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•  Amazon action:climber update 17 Μάι 2012, 15:09

  Image.. Leaning back in the evening breeze, listening to the waves churning, I almost feel like I'm lying on the beach at home instead of hanging from an anchor chain near the 10 meter water mark of a cargo ship near Sao Louis in Brazil. But here I am. The Clipper Hope was due to arrive in the port days ago to pick up a load of pig iron, but for 3 days so far we've been preventing the ship from heaving up anchor by hanging on their chain.
  
  Along with some other people, the captain of the ship didn't understand at first why we were protesting at his vessel. What's wrong with pig iron? It's used to make steel. The answer is it is a cheap and highly destructive way to make steel, and there are better ways to do it. Pig iron is made with charcoal, which is made with huge quantities of wood, and the cheapest way to get this wood is to secretly and illegally log massive areas of remote Amazonian forest and even sometimes use slave labour to burn it up.
  
  There is more life, and more different types of life, in this forest than anywhere else, and seeing it transformed into wasteland is one of the saddest images of what is happening to our planet. The rate of deforestation of the Amazon is once again increasing because of recent government decisions.
  
  So I hope the captain and friendly crew of the Clipper Hope will google Greenpeace and pig iron to find our new report, and learn about the consequences of the manufacture of their cargo. I hope U.S. car manufacturers like Ford and GM will learn about where their steel comes from. I hope we can all learn about the real costs of maintaining our cheap, convenient lifestyles and choose a better way. We don't have to destroy the Amazon, and we don't have to destroy our future.

  Emma Briggs is a climber and the Bosun onboard the Rainbow Warrior, she is from Byron Bay, Australia.

  

  

•  Mayan people join action to keep honey GE free 16 Μάι 2012, 17:02

  Image..

  Recently members of the Mayan people living on the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico joined Greenpeace activists and said no to genetically engineered crops. Using their own bodies to form the message ‘MA OGM’ or ‘No to GE’, 2000 activists gathered at eight different Mayan archaeological sites to draw attention to the risks of contamination of honey production by Monsanto’s genetically engineered (GE) soy.

  It is important to remember that the European Court of Justice (ECJ) has already ruled that honey contaminated with pollen from GE maize, also produced by Monsanto cannot be sold on the EU market. 40% of the Mexican honey is produced on the Yucatan and it exports 90% of its production to Europe. Monsanto’s GE soy is therefore threatening the livelihood of the forty thousand beekeepers and their families who rely on honey production.

  Monsanto has requested authorization to plant commercial GE soy in Mexico despite a previous court order that invalidated a permit to plant 30 000 hectares with ‘pilot sowing’ of GE soy in the States of Campeche, Yucatan and Quintana Roo. Out of the 253 000 hectares that have been applied for, 60 000 are planned in Yucatan and if approved it could be only a matter of time before the Mexican honey is contaminated by Monsanto’s GE soybean pollen.

  The Governor of Yucatan, Ivonne Ortega Pacheco has already said she is in favour of declaring Yucatan GE-free and she made a request to this effect to the Mexican Ministry of Agriculture. The action also aimed to encourage municipalities and other States to declare themselves GE-free and to get the Mexican federal government to ratify these decisions and give them legal standing. Earlier this year, Greenpeace protested to the Mexican authorities as they ignored the recommendations of the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food – Olivier de Schutter to restore the moratorium on GE maize in the country.

  The bee population in general is suffering from Colony Collapse Disorder, a phenomenon where worker bees abruptly disappear and cause a collapse of the bee colony, due to multiple factors linked to agrochemicals. The economic effect is significant as over 90% of the world’s food crops need bees.

  Aleira Lara

  GE Campaigner, Mexico

  

  

•  Fukushima nuclear disaster: who profits and who pays? 16 Μάι 2012, 14:30

  Last week, the inevitable finally happened. The company responsible for the Fukushima nuclear disaster, Tokyo Electric Power Company, or TEPCO, has been nationalised. Japan’s trade and industry minister Yukio Edano announced a de facto state take-over of the company with a further injection of $12.5bn, bringing the total of state capital in TEPCO to $33.2bn. Edano has said that: “Without the state funds, (TEPCO) cannot provide a stable supply of electricity and pay for compensation and decommissioning costs”.
  
  The total direct costs of the Fukushima Daiichi catastrophe for TEPCO, including compensation and clean up, are estimated at over $100bn. Many Japanese, however, experience in their daily lives that the damages are considerably higher because most of their claims and losses go uncompensated and most of their suffering goes unrecognised.

  Image.. The nationalisation of TEPCO, together with a legal practice called “channelling of liability” in which all liability related to the Fukushima nuclear disaster has to be channelled to TEPCO, means Japanese taxpayers and ratepayers will foot most of the bill.
  
  An infuriating aspect of this story is that in a recent presentation by General Electric (GE) about its “success” over the past 50 years, there was not a word about the Fukushima disaster and nothing approaching an apology. Yet the Fukushima disaster was affected by well-known problems related to GE’s Mark 1 design, which was used at all four troubled reactors. Furthermore, GE was involved in maintenance throughout the four decades of the plant’s operation and had 44 on site at the time of the accident.
  
  GE, together with its corporate mates from Hitachi, which is responsible for the construction of Fukushima Daiichi Unit 4, and Toshiba, which delivered Reactor No. 3, as well as Ebasco, Kajima, Areva and many others, have mostly kept mum about their involvement.
  
  The Prime Minister orders venting
  
  Prime Minister Naoto Kan had to order venting the day after the disaster. Without venting the containment might have given way to the rising pressure, which is a problem identified 30 years ago by several GE whistleblowers. It was not easy to give the order. Workers would risk potentially lethal doses of radiation and the evacuation around Fukushima had not even started. Venting would expose thousands of people to radiation, but the alternative of an exploding reactor would create even more havoc. TEPCO, GE, Hitachi, and Toshiba knew that this could happen. Not one of them ever demanded the closure of the reactors. Closing their eyes to their obviously faulty product, they spread the impression that people were safe.
  
  Socialising risks, privatising profits
  
  TEPCO is different than Chernobyl where the state owned and operated the reactor. A private enterprise developed the Fukushima Daiichi’s Mark 1 reactors and GE, Hitachi, Toshiba and other companies made huge profits building and servicing the power station. If this were a car, these companies would recall all their nuclear reactors and compensate customers for the costs and losses incurred.
  
  But this is not a car. This is the nuclear industry and these companies continue as if nothing has happened to them. They are saved by TEPCO’s bankruptcy and nationalisation, and they are saved by the unique liability regime surrounding the nuclear industry where profits are privatised but accident liabilities are socialised.
  
  It is clear why we don't see GE, Hitachi and Toshiba rush to put hundreds of millions of dollars into the Fukushima compensation fund. If they did, they would be admitting some kind of guilt and could open up an avenue for making compensation claims against them. Their share prices would plummet and it would force them to rethink their involvement in the nuclear sector. And who wants that?
  
  Well, I want it.
  
  I think that what we see now is an utter shame and outrage. Elsewhere, Hitachi and GE are trying to convince the Lithuanian government to pump almost $9bn into a new nuclear reactor, and accept a liability regime that is capped at $160m. Toshiba, with its sub-group Westinghouse, is wooing Czech CEZ to buy two reactors with the cap on liability in the Czech Republic at $450m. Hitachi is also actively lobbying Turkey with a cap of $24m, and Vietnam with a $230m cap to buy one of its reactors.
  
  At the same time, I hear of people struggling to make ends meet after they fled the Fukushima region, of suicides because the hardships are too much to bear, of families split apart because they do not dare let their children grow up in the contaminated areas even though the father's work is still there, and of companies gone bankrupt because their resources are suddenly taken off the market due to contamination.
  
  First, all victims need to get the compensation they deserve. The nationalisation of TEPCO is a step that could improve the situation. But this should not mean that those who profited from the risk that Fukushima Daiichi clearly posed and those that are profiting from all the other uncovered risks from nuclear power in the rest of the world should escape their responsibility. Facing this responsibility in terms of cold hard cash could help prevent a disaster like this happening again.

  Jan Haverkamp is a Greenpeace nuclear energy expert on energy issues in Central Europe

  

  

•  Occupying an anchor chain, thinking of freshly baked muffins 15 Μάι 2012, 23:30

  

  What do you need most on an anchor chain in the middle of the Atlantic, when you’ve been there for over 24 hours, and it’s pouring with rain? Muffins.

  Freshly baked by our chef, Walter, and put into waterproof tins ready for loading into speedboats. Speedmuffins. Pronto pastries. Two young Brazilians - Leonor and Elissama - are waiting across the water having been up most of the night and little things like this make all the difference. Fruit is great, but nothing beats that fresh-from-the-oven comfort of spongey goodness.

  Occupying an anchor chain for over a day is a pretty challenging operation. Just getting off the Rainbow Warrior onto the inflatables is difficult, as the waves make stepping off the ship onto the moving boat like playing Super Mario Brothers for real. Then it’s a ten minute boat ride across the water with salty spray drenching everything in sight – camera gear, sunglasses and baked goods.

  Once Leonor arrives on scene she receives the signal from the boat driver and gets onto a tiny stepladder (Supermario again) before scrambling up towards the platform. Well, I say platform – it’s more of a small plank with Greenpeace written underneath it. It’s all done safely and carefully, but that doesn’t stop the heart racing when you see how high up she is.

  And then... well, not much really. Hours of sitting there, making sure she is safe, and waiting. No crowds of supporters cheering her on, just a safety boat with a driver giving her the thumbs up once in a while. It’s a bit like David Blane without the ego. When I was out there with I tried to give her my best winning smile and to think positive thoughts, but I’m not sure that was helping very much.

  

  What really keep these girls going are the messages of support we’re receiving not just here in Brazil but around the world. This isn’t a ‘grey area’ environmental protest, where there are two valid points of view – we’re exposing things like slave labor and the illegal destruction of forest that is home to uncontacted tribes like the Awa. These are things that Brazilians – as well as people all over the world – have decided are unacceptable in our society.

  It’s pretty hard to explain the link with ships like this one in words, but I’ll try. If Elissama and Leonor hadn’t stopped it, the Clipper Hope would be loading pig iron and taking that to the USA. Pig iron is used to make steel for cars, but here in Brazil it is leading to huge deforestation and is sometimes produced using slave labor. The Brazilian President and companies like Ford, GM and BMW - have a big role to play in stopping this from happening, but at the moment they’re turning a blind eye to the problem.

  See? Much easier to close your eyes, think of the young Brazilians and imagine the smell of freshly baked muffins.

  Update: in this post, I referred to Elissama and Leonor as "girls". I appreciate that this could appear patronizing, and that they are of course both young women, and well respected activists. I didn't mean to cause offence and I apologize if this did.

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  Photo copyright Marizilda Cruppe / Greenpeace

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•  Broadcasting live! We’re reading your messages to Apple at their Headquarters 15 Μάι 2012, 18:31

  Hi,

  Image..My name is Brandy and I’m here in our “iPod” to send Apple your messages. We’re right in front of Apple’s headquarters in Cupertino, California, in an eight-foot tall, ten-foot wide pod broadcasting audio messages from people like you to Apple’s employees and executives asking the company to power its iCloud with clean energy instead of coal. You can follow us on our livestream now.

  In the past month, 215,000 of you have written to Apple to tell them that we want their iCloud to be powered by clean energy, not coal.

  This is an incredibly important issue for me personally. I use Apple products every day, just like millions of people around the world. I use my iPad every day in school, just like the one I’m using right now in this pod. It helps me in everything from taking notes, helping me to study for my tests (or even distracting me from class every once in a while.) My iPhone helps me connect with my friends.

  I don’t want to stop using those great tools. I want Apple to use their influence to power the iCloud I use every day with clean energy, not dirty coal that’s bringing our planet to the brink of disaster. 

  It’s been really inspiring to see how many of you agree in your messages! Here are a few of my favorites:

  "Surely a visionary company like Apple can see that renewable energy is not only the smart thing to do, it's the right thing to do. Clean our Cloud!"

  
  

  "Imagine, design, create ... Apple you need to approach your energy usage with the same ideals. You are supposed to be at the forefront of innovation yet you are using outdated, non-sustainable energy producers. Go Green!" 

  We’re going to stay here and read Apple your messages as long as we can. If you haven’t sent them one yet, join the fun by going to facebook.com/cleanourcloud and we’ll try to read your message too!

  From our iPod,

  Brandy Palm 

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