds of thousands of children and their families are reported to have been driven below the breadline since the benefit cap came into effect in 2017.

    No other country in the world has a similar policy. But in Britain, punishing children is now a bipartisan issue.

    …

    https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/uk-labour-starmer-selling-party-tory-donors-pulling-strings