It’s not every day that the US Chamber of Commerce shows up on my doorstep here in the city by the Bay. Since the Chamber is the multi-million dollar lobbyist muscle for some of the biggest climate criminal corporations in the world, I decided to rearrange my morning to pay them a visit. Let’s see, to do list for Thursday:

8:00 am Punk Chamber with balloon banner in lobby of their conference. Check.


8:30 Meet up for coffee, tell stories, high five! Check.
8:35 Back to the office to take on more corporate polluters. Check. I love my life.

Here's a little backstory and an idea for what you can do:

We’ve seen some high profile businesses leave the Chamber recently because their extreme position on climate change has put it out of step with the growing number of US businesses that support the clean energy and climate legislation that would strengthen our economy and protect our planet. With President Tom Donohue at the helm of the Chamber, the climate lies and deception have been free-flowing. Hence, our banner reads: “ Donohue’s Climate Lies: Bad for Business, Bad for America.”

My personal message to Donohue: if you’re going to parade around in San Francisco with your sassy double talk on the climate, you’d better believe we’ll be there to speak truth directly to your power, even if it’s over your morning breakfast pastry at a swanky hotel.

The important take home here is that this isn’t about Tom Donohue or banners — it’s about saving the climate, and the millions of people and countless species that will be effected if we don’t. The American business community and the planet will continue to be harmed as long as Don0hue’s Chamber stands in the way of meaningful climate action.

What’s next for Tom Donohue? Well, that’s up to you. People like him could be leading the world toward climate solutions. He should be held accountable for doing the opposite. So call for Donohue to get fired. You can start on the Chamber facebook fan page here (a good read for some zany propaganda). Don't be shy about fanning the page, leaving a comment about what you think of Donohue and the Chamber's anti-climate propaganda, and then un-fanning the page.

Have fun and thanks for raising your voice to save the climate!

Through my few years of experience with organizing, I’ve never had the pleasure to join with such a diverse coalition of organizations as I did yesterday when the US Chamber of Commerce came to town. With a crowd of over 100 strong, Greenpeace joined with local labor unions, a national worker’s rights group, Change To Win, as well as Sierra Club, MoveOn and many more to call out Tom Donohue, the president of the US Chamber of Commerce.



Our event kicked off with a press conference that included high-energy speeches from local business owners, local labor union members, and representative from the Sierra Club and yours truly. After a collective call for the US Chamber of Commerce to represent the small businesses and not a handful of CEOs, we all marched over to the Fairmont Hotel where the conference was being held. There we were joined by local San Francisco City Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi, who jumped on the bull horn and called for the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce to continue distancing itself from Tom Donohue’s US Chamber because of their polices on climate, health care, and workers' rights.



Why so much attention on one guy? Well, because under Tom Donohue’s leadership, the US Chamber of Commerce has been pushing an agenda that favors corporate CEO profits at the expense of people and the planet. They have spent millions lobbying against important legislation, from climate to health care.

Due to previous protests in Chicago and Philadelphia at their conferences, registration for attendees was closed early and nearly half of the room was filled. I assume they suspected that San Francisco, and its business owners, would not be as welcoming to a climate denier and progress inhibitor like Tom Donohue. Well, I guess they were right about one thing.

I think the administration may be winning, based on some press lately, with their goal to: lower popular expectations significantly and make Copenhagen appear a success even if it violates what the international community agreed to accomplish by Copenhagen.

Recently, President Obama and President Hu of China jointly declared that they "agree on the importance" of carrying through on the Bali Action Plan (BAP). The BAP set all parties on 2-year path to a real agreement with real numbers. Those two years are up in Copenhagen. However, Obama has recently stated his support for delaying an agreement in Copenhagen.

Now we hear from Capitol Hill not just that ‘US Congress may not finish by Copenhagen,’ but that the 'Senate will punt until the Spring' and 'Kerry says climate comes after [not just] health care, [but now] financial reform.' For many reasons, such as that 2010 is going to be a tough election year, this translates to... the US Congress very likely will not pass a climate bill before 2011, by the next scheduled climate meeting in Mexico.

If Obama is waiting for Congress, will his international climate strategy be the same next year? Will he try to lower expectations for Mexico, so it doesn't seem like the US contributed to its failure? Answers to these questions, of course, rely on the president's willingness to invest his time and energy in achieving effective climate policy. But not knowing if that will happen, the question for Copenhagen is how to get a result that prevents a repeat of this US procrastination strategy.

I am starting to wonder if Obama will engage in a serious public campaign on climate before 2011, if even then. We should have seen some hint of this by now. His stated goal for US emissions reductions was actually worse than what the Congress is considering. He has supported a 2020 deadline of getting the US back to 1990 levels of emissions, when the world started to seriously discuss climate change. From the perspective of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, this goal by Obama is to do nothing. We should be reducing about 40% from 1990, not 0%.

In the joint declaration by Obama and Hu, it was sadly apparent which delegation drafted which sentences on carbon sequestration and on nuclear energy. The few public comments from Obama have included endorsement of both of these non-solutions.  We hope President Obama will listen to President Hu and abandon efforts that benefit industry instead of renewable energy solutions that harmonize with goals for a healthy economy and environment.

If we cannot get the BAP fulfilled with any poignance, maybe we can get a pre-launch type of agreement that counts down to a lift-off no later than Mexico. And somehow the US should be given a spanking for not doing its chores (corporal punishment is still normal in many parts of the US). Perhaps that involves a second commitment period for Kyoto, in other words the rest of the world moves forward while the US is an outsider. But the spanking must include thwarting any notion that the US has been a wise and moral leader on climate policy.

Click on some relevant articles below from the last week:

Obama calls for climate pact with 'immediate' effect

Obama must be more engaged on climate change: Greenpeace

U.S. weighs backing interim international climate agreement

 

ICCAT has gone too far.  The greed and corruption running this Commission are now about as well camouflaged as a stegosaurus trying to hide behind a postage stamp.  Forgive the hackneyed humor, but there is no longer any doubt whatsoever that ICCAT does in fact stand for “The International Conspiracy to Catch All the Tuna.”

Last week, at a meeting in Recife, Brazil, the scientific advisers to the Commission proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that the Northern bluefin tuna is in a critical situation.  Not a single delegate dared voice an objection to the fact that the animal’s perilous status qualified it for protection under CITES.

Numerous scientists from a multitude of different countries and environmental organizations submitted proposals stating unequivocally that the quota must be dropped from the current 19,500 metric tons to no more than 8,000 metric tons, if we hope to give the population even a 50% chance of recovery.

The science was bulletproof.  There was not a single shred of evidence that could countervail this assertion.  Greenpeace, WWF, and other environmental groups belabored the point until they were hoarse. Charles Clover, author of The End of the Line and prominent champion of the bluefin, made the trek to Recife to plead the poor fish’s case – he even managed to arrange a screening of the film for the ICCAT delegates.

So, when all was said and done, what was the final decision of the Commission?

In its infinite wisdom, the august body that is ICCAT voted to set the upcoming season’s bluefin quota at 13,500 metric tons.

This number far exceeds any remotely defensible figure.  It’s a quota with zero scientific basis that flies in the face of conventional wisdom and virtually ensures the commercial extinction of this animal.  Such a calculus is justifiable only to the members of what is clearly no more than a political cult idolizing greed, corruption, and piracy.

I need to take a few seconds and collect myself before continuing, lest this post degenerate into rabid polemics and I end up with spittle all over my computer screen.  I am so angry right now that it is difficult for me to express myself in a manner that doesn’t involve the wanton destruction of some nearby appliance.

ICCAT has failed.  It has failed us, and it has failed the bluefin.  It has failed the oceans, it has failed the planet, and it has failed our children.

In fact, ICCAT has even managed to fail the myopic fishing interests that control it.  Any corruption-riddled junta worth its salt should at least be able to satisfy its puppeteers to the degree that it provide them with their illicit plunder for more than just a couple of years.  This quota will not only ensure the destruction of the bluefin, but it will result in the controlling parties not even having a resource to exploit come the end of the Mayan calendar.

Immediately folloing the closing session of the Recife meeting, Charles Clover wrote a scathing and comprehensive letter in response to this kangaroo court escapade, noting that not only was the Commission unable to adopt sensible protections for several shark species, ICCAT actually voted to allow three member nations to continue to use drift nets — one of the most indiscriminate and destructive fishing methods on the face of the planet.  And thus do we all sally forth together into this bright new tuna-free world.

So where’s the silver lining here?  Believe it or not, it rests with the US government.

Nearly a month ago, I wrote a short post about how Dr. Jane Lubchenco, the head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), had passed on Monaco’s proposal and threw her support behind ICCAT with the proviso that ICCAT set “responsible science-based quotas,” among other instructions.  Clearly, the Commission did not adhere to this directive.  As such, it is now Dr. Lubchenco’s responsibility to live up to her promise and champion Monaco’s proposal to grant the Northern bluefin tuna protection under CITES Appendix 1.  And it is our responsibility, as stewards and citizens of this planet, to show her our support.

I urge all who read this to send an email to Dr. Jane Lubchenco at Jane.Lubchenco@noaa.gov reminding her to rise to the occasion and stand up for the bluefin tuna.  ICCAT clearly cannot do so, regardless of the clarity and quantity of science that would justify such action.  It is time to cast off the trappings of this useless, obsolete Commission and to try something that will actually work.

Additional background on this issue can be found in Ashley Mirabile's excellent and comprhensive post on the plight of the bluefin.

On November 16th, two Greenpeace activists from Germany and Italy and two members of the press from India and Italy, all of whom were traveling on valid business and journalist visas, were picked up and detained by Indonesian police. They were on their way to meet the villagers of Teluk Meranti, who have been supporting Greenpeace in its efforts to highlight rainforest and peatland destruction in the Kampar Peninsula--ground zero for climate change. The police also took into custody an activist from Belgium who had been working at our Climate Defenders Camp there.

Despite the validity of their travel documents and the absence of any wrongdoing, two of the activists and both journalists are now being deported by immigration authorities on questionable and seemingly contrived grounds, even though no formal deportation permits have been issued. Just a few days before, immigration authorities deported eleven other international Greenpeace activists who participated in a non-violent direct action on November 12th, in a concession where APRIL, one of Indonesia's largest pulp and paper companies, is clearing rainforest and draining peatland on the Peninsula.

We set up the Climate Defenders Camp to bring attention to role of deforestation as a major driver of greenhouse gas emissions in advance of December's Copenhagen climate negotiations. If we are stop climate change, we must end global deforestation by 2020 and bring it to zero in priority areas like Indonesia by 2015. A drive through the Kampar Peninsula reveals acre after acre of forest conversion from healthy rainforest to palm oil plantations. There is no sign of animal life or biodiversity -- just row after row of palm. The destruction of the peatlands helps to make Indonesia the world's 3rd largest emitter go greenhouse gases, just after the US and China.

In the interest of the environment and human rights, Greenpeace is calling upon world leaders and concerned citizens to contact Indonesia's President Yudhoyono to ask him to stop these repressive actions by the Indonesian Police and Immigration authorities. The tactics currently being used by the authorities are likely to adversely impact upon the Indonesian government's international reputation as well as the country's reputation as a vibrant democracy.

It is not Greenpeace activists or journalists who should be the focus of the authorities, but the companies who are responsible for this forest destruction. We are working to make President Yudhoyono's recent commitment to reduce Indonesia's greenhouse gas emissions a reality and the journalists are telling that story.

You can take action at www.greenpeace.org.

The new "deal" to delay signing a climate agreeement until next year, which was announced at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) meeting this past weekend, is nothing more than an attempt to lower expectations for the climate talks taking place in Copenhagen this December. It’s especially disappointing given President Obama’s key role in the announcement. What we really need is for Obama to step up and lead the world as a bold advocate of an ambitious and binding treaty.

What’s even more disturbing is that this is part of a larger trend in Obama’s handling of the climate crisis since taking office. In his inaugural address he promised to “restore science to its rightful place,” yet he has not followed through on that promise. Instead, he sat back and watched as the coal industry essentially rewrote climate legislation as it moved through the House. And now that the Senate is in no rush to pass a similar bill, Obama is letting that dictate his foreign policy and stalling an international climate agreement.

Fed up with the stalling and lowering of expectations? I know I am. Tell Obama that December is the time to sign an ambitious climate treaty, not some unspecified future date.

This brazen stall tactic is all the more unconscionable when you consider the fact that it ignores the plight of the developing world, which will be hit hardest by global warming even though they did not have nearly as large a hand in creating the problem as developed countries like the US had. There’s more on this topic and the “deal” to not make a deal in Copenhagen in this statement from Greenpeace International:

“ Danish Prime Minister Rasmussen has become complicit in a so-called ‘deal’ which would put Obama’s political difficulties ahead of the survival of the world’s most vulnerable countries,” said Kaisa Kosonen, Climate Policy Advisor for Greenpeace International, in Copenhagen ahead of tomorrow’s “Pre-COP” gathering of key environment ministers in preparation for December’s climate summit.

“I don’t think a majority of countries will buy this face-saving plan. When Obama started downplaying the Copenhagen outcomes, did he check with the world’s most vulnerable countries as to whether their survival was now negotiable? That’s certainly not the message we have heard – climate change impacts are already affecting millions across the developing world and they need action now. There is no real excuse to postpone decisions on legally binding, ambitious action,” said Kosonen.

She questioned whether any EU leaders knew about Rasmussen’s cop-out deal. They were not at APEC, which only includes some of the world’s industrialized countries – the US, Australia, Canada, New Zealand and Japan.

“ EU leaders, including Merkel, Sarkozy and Brown, must immediately step in and publicly oppose this back down from a legally binding climate agreement in Copenhagen,” she said.

Just two weeks ago in Barcelona the 43-member Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) expressed outrage at attempts to steamroll the world’s most vulnerable countries into accepting a watered down political agreement at the Copenhagen Climate Summit. Their calls are supported by the African Group, which said it would accept only legally binding commitments on deep emission cuts and adequate funding from the industrialized world for climate adaptation and mitigation, including tackling deforestation.

“This is not about time but rather the absence of political will from industrialized countries, which are refusing to take their fair share of the global efforts and instead continue to postpone important decisions into eternity. Denmark should be ashamed of itself for caving in to Obama in this so-called deal,” said Kosonen.

Industrialized countries recognized two years ago that they would need to cut their emissions in the range of at least 25-40%. But right now their aggregate emissions stand at a mere 10-17%, not enough to stop climate change. The industrialized countries at the APEC meeting are largely those at the lower end of this range.

The bill passed by the House is certainly at the lower end of emissions reductions targets, aiming for a mere 4% reduction relative to 1990 levels by 2020. Half-measures like this will doom us all to runaway climate change we can believe in – because we’ll be increasingly witnessing its effects with our own eyes.

There was enough bad news last week to make me want to crawl under my desk and never come back out. But as the saying goes, sometimes the darkest hour is just before the dawn. First came news that President Obama, along with other leaders of Asian Pacific countries, would announce that they will not pursue a binding treaty in Copenhagen next month. Millions of climate activists have been working for years to make the Copenhagen negotiations the time when the world would come together to make the necessary agreements that will halt catastrophic climate change. Now that chance is in serious danger of being lost.  

 

 

 

On the heels of this dereliction came word that police were descending on Greenpeace’s Climate Defenders Camp, our outpost in the threatened Kampar Peninsula in Indonesia, designed to show Obama and other leaders the face of deforestation, a primary driver of climate change.

 

But in an amazing turn of events, the chief of police of the Pelalawan district revoked an earlier order of the Governor of Riau to evict Greenpeace activists and permitted them to stay following massive support from local communities. Over 300 community members of Teluk Meranti village, across the river from the camp, came in the morning to prevent Greenpeace activists from leaving the camp under police escort as per the orders of Riau police.

 

The activists in the camp were overwhelmed and humbled by this extraordinary support from the people of Riau, and it confirms our belief that the people of Indonesia wish their forests to be protected. The community support should be a signal to President Yudhoyono that his people are willing to help him honor his ambition to reduce emissions from deforestation.

 

Greenpeace opened the camp three weeks ago to bring urgent attention to the role that rainforest and peatland destruction play in driving dangerous climate change. Almost a fifth of global warming causing emissions come from deforestation, making Riau ground zero for climate change.

 

The camp will continue to serve as a beacon of hope for all of us waiting until our leaders wake up to reality. These leaders will not act until massive public outrage forces them to.The time for action is now, not next year or the year after. We can't kick this can down the road for the next generation to deal with. President Obama, show leadership and galvanize support for a binding treaty now.

Our Land and our Waters: Our Future


As Unangan (Aleut) people who have lived and survived on the Islands of the Aleutian Chain for almost 10,000 years, our survival and our foods have always come from the waters surrounding our Island villages.

The Pribilof Islands were discovered in 1786 by Russian navigator Gavriil Pribilof, ending a three-year search by Siberian merchants for the breeding site of the valuable fur seals. The roaring of seals drew Pribilof's boat through the summer fog to St. George Island. Thus the Pribilof Islands. These islands were not inhabited when discovered. Following this discovery, small bands of Unangan were enslaved to these islands from the Aleutian Chain to protect and harvest the millions of fur seals found there. Thus began a 200 year history of a people misplaced by governments eager to make money off of the vast resources found then and now in the form of fish and crab. The legacy of slavery seems to continue into twenty-first century America.

Today the descendents of the enslaved Unangan, done first by Russia and later by America, are struggling to survive on the islands in which our ancestors made a living and in which many are buried.  The once abundant northern fur seal populations, once ranging in number into the millions, are now numbered around 550,000 and steadily declining. The millions of pounds of king and tanner crab fishery are either a fraction of what they once were or are now closed due to overfishing. Today only a small percentage of fish once so abundant are now being taken by a hand full of large industrialized factory trawlers, long liners and crabbers, many coming to the Bering Sea from far away ports in the lower 48 states.

Traditional foods are moving away, or in many cases becoming so stressed due to the lack of their own foods, that the Unangan are finding it very difficult to fill their needs. With “store bought” foods so expensive and non-nutritious, the Unangan are once again facing an uncertain future. Again a group of people taken from their homes to protect and harvest fur seal may be forced to move from their homes because of poorly managed fisheries by the United States of America.  

These distressing activities are not only happening to the Unangan of the Bering Sea, but to all coastal tribal communities who depend upon the waters for survival.  For every village, it’s the water that provides and not the land.

As a result, the Alaska Federation of Natives recently passed a resolution at their 2009 convention in Anchorage to establish cultural heritage zones to help protect our foods and the habitat they depend upon in our waters. This is a major first step. Now our tribal governments must take the lead and begin to identify and designate these sites.

One such community is the Pribilof Island village of St. George. Their tribal leaders have been in discussions, workshops and research to find a solution to how the bottom trawlers can be stopped before critical benthic habitat is destroyed!

Recently both the Village Corporation and the tribal government of St. George have joined forces to seek cultural heritage zone protections for the waters immediately around their island as well as within the critical habitats of both the Pribilof and Zhemchug Canyons. What they are demanding our governments do is establish no trawl zones within twenty miles around St. George Island and no trawls deeper than 100 fathoms in both Canyons.

The leadership of our Tribes are also requesting that the State and Federal Governments responsible for the management of these resources formulate co- management agreements to ensure local input in any future decisions regarding the use of these fishery resources. This is about the survival of a people. This is about food security. This is about finally recognizing local tribal communities as valuable partners in the understanding of our nation’s ocean resources and seeking their valuable input in its management.

Willie, from Greenpeace UK, blogs from Brazil, where he is attending the ICCAT meeting.

The vultures were literally circling overhead as we approached the ICCAT meeting venue this morning... so something is on its last legs.

So, with just one day of the ICCAT meeting left, it’s time to see what has been achieved here this week. The short answer is ‘not a lot’. Despite a week of meetings, including extra, lengthy, evening sessions, virtually nothing has been decided on or agreed yet. Decisions on quotas for fish like bluefin tuna, protection of sharks and seabirds, are being left until the last minute, and all need to be discussed on the last day.

This wouldn’t be so frustrating if the week’s discourse had been more constructive. Don’t get me wrong, undoubtedly there are many at the ICCAT meeting who are working very hard and very long hours, but the system is so fundamentally flawed that it gives us little hope for very positive outcomes.

Little wonder, perhaps, that articles in today's (London) Times and New York Times poured a great deal of scorn on the whole process.

For days we have heard over and over how ICCAT must regain credibility, and for days we have seen some meaningless ping-pong across the tables as countries blamed each other whilst coming up with perfectly valid reasons why they could not be blamed themselves. It’s akin to a class of school kids explaining in turn where their homework is – you know the kind of thing, ‘dog ate it’, ‘mum put it in the washing machine’, ‘it blew away on the way to school’. Individually every excuse seems plausible. Collectively it means ICCAT has a very, very long way to go.

Last night saw, what was in ICCAT terms, a major step, with countries accepting letters of admonishment when they had not complied with the conservation and enforcement measures they had undertaken to do. A letter home from teacher, if you like. To us, this is pretty lame, but to them it is the first time countries are acknowledging formally that they have not done what they should. Trouble is, of course, the parties to ICCAT are here representing their own governments, and quite possibly have a note from their mum too. Personally, I blame the parents.

All this complying through gritted teeth is hugely frustrating. This week we have seen bizarre acceptances of others wrong-doing (and praise for them admitting it) and even some tacit derogations for a couple of countries to do what they want on hugely controversial issues. Remember driftnets, anyone? Fancy killing a few endangered species?

Ultimately, my impression from this meeting is to feel despondent, and I am even more convinced that there need to be a fundamental reforms of the way we ‘manage’ (and I use the word quite scornfully) our oceans. This gradual way of improving the systems we have bit by bit, issue by issue, year by year, just is not enough. The damage we are doing is happening far faster than our willingness to change.

So yes, we need drastic measures. That means setting large areas off-limits to fishing as Marine Reserves, and the bigger the better. It also means banning certain ways of fishing, and banning fishing for certain species altogether. And it means actually enforcing things too, with legal and financial consequences.

If we don’t start doing this on a huge scale, we will have lost not only our credibility, and our homework, but many irreplaceable species and livelihoods too.