Pandora Sbox Lowres

8/2/2019 Pandora Sbox Lowres

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METALS & MINERALS

OPENING

PANDORAS BOX:The New Wave of Land Grabbing by

the Extractive Industries

and

The Devastating Impact on Earth


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opening pandoras box.


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METALS & MINERALS

opening

pandora s boxThe New Wve of Lnd Gbbing by theExtctive Industies

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OpeningpandOras BOx:The New Wave of Land Grabbingby the Extractive Industriesand

The Devastating Impact on Earth

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acknowledgements

abbreviations, acronyms& technical glossary

definitions

executive summary

land grabbing

introductionenergyTrends in ConsumptionOil Future or No Futur e?Peak Oil?Case Stud 1: Nigeria - Niger Delta Communities Sa Leave Oil inthe SoilCase Stud 2: Tar Sands in Alerta, Canada - The Most DestructiveProject on EarthNew Oil?New Price?

They Call it King Coal Case Stud 3: Mountain Top Removal Mining or Coal, inAppalachia, USA - Wounds that Never HealCaron Capture Storage or Not, Coal Demand is IncreasingNatural Gas the Fuel of No ChoiceShale Gas the Elephant in the RoomCase Stud 4: South Arica - Venda Communities to No! to CoALMiningNuclear EnergyCase Stud 5: Fracking in Dimock, USA - Toic Water turns to FireStatus o Nuclear Energ TodaA Green Energ?

metals & mineralsImpact o MiningProlems Generated MiningPresent and Future ChallengesCase Stud 6: The high price o Gold - Death and Destruction inAmazon Mineral RushSuperccle?Trends: Going ForwardDemandSupplGovernments in ActionThe Financialisation o Commodities

Where rom? Where to?

green energy

conclusion

epilogue

annex 1: opening pandoras box

annex 2: tables and graphs


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THE NEW WAVE OF LAND GRAbbING by THE ExTRACTIVE INDUSTRIESAND THE DEVASTATING IMPACT ON EARTH

acknOwledgementsWe are especiall grateul to Philippe Siaud who authored thisreport. He spent over a ear unearthing the inormation andpainstakingl analsing and reecting on its implications, to uild

the oundations o this report. Philippe has een involved in theoil industr or 18 ears, frst as an operator and then as a trader ocrude oil on the international markets. He let the industr in 2007to concentrate on environmental and social projects. We ver muchappreciate our perseverance and generosit, Philippe, and so doour partners and allies.

Thanks to our Associates and Partners who alerted us to the urgentneed to analse the gloal trends in the etractive industr, to getan overall perspective o what is going on. Ater 25 ears o workingwith partners across the world, suddenl things changed. Since2008, one territor ater another was conronted land graingor etraction - the Colomian Amazon or gold; Indias trial orest

lands or auite; Venda, South Arica or coal; Ghana or gold - thelist continues apace.

We thank the communities at the rontline o this intensiing waveor sharing our stories o courage and traged in the attle orsanit.

We are indeted to generous advisers who have een engaged inthe etractive world or man ears - some rom within the industrand others working with communities, monitoring and challenginginjustices, especiall Richard Soll (London Mining Network),Andrew Whitmore (Mines and Communities), Roger Mood(Nostromo Research), Geo Nettleton (PIPLinks), Andrew Hickman(Down to Earth), Nnimmo basse (Environmental Rights Action

and Friends o the Earth International), Adulai Darimani (Third

World Network-Arica), Vandana Shiva (Navdana), Martin Stanle(Holl Hill Trust), Martin blake (GreenAsia Group), Paul Dickinson(Adviser), Ian Laming (Adviser), Gilert Makore (Zimawe

Environmental Law Association), David Fig (Universit o CapeTown), Andrew Muir (Wilderness Foundation), Suzanne Dhaliwal(UK Tar Sands Network) and Susan Smitten (Respecting AoriginalValues and Environmental Needs).

Man others have provided willing advice and support in variouswas: Jules Cashord (author), Henk Hoelink (GRAIN), Martinvon Hilderand (Gaia Amazonas), Sulemana Audulai andGathuru Muru (Arican biodiversit Network), Silvia Gomez(anthropologist), John Swit (Swit Foundation), Nigel Crawhall(TILCEPA-IUCN), Dana Lanza (Conuence Philanthrop), NumeMashinini (Open Societ Initiative or Southern Arica), MichaelShaw (biomatri Water), Mike Jones (Resilience Practitioner),

Accin Ecolgica and Oilwatch, to name a ew. And we areespeciall grateul to Swit Foundation, The Christensen Fund andRoddick Foundation or supporting us in this work.

For their creativit, time and energ, our thanks to: CamilaCardeosa or graphic design; Stig or illustration and covergraphics; and the team who put it together - Am Woodrow Arai,Hannah baldock, Teresa Anderson, Carine Nadal, Rowan Phillimore,Liz Hosken and Fiona Wilton.

And fnall, special thanks also to those who endorsed the Report:Michael Mansfeld QC, Patrick Mulvan, Henk Hoelink, Nnimmobasse, Richard Soll, Poll Higgins, Vandana Shiva, GathuruMuru, Peter Roderick and Damien Curtis.


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aBBreviatiOnsand acrOnyms

BASF baden Aniline and Soda FactorBP british Petroleum

BRIC brazil, Russia, India, ChinaCCS Caron Capture and StorageCCW Coal Comustion WasteGHG Greenhouse GasEEA European Environment AgencEIA Energ Inormation AdministrationIEA International Energ AgencIAEA International Atomic Energ AgencIHS CERA Inormation Handling Services: Camridge Energ

Research AssociatesIMF International Monetar FundIPCC Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

IUCN International Union or Conservation o NatureITPOES Industr Taskorce on Peak Oil and Energ SecuritMEP Memer o the European ParliamentMTR Mountain Top RemovalMI I Mineral Inormation InstituteOECD Organisation or Economic Cooperation and DevelopmentONS Ofce or National StatisticsOPEC Organisation o the Petroleum Eporting Countries

PGM Platinum Group Metals (platinum, palladium, rhodium,ruthenium, osmium, iridium)

PNAS Proceedings o the National Academ o Sciences o theUnited States o America

PwC PricewaterhouseCoopersUNEP United Nations Environment ProgrammeUNESCO United Nations Educational, Scientifc and Cultural

OrganisationUSGS United States Geological Surve

Technical Glossary$ All dollar denominations in US dollarsb/ d barrels per da

GW GigawattkWh Kilowatt hourM3 Cuic metreMt Million tonnesMW MegawattTOE Tons o Oil EquivalentTWh Tera Watt hour (1 terawatt-hour per ear = 114 megawatts)USD/ bbl US Dollars per arrel


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Metals and MineralsA mineral is a naturall occurring solid chemical sustancehaving characteristic chemical composition, highl orderedatomic structure, and specifc phsical properties. Mineralsrange in composition rom pure elements and simple salts to vercomple silicates with thousands o known orms. For the sakeo simplifcation we will use the term metal or pure elementsrom the periodic tale (e.g. gold - Au, copper - Cu, iron - Fe),and mineral or more comple structures containing two or morechemical elements.

Rare Eart hsRare Earths Elements (REEs) are a set o 17 chemical elementsin the periodic tale (scandium, ttrium, lanthanum, cerium,praseodmium, neodmium, promethium, samarium, europium,gadolinium, terium, dsprosium, holmium, erium, thulium,tterium, luthertium). Despite their name, rare earth elements(with the eception o the radioactive promethium) arerelativel plentiul in the Earths crust. However, ecause otheir geochemical properties, rare earth elements are tpicalldispersed and not oten ound in concentrated and economicalleploitale orms. The ew more accessile deposits are known asrare earth minerals.

Exponent ial Growt hIn approimate terms, a unit growing annuall % will doule itssize in 70/ ears. For instance Chinas econom, growing at rates

close to 10%, will doule its size in just 70/10=7 ears.

Hydraulic Fracturing (Fracking)is the process used or etracting natural gas trapped in rockthousands o eet elow the ground. A well is drilled into geologicormations, which contain large amounts o gas, in order to accesspreviousl unattainale resources. The well is cased with steeland concrete and then eplosives are used to make perorationsin the casing where the gas can e ound. Fracking uid, which isa miture o water, sand and chemicals, is then injected into thewell at a ver high pressure causing the shale rock to racture andreleasing the gas.

between 1 and 8 million gallons (4,000 - 35,000 cuic meters) owater are required ever time a well is racked and as man as 600chemicals are ound in the racking uid. The enormous quantito water needed is either sourced near, which can deplete resh

water supplies, or is rought in hundreds o trucks. Up to 70%o the non-iodegradale racking uids remain underground andthe uids that do return to the surace are usuall stored in openpits or trucks close to the well. The toic wastewater in open pitsevaporates dispersing VOCs (volatile organic compounds) intothe atmosphere. Methane gas and toic chemicals can leach outduring the racking process and contaminate near groundwater.In several cases alarmingl high levels o methane have een oundin drinking water in near towns or cities, leading to people eingale to set their tap water on fre.

Mountaintop Removal MiningMountaintop removal mining (MTR), also reerred to as vallefll coal mining, is a ver destructive orm o strip mining whichactuall removes the tops o mountains. Entire mountain rangeshave een destroed in some areas o the USA and et thisdevastating orm o mining is spreading. Firstl, orests are cutdown which destros all the vegetation and oten strips awa thetop laer o soil. Eplosives are used to last as much as 800 eeto mountaintops and rock rom these eplosions can threatennear homes and residents. Huge Shovels are used to dig up thesoil ater the eplosions and the soil is then taken awa trucksor dumped into adjoining valles. Net, the rock is dug into touncover and remove the coal. When the coal is removed all o the

overurden rom the process is dumped into close valles,which creates valle flls. Once the companies have fnishedmining the mountain is let arren and ooding ecomes common.Without the trees covering the mountains, torrents o rainwaterow o steep slopes endangering the communities who live elow.Although there have een attempts to replant vegetation on theare mountaintops, the mountains never ull recover.1

1 Mountain Justice wesite,http://mountainjustice.org/acts/steps.php

deinitiOns


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executive summaryMINING, OIL and GAS: the impact o these etractive industries hasalwas raised serious social and environmental concerns. However,this report signals a wake-up call to the act that, toda, the scale,epansion and acceleration o these industries are ar greaterthan most o us realise. We are no longer talking aout isolatedpockets o destruction and pollution. Nowadas, chances are that,no matter where ou live on Earth, land acquisitions or mining, oiland gas might soon e at our door. This trend is now a major drivero land graing gloall, and poses a signifcant threat to theworlds indigenous communities, armers and local ood productionsstems, as well as to precious water, orests, iodiversit, criticalecosstems and climate change.

This report alerts gloal citizens to the dnamics in the etractiveindustries as a whole, and shows the alarming scale o this overalltrend. Just as in the Greek mth, when Pandora opened the o andlet out all the troules known to mortals, so too this new wave oland graing or mining is leading to unimaginale destruction. Ihope does remain, we must wake-up and act now.

The etent and the scale o the increase in etraction over the last10 ears is staggering. For eample, iron ore production is up 180%; coalt 165%; lithium 125%, and coal 44%. Theincrease in prospecting has also grown eponentiall, which meansthis massive acceleration in etraction will continue i concessionsare granted as reel as the are now.

The period etween 2005-2010 has seen Chinas mining sector grow nearl a third. In Peru, mining eports or 2011 have increasedan astonishing one-third in one ear, and the region o Puno in theSouth o the countr has seen mineral concessions almost tripled

etween 2002 and 2010. In South Arica meanwhile, a consortium ointernational investors has applied or the rights to drill or shale oiland gas or a section covering around 10% o the countrs surace.

Across Latin America, Asia and Arica, more and more communitlands, rivers and ecosstems are eing despoiled, displaced anddevoured mining activities. Enormous industrial wastelandsare created rom vast open pit mines and mountain top removal;voracious use and poisoning o water sstems; deorestation;contamination o precious topsoil; air pollution; acid leaching; cancerclusters - the catalogue o devastation is relentless and growing.

The rights o arming and indigenous communities are increasingl

ignored in the race to gra land and water. Each wave o newetractive technologies requires ever more water to wrench thematerial rom its source. The hunger or these materials is agrowing threat to the necessities or lie: water, ertile soil andood. The implications are ovious.

Mining does not onl pose a challenge or the gloal South. Thedevelopment o racking - which involves the high-pressureinjection o a toic mi o chemicals into deposits o shale rock torelease the natural gas trapped within - means that developersare now eager to target the large shale oil and gas depositsunder North America and Europe. With the inherent difcult o

sael containing the water and chemicals that are injected intothe ground, these toic cocktails inevital leach into aquiersand local water sstems, and pollute them. In the UK, there arealread several shale oil and gas applications pending, even thoughone developer recentl admitted that two minor earthquakes inLancashire were proal caused its racking operations.

This dramatic increase in the amition, scope and devastation romthe worlds etractive industries comes as a result o a numer oactors converging simultaneousl. The rising prices o metals,minerals, oil and gas have acted as an incentive to eploit newterritories and less pure deposits. Technologies are ecomingmore sophisticated in order to etract materials rom areas whichwere previousl inaccessile, uneconomic, or designated aseing o lower qualit. An overall trend is that deposits with thehighest qualit or concentration have alread een used up. Thismeans that etraction rom less accessile deposits requires moreremoval o soil, sand and rock, and thereore the gouging out oincreasingl larger areas o land and water, as seen with the vastAlerta Tar Sands in Canada.

On top o all o this, there has een a marked acceleration ogloal investments in etractive industries in the last 3 ears.The 2008 collapse o fnancial markets has led hedge and pensionund investors increasingl to target metal, mineral, oil and gascommodities, and their associated fnancial derivatives, in order torecoup their losses and spread their risk. This has had the eect ourther driving their etraction.

The underling stimulus to all this, which governments andcitizens have et to adequatel address, is the thorn issue o

consumption. According to the Mineral Inormation Institute, theaverage American orn toda will use close to 1,343 metric tonneso minerals, metals and uels during his or her lietime, this is morethan 17 tonnes per person per ear. The United Nations EnvironmentProgramme (UNEP) reports that a usiness-as-usual scenariowould lead to a tripling in gloal annual resource etraction 2050 a scenario that the Earth simpl cannot sustain.

There are no eas answers. The environmental impacts o ossiluel etraction and comustion are well documented, while uraniummining and nuclear power are alread raught with controvers.And while man have pinned their hopes on the potential o greenenerg solutions, such as electric cars, solar panels and wind

turines, these also all require signifcant amounts o technologand minerals: rare earths primaril among them. As the use ogreen technologies scales up, inevital, it too translates into amassive increase in et more devastating mining activit.

As we know the industrial economic model is premised on endlessgrowth, deing the laws o lie. Ultimatel the options arerutall clear: either enough o us are ale to turn the tide, asedon an economic model that supports living processes, or we wille orced to do so, with much unnecessar suering. Meanwhile,there are currentl ew incentives or regulations to ensure thevarious actors in the production chain constrain the shameul waste


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and osolescence. To re-use, reccle, design or recclailitor to develop the sstems that use materials efcientl andeconomicall, would at least close the ccle o waste and reduceour impact, some sa a signifcant amount.

We live on a eautiul and wondrous planet the onl one we knowo in our cosmos. She suddenl eels ver small and vulneralein the ace o the momentum o destruction we have unleashed

on her, through our conscious and unconscious actions. We mustrecognise this realit: i we continue in our current direction, ourchildren will e let to clean up an increasingl arren and unstaleplanet, littered with toic wastelands and a huge scarcit o water,which we would have let in our wake.

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THE NEW WAVE OF LAND GRAbbING by THE ExTRACTIVE INDUSTRIESAND THE DEVASTATING IMPACT ON EARTHTHE NEW WAVE OF LAND GRAbbING by THE ExTRACTIVE INDUSTRIESAND THE DEVASTATING IMPACT ON EARTH

land graBBingStopping land grabbing is not j ustabout what i s legal . It is aboutwhat i s just .On the 16th o Novemer 2011, Cristian Ferrera was shot dead two masked men in ront o his house and his amil. Cristian livedin San Antonio, a village north o Santiago del Estero in Argentina.He was part o an indigenous communit, and memer o one oour partners, the indigenous peasant organisation MOCASE ViaCampesina. His crime? To reuse to leave his homeland in orderto make wa or a massive soean plantation, one o so man thathave een encroaching on rural communities throughout Argentinain the last decade. So the plantation owners had him assassinated.Cristian was onl 25 ears old.

Gamela is a region in Ethiopia that orders South Sudan. It is hometo one o the most etreme cases o land graing in the world.Over hal o all the arale land in the region has een signed awato Indian, Saudi and other investors who are now us moving thetractors in and moving the people out. Ethiopia is in the midst o asevere ood crisis and is heavil dependent on ood aid to eed itspeople. yet, the government has alread signed awa aout 10% othe countrs entire agricultural area to oreign investors to producecommodities or the international market.

One could continue with man more eamples o how people whojust want to grow ood and make a living rom the land are eing

epelled, criminalised, and sometimes killed, to make room or theproduction o commodities and someone elses wealth.

Never eore has so much mone gone into the industrial oodsstem. The last decade has witnessed a spectacular increase inspeculation on the ood commodit markets, sending up ood priceseverwhere. With todas gloal fnancial and economic crises,speculative capital is searching or sae places to multipl. Foodand armland are such places. Everone has to eat, is the newmantra preached in oard-rooms. The race is on to take control overthe worlds ood-producing resources - seeds, water and land - and

the gloal distriution o ood.

Mone is also owing directl into arming and land acquisition.banks, investment houses and pension unds are activel uing

up armland all over the world. Most o this is happening in Arica,where peoples customar rights to land are eing grossl ignored.

This latest trend in gloal land graing - that or outsourced oodproduction - is onl one part o a larger attack on land, territoriesand resources. Land gras or mining, tourism, iouels, damconstruction, inrastructure projects, timer and now carontrading are all part o the same process, turning armers intoreugees on their own land.

Etracted rom:* GRAINs acceptance speech o the Right Livelihood Award, 5 Decemer 2011

http://www.grain.org

Hunger f or oi l , gas, minerals andmetals - another dimension of landgrabbingEtractive industries represent another dimension o the samephenomenon - deals eing done etween hungr corporationsand governments taking advantage o the enormous amounts ospeculative capital looking or places to multipl. What is einggraed is not onl the land and the water rom dispossessed localcommunities, ut whole ecosstems are eing violentl destroed

technologies o etraction which penetrate ever more deeplinto the od o the Earth. Toic chemical cocktails poison soil andwater, ar eond the site o operation. The huge amounts o waterrequired or these new technologies has led to mining o ancientaquiers in Australia, called cnicall new water.1 This reporteposes the dnamics o the growth in etractive industries andtheir impact on the Earth.

1 http://nonewcoal.greens.org.au/vital-water

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IntroductIonThis ear marks the tenth ear since it all started to change.Energ and metal prices have reached record levels in the lastdecade, despite the 2008 fnancial crisis, the end o quantitativeeasing policies in the US, Europes sovereign det crisis andChinas economic slowdown. Economists talk o a third economicsuperccle, ater the frst one in the late 19th centur (USindustrialisation), and the second one just ater World War II(Europes and Japans reconstructions). Now it is the bRIC (brazil,Russia, India, China) countries, China frst among them, that leadthe charge. In oth previous cases these superccles saw a rapidrise in the demand or raw materials, onl to see an arupt end tothe ccle (frstl due to World War I and later to the 1973 oil shockrespectivel). Underling these ccles, demand or raw materialshas kept increasing throughout the 20th centur. According toUNEP,1 the annual etraction o construction materials in thattime rame has grown a actor o 34, ores and minerals aactor o 27, ossil uels a actor o 12, iomass a actor o

3.6, and total material etraction a actor o aout 8 while,simultaneousl, GDP rose 23-old. yes, the econom is gettingetter at reducing the intensit o materials, ut the sheer increasein the asolute consumption o raw materials is staggering.besides, consumption in the earl part o the 20th centur wasoverwhelmingl ased on iomass, ut the main materials nowconsumed are mineral - ossil uels chie among them. In short,the composition o materials has shited rom renewale to non-renewale.

1.glOBal material extractiOn in

BilliOn tOns 1900-2005

1 UNEP (2011) Decoupling Natural Resource Use and Environmental Impacts romEconomic Growth. URL: www.unep.org/resourcepanel/Portals/24102/PDFs/DecouplingENGSummar.pd

O all the materials used in the US in the 20th centur, more thanhal were used in the last 25 ears. 2 yet, despite this ig increasein demand, the overall trend has een (until 2001) a drop inthe average real prices o most commodities, ecause o igimprovements in productivit. There is a ig bUT though: theseproductivit gains have never taken into account eternal costs,that is, the cost to the Earth and her inhaitants.

The loss o enormous amounts o topsoil, the etinction ocountless haitats and species, the eviction o millions rom theirhomelands to make wa or large- scale etraction, the legac opolluted rivers and acquiers, felds and air, the toicit roughtto the land, the enormous consumption o resh water, the CO2pumped into the atmosphere: this is the huge damage to theenvironment that will e with us or generations, i not orever. Andet it is not included in standard economic calculations. It is let asa det or our children to pa.

According to TruCost,3 a british consultanc, the environmentaleternalities o the worlds top 3,000 listed companies totalaround $2.2 trillion annuall. Lord Stern called it the greatestmarket ailure the world has ever seen.4 but calling it a marketailure is in act part o the mindset that created the prolem inthe frst place. As i the destruction o the Amazon orest could ecommodifed and given a fnancial value that should e weighedagainst the commercial gains otained rom this ver destruction!

According to the Mineral Inormation Institute (MII), the averageAmerican orn toda will use close to 1,343 metric tonnes ominerals, metals and uels during his or her lietime.5 This ismore than 17 tonnes per person per ear. In the UK, the Ofce or

National Statistics (ONS) estimates the national total raw materialsconsumption at close to 2 illion tons per ear.6 This is equivalentto 30 tons per person, per ear, and it does not even take intoaccount the consumption o raw materials hidden in importedfnished products. In India, despite recent annual growth rates oetween 8 to 10%, the average is still aout 4 tons per head, perear. As has een widel documented, i everone on the planetwas living the lie o those in the West, we would need not one,not two, ut etween three and fve planets (depending on onesincome).

2 Matos, G. and Wagner, L. (1998) Consumption o Materials in the United States,

19001995: Annual Review o Energ and the Environment, p. 107. In: USGS(2002) Materials in the Econom Material Flows, Scarcit, and the Environment.URL: http://pus.usgs.gov/circ/2002/c1221/c1221-508.pd

3 TruCost (2011) Universal Ownership: Wh Environmental Eternalities Matter toInstitutional Investors. URL: http://www.trucost.com/pulished-research/43/universal-ownership-wh-environmental-eternalities-matter-to-institution-al-investors-ull-report.

4 Stern, N. (2007) The Economics o Climate Change: The Stern Review. CamridgeUniversit Press.

5 Mineral Inormation Institute. (2011) Mineral baby. URL: http://www.mii.org/MiibaMain.html

6 Ofce o National Statistics (2011) Material ow accounts 1970-2009URL: http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/pulications/re-reerence-tales.html?edition=tcm%3A77-224120

Ores and industrial minerals Fossil energy carriers

Construction mineralsGDPBiomass

Source: Krausmann et al., (2009) in: UNEP (2011)Decoupling Natural Resource Use and Environmental Impacts rom Economic Growth.


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At a gloal level, we are alread past the point o sustainailit the so-called gloal overshoot. According to the EuropeanEnvironment Agenc (EEA)7 the gloal average ecological ootprint(EF), a measure which translates consumption into direct andvirtual land use, was estimated at 2.6 ha/person in 2006 comparedto an average availale gloal iocapacit o 1.8 ha/person. Withthe increase in the worldwide population (epected to reach9 illion 2050), the growing purchasing power o Asia and

Aricas middle classes, the uranisation o the world and theaspirations o illions to emulate a Western liestle, the demandor natural resources is now moving at reakneck speed. Goingorward, the UNEP estimates that in a usiness-as-usual scenario,where industrialised countries maintain their per capita resourceconsumption and developing countries catch up with them, wewill see a tripling o gloal annual resource etraction 2050.A second possile scenario (one which we might term moderatecontraction and convergence), where industrialised countrieshalve their per capita resource consumption and developingcountries catch up with them (all o them reaching an averageconsumption o 8 tons/head/ear), would lead to a 40% increasein resource etraction 2050. To even envisage a third scenario otough contraction and convergence, where TOTAL gloal resourceconsumption is maintained at ear 2000 levels (i.e. 50 illiontons), would require developed countries to reduce their resourceuse a actor o 3 to 5, and or developing countries to eceedno more than 6 tons/head/capita.8 but even such a ar-reachingscenario would do no more than maintain resource consumption atear 2000 levels a level which, as can alread e seen across thegloe, is not sustainale.

7 European Environment Agenc (2010) The European Environment State andOutlook 2010: Consumption and the Environment. URL: www.eea.europa.eu/soer/europe/consumption-and-environment

8 UNEP (2011) Decoupling Natural Resource Use and Environmental Impacts romEconomic Growth. URL: www.unep.org/resourcepanel/Portals/24102/PDFs/DecouplingENGSummar.pd

The task is indeed daunting. Mother Earth has never eore in herhistor eperienced such an assault. This is not the frst time thatcommodities have een in demand, ut never eore has it eenon such a scale. It now looks as i the 1990s were the last period ocheap raw resources. The turn o the centur has seen the rise othe giants o Asia, and man more nations are now competing toaccess ever decreasing resources. This entails ever more aggressivestrategies to locate and eploit, with terrile consequences not onl

at local ut at gloal levels too.Looking ahead, what does this mean or Earth and her inhaitants,human and non-human rocks, soils, rivers, seas, animals, trees,plants? How can she ever cope with such an onslaught while, asso man indigenous people have known since time immemorial, herloss is ultimatel ours? The answer, as we know all too well, is thatshe cannot. We are now eperiencing the 6th mass etinction ospecies,9 on such a scale and with such rapidit as has never eenseen eore. It is also the frst etinction in the Earths histor thathas een rought aout one o Earths own species. Ecosstemsacross the world are on the verge o collapse. 10

This report will look at the ig picture, given todas parameters.That is, an economic model premised on growth, that somehope will one da e sustainale, a population with increasingneeds, and an urgent need to move awa rom releasing CO2 inthe atmosphere developing green alternatives. It is o courseimpossile to delve into the details an encclopaedia wouldnot sufce. Nor is it the amition o this report to come up withnew inormation or solutions. Rather, our ojective is to weavetogether what is known in order to present a picture o the scaleand magnitude o the war we are consciousl and unconsciouslwaging on Earths ast diminishing resources. And to tr and readinto the trends or what is to come i we do not take urgent actionnow to dramaticall alleviate the strain we are putting on Mother

Earth. While we lack oresight, and so an sense o due proportion,let alone respect and compassion, how could we know how muchstrain is too much? The precautionar principle is our most criticalguide or action now. The aim o this report is to galvanise oresightand gloal action.

9 Palaeontologists characterize mass extinctions as times when the Earth losesmore than three-quarters of its species in a geologically short interval. Biolo-gists now suggest that a sixth mass extinction may be under way, given theknown species losses over the past few centuries and millennia. Nature 471,51-17 (03 March 2011), Has the Earths sixth mass extinction arrived?

10 Living Beyond our Means: Natural Assets and Human Well-being, Statement ofthe Millennium Assessment Board (2005).


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energy


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Trends in ConsumptionThe growth o energ demand in the world is a consequence o ourcurrent and uture patterns o consumption, driven the massiveincrease in the world population and the average disposaleincome o that population.

As reported in 2011 british Petroleum (bP) in its Energ Outlook20301 the world population has quadrupled since 1900, real income

has grown a actor o 25 and primar energ consumption aactor o 22.5. Furthermore, in the last twent ears the worldsreal income has increased 87%, and is on course to increase 100% in the net twent ears. Eon estimates in its own Outlook2

that gloal energ demand is epected to rise 35% etween2005 and 2030, which time it is epected to e si times thelevel in 1950. The graph elow shows the projections o the worldcommercial energ use in illion tons o oil equivalent.

bPs Outlook report is ased upon todas stated course o action countries around the world: i.e., a gloal status quo with verlittle political will to address the current ecological crisis head-on.barring a dramatic change in our patterns o consumption, here is

what bP tells us we will see 2030:

3.wOrld cOmmercial energy use

1 bP (2011) Energy Outlook2030. URL: http://www.p.com/liveassets/p_inter-net/gloalp/gloalp_uk_english/reports_and_pulications/statistical_en-erg_review_2011/STAGING/local_assets/pd/2030_energ_outlook_ooklet.pd

2 Eon Moil (2010) The Outlook or Energy: A View to 2030. URL: www.eon-moil.com/corporate/fles/news_pu_eo_2010.pd

Fossil uels will still e the main source o energ, withoil, coal and gas tending towards a share o aout 26-27%each so around 80% o our primar energ needs aresupposedl still going to e met ossil uels in 2030. Itwas 88% in 1990 a ver paltr, dispiriting improvementin ort ears.

93% o the increase in energ consumption in the net 20ears is epected to come rom non-OECD countries, whose

share o the total world consumption is epected to reach66% vs 50% toda, while it was 43% in 1990.

Despite the act that the caron intensit o economicgrowth - i.e., the amount o CO2 emitted per unit o GDP -will decrease with the introduction o greener energies andmore efcient energ use, bP orecasts that worldwide CO2emissions will e 27% higher in 2030 than toda.

Moreover, according to recent fgures released bP, worldwideGDP will grow 3.7% ever ear over the net twent ears. Thismight not sound like much ut eponential growth o this sort isindeed rightening: a 3.7% annual growth rate over twent earsmeans that the gloal econom will e twice as ig in 2030 as it

is toda. How Mother Nature will cope is oviousl not part o theequation. An econom growing 10% annuall, as Chinas has donerecentl, will DOUbLE its size in just SEVEN ears.

Renewables

Gas Oil Coal

Nuclear Hydro

Source:bP (2011) Energy Outlook 2030.


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ENERGy

Oi l Future or No Future?Wth th uct cvtl l cl,cly v tt uu t vl -cvtl uc l (t, hl l, h, tc) wth tlcquc th cytm cmmut.

The histor o oil is closel associated with the histor o modernWestern civilisation. Replacing coal as the dominant uel in the2nd hal o the 19th centur, oil has proven to e a reliale andcheap source o energ or more than a hundred ears. Cheap,that is, i we do not take into account the massive ecological socialdamage caused its etraction and, even more so, the legaco illions o tons o CO2 released in the atmosphere or whichwe can arel glimpse the real price we will have to pa. Oil isnow entering its terminal phase. On the one hand there is generalrecognition that it must quickl make wa or cleaner, greeneralternatives that is, alternatives emitting less CO2 than it does.On the other hand, all o our resources are ast diminishing anwaand, coupled with increasing worldwide demand, oil as a majorsource o energ is ast approaching crunch time. This in theorshould e good news it would e much more difcult to get rido our addiction i we had hundreds o ears o reserves under oureet, accessile at a minimum cost.

Peak Oi l?Theories aound as to how much oil is actuall still availale in theground. For political and commercial reasons, producing countriestend to overestimate their reserves, as do the major oil companies.According to the Industr Taskorce on Peak Oil and Energ Securit(ITPOES),3 there are currentl 70,000 oil felds in production in theworld ut a mere 120 o them contriute 50% o the production

and one feld alone, the super giant Ghawar feld in Saudi Araia,contriutes 5% o the total. No major feld has een discoveredin the last 30 ears. Serious prospects can e ound in Iraq andthe Caspian Sea, ut the gloal earl rate o depletion o oilfelds is aout 4 million arrels per da (/d) while world demandincreased 2.8 million /d in 2010, the 2nd highest increase in 30ears, to reach 87.8 million /d. The International Energ Agenc(IEA) recentl said the world needed to fnd the equivalent o 4Saudi Araias in the net 20 ears even to hope to sustain currentproduction. Meanwhile Saudi Araia itsel might use all its currentproduction 2030, more than 8 million /d, to eed its ownrequirements. Demand or electricit in Saudi Araia is increasing

8% a ear (in eect, douling total consumption ever 8.75ears). Remarkal, the IEA itsel implicitl acknowledged thatpeak oil was upon us, as shown on the let this graph rom theEnerg Outlook 2010 report.

3 ITPOES (2010) The Oil Crunch: A Wake-up Call or the UK Economy. URL: http://peakoiltaskorce.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/fnal-report-uk-itpoes_report_the-oil-crunch_e20101.pd

cooo o h o o -bb h . cooo o h o o

h o b h o o b o o. w h o b ho. noh h o o o.th h o n o . i o o h o. i

o h b, ho o b h.Nnimmo Bssey,Executive Diecto ofEnvionmentl rights action, nd Chiof Fiends of the Eth Intentionl

4.wOrld Oil prOductiOn By type

Unconventional oil

Crude oil: felds yetto be developed

Crude oil: currentlyproducing felds

Natural gas liquids Crude oil: felds yet

to be ound

IEA Projections - Gloal oil production reaches 96 m/d in 2035 due to rising output onatural gas liquids and unconventional oil, as crude oil production declines.

Source:IEA World Energy Outlook 2010


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Cse Study 1:

n - n d co l O h so!po bo o oo, h oo, h b oo.Nnimmo Bssey, Executive Diecto of Envionmentl rights action, nd Chi of Fiends ofthe Eth Intentionl.

Ogoni land, in the vast Niger Delta, is the ancestral home ocommunities who have lived there or centuries. To the Ogonipeople their land is sacred and the souls o humans and animals areintertwined. Rituals, oten with am, are perormed to honour theland and give thanks or its rich gits o aundant ood and water. 1Ogoniland was the home o Ken Saro-Wiwa, a human rights and

environmental activist, who campaigned to protect his peopleseautiul delta rom the violations o the oil industr, until he wasassassinated in 1995.

This was one o the man reactions to the act that in 1993, theOgoni people united and epelled Shell Oil rom Ogoni land.Environmental Rights Action (ERA) (Friends o the Earth Nigeria)work with the Ogoni to help them deal with the devastatingimpact which Shell Oil continues to have on their homeland andcommunities. It is hard to imagine, ut when people visit the areathe leave deepl shocked and outraged. For eample, there weretwo major oil spills in 2008 and 2009, which continued unaatedor months. The local communit were orced to aandon their

traditional was o arming and fshing as the thick oil killed theplant lie and the rivers, suocating the fsh and caking the irdsand animals in oil. An average o 2 oil spills are recorded EVERyDAyin Nigeria, so this is also a realit or man other communities inNigeria.

Gas aring is another major challenge in Nigeria, which is havingdevastating implications locall and gloall. The urning o oassociated gas rom crude oil etraction is contriuting to acid rain,desertifcation and dring up o rivers such as Lake Chad, and to

1 For more inormation see Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organisationhttp://www.unpo.org/members/7901

gloal warming. These conditions are orcing pastoralists andfshermen to migrate as environmental reugees, which increasespressure on land elsewhere. Diseases, such as ronchitis, romumes o the gas aring, are also rie.

In 2011 the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) Report ontheir assessment o the environment o Ogoni land confrmed theconcerns and claims o the Ogoni people. The Report ound that, inover 40 locations tested, the soil is polluted with hdrocarons up

to a depth o 5 metres. Further, that all the water odies in Ogoniland are polluted. UNEP also reported that the levels o enzene(a chemical known to cause cancer) in approimatel 90 o thelocations, is more than 900 times aove accepted World HealthOrganisation standards. yet this contaminated water is the sourceo drinking water or local communities. The UNEP estimated that itwould take 35 ears to clean up Ogoni land and water sstems, andan estimated one illion US dollars to egin the clean up.

As Nnimmo basse (Eecutive Director o Environmental RightsAction, and Chair o Friends o the Earth International) highlights:The fgure in this report assumes all the unding comes in and theconditions eist to use them eectivel. We have estimated that it

will take etween 300-500 illion dollars to clean the entire NigerDelta, and almost a lietime to restore Ogoni land.

ERA has een supporting local communities in their call orleaving oil in the soil, and the have presented a proposal tothe Nigerian government or no new oil felds. ERA have eeninvolved in numerous campaigns and lawsuits to hold corporationsto account, including the 2005 landmark ruling a Nigerian HighCourt that gas aring is unconstitutional, damages people and theenvironment, and must stop. Recentl, the bodo communit fleda case in the High Court in London to sue Shell or damages to theirecosstems and communit, and, in 2011, Shell admitted liailit.However the struggle to stop oil spills continues in Decemer

2011 Shell spilled nearl 2m gallons o oil o the coast o bonga,Nigeria, in the worst spill in Nigeria in 13 ears.2

For more inormation:

Environment Rights Action http://www.eraction.org See feld studies and testimonials rom communities -

http://www.eraction.org/component/eracontent/?view=categories&id=2

Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organisation - http://www.unpo.org/members/7901

2 Michael Keating (2010) Nigerias oil disasters are met with silence, theGuardian, 9 January, 2012 http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisree/2012/

jan/09/nigeria-oil-disaster-silence?INTCMP=ILCNETTXT3487

She

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tGo

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.PhotographyAlisonDilworth/FriendsofTheEarth.


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ENERGy

Cse Study 2:

t s ab, c th o oj o ehi h h o b o. i h o o c, o a. B h , hoo b h h o o moh eh? i oo, h o.Diftpile Fist Ntion Chief rose Lboucn *

The boreal orests in Alerta, Canada, are a unique and ragileecosstem which is home to diverse cultures o the First Nationpeoples. Their traditions have adapted to this comple landscapeover centuries.

Toda the landscape is scarred Tar Sands Etraction which hasecome known as the most destructive project on Earth.1 Thescale is so enormous that the wound can e seen rom space.

The oil emedded in the sand lies under 140,000 km2 o orests,equivalent to the size o England.2 The Tar Sands process emits asmuch as our times more caron dioide than conventional drilling.There is rapid deorestation as trees are cut down and the top laero peat is removed to reveal the oil sands. Four arrels o water,energ equal to three arrels o oil, and our tons o earth arerequired to etract one arrel o oil.3

The etraction process contaminates the water and createsenormous toic tailing ponds. It is estimated that thousands omigrator irds die ever ear when the land on the oil toicsuraces, man more than the industr is reporting. First Nationscommunities living close to the oil sands or downstream on the

* Cited in Hoekstra, G. (2012) First nations fercel opposed to Northern Gate-wa, Vancouver Sun, 3 Januar 2012, http://www.vancouversun.com/news/First+nations+fercel+opposed+Northern+Gatewa/5937416/stor.html (accessedon 6 Feruar 2012).

1 Hatch, C. and Price, M. (2008) Canadas Toic Tar Sands: The Most DestructiveProject on Earth. Environmental Deence Pulication, Feruar 2008. http://environmentaldeence.ca/sites/deault/fles/report_fles/TarSands_TheRe-port.pd (accessed on 9 Feruar 2012).

2 See here: http://www.no-tar-sands.org/what-are-the-tar-sands/ (accessedon 9 Feruar 2012).

3 All Against the Haul (2012) The most destructive project on earth Online:http://allagainstthehaul.org/the-haul/the-heav-haul/the-alerta-tar-sands/ (accessed on 6 Feruar 2012).

Athaasca River, are suering rom higher-than-normal cancerlevels and illness.4

Warner Nazile, an activist rom british Columia and memer o theWetsuweten First Nation, said: Its literall a toic wastelandare ground and lack ponds and lakestailings pondswith anawul smell.5

In Januar 2012, there was hope when the Oama administrationrejected an application rom a Canadian frm to uild the KestonexL pipeline, stretching 1,700 miles rom the Alerta Tar Sands toTeas. However, this does not guarantee that the pipeline willnever e uilt and the struggle to stop new pipelines is not over.First Nations communities are fercel contesting another plannedpipeline , Enridges Northern Gatewa. 730 miles o pipelinewould carr 525,000 crude arrels rom the Tar Sands dail toKitimat on the british Columian coast, to e shipped to Asia. Thepipelines path is across pristine lakes, mountains and First Nationsterritor. It is supported the Canadian government due to thelarge revenue it will generate.6 No First Nations in british Columiahave endorsed the pipeline. The ear that inevitale oil spills rom

the pipeline will leave permanent scars on their ancestral landswhich the have a dut to protect or the net generation.

Tar Sands eemplifes the scale and the long-term destructioncaused the new generation o etractive technologies. Thispermanent damage to huge ecosstems is increasingl understoodas Ecocide- a crime against an ecosstem and all the communitieswho depend on it.


Tar Sands UK Network - http://www.no-tar-sands.org/what-are-the-tar-sands/

Eradicating Ecocide -http://www.eradicatingecocide.com/

4 berr, C. (2012) Alerta Oil Sands Up Close: Gunshots Sounds, Dead birds, aMoonscape, Indian Countr Toda Media Network, 2 Feruar 2012, http://in-diancountrtodamedianetwork.com/2012/02/02/alerta-oil-sands-up-close-gunshot-sounds-dead-irds-a-moonscape-95444#izz1lF5gtxTJ (accessed on6 Feruar 2012).

5 Iid.

6 Iid.

Alberta

Oilsan

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As is clearl illustrated, even with the addition o felds et to eound, conventional crude oil production peaks in 2015. This meanswe must now rel on unconventional oil epensive, elusive anddirtier to etract. The etraction o these elusive deposits have argreater impacts on ecosstems and communities ecause o thepervasive technologies, toic chemicals and the huge amounts owater used to etract these less accessile deposits.

This all serves to highlight that energ conservation has never

een so urgent. Another stud, this time led Sir David King,ormer Chie Scientifc Advisor to the UK Government, and researchers rom Oord Universit, claimed that oil reserves hadeen eaggerated a third, mainl OPEC. 4 Their own researchestimated reserves at 850-900 illion arrels, not the 1,150-1,350illion arrels ofciall claimed oil producers and accepted the IEA. The anticipated that demand could outstrip suppl 2014-2015.

but ar rom relegating oil to the ackurner in order to switlget rid o our dependence, these dnamics have in act two majorconsequences: a rearguard action oil companies, minimisingor dening the links etween ossil uels and climate change whileaggressivel tring to fnd new deposits; and the end o (ver)cheap oil.5

New Oi l?As discussed, ig discoveries o conventional oil are now ewand ar etween. besides, the geopolitical landscape o oil haschanged a lot in the last ew decades. While the original majoroil companies, known as the seven sisters, were dominant inthe 1960s, the pendulum has since then swung ack frml inavour o national state oil companies. According to bP, just 9%o reserves are outside the grip o national companies, comparedwith 90% thirt ears ago. OPECs share o the oil market will

inevital increase in the ears to come. I an major conventionaldiscover remains to e made, it will most likel not e made an international major oil compan, whose uture prospects havedramaticall shrunk. As a result, oil companies now venture intomore and more difcult areas in order to fnd new deposits. Theseareas require epertise, capital and risk-taking, while at the sametime eing ever more devastating or the environment. Among thenew strategies o development:

Deep offshore exploration, which has accounted orapproximately 50% o all global discoveries since 2006.Brazil is the leader in the feld.

New geographical fr onti ers: Arctic, East Arica. As Bob

Dudley, BP Chie Executive, puts it: the Arctic is one o theworlds last remaining unexplored basins.

Tar sands: Canada, Venezuela. Four tons o sand and fvebarrels o water are necessary to produce just one barrelo oil while the whole operation is estimated to generate

4 Mason, R. (2010) Oil Reserves Eaggerated One Third.The Daily Telegraph.22 March, 2011. URL: www.telegraph.co.uk/fnance/newssector/energ/oilan-dgas/7500669/Oil-reserves-eaggerated--one-third.html

5 Greenpeace (2010) Whos Holding Us Back? How Carbon-Intensive Industry isPreventing Eective Climate Change Legislation. URL: www.greenpeace.org/international/en/pulications/reports/Whos-holding-us-ack

three to fve times as much CO2 as conventional oilextraction.6

Pre-salt reservoirs: Brazil. The total depth o these rocks,i.e. the distance between the surace o the sea and theoil reservoirs under the salt layer, can be as much as 7,000meters.

Shale oil : mainly USA or now, but seen as a game-changer or the US oil industry. See chapter on shale

gas or the description o the highly damaging rackingtechnique used to access these deposits.

New Price?Looking at the ig picture, a shit seems to have taken place atthe turn o the centur rom a suppl-driven price (wars aectingsuppl or over-suppl depressing prices, as in the mid-1980s) to ademand-driven price. This is corroorated oth the emergenceo China and India in the last ten ears, pushing demand sharpl up(as discussed earlier), and the lack o major discoveries, puttinga cap on the oil on oer. In short, the oil market suppl and demandhas tightened up since 2000, ringing added volatilit to the price.

As previousl mentioned, the cheap sources o oil are asicallfnished. The ITPOES report ranks etraction costs as ollows: SaudiAraia 20 usd/l, Other Middle East 25 to 30 usd/l, Other OPEClow 30s, Russia 35 usd/l, non-OPEC (conventional oil) 50 to 60usd/l, deep oshore 65 to 75 usd/l, Canadian tar sands 85 to95 usd/l. Iraq is the last countr with low costs o etraction in aposition to signifcantl increase its production (estimation: +4 to5 million /d). Saudi Araia has a current spare capacit o close to3.5 million /d, assuming it can indeed produce 12.5 million /d,ut its potential to go much eond that or an length o timeis seriousl in dout. Even more importantl, the InternationalMonetar Fund (IMF) has recentl estimated7 that the reak-evenoil prices i.e. the price at which the Middle East oil producersalance their udgets given their level o ependiture and non-oilrevenues has risen to 80 usd/l or the UAE and Saudi Araiarom 60 usd/l three ears ago and 30 usd/l ten ears ago.This asicall means that incremental arrels needed to suppl theworld will come rom epensive sources.

Once again, given the urgent need to move awa rom oil anwa,ecause o its caron impact, this should e seen as anotherreason to move awa switl to other, cleaner sources o energand energ conservation. but we just cant, or wont, shake o ourletharg, and the uncertaint now prevailing on oil is also helpingthe cause o climate changes iggest nemesis: coal.

They Call i t King CoalM cl wly c th mt mm m, th th cytm cmmut. Th u cl l th tmtt Co2 t th tmh; m th y

6 Source: www.no-tar-sands.org

7 International Monetar Fund (2011) World Economic and Financial Surveys,Regional Economic Outlook: Middle East and Central Asia. URL: http://www.im.org/eternal/pus/t/reo/2011/mcd/eng/pd/mreo1011.pd


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ENERGy

th l ul. a yt, th cumt cl jct t c y 50% th t twty y.

Coal is dierent rom oil in two major was: it is widelgeographicall distriuted, with ewer geopolitical considerationsto consider, and it has igger reserves more than 100 earsat current consumption rates (although it is less than that i weaccount or increasing consumption). However it is also much lessversatile than oil. Its two main uses are or electricit generation(thermal coal, urned to create steam to propel turines) and ormanuacturing steel and cement (coking coal, aka metallurgicalcoal), with thermal coal representing 70% o the total production.Coal can also e turned into a liquid uel (coal liqueaction). SouthArica, poor in oil ut rich in coal and anious to develop its ownuels when it was acing isolation during the apartheid ears, haseen at the oreront o the CTL (coal-to-liquid) technolog since1955, its strategic value more than making up or its high cost.

The environmental legac o coal is terrile ut, as is the caseor oil, mainstream economics lindl reuse to acknowledge thetrue cost o coals etraction and use. A new report the Newyork Academ o Sciences8 is damning in its assessment: Eachstage in the lie cycle o coalextraction, transport, processing,and combustiongenerates a waste stream and carries multiplehazards or health and the environment. These costs are externalto the coal industry and are thus oten considered externalitiesWe estimate that the lie cycle eects o coal and the waste streamgenerated are costing the US public a third to over one-hal o atrillion dollars annually. Many o these so-called externalities are,moreover, cumulative. Accounting or the damages conservativelydoubles to triples the price o electricity rom coal per kWhgenerated, making wind, solar, and other orms o non ossil

uel power generation, along with investments in efciency andelectricity conservation methods, economically competitive.

Each ear a tpical 500MW coal-fred power plant emits 10,000tons o sulphur dioide (SO2), 10,200 tons o nitrogen oide (NO),500 tons o particulate matter, 120,000 tons o ash, 193,000 tonso sludge and 3.7 million tons o caron dioide (CO2) along withman other toins.9 Coal produces one and a hal times the CO2emissions o oil and twice as man as natural gas. Coal urningaccounts or 40% o worldwide electricit ut also 72% o CO2emissions generated power stations. I we include coals otheruses, mainl industrial and residential, coal represents 25% o totalenerg consumption ut is responsile or 41% o worldwide CO2emissions.

As reported the Ny Academ o Sciences ( ibid.) the catalogueo coals impact on health and the environment makes or a grimreading:

Underground mini ng - occupational injuries, diseases,chronic illnesses and deaths.

Mountain Top Removal (MTR) - to expose coal seams,

8 New york Academ o Sciences (2011) Full Cost Accounting or the Lie Ccleo CoalAnnals o the New York Academy o Sciences. Ecological EconomicsReviews. v.1219, pp.7398, Feruar 2011.

9 Sourcewatch (2011) The Environmental Impacts o Coal. URL: http://www.sourcewatch.org/inde.php?title=Environmental_impacts_o_coal

orests are removed and rocks ragmented withexplosives. The rubble or spoils then sit precariouslyalong edges and are dumped in the valleys below.

Coal Combustion Waste (CCW) or fly ash - contains toxicchemicals and heavy metals; pollutants known to causecancer, birth deects, reproductive disorders, neurologicaldamage, learning disabilities, kidney disease anddiabetes.

Methane - emitted during coal mining, methane is agreenhouse gas 25 times more potent than CO2 in a 100-year lie cycle.

Impoundments - ound at the periphery and at multiplelevels at Mountain Top Removal (MTR) sites, adjacentto coal processing plants, and as coal combustion waste(y ash) adjacent to coal-fred plants.

Slurr y f rom processing pl ants a toxic by-product romthe cleaning-up o coal to remove impurities and heavymetals to prepare it or combustion.

Water contaminati on - chemicals in the waste streamsinclude ammonia, sulphur, sulphates, nitrates, nitric acid,tars, oil, uorides, and other acids and metals such assodium, iron, cyanide plus additional unlisted chemicals.

Carcinogenic emissions - most o them emitted into water,mainly consisting o cadmium and arsenic.

Communit y healt h i mpacts - lung cancers and heart,respiratory and kidney diseases.

Ecological impacts - imperilled aquatic ecosystems,harmul algal blooms, long-range air pollutants, loss oair quality, atmospheric nitrogen deposition, acid rain,release o mercury in the environment.

Contri buti on to climate change - increased release o CO2and methane in the atmosphere.

This should e compelling enough to tr and sta awa rom coal asmuch as possile. However, this is not the route that governmentsacross the world are taking. Caron Capture and Storage (CSS)technolog is now high up on the agenda o the coal industr andis eing aggressivel promoted oth the IntergovernmentalPanel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the International EnergAgenc (IEA) as an essential component in the fght to reduceCO2 emissions in the atmosphere. In its 2009 CCS TechnologRoadmap,10 the IEA estimated that CCS will achieve up to 20% othe reduction in CO2 emissions required 2050, which will alsomean trapping and storing a volume o CO2 equivalent to twice thevolume o oil and gas the world currentl etracts each ear. but isthis too good to e true?

For one, the technolog itsel is not et commerciall or technicallproven on a large scale. The race is on to prove the concept ut some estimates it will not e read or at least 10 to 15 ears.So ar, 80 large-scale industrial projects in various stages odevelopment have een initiated around the world, with the US,the EU, Canada and Australia, among others, having invested $26illion up to 2010. Meanwhile, a numer o voices have epresseddeep concern aout devoting so man resources and energ to CCS.

10 IEA (2009) Technology Roadmap: Carbon Capture and Storage. URL: www.iea.org/papers/2009/CCS_Roadmap.pd


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Cse Study 3:

mo to ro m o co ah, usa - wo h H

Mountain Top Removal (MTR) mining is also reerred to as ValleFill Coal Mining. It is a ver destructive orm o strip mining whichactuall removes the tops o mountains.

Entire mountain ranges have een destroed in some areas o theUSA and et this devastating orm o mining is spreading. Firstl,orests and all the vegetation is clear cut and destroed and the topsoil is striped awa. Eplosives are used to last as much as 800eet o mountaintop, and rock rom these eplosions threatennear homes and residents. Huge machines are used to dig up thesoil ater the eplosions and the soil is then taken awa trucksto e dumped into adjoining valles. Net, the rock is gouged out

to uncover and remove the coal. When the coal is removed all o theoverurden rom the process is dumped into close- valles,which flls up whole valles.

Once the compan has fnished mining, the mountain is let arrenand ooding ecomes a prolem. Without the trees coveringthe mountains, torrents o rainwater ow o steep slopes,endangering the communities who live elow. Although there haveeen attempts to replant vegetation on the are mountaintops, themountains never ull recover.

Ro Goodwin rom Coal River Mountain Watch, descries the impacto Mountain Top Removal mining in southern West Virginia:

There were glaciers that covered much o the mountainouseastern US, but Southern Appalachia is unique. Because therewere no glaciers here, the topsoil is some o the oldest inthe world and thats why there are ramps, ginseng and mollymoochers among other valuable species. What you are doing hereon this mine site is destroying the 10,000 year-old species that,

regardless o what you do, will not grow back. Even i you wait10,000 more years, there is no guarantee it will ever be like it was.People in the community are concerned because they have thrivedo harvesting these species or generations and now they arebeing destroyed. This destruction, combined with a lack o accessto the mountain due to security, blasting, and active mining is ahuge concern o the community.1

1 Goodwin, R. (2011) Report rom Citizens Inspection o Coal River Mountain,Coal River Mountain Watch, http://www.crmw.net/crmw/content/report-citizens-inspection-coal-river-mountain (accessed on 14 Feruar 2012).

The ojections and concerns are o several orders:

Costs. Pollution - CCS is meant to address the release o CO2

at the point o combustion. However CO2 will still be

released during extraction and transportation to thepoint o combustion, while all the other types o pollutionalready described earlier are still prevalent

Storage risks. Energy consumption - CCS wastes energy as it uses

between 10 to 40% o the energy produced by a powerstation, thereby erasing the efciency gains o the last50 years and increase resource consumption by one third.Power stations with CCS not only require more energy, butwill also need 90% more reshwater than those without.11

11 ISIS (2008) Carbon Capture and Storage: A False Solution. See here: http://www.i-sis.org.uk/CCSAFalseSolution.php

The issue o water in coal mining is alread wreaking havoc andCSS will make the prolem even worse. Not to mention the twistedlogic o fghting one aspect o coal (CO2 release) with more coal(and ignoring all other negatives o its etraction).

Carbon Capture Storage or Not, Coal Demand i sIncreasingGlobally, coal remains the leading source o electricitygeneration until 2035, although its share o electricity generationdeclines rom 41% to 32%. A big increase o non-OECD coal-fredgeneration is partially oset by a all on OECD countries.Thisstatement rom the IEA World Energ Outlook 2010 sums it up, asdoes this graph rom the same source, showing the evolution ocoal-fred electricit generation:

Moun

taintop

Remova

linRa

leighCoun

ty,

WestVirgina.

PhotographyVivianStockman


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China India Other Non-OECDs OECD

A drop in coal-fred generation in the OECD countries is oset vast increases in otherregions, especiall China. Source:IEA World Energy Outlook 2010.

5.cOal-ired electricity

generatiOn By regiOn

The stor o coal in the ears to come will essentiall take place in

Asia. For the frst time, China ecame a net coal importer in 2009o oth thermal and coking qualities. It is now estimated that 90%o the increase in worldwide coal consumption in the net 20 earswill come rom Asia, with strong demand epected in China, India,South Korea and Taiwan. Even Vietnam, acing rapid uranisationand industrialisation, is on course to import as much as 100 milliontons 2020. Going orward, mature economies are moving awarom coal, in particular towards natural gas, while developingeconomies are asicall putting their hands on ever orm oenerg the possil can to sustain their economic growth. In thisrespect coal, as seen earlier, is among the easiest routes orwarddue to its prevalence and relativel cheap price. Natural gas is the

ovious candidate in a strateg o short-term mitigation ut it hasits dark side too.

Natural Gas the Fuel ofNo ChoiceTh vlmt ck tchqu t cc t hl mt m-ch th uty v w l l tl ul. Th mct ck th cytm th ujct ht t, wth lcl tlly t w wt ctmt

y chmcl mth, v cc thquk (s .2).

Natural Gas accounts or 25% o gloal primar energ, while oilsshare is 35% and coals 30%. Other energies such as nuclear andrenewales, make the last 10%. Put another wa, 90% o the worldsprimar energ comes rom ossil uels. bP orecasts a convergenceo the three ossil uels towards a market share o aout 26-27%each in 2030 while non-ossil uels will reach a share o aout 7%each. This would still leave a collective share o close to 80% orossil uels, wa too much to have an inuence on reducing ourcaron emissions. Natural gas is epected to e the astest growingossil uel to 2030.

The IEA estimates that 2035, the gloal consumption o naturalgas will reach 4.5 trillion cuic meters (m3), an increase o 1.4trillion m3 on 2008 fgures, or an average increase o 1.4% perear. China, currentl a ver low user o gas (which represents lessthan 4% o its primar energ), will see an annual consumptionrise o 6% and will account or one fth o the increase in gloaldemand. The share o natural gas in its primar energ will thengrow to 9%. The Middle East will see the 2nd iggest increase, its

share in world consumption growing rom 10% in 2010 to 17% in2035. Its share in world production will also grow rom 15% to 19%.OECD countries, especiall Europe, will accelerate the switch romcoal to natural gas. The Eastern countries, with China leading thewa, will remain heav consumers o coal and while gass shareincreases, in OECD Asia it is at the epense o oil rather than coal.

Natural gas releases 50% less caron in the atmosphere than coaland close to zero sulphur. Its etraction is generall less hazardousand polluting than coal and it oviousl does not present the samerisks as nuclear energ. but it is still a net CO2 emitter.

Reserves are currentl estimated at 180 trillion m3, which wouldcover 60 ears at current consumption rates. This numer o 180trillion m3 represents conventional gas reserves. Recentlthough, the development o unconventional gas, especiallin the US, has een nothing less than a game-changer, withproound consequences on the wa we see gas, its prices and itsenvironmental impact.

The technological revolution in unconventional gas has beenthe single most important energy innovation so ar this century,sas Daniel yergin, Inormation Handling Services: CamridgeEnerg Research Associates (IHS CERA) Chairman and author o thePulitzer-Prize winning ook The Prize.

Shale gas The Elephant in t he RoomShale gas is conventional natural gas that is produced romreservoirs predominantl composed o shale with lesser amountso other fne-grained rocks, rather than rom more conventionalsandstone or limestone reservoirs. The gas shales are oten oththe source rocks and the reservoir or the natural gas.

Drilling and production o gas shales in man cases is ver similarto that o conventional natural gas reservoirs; however, due to alack o permeailit, gas shales almost alwas need to e roken,what is called racture stimulation and oten require higher welldensities. According to the Canadian Association o PetroleumProducers a primar concern in producing shale gas is protecting

resh water aquiers. Water used in drilling or racturing comesrom lakes, rivers, local suppl or eisting oil, gas or water wells.Here lies the main issue with shale gas.

besides requiring huge amounts o water, the high-pressureinjection o water and sand mied with chemicals necessar toracture the shale (a process called hdraulic racturing or racking)cannot e contained and inevital leaks into water aquiers.The industr replies that racking takes place so ar elow theaquiers that there is no risk o contaminating water supplies.The evidence however, is not there. Even i this were ound to e


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Cse Study 4:

soh a - v co no! o coal mm h h o h eh. th h

o o. i o h oo o, o o h. OZwifho, o , h o o.th o b . i o h Mupo,o moh eh.Dzomo l Mupo (Voice of the Eth), Custodins of the Netwok ofSced Sites in Vend, South afic.

the neighouring Vele mine also owned CoAL in the Limpopoprovince. A report Mine Not Waste Not an international

epert, commissioned the communities, reveals that CoALhas ailed to provide complete water studies or the project andhas et to e granted a water license. There is also a high risk ocontaminated water rom the mine seeping ack into the watertale and polluting ground water.

The Report also highlights how CoALs Environmental ImpactAssessment (EIA) and Environmental Management Plan (EMP) areincomplete. CoAL reused, despite it eing illegal to do so, to givethe interested and aected parties copies o their prospecting permitand their Environmental Management Programme or Makhado.

Civil societ groups have moilised in response, demandingrecognition o the act that no water license has et een granted

and asking gloal share-holders and potential investors toreconsider their investment in the CoAL Makhado project.

Dzomo la Mupo are calling or recognition o their sacred sitesas No-Go Zones or development and etractive industries.Having developed principles, local constitutions and communitgovernance plans, the custodians are seeking legal recognitiono their responsiilit to protect their network o sacred sitesaccording to their customar governance sstems, under nationaland international laws.


Mine Not Waste Not: A preliminary critique o

aspects o the CoAL (Coal Arica Ltd) Makhado CollieryProject Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) andEnvironmental Management Programme (EMP). http://www.gaiaoundation.org/sites/deault/fles/documents/MineNotWasteNot_december2011.pd

Open letter to South Arican Minister o Water andEnvironmental Aairs 15/11/2011 - http://www.minesandcommunities.org/article.php?a=11319&l=1

Gaia Foundation - www.gaiaoundation.org/galleries/albums/makhadzis-deenders-sacred-sites

Mupo Foundation - www.mupooundation.org

Venda in Limpopo Province is well known or its iodiversit andcultural heritage. To the Venda peoples the indigenous orests, rivers,mountain peaks and wateralls are places o vital ecological, culturaland spiritual importance revered as sacred sites. The network osacred sites are protected custodial clans. The elder women withinthese clans - the Makhadzis - are known as the rainmakers o SouthArica, who practice cultural traditions o rainmaking to maintain thehealth and integrit o the local ecosstems.

However, Vendas cultural and ecological diversit are increasinglthreatened land graing, development projects, tourism andnow mining. Coal o Arica (CoAL), an Australian mining compan,has proposed the Makhado Coking Coal Project. I this goes ahead,the communit aces severe ecological, social and economicdamage to their ancestral homes. The iggest concern is waterecause this is an area where water is alread scarce. CoAL hasadmitted that the project will ehaust the underground water inthe Venda area 2014, and this is without even considering thewater needs o the local communit, or the water consumption o

Ven

da

,Sou

thAfrica

.PhotographyWillbaxter


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ENERGy

27

true, water contamination is not the onl risk. Cuadrilla, which hasstarted working on a shale gas deposit in Lancashire in the UK,recentl admitted that two minor earthquakes that happened othe Lancashire coast were the likel consequence o its rackingoperations.12

A new stud Cornell Universit13 is adding more uel to the fre. Init, the authors claim that methane, the chie component o naturalgas, is escaping into the atmosphere in ar larger quantities thanpreviousl thought, with as much as 7.9% o it pufng out rom shalegas wells, intentionall vented or ared, or seeping rom loose pipefttings along gas distriution lines. This would deunk the usualaccepted notion that gas is much riendlier than coal on GreenhouseGas. Mr. Howarth, a proessor o ecolog and environmental iologand the lead author o the stud, said his analsis, which lookedspecifcall at methane leakage rates in unconventional shalegas development, was among the frst o its kind and that muchmore research was needed. Another stud, rom Proceedings othe National Academ o Sciences o the United States o America(PNAS),14 reads as ollows: Directional drilling and hydraulic-

racturing technologies are dramatically increasing natural-gas

extraction. In aquiers overlying the Marcellus and Utica shaleormations o Northeastern Pennsylvania and upstate New York,we document systematic evidence or methane contamination odrinking water associated with shale-gas extraction. We concludethat greater stewardship, data, andpossiblyregulation areneeded to ensure the sustainable uture o shale-gas extractionand to improve public confdence in its use.

The deate is sure to e raging. The stakes indeed could not ehigher. With shale gas, the US elieves it has ound the miraclecure: gas, the cleanest ossil uel, availale at home, in vastquantities, ensuring a sae and secure domestic energ suppl ordecades to come and generating thousands o jos in the process.

For energ companies and politicians alike, it is a dream cometrue. but the nagging issue o environmental pollution generated racking does not want to go awa. A report Democrats in theUS Congress,15 released in April 2011, said that etween 2005 and2009, a total o 780 million gallons o hdraulic-racturing productshad een used 14 companies. More than 2,500 productscontaining chemicals and other components were used, including29 known or possile human carcinogens, regulated under the SaeDrinking Water Act or their risks to human health or listed as airpollutants. In many instances, the oil and gas service companieswere unable to identiy these proprietary chemicals, suggestingthat the companies are injecting uids containing chemicals

12 Cuadrilla Resources (2011) Findings o Report on Seismic Events Published.Press Release: 2 Novemer 2011. URL: http://www.cuadrillaresources.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/Cuadrilla-Resources-Press-Release-02-11-11.pd

13 Howarth, R. et al. (2011) Methane and the Greenhouse-gas Footprint o NaturalGas rom Shale Formations. URL: www.sustainaleuture.cornell.edu/news/at-tachments/Howarth-EtAl-2011.pd

14 Osorn, S. et al. (2011) Methane Contamination o Drinking Water Accompany-ing Gas-Well Drilling and Hydraulic Fracturing. PNAS. URL: http://www.pnas.org/content/earl/2011/05/02/1100682108.ull.pd+html

15 Democrat Committee on Energ and Commerce (2011) Committee DemocratsRelease New Report Detailing Hydraulic Fracturing Products. URL: http://dem-ocrats.energcommerce.house.gov/inde.php?q=news/committee-democrats-release-new-report-detailing-hdraulic-racturing-products

that they themselves cannot identiy, Democrats on the Energand Commerce Committee said. but the stakes are not limited tothe US alone. The initial success o the US industr has not goneunnoticed aroad and man countries are now keen to replicatethat success at home. So ar, France is the onl countr which hasput a moratorium on all shale gas etraction.

It is hard to overstate the importance o shale gas and moregenerall, o unconventional gas, in the redefnition o energ

policies going orward. The earthquake and tsunami in Japan,their impact on nuclear energ, and the unrest in the Middle East,reminding everone how volatile the region is, recentl cominedto make an even more powerul case or domestic natural gas. TheIEA last ear estimated the reserves o unconventional gas at 385trillion m3, covering 130 ears o current consumption. It was thenpredicting that the share o unconventional gas in the total naturalgas output would clim rom 12% in 2008 to 19% in 2035. In light othe recent events, this seems understated and it will take a massiveeort civil societ to tr and control this development and tomitigate the consequences o racking on the environment. Thegenie is clearl out o the ottle, and as we saw earlier with caron

capture, it is a genie hard to resist - the temptation to rel onquick-fes, in a usiness-as-usual scenario that avoids questionsaout our wasteul wa o lie, gloall, is just too strong.

Nuclear EnergyTh ty t Fukuhm h v m cutwy m ucl y ut t u t ty th l ucl ywlw h, l y a cut.

The most successul PR eercise in recent times has een thereranding o nuclear energ into a green energ, on the asis

that its record is etter than ossil uels on CO2 emissions. Thisis not to sa that nuclear energ does not release CO2. Indeed itdoes, in the uilding o the reactors themselves and in the mining,transporting and processing o uranium. However, even eminentscientists and environmentalists like James Lovelock have endorsedit considering that its inherent dangers and aws were a etter riskthan runawa greenhouse gas emissions. The pollution generated uranium mining, the health hazards o living near a nuclear plant,the impact on ecosstems o releasing vast amounts o hot waterin near rivers or seas, the terriing consequences o a majoraccident, the et unsolved prolem o radioactive waste disposal all these undamental issues have een relegated to the status o

necessar evils in the crusade against CO2.Even the Fukushima disaster in Japan last ear does not seem toe undamentall changing the uture o nuclear energ. Granted,some industrialised nations have said the would graduall phaseout nuclear power (German, Switzerland, belgium), ut themajor nuclear powers (UK, USA, France, Russia) will not changedirection. Meanwhile major developing nations, ater pausing or ashort while, are more than likel to resume the massive epansiono their nuclear capacit in the ace o the relentless need oradditional power (China, India).


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.

fg 2


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ENERGy

Cse Study 5:

do, usa to w o w 65 b h. d boo boo , o b , o , o

. i h o o h bh o o . th o oh h h h ho , hh h h o l .Helth expets in lette to U.S. Envionmentl Potection agency. *

The health o ecosstems and communities in 31 states in USA iseing threatened hdraulic racturing (racking). The hiddenimpacts o racking are now suracing with increased incidences ocontaminated water, earthquakes and destruction o ecosstems onan enormous scale.

The small town o Dimock, Pennslvania has ecome a smolacross the USA o the impact o racking. Dimock is situated aovethe Marcellus shale deposit and has een descried as groundzero in the attle over whether racking is sae. 1 In 2008, Caot Oiland Gas approached residents to sign leases to allow the companto drill on their land.

The costs o drilling have een higher than was oreseen. Soonater racking egan, the drinking water ecame polluted andresidents were shocked when their tap water caught fre. On 1

Januar 2009, the water well o one resident lew up due to highlevels o methane that had escaped during the racking process andleaked into the aquier, and then into their well.2 Man residentshave eperienced health prolems due to high levels o methaneand other metals in the water.3 A resident in Dimock who has eenunale to drink water rom her tap or three ears lamented Wenever imagined that we would not e ale to drink our local water.4

Initiall Caot Oil and Gas provided 11 amilies in Dimock with ottledwater dail until Novemer 2011 when deliveries suddenl stopped.Residents have een let to seek alternative water sources alone.5

* Cited in Zelman, J. (2012) Dimock, Pennslvania Fracking RollercoasterContinues As Health Eperts Push EPA, The Hufngton Post, 10 Januar 2012,http://www.hufngtonpost.com/2012/01/10/dimock-pennslvania-racking-epa_n_1197361.html (accessed on 7 Feruar, 2012).

1 State Impact Pennslvania (2012) Dimock, PA: Ground Zero In The Fight

Over Fracking, Online: http://stateimpact.npr.org/pennslvania/tag/dimock/page/2/ (accessed on 7 Feruar, 2012).

2 Lustgarten, A. (2009) Ofcials in Three States Pin Water Woes on Gas Drilling,ProPulica, 26 April 2009, http://www.propulica.org/article/ofcials-in-three-states-pin-water-woes-on-gas-drilling-426 (accessed on 7 Feruar, 2012).

3 Zelman, J. (2012) Dimock, Pennslvania Fracking Rollercoaster ContinuesAs Health Eperts Push EPA, The Hufngton Post, 10 Januar 2012, http://www.hufngtonpost.com/2012/01/10/dimock-pennslvania-racking-epa_n_1197361.html (accessed on 7 Feruar, 2012).

4 Legere, L. (2009) Nearl a ear ater a water well eplosion, Dimock Twp.residents thirst or gas-well f, The Times-Triune, 26 Octoer 2009, http://thetimes-triune.com/news/nearl-a-ear-ater-a-water-well-eplosion-di-mock-twp-residents-thirst-or-gas-well-f-1.365743#izz1lo10CRtI (accessedon 7 Feruar, 2012).

5 Iid.

In Januar 2012, 20 health eperts urged the EnvironmentalProtection Agenc to investigate water contamination and provideresidents o Dimock with access to sae drinking water.

The Environmental Protection Agenc has now intervened andwill suppl water or several amilies, as well as testing wells inthe area. Data has revealed dangerous levels o arsenic and otherchemicals in the water.6

There is currentl a moratorium on drilling in the Dimock area, utthe town continues to e plagued with the legac o environmentaldestruction. Dimock is ecoming one o man towns in the USAand gloall to suer rom the rapid spread o racking. This newetractive technolog is eing sold as a greener and cleanerorm o energ. A momentum is growing to an racking across theworld, as the dire consequences alert people to the act that theshort and long-term cost is too high. In Pittsurgh or eample, theCit Council passed this Ordinance in 2011:

Toxic Trespass Resulting rom Unconventional Natural Gas

Drilling makes it illegal to deposit toxic substances or potentiallytoxic substances within the body o any resident o Pittsburgh,or into any natural community or ecosystemas the result oactivities prohibited byOrdinances o the City, or throughnegligent actions which result in a violation o any provision othis ordinance[such actions are] declared a orm o trespass,and [are] hereby prohibited.7


Community Environmental Legal Deense Fund http://www.celd.org

Press release: Gasland flm - http://www.gaslandthemovie.com/whats-racking/

Frack o UK - http://rack-o.org.uk/

6 Lustgarten, A. (2012) years Ater Evidence o Fracking Contamination, EPAto Suppl Drinking Water to Homes in Pa. Town, ProPulica, 20 Januar 2012,http://www.propulica.org/article/ears-ater-evidence-o-racking-contam-ination-epa-to-suppl-drinking-water (accessed on 7 Feruar, 2012).

7 Communit Environmental Legal Deense Fund (CELDF) (2011) Press Release:Pittsurgh Council Votes to ban Upstream Poisoning o Cit Residents and theEnvironment Caused Corporations Fracking or Shale Gas, Decemer 20th,2011 http://celd.org/celd-press-release-pittsurgh-council-votes-to-an-upstream-poisoning-o-cit-residents-and-the-environment-caused--corporations-racking-or-shale-gas


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Pulic opinion might disagree though. A Novemer 2011 poll carriedout the bbC in 23 countries16 came up with the ollowing results:most (people) are signifcantl more opposed to nuclear power thanthe were in 2005, with just 22% agreeing that nuclear power isrelativel sae and an important source o electricit, and we shoulduild more nuclear power plants. 71% thought their countr couldalmost entirel replace coal and nuclear energ within 20 ears ecoming highl energ-efcient and ocusing on generatingenerg rom the sun and wind. Gloall, 39% want to continue usingeisting reactors without uilding new ones, while 30% would liketo shut everthing down now. In German, where the governmentdecided to phase out its nuclear programme, opposition to newreactors has grown rom 73% in 2005 to 90% toda. In France,which is 80% reliant on nuclear power, opposition rose rom 66%to 83%. Surprisingl, in Japan, new reactor opposition showed amore modest rise, rom 76% to 84%. britons and Americans othsupported uilding new reactors those in avour rose rom 33% to37%; in the US the numer was unchanged rom 2005.

Status of Nuclear Energy TodayNuclear energ enjoed a rapid epansion in the 60s and 70s

eore slowing down dramaticall in the 80s and 90s, ater theThree Mile Island and especiall the Chernol accidents. Giventhe lead-time to construct nuclear plants, in eect it meant thatnew reactors were uilt up until 1990. The net 15 ears saw a longnuclear winter that lasted until the mid-2000s when the industrsuccessull managed to drape itsel in environmental clothing.Coupled with the emergence o China, India and other energ-thirst nations, it gave a new lease o lie to nuclear energ.

6.wOrld nuclear generating capacity,

1960 tO 2009

16 black, R. (2011) Nuclear Power Gets Little Pulic Support Worldwide. BBC NewsScience and Environment. URL: http://www.c.co.uk/news/science-environ-ment-15864806

In 2008, construction started on 10 new reactors, the frst doule-digit increase since 1985. At the end o 2010, 440 reactors werein operation in 29 countries, with an installed capacit o 375GW.The relative weight o nuclear energ in the electricit mi variesconsideral etween countries, with France ar the mostreliant on nuclear power (a spot once occupied Lithuania, whichclosed its last Soviet-era reactor in 2009. This reactor was similarto Chernols and decommissioning it was a pre-requisite orLithuanias admission to the EU. Plans are under wa or a newreactor to e uilt 2020, in cooperation with neighouringPoland, Latvia and Estonia).

China currentl possesses 13 reactors and India has 20. This ishowever aout to change, with ig plan

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