We’re going to ask the Nelson-Creston candidates about environmental issues, starting with Nicole Charlwood from the BC Greens.
He was a sled dog musher, a hunting guide and a horseback tour guide along the Great Divide in the Rockies. Keith met Mike Judd in the foothills of southern Alberta last week. This week we hear the interview with the backcountry man who protects his turf… from logging, Shell Oil, and big coal.
David Suzuki tells us how he really feels, and more.
Listen or download the full show here:
Environment News
From Kampala to Stocholm to Montreal, student organized strikes were held in over 3,000 locations across the globe on Friday September 25th.
In Nelson British Columbia, over 110 people gathered in a socially-distanced general strike organized by the youth-led group Fridays For Future Nelson. Protesters lined Nelson’s iconic Big Orange Bridge Friday afternoon, self-distancing and wearing masks.
https://thenelsondaily.com/news/social-distancing-%E2%80%94-youth-climate-protest-returns-nelson
At the United Nations this week, world leaders unilateraly pledged to clamp down on pollution, embrace sustainable economic systems and eliminate the dumping of plastic waste in oceans by the middle of the century as part of “meaningful action” to halt the destruction of nature on Earth.
Emmanuel Macron, Angela Merkel, Justin Trudeau, Jacinda Ardern and Boris Johnson are among 64 leaders from five continents warning that humanity is in a state of planetary emergency due to the climate crisis and the rampant destruction of life-sustaining ecosystems. To restore the balance with nature, governments and the European Union have made a 10-point pledge to counteract the damage to systems that underpin human health and wellbeing.
The crowning moment of the talks was when Chinese President Xi Jinping pledged to become Carbon Neutral by 2060. This doesn’t sound like much, but because China’s emissions are so huge, when scientists put the data into climate modelling it resulted in the largest favorable shock that their models have ever produced. President Xi went on to condemn the United States for holding the world back from rapidly reducing emissions.
In contrast, under the increasingly isolationist leadership of President Donald Trump the world’s second-largest gas emitter pulled out of the Paris agreement. The United States President continues to deny the scientific evidence of climate change and blamed China for stalled momentum on tackling global emissions.
In California, a new wave of catastrophic wildfires are laying waste to communities and large tracts of land.
The new fires erupted on Sunday in the famed Napa-Sonoma wine region and in far Northern California’s Shasta County, forcing hasty evacuations of neighbourhoods.
Since August 15, fires in the state have killed 26 people and destroyed more than 7,000 structures.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/9/28/new-california-wildfires-force-evacuations
https://www.aljazeera.com/gallery/2020/9/28/in-pictures-wildfire-in-california-quadruples-in-size/
The mayors of a dozen major world cities, including Berlin, Milan, and Vancouver, have pledged to divest from fossil fuels—a move that sends a shot across the bow of those still working to inhibit efforts to “build back better.”
The latest divestment pledge, backed by the C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group, constitutes just such a broad-gauge stance, calling on signatories—including the mayors of Bristol, Cape Town, Durban, London, Los Angeles, New Orleans, Oslo, and Pittsburgh—to “commit to divesting all city assets and pension funds from fossil fuel companies; increasing financial investments in climate solutions; and advocating for fossil-free finance from other investors,” notes Utility Dive. Joining as the 12th signatory, New York City adds heft to its 2018 initiative, and to its parallel commitment to invest US$4 billion in climate solutions by 2021.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made a promise that Canada would plant two billion trees to fight climate change following a meeting with activist Greta Thunberg last year.
None so far have been planted, according to Montreal newspaper La Presse.
The Canadian prime minister met with the teenage environmentalist on 27 September, 2019, in the midst of his re-election campaign, and as thousands gathered for climate strikes in the country, and around the world.
In a statement, press secretary Ian B. Cameron said that during the pandemic the Canadian government provided $30 million to the forest sector to safely continue operations.
Environment and Climate Minister Jonathan Wilkinson says he will be bringing in legislation to cut Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions more than what has already been promised.
Wilkinson told The Canadian Press that COVID-19 is a priority but that Canada cannot afford to ignore climate change.
“While COVID is certainly a threat to the health and safety of Canadians and to our economic recovery, the crisis that is climate change, if left unaddressed, will have impacts that are even more significant than COVID-19,” he said.
https://www.jwnenergy.com/article/2020/9/25/legislation-to-set-five-year-climate-targets-highe/
Scientists across British Columbia are raising an uproar over the BC NDP’s weak response to the report on Old-Growth forest released on September 11th.
The much anticipated Old Growth Strategic Review Report commissioned by the province called, among many actions, for an immediate deferral of all logging in biodiverse old growth forests. On the same day as the report dropped, forests Minister Doug Donaldson committed to temporarily halt logging on 350,000 hectares of forest.
But, Nelson scientist Rachael Holt says that most of the 2-year protections cover areas that were already protected, had already been logged, or were not slated for logging at all
B.C. First Nations Forestry Council CEO Charlene Higgins says there has been no meaningful consultation with First Nations in BC’s Old Growth policies, another of the report’s key recommendations.
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