greenwashing

Report Details ‘Toxic’ Fossil Fuel Pollution in COP28 Host UAE

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The sun sets amid heavy air pollution in Dubai. (Photo: Forbes Johnston/flickr/cc)

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

“Nobody will ever hold the government to account publicly,” said one climate campaigner. “We do not have the privilege of speaking out against the government.”

Despite greenwashing efforts like hosting the ongoing United Nations Climate Change Conference, the United Arab Emirates—the world’s seventh-biggest oil producer and sixth-largest exporter—is contributing heavily to toxic air pollution, creating a “devastating impact on human health.”

That’s according to a Monday report from Human Rights Watch (HRW) report—entitled ‘You Can Smell Petrol in the Air’: UAE Fossil Fuels Feed Toxic Pollution —which “documents alarmingly high air pollution levels in the UAE” and how toxic air caused by oil and gas production creates “major health risks” for the country’s 9.4 million people.

As the report details:

The UAE government says that the country has poor air quality but mainly ascribes this to natural dust from sandstorms. However, academic studies have shown that natural causes are not the single, or in some cases even the major, factor in air pollution. A 2022 academic study found that, in addition to the dust, emissions including from fossil fuels contribute significantly to the problem in the UAE. Air pollution and climate change are directly linked, as the extraction and use of fossil fuels are the sources of air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions.

The report’s researchers analyzed levels of PM2.5 —fine particulate matter measuring 2.5 micrometers or smaller that can penetrate human lungs and blood—at 30 UAE government monitoring stations and found that they were, on average, three times higher than the World Health Organization’s (WHO) daily recommended exposure.

According to the latest available data from the World Bank, the UAE’s mean annual PM2.5 exposure is over eight times higher than what the WHO says is safe .

The WHO estimates that approximately 1,870 people die each year from outdoor air pollution in the UAE.

“Fossil fuels pollute the air people breathe in the UAE,” HRW environment director Richard Pearshouse said in a statement . “But the obliteration of civil society by UAE’s government means that no one can publicly express concerns, let alone criticize the government’s failure to prevent this harm.”

The report explains:

Those in the UAE wanting to report on, or speak out about, the risks of fossil fuel expansion and its links to air pollution face risks of unlawful surveillance, arrest, detention, and ill-treatment. Over the last decade, authorities in the UAE have embarked on a sustained assault on human rights and freedoms, including targeting human rights activists, enacting repressive laws, and using the criminal justice system as a tool to eliminate the human rights movement. These policies have led to the complete closure of civic space, severe restrictions on freedom of expression, both online and offline, and the criminalization of peaceful dissent.

“Nobody will ever hold the government to account publicly,” said one climate activist interviewed by HRW. “We do not have the privilege of speaking out against the government.”

Pearshouse argued: “Air pollution is a dirty secret in the UAE. If the government doesn’t allow civil society to scrutinize and speak freely about the connection between air pollution and its fossil fuel industry, people will keep experiencing health conditions that are entirely preventable.”

Most of those affected by air pollution in the UAE are migrant workers, who make up nearly 90% of the country’s population. In addition to enduring widespread serious labor abuses, these workers—many of whom hail from some of the world’s most climate-vulnerable countries—face deadly dangers from air pollution.

Migrant workers interviewed by HRW said they breathe air that burns their lungs, are often short of breath at work, and suffer from skin and other ailments they believe could be caused by pollution. However, migrant workers told HRW that they were given no information about the risks of air pollution or how to protect themselves.

One migrant worker told HRW: “Sometimes, the environment becomes dark and murky. We discuss among friends why it is that way… The conversation ends there. During such times friends also fall sick.”

While the UAE government has submitted a recently revised domestic climate action plan as required by the 2015 Paris agreement, the plan has been criticized for its continued reliance upon fossil fuel production.

“Sometimes, the environment becomes dark and murky. We discuss among friends why it is that way.”

The choice of the UAE and the CEO of its national oil company— Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber —as host and president of the U.N. Climate Change Conference also stunned and angered many climate campaigners around the world. In the United States, climate activists were also outraged after U.S. climate envoy John Kerry glowingly endorsed Al Jaber as “a terrific choice” for the COP28 presidency.

Late last month, internal records leaked by a whistleblower showed that Al Jaber used meetings about COP28 to push foreign governments for fossil fuel deals. In response to the allegation, former Marshallese President Hilda Heine resigned from COP28’s advisory board.

Al Jaber stoked further controversy over the weekend when he insisted there is “no science” supporting the effort to rapidly phase out planet-heating fossil fuels.

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

Continue ReadingReport Details ‘Toxic’ Fossil Fuel Pollution in COP28 Host UAE

Carbon Offsets 101: Why We Can’t Offset Our Way Out of the Climate Crisis

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The buildings and steaming cooling towers of a coal-fired power plant behind a landscape park in Germany. Frank Bienewald / LightRocket via Getty Images

https://www.ecowatch.com/carbon-offsets-climate-crisis.html

… Carbon offsets are in theory a way to cancel out greenhouse gas emissions by funding an activity that will remove a supposedly equal amount of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere or prevent an equal amount of carbon pollution. They can be purchased by everyone from major companies pursuing net-zero emissions goals to individuals looking to compensate for high-carbon activities like flying. Typically, an institution or individual will purchase a certain amount of carbon credits, with one credit usually standing in for one metric ton of carbon dioxide — or what is typically emitted by driving 2,513 miles in a gas car — removed from the atmosphere. (That’s roughly the distance between San Francisco and Atlanta). Whoever buys the carbon credit is essentially buying the right to count the emissions reduction as theirs even if it’s being performed by a tree-planting or renewable energy project on the other side of the globe.

…

Quick Facts

  • One carbon credit usually equals one metric ton of carbon dioxide supposedly removed from the atmosphere, or the equivalent of driving 2,513 miles in a gas-powered car.
  • The voluntary carbon market quadrupled in value between 2020 and 2021 to reach nearly $2 billion. 
  • The average tree absorbs 20 pounds of carbon dioxide each year during the first 20 years of its life.
  • Only four percent of carbon offset projects actively remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, as opposed to preventing additional emissions. 
  • More than 170 climate, environmental and Indigenous rights groups signed an open letter opposing carbon offsets. 
  • At least 52 percent of carbon-offset generating wind projects in India would have been built anyway.
  • California’s forest carbon offsets program likely overestimated its emissions reductions by at least 80 percent. 
  • A Ryanair program to offer passengers €1 carbon offsets only actually offset the company’s emissions by 0.01 percent. 
  • Sixty-six percent of highly-polluting companies studied relied on carbon offsets to meet their net zero targets.
  • There are only around 500 million hectares of land available for tree-planting carbon offset projects and Shell wants to claim 10 percent of it.

…

They’re a Scam: One of the main criticisms of carbon offsets is that many projects don’t really do what they say they are going to do, namely, prevent additional emissions. A major ProPublica report published in 2019 reviewed 20 years of forest-preservation-based offset projects and found that “In case after case […] carbon credits hadn’t offset the amount of pollution they were supposed to, or they had brought gains that were quickly reversed or that couldn’t be accurately measured to begin with.” A 2021 study of wind farms in India found that at least 52 percent of the projects used to back offsets would have been constructed regardless and that therefore the selling of the offsets to polluting industries actually increased emissions. Two studies of California’s forest carbon offsets program found that it overestimated its emissions reductions by at least 80 percent. The dubious nature of many carbon-offset projects leads to charges of greenwashing, because fossil fuel or airline companies can use their purchasing of offsets to market themselves as being more sustainable than they really are. For example, a Ryanair program to charge its customers €1 to offset their flight only lowered the company’s emissions by 0.01 percent.

…

They’re a Distraction From Reducing Emissions: Even if every carbon offset project worked exactly as advertised, however, it wouldn’t be an effective tool for fighting climate change. That’s because the climate crisis is caused by pumping greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere and will only be halted if emissions actually stop as well. Yet a 2021 study looking at net-zero pledges from the sectors responsible for 64 percent of greenhouse gas emissions found that 66 percent of them relied on carbon offsets. Oil, gas and mining companies were especially dependent on offsets for their net zero plans. 

…

What everyone in the climate space can agree on is that the emphasis needs to move away from purchasing offsets and towards actually reducing fossil fuel emissions. At their best, offsets could be a stop-gap measure to fund beneficial projects and counteract emissions that there is not yet a technologically feasible way to reduce directly. At their worst, carbon offsets risk giving polluters an easy way to greenwash their image while continuing business as usual, actually increasing emissions through miscounting and reproducing the injustices underlying the climate crisis. Given that the current system tips more towards the latter than the former, it’s important for governments, companies and individuals to focus on not putting greenhouse gas emissions in the atmosphere in the first place. 

Read the original article https://www.ecowatch.com/carbon-offsets-climate-crisis.html

Continue ReadingCarbon Offsets 101: Why We Can’t Offset Our Way Out of the Climate Crisis

Five Key Narratives to Watch For at COP28

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Original article republished from DeSmog.

Here’s DeSmog’s take on what to expect at this year’s climate summit, from Big Oil’s influence, to a new Big Ag agenda, to promotion of sketchy solutions that would keep oil and gas burning for decades to come.

The United Arab Emirates’ pavilion at COP27. Credit: Adam Barnett

The annual United Nations climate negotiations are just a week away. Known as COP28 — since it’s the 28th year of the “conference of the parties” to the United Nations climate agreement — it will be hosted by the United Arab Emirates in Dubai from November 30 through December 12. 

COP28 will be especially significant, as it will feature the first-ever “global stocktake,” of how much progress — or lack thereof — countries and other stakeholders have made toward meeting the goal established in 2015’s Paris Agreement of limiting warming to “well below” 2º degrees Celsius. 

Negotiators at COP28 will also aim to make progress on key climate issues including loss and damage finance, a just energy transition, and closing the emissions gap.

As the climate crisis accelerates, so, too, do efforts by the fossil fuel industry to derail steep reductions in carbon pollution by mid-century, in part by promoting false solutions. Below, we’ve rounded up recent coverage to help you make sense of the key denial and greenwashing narratives that will be front and center during the event.

A Big Presence from Big Oil

After all, this is the first annual climate conference with a Big Oil exec at the top: COP28 President Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber. 

Al Jaber, the person leading these global climate negotiations, is the CEO of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC). He has openly called for fossil fuel companies’ “help to drive the solutions,” and advocated overcoming “the hurdles to scale up and commercialize hydrogen and carbon capture technologies” — two so-far unproven climate solutions being heavily promoted by the fossil fuel industry. A big presence from Big Oil would be in line with trends at the past two summits: 636 fossil fuel lobbyists registered to attend last year’s conference in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, while 503 registered for 2021’s gathering in Glasgow.

Dive deeper with our Climate Disinformation Database profile of Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber, our coverage of his appointment as COP28 president, and our reporting last year on fossil fuel lobbyists at COP27.

An Industry Push for CCS

The fossil fuel industry will paint carbon capture and storage (CCS) as a climate solution during this year’s conference. Critics argue it is anything but. 

Of the 32 commercial CCS facilities operating worldwide, 22 use most, or all, of their captured carbon dioxide (CO2) to pump more oil out of depleted wells. Burning that oil creates far more CO2 than what is captured. 

DeSmog recently analyzed 12 large-scale CCS projects around the world and found countless missed carbon capture targets, as well as cost overruns, with taxpayers picking up the tab via billions of dollars in subsidies. Despite these failures, Big Oil publicly champions CCS and pushes projects over communities’ objections. Privately, the industry shares critics’ concerns.

With the Biden administration channeling billions of dollars into investments and tax credits for CCS, the United States is likely to be a key CCS supporter at the conference.

Dive deeper with our explainer on how CCS is used for “enhanced oil recovery,” our investigation into CCS’s biggest fails, hear what Big Oil is saying about CCS in private.

Greenwashing by Big Agriculture

This year’s climate conference is coming on the heels of the world’s hottest year, with devastating floods around the world affecting the global food supply, and more than 330 million people worldwide facing famine. So COP28 leaders have released a four-point “food and agriculture” agenda for the summit that calls for governments and industry to collaborate on finding new solutions to climate change–driven food insecurity. 

However, some of the biggest companies in agribusiness, are using greenwashing to shift the debate away from meaningful action. DeSmog has debunked six concepts that the world’s largest food and farming companies will be co-opting in hopes of swaying debates and discussions in  Dubai — including “regenerative agriculture,” “nature-based solutions,” and “climate neutrality.” Stay tuned for DeSmog’s coverage from Dubai — our team will be keeping a close eye on Big Ag.

Dive deeper with our coverage of how food systems are linked to fossil fuel consumption, investigations into the meat and dairy groups downplaying their industries’ climate impacts, and the ties between Big Ag and right-wing politicians in the EU.

PR Spin That Promotes Denial and Delay

Ever wonder how a top oil-producing nation like the United Arab Emirates earned hosting duties for this year’s climate summit, or why the chief of UAE’s state oil company ADNOC, Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber, has ascended to one of the top roles in global climate negotiations? Reporting by DeSmog revealed that from 2007 to 2009, Edelman, the largest public relations firm in the world, ran a campaign to bolster the UAE and Al Jaber’s green images. 

Advertising and PR agencies like Edelman have long burnished the public’s perceptions of fossil fuel interests, and are still creating advertising campaigns for big polluters that distract from and delay climate action — such as sponsored-content for a pesticides giant or leading climate communications while catering to Big Oil. Still, within the ad industry, pressure is mounting to stop working with fossil fuel clients. Some companies and organizations are even dropping ad and PR firms for taking on new fossil fuel industry accounts. 

Follow DeSmog’s coverage as we highlight the PR spin at COP28.

Dive deeper with our Climate Disinformation Database profiles of PR and ad firms Edelman, Ogilvy, and FleishmanHillard, our investigation into Edelman’s campaign to burnish Al Jaber and the UAE’s green creds, and our coverage of the backlash to Havas winning Shell’s business.

Anticipate Disinformation 

Disinformation strategies and narratives will be on display throughout the summit — much as we reported during COP27, where fossil fuel-linked groups spent around $4 million on social media ads that spread false climate claims. 

The disinformation may flow thicker and faster than ever during COP28. As DeSmog has reported, over the past five years climate greenwashing has “gone through the roof,” as major polluters turn to greenwashing to avoid accountability for the climate crisis. In part, this may be a response to the increasing number of climate lawsuits and legal complaints against misleading climate claims. Attorneys general across the U.S. have charged fossil fuel companies with defrauding consumers by lying about the impacts of burning coal, oil, and gas — while activists and campaigners in Europe seek to hold Big Oil accountable under regulations against misleading advertising.

To understand disinformation tactics and where they come from, dig into DeSmog’s reporting about past greenwashing campaigns. We recently shone a light on the way the gas industry borrowed Big Tobacco’s tactics to promote doubt over the health effects of gas stoves. Or read our investigation into how corporate polluters and their political allies have been using the same rhetoric of delay for the past six decades when faced with the prospect of regulation.

Dive deeper with our column on why greenwashing works and how to fight it, our Q&A with Climate Investigations Center researcher Rebecca John, and our investigation into Shell’s knowledge of climate change.

Original article republished from DeSmog.

Continue ReadingFive Key Narratives to Watch For at COP28

‘Real Solutions, No Bullshit’: Action Targets Biden DOE Over Climate Scams, Greenwashing

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

Climate Justice Alliance campaigners protest outside the Department of Energy in Washington, D.C. on October 31, 2023. (Photo: Climate Justice Alliance/Twitter)
Climate Justice Alliance campaigners protest outside the Department of Energy in Washington, D.C. on October 31, 2023. (Photo: Climate Justice Alliance/Twitter)

“Now more than ever, we need real leadership from the Department of Energy to end fossil fuels,” said one organizer.

Climate advocates on Tuesday donned Halloween costumes to greet attendees of the U.S. Department of Energy’s “Justice Week,” but the organizers assembled outside the agency will be urging guests to demand far more from Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm and the Biden administration, who they say are “greenwashing” efforts to further equity and environmental justice.

The department’s Office of Economic Impact and Diversity is holding the five-day event, where officials plan to highlight efforts to move “toward a more equitable, clean, and just energy future.”

The week will include discussions of the Low-Income Communities Bonus Credit Program, which pushes for more access to renewable energy facilities in underserved communities, and executive actions President Joe Biden has taken to promote environmental justice.

All those actions, however, have happened alongside the administration’s push in favor of so-called climate “solutions” that scientists say are unproven and serve only to perpetuate fossil fuel extraction under the false assumption that it can do so while still addressing greenhouse gas emissions and planetary heating.

The DOE, noted Basav Sen, a climate justice project director at the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) who took part in the action, is “the biggest funder of false solutions such as carbon capture and storage, hydrogen, and direct air capture.”

“These are scams. We know that the real solution to the climate crisis is to keep fossil fuels in the ground and make a rapid, just transition to real renewable energy controlled by communities,” said Sen, wearing zombie face paint at the direct action. “Instead what were seeing from the Department of Energy is a continuation of the fossil fuel economy.”

https://twitter.com/CJAOurPower/status/1719337073138659593?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1719337073138659593%7Ctwgr%5E687ef4ed8031dc7555611958ea60e404e2abfa20%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.commondreams.org%2Fnews%2Fcarbon-capture

As Common Dreams reported in May, analysts say that just running the machinery to operate a carbon capture and storage project—like the ones the Biden DOE announced a $1.2 billion investment in earlier this year—would increase energy consumption by 20%, adding to carbon dioxide emissions.

Smog, benzene, and formaldehyde emissions also increase with carbon capture technology, biologist Sandra Steingraber said—three types of pollution that disproportionately affect people in low-income neighborhoods, the very communities the DOE says it’s targeting with environmental justice programs and events like “Justice Week.”

Additionally, noted Sen, the DOE is continuing to license exports of fossil gas.

“We are here today to tell attendees of the Department of Energy’s Justice Week that the version of environmental and energy justice that they’re going to hear from the Department of Energy in the event is greenwashing, pure and simple,” said Sen. “The Department of Energy cannot pretend to be on the side of environmental justice while they are actively licensing more fossil gas exports, which means more fracking, more air and water pollution, more pipelines, more export terminals, more sacrifice zones in frontline communities.”

Some of the campaigners displayed the organizers’ message succinctly on a banner reading, “Real Solutions. No Bullshit.”

“Now more than ever, we need real leadership from the Department of Energy to end fossil fuels, quit peddling climate scams and advance energy justice,” said Climate Justice Alliance (CJA), one of the groups behind the action.

https://twitter.com/CJAOurPower/status/1719358386016337965?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1719358386016337965%7Ctwgr%5E687ef4ed8031dc7555611958ea60e404e2abfa20%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.commondreams.org%2Fnews%2Fcarbon-capture

Addressing Granholm, the group added that the secretary “can’t cover up [her] record with greenwashing events like Justice Week 2023 while undermining real climate and environmental justice with [her] actions.”

“We demand an end to fracked gas exports, carbon capture, and hydrogen energy,” CJA said.

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

Continue Reading‘Real Solutions, No Bullshit’: Action Targets Biden DOE Over Climate Scams, Greenwashing