private jets

Climate activists block holes on Spanish golf courses over water use

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https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20230702-climate-activists-block-holes-on-spanish-golf-courses-over-water-use

Madrid (AFP) – Climate activists said Sunday they had plugged the holes on 10 golf courses across Spain to protest at the sport’s excessive water usage as Europe lives through a severe drought.

Some activists blocked holes with cement while others filled the holes with seedlings, Extinction Rebellion said © Handout / Extinction Rebellion/AFP
Some activists blocked holes with cement while others filled the holes with seedlings, Extinction Rebellion said © Handout / Extinction Rebellion/AFP

Activists from Extinction Rebellion (XR) filled in the holes under cover of darkness in Barcelona, Madrid, Valencia, the Basque Country, Navarra and the Balearic Island of Ibiza to denounce “the waste of water during one of the worst droughts Europe has ever suffered”.

“Golf has no place in a world without water,” said a statement from the group, which uses direct action to underline its warnings about the dangers to the planet.

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“Just one hole of a golf course consumes more than 100,000 litres of water a day to maintain the surrounding green,” XR said, citing figures from the Spanish NGO Ecologists In Action.

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Experts say parts of Spain — which is the world’s biggest exporter of olive oil and a key source of Europe’s fruit and vegetables — are the driest they’ve been in a thousand years, with the prolonged drought depleting reservoirs to half their normal capacity.

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Extinction Rebellion said it was part of a series of international protests “targeting the richest 1 percent of the population” through their golf courses, private jets and high-end cars to make clear that “the rich and their leisure activities that waste essential resources are a luxury we cannot afford”.

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It should be clear – if you bother to engage your brain – that the climate crisis is already affecting inflation and the cost of living crisis. Less precipitation (rain) and disrupted weather [patterns] through climate change mean less crops and increased prices in the supermarket for your fruit and veg, vegetable and olive oil, all those goods made from wheat, corn, beans, etc. The Capitalists will tell you it’s all because of the war in Ukraine. Bollocks, climate change is adversely affecting crops everywhere, Ukraine is not the only place growing crops. Climate change is affecting everyone now.

It’s also noted that the rich are specifically addressed targeted.

Related: Climate change crisis: Golf courses on borrowed time as Earth’s weather patterns become wilder

Continue ReadingClimate activists block holes on Spanish golf courses over water use

Climate activists arrested as private jets receive more protection than planet

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https://www.greenpeace.org/international/story/59935/climate-activists-arrested-private-jets-receive-protection-planet/

At least 102 climate activists from seventeen countries representing Greenpeace, Stay Grounded, Extinction Rebellion, Scientist Rebellion and other climate justice groups are still being detained in Geneva, Switzerland 20 hours after a peaceful protest against Europe’s largest annual private jet fair, the European Business Aviation Convention & Exhibition (EBACE) in Geneva.

“A unique, European coalition of courageous activists from 17 countries severely disrupted the excessive champagne party of a super-rich elite – Europe’s largest private jet sales event. Their demand is unequivocal, private aviation should be consigned to the history books. We support the activists and demand their immediate release.” – said Klara Maria Schenk, a transport expert for the European Mobility For All campaign.

A hundred climate activists supporting Greenpeace, Stay Grounded, Extinction Rebellion, Scientist Rebellion and other climate movement groups from 17 countries have disrupted Europe’s biggest private jets sales fair, the annual European Business Aviation Convention & Exhibition (EBACE) in Geneva
© Thomas Wolf / Stay Grounded / Greenpeace

Activists peacefully occupied jets exhibited at the business event by the Geneva airport and chained themselves to aircraft gangways in order to keep prospective buyers from entering. The protestors held giant tobacco-style health warning label hand banners marking the jets as toxic objects and warning that ‘Private Jets Burn Our Future’, ‘Kill Our Planet’, and ‘Fuel Inequality’. Public service announcements from loudspeakers carried by the activists exposed the devastating consequences of private jets for our planet and revealed the hypocrisy of promoting private jets amidst rising social inequality.

Contrary to several misleading media reports, the activists never entered the taxiways or runways of the airport. The activists make it clear that at no time they intended to disrupt commercial air traffic at Geneva Airport. A spokeswoman for air traffic control agency Skyguide confirmed protestors had not accessed the runway during the incident, according to Aviation International News.

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https://www.greenpeace.org/international/story/59935/climate-activists-arrested-private-jets-receive-protection-planet/

Continue ReadingClimate activists arrested as private jets receive more protection than planet

Climate activists disrupt Europe’s biggest private jet fair

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https://www.theguardian.com/business/2023/may/23/climate-activists-private-jet-fair-greenpeace-stay-grounded-extinction-rebellion

Protesters from Greenpeace, Stay Grounded, Extinction Rebellion and others chain themselves to aircraft in Geneva

Dozens of climate activists have disrupted Europe’s largest private jet trade fair by chaining themselves to aircraft to protest against the sector’s carbon emissions.

The demonstrators on behalf of Greenpeace, Stay Grounded, Extinction Rebellion and Scientist Rebellion also attached themselves to the entrance gates of the event at Geneva airport in the hope of preventing prospective buyers from entering the annual show.

The activists, who were calling for a global ban on the use of private jets because of their carbon footprint, stuck tobacco-style health warning labels on some of the jets at the European Business Aviation Convention and Exhibition (EBACE) saying private jets “burn our future”, “kill our planet”, and “fuel inequality”.

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https://www.theguardian.com/business/2023/may/23/climate-activists-private-jet-fair-greenpeace-stay-grounded-extinction-rebellion

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Time to make the rich pay for climate change

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https://www.energymonitor.ai/policy/just-transition/opinion-time-to-make-the-rich-pay-for-climate-change/

Image: Scientist Rebellion / Twitter

Philippa Nuttall

The richest 10% of citizens are responsible for 50% of global carbon emissions. Taxing private jets would be a good place to start – and raise money for cleaner alternatives.

e tend to say ‘we are all in the same boat’, but frankly we are not. We are all in the same ocean, but not in the same boat.” EU Climate Change Commissioner Frans Timmermans was thinking of vulnerable, low-income countries when he made this remark, but the thrust of his quote also holds true for the division between the richest and the less well off in all countries. While the poorest everywhere are trying to stay afloat, battered by a storm of high energy and food prices and falling real wages for many, the richest continue to hop around in their private jets.

Yes, we must all change our behaviour and drastically reduce our emissions, but in 2023 let’s stop pretending we are all in this together. We need policies that force the very rich to pay for the outsized amount of pollution they cause.

Kevin Anderson, professor at the University of Manchester’s Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research in the UK, and economist Ann Pettifor have been making this case for years. “The green movement has lost its way by making us feel we are all equally responsible for the [climate] crisis,” Pettifor said when I interviewed her in 2021. Both have called for emission reduction efforts to be focused on the world’s wealthiest 10% of individuals, who are responsible for 50% of global carbon emissions – and especially the top 1%. The super rich contribute close to 17% of global emissions.

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https://www.energymonitor.ai/policy/just-transition/opinion-time-to-make-the-rich-pay-for-climate-change/

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Ultra-rich private jet travel has soared since the pandemic – and emissions followed

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https://www.energymonitor.ai/policy/ultra-rich-private-jet-travel-has-soared-since-the-pandemic-and-emissions-followed/

The private jet sector has boomed since the start of the pandemic, reveals a report from the progressive think tank Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) and nonpartisan organisation Patriotic Millionaires. While there was a drop in private flights in 2020, the sector picked up quickly again and saw an unprecedented number of 5.3 million business jet operations in 2022.

Compared to 2019, the number of flights globally and in the US increased by around a fifth last year. A 2022 study found that because of the increased flights, private jet emissions have increased by 23%. In the last two decades, the global private jet fleet size increased 133% – from 9,895 in 2000 to 23,122 in mid-2022.

Private jet travel is reserved for the few. The typical private jet owner has a net worth of $190m, according to the report. Since private jets emit at least ten times more than commercial planes per passenger, these ultra-rich private flyers are causing a disproportionate amount of emissions.

Awareness about the environmental costs of private jets has been increasing, putting frequent flyers under scrutiny. Celebrity Kylie Jenner made headlines last summer when she used her private jet for a short hop of just 17 minutes, a trip that would have taken less than an hour by car. A Twitter account tracking private jet flights of celebrities – since suspended, together with a similar account tracking Elon Musk’s flights – showed that this trip was far from unusual for the rich and famous.

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https://www.energymonitor.ai/policy/ultra-rich-private-jet-travel-has-soared-since-the-pandemic-and-emissions-followed/

Continue ReadingUltra-rich private jet travel has soared since the pandemic – and emissions followed