GRIZZLY MOMMA AT CLEARCUT NEAR NELSON. GREAT PHOTO BY CHEVAY RODDICK.
LISTEN OR DOWNLOAD JUNE 6 SHOW:
Mélanie Mercier from Rossland reports on two public meetings on a proposed open pit magnesium just kilometres outside the community. National Observer columnist Chris Hatch talks about the ‘Pyrocene’ the age of fire in Canada’s forests and about public opinion on the climate crisis. The BC government has put a 2 year renewal on logging deferrals in the Fairy Creek valley, but thousands of hectares of old growth continue to be clearcut around the province. Wilderness Committee campaigner Torrance Coste tells us about it.
LINKS MENTIONED:
Chris Hatch’s Zero Carbon newsletter for the National Observer
Every Sunday in your in-box: https://www.nationalobserver.com/newsletters/zero-carbon
Detailed report on Canadian views of the climate crisis:
https://us10.campaign-archive.com/?e=1b5f7fb052&u=b875f28558b977d816bd49362&id=252ee0da55
Rossland Telegraph’s Sara Golling on proposed magnesium mine
https://rosslandtelegraph.com/news/opinions-and-questions-west-high-yields-upcoming-community-meetings
Backround on Fairy Creek logging temporary deferrals
https://www.wildernesscommittee.org/news/two-year-logging-deferral-map-fairy-creek-and-walbran
EVENTS:
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JUN 8, 2023, 7 – 8:30PM
On-line Webinarn. Examining the Moral Panic around Drag Story Time
Mir Centre for Peace online Peace Cafe with local educator Aaron Korbacher for a peace café: Disrupting Disinformation: How the Moral Panic around Drag Story Time Is Manufactured—and What We Can Do About It. The presentation will explore the origins of the recent surge in online disinformation related to trans and queer people. Then participate in a discussion of what we can do to disrupt it.
Natasha Edmunds, of Neighbours United, will share the approach known as deep canvassing—a strategy to overcome fear and bridge divides by listening deeply, connecting with empathy and promoting learning in non-judgmental ways.
Register through the Mir Centre for Peace at selkirk.ca
https://www.selkirk.ca/events/disrupting-disinformation
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Noon Friday Jun 16
West Kootenay Climate Hub Zoom Webinar
Inner Development Goals and the minusfiftypercent.org Initiative
Why we must grow both individually and collectively to create the future we all desire.
Free for everyone, register at WestKootenayClimateHub.ca
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ENVIRONMENT NEWS BITS AND LINKS
The head of the world’s leading carbon credit certifier has announced he will step down from his role at Verra, a Washington-based nonprofit certifying organization. Verra has been accused of approving tens of millions of worthless offsets that are used by major companies for climate and biodiversity commitments, according to a joint Guardian investigation earlier this year.
Verra dominates the $2bn voluntary carbon market, which has certified more than 1bn credits through its verified carbon standard (VCS).
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As fires blaze in Alberta, Saskatchewan and B.C., new research has drawn a direct link between carbon pollultion emissions traced back to the world’s major fossil fuel producers and the increase in extreme wildfires across western Canada and the United States.
The journal Environmental Research Letters published the report that found that 37 per cent of the total burned forest area in Western Canada and the United States between 1986-2021 can be traced back to 88 major fossil fuel producers and cement manufacturers.
“What we found is that the emissions from these companies have dramatically increased wildfire activity,” said Carly Phillips, co-author on the study and a researcher at the Science Hub for Climate Litigation at the Union of Concerned Scientists.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/wildfires-climate-change-carbon-88-1.6852178
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Last week Alberta’s highest court dismissed motions by former Premier Jason Kenney and the Alberta government to throw out a defamation lawsuit brought forward by five environmental groups.
Environmental Defence, West Coast Environmental Law, Dogwood Initiative, Stand.earth and the Wilderness Committee are suing the former Premier and the province for lying about the findings of their Public Inquiry into Anti-Alberta Energy Campaigns. Over two years, groups and individuals were named publicly and targeted on social media, causing some individuals to receive death threats.
Tim Gray, Executive Director, Environmental Defence. said “Truth matters in a democracy, and today’s court decision makes clear that the former Alberta Premier specifically targeted environmental organizations to undermine our efforts to communicate the risks of climate change, and the role an expanding oil industry plays in threatening the future of Canadians.”
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Canada is again set to fail to meet its greenhouse gas emissions target. The target of 40 to 45 per cent by 2030 was set to meet the recommendations from most recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC.
The government recently released its latest emissions inventory report showing the country far behind where it needs to be. Jerry DeMarco, the environment commissioner in the Auditor General’s office, has criticized the government’s record as a litany of broken promises:
“We have been repeatedly ringing the alarm bells. Now, these bells are almost deafening.”
Canada is the only G7 nation with 2022 carbon emissions levels that are above its 1990 levels. It has among the highest greenhouse gas emissions per capita in the world, and its fossil fuel industry is also among the world’s largest.
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The US Lummi Nation in Washington state is going to court to block the billion-dollar port project in Canada. In April the Canadian government gave the go ahead to the Roberts Bank Terminal 2 Project on the lower Fraser.
The Lummi Nation says it holds transboundary rights and that Canada has failed to ‘consult and accommodate’ their rights.
The effort to block approval of the controversial new container terminal project in Vancouver marks the first major attempt to use the recent landmark decision by the Canadian supreme court, which found that some Indigenous peoples living in the US have rights in Canada.
That would be the Sinixt Desautel decision on continued hunting rights of Sinixt living in Washington State here in their territories in Canada.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/may/19/lummi-nation-canada-port-extension-project
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More than 130 members of the U.S. Congress and the European Parliament are asking the United Nations and other key decision-makers to remove Sultan al Jaber, CEO of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC), from his role as COP 28 President.
“The decision to name as president of COP 28 the chief executive of one of the world’s largest oil and gas companies—a company that has recently announced plans to add 7.6 billion barrels of oil to its production in the coming years, representing the fifth-largest increase in the world— risks undermining the negotiations,” states the May 23 letter from the elected reps.
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