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Capital Blight News #116

Submitted by x344543 on Mon, 08/08/2016 - 15:54

Compiled by x344543 - IWW Environmental Unionism Caucus, August 10, 2016

A supplement to Eco Unionist News:

Lead Stories:

The Man Behind the Curtain:

Green is the New Red:

Greenwashers:

Disaster Capitalism:

Other News:

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.

Tags: 
Eco Unionist News
capital blight
green unionism
climate justice
climate change
Green is the New Red
Koch Brothers
American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC)
public transit
ExxonMobil
Shell
privatization

Carbon Bubble News #116

Submitted by x344543 on Mon, 08/08/2016 - 15:46

Compiled by x344543 - IWW Environmental Unionism Caucus, August 10, 2016

A supplement to Eco Unionist News:

Lead Stories:

Other Carbon Bubble News:

Utility Death Spiral News:

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.

Tags: 
carbon bubble
Eco Unionist News
green unionism
oil workers
oil
natural gas
coal
mine workers
Nevada
renewable energy
renewable energy workers
Koch Brothers

A Message to the Membership of ILWU Local 10

Submitted by x344543 on Sun, 08/07/2016 - 13:52

By Derrick H Muhammad - ILWU Local 10, August 4

Brothers and Sisters: Ignorance is not bliss. Ignorance is death. Ignorance can never carry the union to where it needs to go. Ignorance will cause the union to stumble.

Speaking with intelligence and exemplifying knowledge of the issues on behalf of working class and marginalized people is a noble thing. It is a union thing. It is what our predecessors did. Study the history of Harry Bridges, Bill Chester, Leroy King and Cleophas Williams just to name a few. In addition to being longshoremen and warehousemen these men were profound thinkers. Everything these men did had political ramifications. It is unwise to think otherwise.

Make no mistake about it. Local 10’s voice carries weight in the community and in City Hall. It is our responsibility to all of those who came before us and to the generations of laborers’ yet to come to preserve what we have inherited and to make progress. Please don’t let anyone tell you anything different.

The question of the building of a marine terminal at the old Oakland Army Base and the question of coal exports from the same terminal are two distinct issues. In 2012, Local 10 and many others from labor, spoke in favor of the building of this marine terminal. Subsequently, the approval of the building of the marine terminal was given the green light by the City of Oakland. So even though coal exports are banned, the marine terminal project is supported and should still go forward.

Lastly, much respect and gratitude to all the B Men who responded to their union's call.

In Solidarity,

Derrick H. Muhammad
ILWU Local 10, Secretary-Treasurer

Tags: 
Oakland
coal
exports
ILWU Local 10
International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU)
jobs versus environment
labor and environment
green unionism
Thin Green Line

Food, Labour and Ecology

Submitted by x344543 on Tue, 08/02/2016 - 19:07

By "Lucy Parsons" - Vancouver IWW, July 28, 2016

Separating food production from the global commodities market is a key component of, and a crucial first step towards achieving both social and of course ecological sustainability. Prior to the collapse of the Soviet Union, Cuba had been relying on sugar cane as a cash crop which they used for trade with Soviet bloc (and a few other) countries in return for food and consumer goods. After the collapse of the USSR, Cubans had to radically reimagine their food production strategies which in the end resulted in possibly the most sustainable food production systems on earth – all this without relying on global trade networks and the flawed logic of comparative advantage and structural adjustment which plagued so many of Cuba’s neighbours during the 80’s and 90’s.

From a western, urban perspective however, this means establishing an inclusive and secure culture of urban agriculture and perhaps most importantly, a culture of local eating. Beyond the obvious (hello, climate crises!) steps in this direction help to A) resolve what Marx described as the town/country antithesis and B) develop a sense of social capital among workers who can reconstruct themselves as something like urban farmers (key links in the food and sustainability chain), rather than underutilized wage labourers – alienated from both the process and product of their labour.  

For some perspective on this issue, we need to take a step back into the 19th century, where Marx observed that cities and rural communities had between them a kind of metabolism – wherein cities consumed food and other raw materials produced in towns and villages (which despite their importance in the creation of wealth, remain much poorer than cities) and indeed consumed people insofar as peasants were being separated from their means of subsistence by the enclosure movement and advances in agricultural technology etc. and forced to find work in the growing industrial centers of England. While this metabolism is less stark now than it might have been in Marx’s day, it still very much exists: much of the food that is consumed in our cities comes from abroad, and agricultural regions remain an important source of immigration into Canadian cities (e.g. the Punjab and other Asian agricultural regions).  

As it stands, the relationships many people have to food production is often mediated through the lens of the McJob which thrive on alienating workers from the process of production through an at times breathtakingly sophisticated division of labour. Equally breathtaking, is of course the veritable omnipresence of fast food advertising and the ubiquitous presence of many of these bands in our collective cultural psyche. All this together goes a long way in terms of deepening unhealthy misconceptions commonly held around food (misconceptions which are of course very profitable!); and indeed the immediate relationships between food, ecology and the environment. Establishing at least some measure of local (and ideally) worker control over what we eat is important and will require the cooperating and coordination of workers at every level of the supply chain – from farms (urban or otherwise) to the grocery store stock room right to the restaurant floor.

There are however a number of organizations which are working to address some of these issues from both the rural, and the urban perspective:

This post was informed in large part by Paul Burkett’s book “Marx and nature: a red and green perspective”.

Tags: 
Industrial Workers of the World (IWW)
agriculture
agricultural workers and peasants
green unionism
Karl Marx
ecosocialism
green syndicalism

More Farmers, Better Food: A framework for British Agricultural Policy

Submitted by x344543 on Tue, 08/02/2016 - 18:55

By the Land Workers' Alliance - August 2016

The UK’s small-scale, ecological and family farms are at the heart of our rural culture and communities; they create employment, protect cherished landscapes and provide a huge amount of the food we eat. However, in the past, the UK’s farming strategies have undermined domestic production of healthy, affordable food and left many small farms unfairly disadvantaged in the market place.

The task of creating a post-Brexit ‘British Agricultural Policy’ that support producers, protects the environment and prioritizes access to healthy, nutritious food for all is a complex but essential one. It represents a great opportunity if the Government is ready to listen to the needs of all stakeholders and put in place a truly long-term plan for environmental, social and economic resilience.

In order to contribute to this debate, The Landworkers’ Alliance proposes 8 points that we believe must be integral to forthcoming policy. Over the next 6 months we will carry out an in-depth consultation among our members to draw up a more comprehensive policy proposal that addresses the needs of food producers in the UK. We will also work with other organizations to draw up a framework for a ‘Peoples’ Food Policy’ that can address the systemic inequalities and misguided policies currently afflicting the food and farming sectors.

Download ‘More Farmers, Better Food – A framework for British Agricultural Policy’ here:

Tags: 
United Kingdom (UK)
food sovereignty movement
La Via Campesina
agricultural workers and peasants
climate justice
green unionism

EcoUnionist News #115

Submitted by x344543 on Mon, 08/01/2016 - 19:34

Compiled by x344543 - IWW Environmental Unionism Caucus, August 2, 2016

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

Lead Stories:

Ongoing Mobilizations:

The Thin Green Line:

Just Transition:

Bread and Roses:

An Injury to One is an Injury to All:

Whistleblowers:

Wobbles:

Other News:

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.

Tags: 
Eco Unionist News
green unionism
Thin Green Line
just transition
health and safety
agricultural workers and peasants
agriculture
whistleblowers
labor and environment
green jobs

Capital Blight News #115

Submitted by x344543 on Mon, 08/01/2016 - 17:54

Compiled by x344543 - IWW Environmental Unionism Caucus, August 2, 2016

A supplement to Eco Unionist News:

Lead Stories:

The Man Behind the Curtain:

Green is the New Red:

Greenwashers:

Disaster Capitalism:

Other News:

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.

Tags: 
capital blight
Eco Unionist News
green unionism
climate justice
climate change
greenwashing
Green is the New Red
ExxonMobil
Shell
American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC)
Koch Brothers
privatization

No Coal in Oakland: a Report on the Campaign

Submitted by x344543 on Mon, 08/01/2016 - 00:00

By Margaret Rossoff - No Coal in Oakland, August 2016; image by Brooke Anderson

Many activists have expressed interest in an account of how the No Coal in Oakland campaign was organized.  This article is a response, but is not a history.  It is structured thematically rather than chronologically, and the many amazing activists and organizers are not identified by name.  Some of our initiatives came from organizations and some came from individual activists, but this account does not attempt to credit them, as every idea became a shared project.  Unlike just about every document during the campaign, this is not a collectively written piece.  It was significantly improved by careful readings by several people, for which I am very grateful, but I am responsible for all errors and omissions.  I expect—and hope–others will be writing their own accounts from a variety of perspectives.

I have included many links for documents referred to in this account.  For general background about the campaign, go to NoCoalinOakland.info.  A guide to acronyms is at the end of the article.

Margaret Rossoff
margaretmft@gmail.com

Strategy

No Coal in Oakland’s campaign was focused on persuading the members of the Oakland City Council to ban storage and handling of coal at a bulk export marine terminal to be built on City-owned land.  This would effectively prevent the transport of coal through Oakland and other cities along the rail lines as well as the shipment of coal overseas.

  • Our campaign to get the council members to vote for the ban had several components.  The primary ones were:
  • Direct lobbying with council members.
  • Outreach to Oakland residents, including particularly West Oakland residents and participants in community groups.  This was intended both to influence elected officials through popular opposition, and because we saw our campaign as part of building the larger movement for environmental justice and to contain climate disruption.
  • Insuring that evidence of the dangers of coal was adequately documented and presented to the council, including rebutting misleading claims by the developers.
  • Exploring other routes that might also lead to keeping coal out of Oakland.

This article focuses primarily on the first two aspects of our campaign. 

Tags: 
Oakland
coal
exports
green unionism
yellow unionism
Phil Tagami
Industrial Workers of the World (IWW)
Service Employees International Union (SEIU)
Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU)
International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU)
National Nurses United
Laborers' International Union of North America (LIUNA)
North America's Building Trades Unions (NABTU)
System Change not Climate Change (SCnCC)
West Oakland Environmental Indicators Project (WOEIP)
Sierra Club
Sunflower Alliance
Brooke Anderson
No Coal in Oakland (NCIO)

Solidarity with striking North Sea oil workers

Submitted by x344543 on Sun, 07/31/2016 - 11:09

Greg Muttitt - Oil Change International, July 26, 2016

Today 400 workers on Shell platforms in the UK North Sea went on strike. On behalf of our more than 100,000 supporters, Oil Change International stands in solidarity with these workers.

The striking workers are employed by Wood Group, a contractor to Shell and one of the largest service companies in the North Sea. After two rounds of layoffs, Wood Group sought to unilaterally impose pay cuts of up to 30%, added an additional four to five weeks’ work annually, extended work shifts, and imposed restrictive new limitations on leave. The Unite and RMT trade unions both voted overwhelmingly to go on strike against these harmful changes in pay and conditions.

Oil companies have long ridden roughshod over workers, communities, and the environment. At Oil Change International, we see the fight for fair treatment of oil workers as a critical part of the wider global struggle for responsible, just, and clean energy production.

Everyone has the right to safe working conditions and fair pay. The drop in the oil price is no excuse for highly profitable fossil fuel companies to pass the costs onto workers. As Unite Regional Officer John Boland put it, “For decades, oil and gas companies across the North Sea have made hay while the sun shone and become very profitable on the back of the hard work and dedication of our members. Now that the weather has turned for the industry, they are using the downturn to attack the pay, terms, and conditions of our members.”

We continue to strive for a future in which energy industry workers enjoy decent and stable jobs in a clean energy economy, and are not tied to the profiteering whims of Big Oil. We wish the striking workers every success in holding Wood Group to account and demanding a fair deal.

Tags: 
oil workers
green unionism
oil
National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT)
Oil Change International

NY Times Pushes Nukes While Claiming Renewables Fail to Fight Climate Change

Submitted by x344543 on Sat, 07/30/2016 - 19:24

By Harvey Wasserman - EcoWatch, July 25, 2016

The New York Times published an astonishing article last week that blames green power for difficulties countries are facing to mitigate climate change.

The article by Eduardo Porter, How Renewable Energy is Blowing Climate Change Efforts Off Course, serves as a flagship for an on-going attack on the growth of renewables. It is so convoluted and inaccurate that it requires a detailed response.

As Mark Jacobson, director of Atmosphere/Energy Program at Stanford University, pointed out to me via email:

The New York Times article "suffers from the inaccurate assumption that existing expensive nuclear that is shut down will be replaced by natural gas. This is impossible in California, for example, since gas is currently 60 percent of electricity supply but state law requires non-large-hydro clean renewables to be 50 percent by 2030. This means that, with the shuttering of Diablo Canyon nuclear facility be 2025, gas can by no greater than 35-44 percent of California supply since clean renewables will be at least 50 percent (and probably much more) and large hydro will be 6-15 percent. As such, gas must go down no matter what. In fact, 100 percent of all new electric power in Europe in 2015 was clean, renewable energy with no new net gas, and 70 percent of all new energy in the U.S. was clean and renewable, so the fact is nuclear is not being replaced by gas but by clean, renewable energy.

"Further, the article fails to consider the fact that the cost of keeping nuclear open is often much greater than the cost of replacing the nuclear with wind or solar. For example, three upstate New York nuclear plants require $7.6 billion in subsidies from the state to stay open 12 years. To stay open after that, they will need an additional $805 million/year at a minimum, or at least $17.7 billion from 2028-2050, or a total of $25.3 billion from 2016 to 2050. If, on the other hand, those three plants were replaced with wind today, the total cost between now and 2050 would be $11.9 billion. Thus, keeping the nuclear plants open 12 years costs an additional $7.6 billion; keeping it open 34 years costs and additional $25.3 billion, in both cases with zero additional climate benefit, in comparison with shuttering the three plants today and replacing them with onshore wind."

Gideon Forman, climate change and transportation policy analyst at David Suzuki Foundation, also shared his dismay on the Times piece:

"The notion that non-renewable power sources are necessary is questionable at best. Some scientists believe that, over the next few decades, renewables could provide all our power. One is Stanford Prof. Mark Jacobson. He has done modeling to show the U.S. could be entirely powered by renewables by 2050.

"Porter is wrong to claim that nuclear produces 'zero-carbon electricity.' If we look at the full nuclear cycle, including production of uranium fuel, we find it involves considerable carbon emissions. Jacobson and his co-author, Mark A. Delucchi, have written, 'Nuclear power results in up to 25 times more carbon emissions than wind energy, when reactor construction and uranium refining and transport are considered.'

"Porter says if American nuclear plants were replaced with gas-fired generators it would lead to 200 million tons of additional CO2 emissions annually. But it's wrong to suggest that nuclear could only be replaced by natural gas. A full suite of renewables—along with energy storage and conservation programs—could meet demand, certainly in the not very distant future.

"Porter suggests that nuclear power can 'stay on all the time.' But of course, nuclear plants, like all generators, are sometimes out of service for maintenance. This downtime can be considerable. For example, it is expected that from 2017 to 2021, Ontario's Pickering nuclear station will require back-up almost 30 percent of the time."

Karl Grossman, professor of journalism at State University of New York/College at Old Westbury, called the Times piece "outrageous." He told me:

"The Times piece continues the paper's long record of minimizing and downplaying—not recognizing and indeed often denying—the deadly impacts of nuclear power. It's been a shameful journalistic dysfunction. As Alden Whitman, a Times reporter for 25 years, told me, 'there certainly was never any effort made to do' in-depth or investigative reporting on nuclear power. 'I think there stupidity involved,' he said, and further, 'The Times regards itself as part of the establishment." Or as Anna Mayo of The Village Voice related: 'I built a full-time career on covering nuclear horror stories that the New York Times neglected.'"

So where do I stand on the Porter piece? Here are my eight biggest complaints:

Tags: 
nuclear power
greenwashing
solar communism
green unionism
jobs versus environment
labor and environment
renewable energy workers
renewable energy
just transition

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