EcoUnionist News #85

Compiled by x344543 - IWW Environmental Unionism Caucus, January 5, 2016

The following news items feature issues, discussions, campaigns, or information potentially relevant to green unionists:

Lead Stories:

• "Conservation" Is Used to Justify the Displacement of Indigenous People - By Alejandra Orozco‐Quintero, Catie Burlando and Lance W. Robinson, Truthout, January 2, 2016
• Inside the Paris Climate Agreement: Hope or Hype? - By Brian Tokar, CounterPunch, December 30, 2015
• Climate activists can learn a lot from Black Lives Matter - By Kate Aronoff, Waging Nonviolence, December 29, 2015
• Terror, climate chaos, financial crisis are the costs of ‘doing business’ - By Nafeez Ahmed, Middle East Eye, December 24, 2015
• Laudato Si—The Pope’s Anti-Systemic Encyclical - By Michael Löwy, Monthly Review, December 2015

Ongoing Mobilizations:

• Flush the TPP - Spring 2016: | #FlushtheTPP
• Railcon15 - Next Conference TBA | #Railcon15

The Thin Green Line:

• Boycott ExxonMobil Because #ChildrenRNot4Sale - By Staff, Educating the Gates Foundation, December 31, 2015
• The Thin Green Line of Resistance: Year in Review - Dan Serres on Locus Focus, KBOO FM, December 28, 2015

Bread and Roses:

• Climate Change Is Taking A Toll On Farmers’ Mental Health - By Natasha Geiling, Think Progress, January 4, 2016
• The disturbing lack of black organic farmers - By Katie Herzog, Grist, January 4, 2016
• Sakuma Bros. Farm Wins 2015 Scrooge of the Year - By Staff, Boycott Sakuma Berries, January 2, 2016
• 16 Reasons 2016 Will Bring Positive Change to the Global Food System - By Danielle Nierenberg, EcoWatch, January 2, 2016
• Venezuela Passes Law Banning GMOs, by Popular Demand - By William Camacaro, Frederick B. Mills, Christina M. Schiavoni, CounterPunch, January 1, 2016
• Judge green lights whistleblower claim against USDA by pesticide researcher - By Steve Volk, Washington Post, December 31, 2015
• No Such Thing As “The American Farmer” - By Gene Logsdon, The Contrary Farmer, December 30, 2015

An Injury to One is an Injury to All:

• Caught in China's crackdown on labor radicals - Ellen David Friedman interviewed by Ashley Smith, Socialist Worker, January 4, 2016
• Workers' Comp Industrial Complex: The Middlemen Silencing Injured Workers - By Michael Grabell, Truthout, January 3, 2016
• NTSB report shines light on train collision - By Mary Clarkin, The Hutchinson News, January 2, 2016
• Tiny Materials in Countless Products Raise Big Questions for Environment and Health - By Elizabeth Grossman, Truthout, January 2, 2016
• WHERE ARE THEY NOW? Injured worker faces long road back - By Malcolm Hall, Indeonline, January 2, 2016
• Hurt Plumbers Want School Explosion Video - By Nick Rummell, Natural Gas Watch, December 31, 2015
• China mine survivors detected by infrared cameras in Shandong - By Staff, BBC, January 3, 2016 December 30, 2015
• A Legacy of Shame: Canadian Mining Companies leave behind decades of violence in Guatemala - By Scott Price, Intercontinental Cry, December 30, 2015
• Mexican Government Ignores Social Impact of Energy Projects - By Emilio Godoy, Truthout, December 30, 2015
• Newcrest coy on Hidden Valley shutdown - By Rosalyn Albaniel, Post Courier, December 30, 2015
• Unions threaten to shut down coal mines as four more potential cases of 'black lung' emerge - By Matt Peacock, Australian Broadcasting Corporation, December 30, 2015
• Union blasts SFMTA over Muni operator wages - By Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez, San Francisco Examiner, December 30, 2015
• Wave hits North Sea drilling rig, killing 1 - By Staff, Associated Press, December 30, 2015
• First responders, fire departments in U.S. often unprepared for hazardous train derailments - By Rick Rouanand Laura Arenschield, Columbus Dispatch, December 28, 2015
• Dozens feared dead in explosion at gas plant in Nigeria - By Staff, Russia Times, December 24, 2015
• Construction Workers Are Dying: Where's The Outrage? - By Joe Maniscalco, Labor Press, December 11, 2015

The Greenwash Report:

• Emails: US Government Facilitated LNG Business Deals Before Terminals Got Required Federal Permits - By Steve Horn, DeSmog Blog, January 3, 2016
• Alberta’s new oil marketing ‘triumph’ - By Barry Weisleder, Socialist Action, December 31, 2015
• During Paris Climate Summit, Obama Signed Exxon, Koch-Backed Bill Expediting Pipeline Permits - By Steve Horn, DeSmog Blog, December 30, 2015
• 9 Gifts President Obama Gave Big Oil in 2015 - By Lukas Ross, Friends of the Earth, December 28, 2015

Disaster Capitalism:

• Record-Breaking 2015 Temperatures Connected To Ongoing Fish Kill on Mississippi Beaches - By Julie Dermansky, DeSmog Blog, December 31, 2015
• California gas leak called the biggest disaster since BP - By Katie Herzog, Grist, December 30, 2015
• California Methane Gas Leak is Worst U.S. Environmental Disaster Since BP Oil Spill - Erin Brockovich and David Balen interviewed by Juan González and Amy Goodman, Democracy Now, December 30, 2015
• Fukushima Today - By Robert Hunziker, CounterPunch, December 29, 2015
• Why Engineers Can’t Stop Los Angeles' Enormous Methane Leak - By Melissa Cronin, Vice, December 26, 2015
• New infrared video reveals growing environmental disaster in L.A. gas leak - By Joby Warrick, Washington Post, December 24, 2015

Carbon Bubble:

• Metso cutting 44 jobs from minerals division in Finland - By Cecilia Jamasmie, Mining.Com, January 4, 2016
• North Dakota rigs slip below 60 for first time since 2009 - By Associated Press, FuelFix, January 4, 2016
• Oil Industry’s “Death Dance” Continues - By Andy Rowell, Oil Change International, January 4, 2016
• Sharp oil spending cuts, distressed sales to loom over 2016 - By Collin Eaton, FuelFix, January 4, 2016
• China Clamps Down on Coal - By Kieran Cooke, EcoWatch, January 2, 2016
• Swift Energy becomes 40th North American driller in bankruptcy - By Collin Eaton, FuelFix, January 2, 2016
• Dozens laid off at Montana mine as coal industry slumps - By Associated Press, FuelFix, December 31, 2015
• Total U.S. rig count dips below 700 for first time since 1999 - By Jordan Blum, FuelFix, December 31, 2015
• Union: nearly 600 layoffs in works at Murray Energy mines - By Associated Press, FuelFix, December 31, 2015
• Are we witnessing a turning point in the future of coal? - By Ian Verrender, Australian Broadcasting Corporation, December 30, 2015
• Unemployment falling in most big Texas cities, except for Houston - By Joshua Cain, FuelFix, December 30, 2015
• U.S. steelmakers suffering amid oil price slide - By Bloomberg, FuelFix, December 30, 2015
• DuPont moves ahead on job cuts ahead of Dow merger - By Associated Press, FuelFix, December 29, 2015
• BNSF Lays Off 100 North Dakota Employees, More May Come - By Brittany Ford, KVRR, December 28, 2015

Just Transition:

• To Change Everything, It’s Going To Take Everything We’ve Got - By John Foran, Popular Resistance, January 3, 2016
• Wind, solar power soaring in spite of bargain prices for fossil fuels - By Joby Warrick, Washington Post, January 1, 2016
• You Say ISIL, I Say ISIS, Let’s Call the Whole Thing Off - By Tom H. Hastings, CounterPunch, January 1, 2016
• NeFU Says Platte Institute Report Non-Solution to Non-Problem - By John Hansen, Nebraska Farmers Union, December 29, 2015
• WA state climate initiative conflict on road to resolution? - By Patrick Mazza, Cascadia Planet, December 23, 2015

Other News:

• Exxon's Climate Cover-Up Just Got Bigger: Docs Suggest All Major Oil Giants Have Lied Since 1970s - Neela Banerjee interviewed by Amy Goodman, Democracy Now, December 31, 2015
• The Fakery of the Paris ‘Red Carpet’ Premiere of Marc Morano’s Climate Hustle Film - By Graham Readfearn, DeSmog Blog, December 30, 2015
• Floods: instant tiny climate action - By Jonathan Neale, Global Climate Jobs, December 30, 2015
• How A Fracking Protest Exposed Moronic Racism - By Kevin Zeese, Popular Resistance, December 30, 2015; [related] Rex Energy in Spotlight After Viral Video of Racist at Fracking Protest - By Anne Meador, Revolution News, January 1, 2016

For more green news, please visit our news feeds section on ecology.iww.org; Twitter #IWWEUC; Hashtags: #greenunionism #greensyndicalism #IWW. Please send suggested news items to include in this series to euc [at] iww.org.

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are not the official position of the IWW (or even the IWW’s EUC) and do not necessarily represent the views of anyone but the author’s.