green syndicalism

By Ron Kaminkow - Railroad Workers United, July 29, 2014

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.

At first glance, the casual observer from outside of the rail industry is prone to say that single employee train operation sounds dangerous. “What if the engineer has a heart attack?” is an often heard question. And while this question has merit, there are many other and far more complex and unanswered questions about just how single employee train operations could be accomplished safely and efficiently for the train crew, the railroad and the general public. How will the train make a back-up move? What happens when the train hits a vehicle or pedestrian? How will the train crew member deal with “bad-order” equipment in his/her train, or make pick-ups and set-outs en route? What about job briefings and calling signals, copying mandatory directives and reminders of slow orders? These are just some questions that we take up in this article.

Remote Control and “Utility Conductors”

In recent years, the Class I rail carriers have been biding their time, slowly but surely inserting language into recent contracts with both unions of the operating crafts that will facilitate their schemes to run over the road trains with a lone employee. They have made arrangements with the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers & Trainmen (BLET) to allow the BLET represented crew member to make use remote controlled locomotives. With this scenario, the lone operator would strap on a belt pack, dismount from the locomotive, and run the locomotive by remote control operation (RCO) using radio control from the ground. And the carriers have also made deals with the United Transportation Union (UTU) to allow for “utility conductors”; i.e. a conductor who can “attach” to one or more over-the-road trains during the course of a single tour of duty. Between the two arrangements, the rail carriers apparently believe they can safely and efficiently operate road trains with just one employee aboard as opposed to the current standard of two. We disagree.

By x344543 - IWW Environmental Unionism Caucus July 21, 2014

Those familiar with the IWW EUC will recall that we pull no punches in attacking the shortcomings of the business unions (the building trades in particular) on matters of both class and ecology, particularly the Keystone XL pipeline.

In late April of this year, Sean McGarvey, president of the North American Building Trades' Unions issued this statement calling for the expediting of the Keystone XL Pipeline and defending Alberta tar sands mining (which Keystone XL would facilitate, and a key--no pun intended--reason for widespread opposition to it by environmentalists).

In it, he declared:

"I've just spent several days with other building trades union leaders visiting the oil sands region and meeting with officials from the Canadian government as well as industry representatives and contractors...and what we heard, and more importantly what we saw with our own eyes, is nowhere near what the American public is being told by the radical environmental movement."

The assorted labor fakirs referenced by McGarvey included:

• Terry O'Sullivan, General President; LiUNA
• Ed Hill -International President; IBEW
• Bill Hite - General President; United Association of Plumbers and Pipefitters
• Joe Nigro - General President; SMART (International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation Workers)
• Eric Dean - General Secretary; International Association of Ironworkers
• Mike Pleasant - Administrative Assistant to the General President; United Association of Plumbers and Pipefitters
• Terry Healy- Vice President and Special Assistant to the President; LiUNA

There's little doubt that McGarvey is openly hostile to the environmental movement, evidenced by his attempts to marginalize the vast and growing popular opposition to Keystone XL (as well as many other) pipeline(s), tar sands mining, fracking, mountaintop removal coal mining, offshore drilling, and crude-by-rail (all of which are inevitably interconnected due to the current capitalist push to extract every known source of carbon before the impending carbon bubble bursts and strands $trillions in assets) as "radical" (read: fringe) environmentalists.

He claims (without any peer reviewed studies, corroborating evidence from independent sources, or even so much as a single citation) that Canadian government officials, industry representatives and contractors, and his own eyes tell him:

The development of the oil sands accounts for only 7.8% of Canada's annual overall GHG emissions; and only 1/640th of global GHG emissions.

The government of Alberta implemented stringent GHG regulations in 2007, becoming the first jurisdiction in North America to do so. Since 2007, these regulations have resulted in GHG reductions of 23 million tons, the equivalent of taking 4.8 million cars off the road for one year.

Since 1990 GHG emissions from oil sands development have been reduced by 26%.

The Royal Society in Canada has studied water quality impacts and its conclusions suggest that oil sands development are not a current threat to aquatic ecosystem viability.

Alberta law requires all lands disturbed by oil sands operations be reclaimed. All companies are required to develop a reclamation plan that spans the life of the project.

McGarvey wants us to believe that if the capitalists say something is "green" and "safe" that we should trust that information, especially if it's backed up by the (arch conservative, pro-fossil fuel extraction) Canadian government. There couldn't any conflict of interest there right? And of course, we can trust McGarvey's own eyes, because...well...he sees with them, and seeing is believing! (or so McGarvey wants us to think).

If I were him, I'd get my eyes checked, because there's a whole bunch right in front of his eyes that he's not seeing. Either that, or he chooses not to see it.

By Rob Ray - Anarchist News, July 20, 2014

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.

The anarchist movement, particularly its class struggle element, tends to hold up strike action as a symbol of the working classes’ potential collective strength – and not without reason.

Work is where we’ve historically had the most leverage, the greatest ability to increase our freedoms and power as a class. The ruling class says it owns our homes, our factories, our utilities and offices, but we are needed to make these things work and when we refuse to, mortar crumbles out of capitalist palaces.

The London matchgirls in 1888, the general strike of 1926, Saltley Gate in 1972, Grunwick in 1976, the miners’ strike of 1984 – there’s endless romance and grandeur to be found in these stories of working people who gave everything for their class in the face of greedy tormentors. Elation in victory. Heroism in defeat.

And for many there’s a sense of living solidarity in striking which is absent from direct actions such as sabotage, boycott calls, or events which revolve around what is sometimes termed “professional activism” – relying on small groups of dedicated long-term activists rather than the mass of people acting collectively in their own interests.

The picket line is one of the few places where solidarity can be offered practically and publicly, both by people within the workplace, and by groups and individuals outside who normally wouldn’t get the chance.

Brett VandenHeuvel, Columbia Riverkeeper - EcoWatch, July 18, 2014

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.

In remembrance of the one-year anniversary of the Lac-Mégantic oil train tragedy that killed 47 people, the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) raised a banner from cranes today calling out unfair labor practices and protesting unsafe oil at the Port of Vancouver in Washington.

The Port of Vancouver is under intense scrutiny because it has not supported the locked-out ILWU Local 4 who have worked the docks in Vancouver since 1937. The port refuses to assist the ILWU during a labor dispute with the multinational United Grain Corporation. 

At the same time, the port is trying to ram through a dangerous and dirty crude-by-rail terminal proposed by Tesoro. This terminal would send 42 percent of the capacity of the Keystone XL pipeline—360,000 barrels per day—by train to Vancouver, where the oil would be loaded onto oceangoing vessels to sail down the Columbia River. The ILWU has taken a stand against the massive crude-by-rail project.

“Longshoreman would be the guys tying up and letting the ships go, but our local said, ‘no, the risk isn’t worth the reward,’” said Cager Clabaugh, president of the Local 4, ILWU. “We don’t believe in jobs at any cost.” 

The 1,500 square foot banner read:

Unfair grain
Unsafe oil
Community
Under Attack

The ILWU Local 4 is requesting people call Washington Gov. Jay Inslee to ask him to end the labor lockout and reject the Tesoro oil terminal. Now is the time for labor and enviros to stand together for clean water and safe working conditions.

By Don Fitz - Climate and Capitalism, July 15, 2014

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.

The world has over half a century of experience with programs that claim to help nature or feed the planet while they do the opposite.  The twin crises of the early 21st century are economic and ecological collapse.  Should we increase production to create more jobs and accept horrible environmental damage?  Or, should we protect a livable world at the cost of causing more unemployment?

An increasingly popular answer is the “Green New Deal” (GND): create “green jobs” in order to jump start the economy.   But the GND might not provide long term employment and could cause major environmental harm.  Digging beneath the surface appearance of the GND requires exploring its family tree: the Green Revolution, Green Capitalism and the Green Economy.

The Green Revolution

As capitalism spread across the globe, hunger and starvation spread with it.  Hoarding food and selling it to those who have plenty has always been more profitable than sharing food with those who need it.

By the middle of the 20th century, agribusiness decided that new plant varieties could be the focal point of a “Green Revolution” that would “feed the world.”  According to Stan Cox, dwarfing genes “allowed the plant to divert less energy to making stems and leaves and allowed the farmer to apply much more nitrogen fertilizer without making the plants get too tall and fall over.”  But these new varieties required pesticides and were more vulnerable to diseases. [1]

For at least 10,000 years, humans have been using “open pollination” seeds which could be gathered and planted the next year.  The Green Revolution also promoted hybrid seeds, especially for corn.  But hybrid seeds did not reproduce traits sought by farmers.  Those who use them must return to the seed company each year.  Hybrids fostered agricultural dependency.

One of the best summaries of the effects of hybrid corn is in Carmelo Ruiz’ story of Henry Wallace, the agrarian progressive who was Franklin Roosevelt’s Secretary of Agriculture.  According to Ruiz, “Among the most celebrated attributes of hybrid corn is the ease with which it can be harvested by machine.”  Huge fields with “genetic uniformity created a dream situation for pests.” [2, p 10]  As with dwarf varieties, this generated a need for pesticides.  Rapid growth as well as pesticide destruction of the soil’s natural fertility created a need for fertilizers.

A huge increase in output resulted: “between 1950 and 1980, US corn exports were multiplied times 20.” [2]   Results also appeared in increased farming costs, impoverishment of family farmers, and further concentration of wealth in agriculture.

Was this truly the price that had to be paid in order to “feed the world?”  Is it possible that the same yield increases could have occurred if research had gone in another direction?  Ruiz quotes geneticist Richard Lewontin as concluding, “Virtually no one has tried to improve the open-pollinated varieties, although scientific evidence shows that if the same effort had been put into such varieties, they would be as good or better than hybrids.” [2]

Research focused on developing hybrids because they were part of an overall agenda to concentrate capital.  Proponents of the Green Revolution identified a real problem (hunger), but they trumpeted a solution friendly to big business which created as many problems as it solved.  Meanwhile, a low-tech solution was ignored.

By Alex Lotorto - IWW Environmental Unionism Caucus, July 18, 2014

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.

To: Executive Board, Officials, and Business Agents, et al.

• United Association Local Union 524
• IBEW Local 81
• IUOE Local 542
• Teamsters Local 229
• LIUNA Local 130

From:  Alex Lotorto

• Union Delegate, Industrial Workers of the World
  
• Organizer, Energy Justice Network
• p. 570-269-9589
• e. alex@energyjustice.net

Electrical Workers, Fitters are Locked Out By Construction Standards for the Milford and Easton Compressor Station Expansions

The proposed Milford and Easton Compressor Station expansions are part of Columbia Gas Transmission Co.’s (subsidiary of NiSource) East Side Expansion Project. Both proposed expansions do not utilize industry best practices to reduce or eliminate emissions that also require more manhours to install. This means that NiSource, which earned $5.7 billion in net revenue last year, is minimizing its costs, effectively swindling trade union members out of the best possible Project Labor Agreements. In this case, the cause of labor is also aligned with the cause of local environmentalists who seek to limit unnecessary harm to public health and air quality.

Specifically, it has been established by the gas industry associations and the Environmental Protection Agency’s Natural Gas Star program, that electric compressors, gas capture technology, and limiting production tank emissions are now the best practices for protecting air quality during transmission and distribution of natural gas. Columbia Gas is a partner in the EPA’s Natural Gas Star program and should be aware of their own recommendations.

In fact, technology like electric compressors and gas capture methods that eliminate blowdowns of methane during maintenance and inspections can pay for themselves as more methane is shipped to downstream customers. Methane that is now released into the atmosphere during blowdowns could be injected into the intersecting Tennessee and Transco pipelines at the Milford and Easton facilities, respectively, and sold to market. This would generate savings for NiSource within one to three years, depending on the price of methane. Above, you will find links to fact sheets for these technologies from the EPA, produced via industry partnerships.

Commonly, best practice recommendations become codified in EPA regulations once they have been shown to work in the field. This is the case for production tank rules limiting volatile organic compounds (VOCs) emissions to less than four tons per year, about to be enforced in January 2015 . Both Milford and Easton facilities will have waste liquid and condensate tanks that will be required to be fitted with VOC control technology next year. However, NiSource stated to Milford residents in pre-filing meetings that they will not be installing this technology, meaning lost work for union members and more exposure for neighboring families. In fact, there is nothing in their Resources Report submitted to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission describing VOC controls. There is also nothing in the Resources Report describing how hazardous waste will be tended, removed, and disposed of from the facilities, a responsibility best handled by trained union labor.