A wood pellet company, Peak Renewables, wants to cut most of the aspen and spruce in a huge area around Ft. Nelson. Then ship it as pellets to burn in overseas powerplants. Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, BC office researcher and writer Ben Parfitt gives us some background. EVs aren’t the whole solution to Canada’s emissions but they are one you can take now. Nelson Electric Vehicle enthusiast Andrew Chewter updates us on the rapidly evolving field of vehicles. A recent online webinar out of PioneerWorks in Brooklyn took on the theme Capitalism versus Climate and Naomi Klein was as clear as always…. we have a short segment.
LISTEN OR DOWNLOAD the MARCH 9 EPISODE HERE:
EVENTS
Be sure not to miss What’s Next for Nelson: An All Candidates Forum on Climate Action for Nelson’s By-Election, organized by the local Fridays For Future (FFF) team and the Nelson – West Kootenay chapter of Citizens’ Climate Lobby (CCL). The format will follow topics in the Nelson Next plan, with questions coming from community organizations in Nelson.
The forum will be held on Zoom this Sunday March 14, 7-8:30 pm.
Register here bit.ly/nelson-byelection
Please help us spread the word by sharing with family and friends who live in Nelson.
Facebook event page: https://www.facebook.com/fridaysforfuturewestkootenay
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And we all can join Fridays for Future at their weekly Climate Strike Vigil at Nelson City Hall at 2 pm on Fridays.
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Saturday and Sunday, March 20 & 21
We are two weeks away from the Building Movements in Defense of Life Film Festival featuring panel discussions with Wet’suwet’en Land Defenders.
This film festival is a celebration of World Water Day and the brave communities that put their lives on the line to defend it. Each film will be followed by a community specific panel with fierce Indigenous and Black women leaders. A large group discussion with all the women warriors together will close out the festival. More info on the links below.
https://www.mutualaidmedia.com/film-festival
Being promoted by Wet’suwet’en land defenders.
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March 12-21 it’s KDocsFF 2021: Resistance. Freedom. Justice.
They call it Vanouvers premier social justice fillm festival. KDocsFF celebrates the power of documentary film and documentary activism. Working with its Festival Partner, the Vancouver International Film Centre + Vancity Theatre, the annual KDocsFF film festival showcases award-winning documentary films, keynote speakers, filmmakers, panelists, exhibitors, performances, and community partners. Participants engage in lively discussions, debates, and dialogues as they investigate today’s most pressing global issues.
Metro Vancouver’s premier social justice documentary film fest: Uniting learners through social justice, global citizenship, & creative solution-building.
YOu can track it down on the Vancouver International Film Festival site viff.org and see all the great titles on offer.
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ENVIRONMENT NEWS MARCH 9. ’21
Environment News
The Climate data is in for the year 2020, which has officially tied with 2016 for the warmest year on record.
What made 2020 particularly strange is that record years typically fall on El Nliño years, a global event where the oceans surface warms. 2020 was a La Niña year, the opposite of El Niño, where the earth is supposed to be cooler than average. In other words, without La Niña bringing global temperatures down, 2020 would have been even hotter.
The extreme heat caused devastation globally as enormous wildfires raged across California and western north America, Australia suffered through the “black summer” of wildfires, and the Arctic circle saw record shattering temperatures soaring into the high 30s in eastern Siberia.
In February, the United Nations Secretary General Antonio Gutierres called for governments around the world to greatly increase ambitious climate policies. Gutierres declared that 2021 must be “the year to reconcile humans with nature”.
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20210108-where-we-are-on-climate-change-in-five-charts
https://unfccc.int/news/antonio-guterres-2021-is-the-year-to-reconcile-humanity-with-nature
https://news.un.org/en/story/2021/02/1084132
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Global CO2 emissions have already returned to pre-pandemic levels, and even surpassed them. This according to new report published by the International Energy Agency, an intergovernmental NGO which monitors global emissions.
A year ago, the intergovernmental agency called on governments to put clean energy at the heart of economic stimulus plans, but it appears few governments have made a green recovery a priority.
Faith Birol, Executive Director of the IEA said in a statement “If governments don’t move quickly with the right energy policies, this could put at risk the world’s historic opportunity to make 2019 the definitive peak in global emissions.”
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In the Atlantic Ocean, circulation that underpins the Gulf Stream, the weather system that brings warm and mild weather to Europe, is at its weakest in more than a millennium, and climate breakdown is the probable cause, according to new data.
Further weakening of the current could result in more storms, more intense winters, and an increase in damaging heatwaves and droughts across Europe.
Scientists predict that the deep circulation will weaken further as global warming continues. That could bring on a tipping point where the system could become unstable. A weakened Gulf Stream would also raise sea levels on the Atlantic coast of the US, with potentially disastrous consequences.
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Canada’s environment minister says he is reluctant to ask the public service to come up with a plan to achieve an emissions target in 2025, setting up a possible clash with opposition members over the government’s climate bill.
Environment and Climate Change Minister Jonathan Wilkinson said he would rather his department work on implementing the initiatives contained in the federal government’s new climate plan that are designed to achieve their objectives by 2030.
Bill C-12, the Canadian Net-Zero Emissions Accountability Act, would require the federal government to come up with national climate targets for the year 2030 and every five years thereafter, ultimately reaching net-zero carbon pollution by 2050.
Prominent climate scientist Corinne Le Quéré, who chairs France’s High Council on Climate, along with many Canadian academics and opposition members of Parliament have all called on the government to plan for a 2025 target instead of waiting for 2030, saying climate action can’t be delayed.
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On Vancouver Island, Fairy Creek blockade activists trying to protect some of the last stands of old-growth forest on southern Vancouver Island have won a three-week reprieve after a judge adjourned an injunction hearing on Thursday.
B.C. Supreme Court Justice Jennifer Power granted a request by the blockade’s legal team for more time to assemble materials necessary for a defence against the injunction.
Forestry company Teal-Jones had sought the injunction to remove the Fairy Creek blockades at various entry points to its Tree Farm Licence (TFL) 46 near the community of Port Renfrew until Sept. 4.
However, Power said it was in the interest of justice to allow the delay, so defendants could better prepare and the court could set aside more time to hear the matter.
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Near Nelson, the Save Cotton Wood Lake Society has reached its target of $400,000 and has announced they can buy the land above the Cottonwood Lake Park and save it from being logged.
Over the past 20 months, the Cottonwood Lake Preservation Society (CLPS) has run a public campaign to purchase the 49 hectares of mature forest situated directly above Cottonwood Lake that had been slated to be clear-cut logged, the landowner agreed to sell the land to the Society if a certain dollar amount was raised by a certain date.
From online auctions to photo competitions, grade school fundraisers and grant applications, many hundreds donated and the Society says ”We did it! We have raised the money needed to purchase the land and Save Cottonwood Lake!”
After the Save Cottonwood Lake Society buys the land, the Regional District Central Kootenay (RDCK) will set it in a land trust to manage it forever.
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And in Nelson by-election News:
Fridays for Future Nelson and the West Kootenay Chapter of Citizens Climate Lobby are organizing a candidate forum, “What’s Next for Nelson?” a forum which focuses on climate solutions. The event will be held on Zoom on Sunday March 14 at 7pm.
Jamie Hunter, one of the organizers with FFF says, “No other issue will have as much impact on what kind of city we have. We still have the opportunity to make the right decisions and create a sustainable, liveable city that is doing its part to solve the climate crisis.“
There is another candidate forum this week organized by Nelson at its Best on Thursday, March 11.
You can sign up to attend the climate forum on March 14th on Fridays For Future Nelson’s facebook event page https://www.facebook.com/events/1653583881492786/
Week of March 9th, 2021
Longest running Enviro News show on the Radio! 