CLIMATE CRISIS

ROOTS AN D SOLUTION S

IBON PRIMER ON THE

ISBN 978-971-0483-54-9 Copyright IBON International 2010 Some Rights Reserved.

IBON International holds the rights to this publication. The publication may be cited in parts as long as IBON is properly acknowledged as the source and IBON is furnished copies of the nal work where the quotation or citation appears. IBON International is the international division of IBON Foundation, Inc. As an international NGO, IBON Foundation responds to international demand to provide support in research and education to peoples movements and grassroots empowerment and advocacy and links these to international initiatives and networks. IBON international initiates and implements international programs, develops and hosts international networks, initiates and participates in international advocacy campaigns, and establishes regional and country ofces where necessary and appropriate.

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Writers Paul Quintos John Paul Corpus Editor Antonio Tujan, Jr. Cover photos A guy with A camera (http://www.ickr.com/photos/schlegl/2300600425/sizes/o/) Ramon Lauron

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION PART 1. CAPITALIST GROWTH AND CLIMATE CHANGE What is the relationship between economic growth and climate change? Why is the current socio-economic system obsessed with expansion and growth? Why does corporate globalization give rise to imperialist plunder and war? What are the main drivers of climate change under the global capitalist system and what is the role of TNCs in them? Why are advanced industrialized countries principally responsible for causing climate change? PART 2. MARKET-BASED PROFIT-ORIENTED FALSE SOLUTIONS What is wrong with carbon trading and offsetting? What is wrong with carbon capture and storage (CCS)? What is wrong with nuclear energy, megadams, and agrofuels? What is wrong with geoengineering? 23 26 27 30 5

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PART 3. THE WAY OUT: BUILDING EQUITABLE AND SUSTAINABLE SOCIETIES What is sustainable human development? Does sustainable human development require de-growth and de-industrialization? What are the fundamental requirements for shifting towards sustainable human development? PART 4. IMMEDIATE TASKS FOR SOCIAL MOVEMENTS FIGHTING FOR A JUST AND SUSTAINABLE FUTURE ENDNOTES 33

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Introduction

The last two centuries have been heralded for great strides in technology, production and human progress. But these advances have precipitated global ecological and development disasters at the same time. On one hand, a privileged global elite engages in reckless prot-driven production and grossly excessive consumption. On the other hand, the mass of humanity is mired in underdevelopment and poverty with merely survival and subsistence consumption, or even less. The worlds largest transnational corporations (TNCs) based mainly in the Northern countries and with expanding operations in the South, have long been at the forefront of this injustice. Indeed the powerful industrialized nations of today were built on the severe exploitation of the human and natural resources of the global South. Their relentless pursuit of growth and prot demand vast energy and natural resources and generate waste beyond what the planet can sustain. The accumulated emissions of greenhouse gases from industrial societies is altering the climate and disrupting ecological systems which, in turn, are threatening the very survival of millions of species including our own. Climate change is already causing severe damage to the lives and livelihoods of millions of people throughout the world, especially the poor and marginalized communities that are particularly vulnerable to ecological imbalances. It is resulting in greater and more frequent extremes of heat and rainfall patterns as well as tropical cyclones, typhoons and hurricanes. Africa, Asia and Latin America face shorter growing seasons, lower yields, lost or deteriorated agricultural land, decreased agricultural production and freshwater shortages. Droughts in Africa will bring widespread hunger and famine. Asia is already confronting ooding, avalanches and landslides, which will increase illness and death. In Latin America, higher temperatures and reduced biodiversity in tropical forests will devastate indigenous communities. Globally, rising sea levels will ood low-lying areas, increased storm surges will threaten coastal communities, and warmer sea waters will diminish sh stocks. These adverse impacts of climate change are compounding the long-

standing development crises confronting the mass of humanity. Despite the world economys relentless growth, there is unprecedented poverty and hunger in the world today. According to the World Banks much cited dollar-a-day international poverty line, revised in 2008 to $1.25 a day in 2005 prices, there were still 1.4 billion people living in extreme poverty in 2005. This was 36 million more than in 1995. In 2009, it is estimated that an additional 215 million workers and their families fell below this poverty line as a result of the current global economic and nancial crisis. The poverty situation is more serious when other dimensions of poverty such as deprivation, social exclusion, and lack of participation are also considered. Indeed, for the rst time in history, the number of people experiencing hunger has exceeded 1 billion this year, up by 115 million since 2007more than 60% of whom are women. Every six seconds a child dies because of hunger and related causes. One out of four childrenroughly 146 millionin developing countries is underweight; 17 infants under the age of ve die every minute mostly due to preventable causes; half of all girls in the poorest countries have no access to primary education; half a million mothers will die at childbirth this year due to the lack of basic health services for the poor; and nearly a billion people live in urban slums where illness and death are rife. All these point to a system in grave crisis and the need for profound changes in how our societies function. But if the need for radical measures is by now obvious to an increasing number of people, what kind of measures are necessary to truly arrest climate change and why arent those measures being adopted by policy makers? If fossil fuel use and greenhouse gas emissions cause global warming, can new energy sources and new technologies solve the problem? If techno-xes are false xes, what is the role that science and technology can play in solving the climate crisis? If climate change is one of the egregious byproducts of industrialization and rapid economic growth, does this mean that underdeveloped countries must reject industrial progress and growth? If overproduction and overconsumption is a major cause of climate change, what does this mean for countries where the vast majority of the population are deprived of the basic necessities in life? This primer traces the roots of the climate crisis as well as other social crises to the dominant economic paradigm and the prevailing socio-economic system in the world todaya system that has proven capable of generating unprecedented wealth for some at the same time impoverishing the majority of the people and devastating the planet. Part 1 discusses the relationship between economic activities in modern industrial societies and climate change. Particular attention is given to the role TNCs as dominant actors in the global economy. Part 2 discusses

the false solutions to the climate crisis that are being promoted by corporate and elite interests who are hell-bent on maintaining the status quo. Part 3 discusses the requisites for the shift towards sustainable human development. It points to the need for a radical change in the distribution of wealth and power within societies and between countries in order to arrest climate change and social crises. The last Part identies the priority tasks for social movements in order to bring this alternative vision closer to fruition.

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PART 1
Capitalist Economic Growth and Climate Change

What is the relationship between industrial economic growth and climate change? We know by now that global warming and climate change are caused by the buildup of heat-trapping greenhouse gases (GHGs) in the atmosphere. This build up has been driven by the massive increase in human-induced GHG emissions since the industrial age began 250 years ago. The most dramatic increase has been in carbon dioxide (CO2). It is the most important GHG today, accounting for around 80% of all GHGs released into the atmosphere annually.1 Annual CO2 emissions have grown more than 20-fold between 1800 and 2000, from 1Gt (gigatons or billion tons) to 23Gt. The atmospheric concentration of CO2 has also increased as a consequence. It currently stands at 388ppm (parts per million), 50% higher than its pre-industrial level (250ppm), and far above its normal range (100-300ppm) over the last 800,000 years. Methane (CH4) and nitrous oxide (N2O) levels have also seen comparable increases.2 GHG emissions result from almost every aspect of industrial societyfrom energy, to transportation, to production. Much of the human-induced release and build up of GHGs in the atmosphere originate from the burning of fossil fuels. Fossil fuel combustion produces electricity and heat, and provides energy for industry, transportation, commerce, and household consumption. Annually, about 55 60% of total GHG emissions and 70% of all CO2 emissions come from the burning of fossil fuels. Agriculture and land use change (referring to deforestation and land conversion), meanwhile, are responsible for around 30% of all GHG emissions and 25% of CO2 emissions. Agriculture has driven increases in N2O and CH4 emissions as well. The tremendous growth in GHG emissions came in step with the equally tremendous economic growth paved by the industrial revolution. Expansion in economic activity demands greater energy and materials use, and hence, drives greater emissions. Gross domestic product (GDP) is the most widely-used measure and

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index of economic production, size, and expansion today. Figure 1 shows how fossil fuel CO2 emissions and the world gross domestic product (GDP) have grown exponentially in lock-step with each other over the past two centuries. The world economy grew the fastest in the last 50 60 years, driving with it an unprecedented increase in human-induced GHG emissions. Consider the following. Between 1820 and 2006, the global GDP experienced a 70-fold expansion, 90% of it occurring after 1950.3 Similarly, the last half century accounts for 80% of the 580-fold growth in fossil carbon emissions between 1820 and 2006, and 80% of all fossil carbon released into the atmosphere over the same 126-year period.4, 5 GDP and emissions increases show no signs of letting up (see Figure 2). Projections see global GDP doubling in the next two decades, from US$ 60 trillion in 2006 to US$ 137 trillion in 2030 [3.5% average annual growth]. Over the same period, annual energy-related CO2 emissions are projected to increase by 30%, from 28Gt to 40Gt in 2030 [1.4% average annual growth]. Overall GHG emissions, including non-energy related CO2 emissions and all other gases, would also rise by 30%, from 42Gt CO2-eq (billion tons of carbon dioxide equivalent) to 56Gt CO2 by 2030.3 This unabated rise puts the world on a path towards GHG concentrations in the atmosphere rising to 1000ppm CO2-eq by 2100, and global average temperatures increasing by as much as 6C.7

Why is the current socio-economic system obsessed with expansion and growth? The socio-economic system is what determines how society harnesses nature to satisfy human needs. The dominant socio-economic system in the world today is capitalism. In this system, the machinery, raw materials, and labor-power necessary to run all modern industry and commerce is owned by a tiny fraction of the population. In capitalisms current stage, entire industries are dominated by a few giant rms; the advanced capitalist countries are effectively ruled by a nance oligarchy, and these powerful states dominate the poor and underdeveloped countries of the South. Under this system, the economy is divided into numerous autonomous business enterprises or corporations. Within each enterprise, internal production and labor is organized under the direction of the owners. What, how much, and in what manner various enterprises produce are therefore the private business of individuals or small groups of individuals who are motivated by the single-

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Figure 1. Trend in CO2 Emissions and World GDP (1820-2004)

Source: Carbon Dioxide Analysis Center (CDIAC); 2009; Angus Maddison, 2009. World GDP in 1990 Geary-Khamis dollars. No data for World GDP in the years between 1820 -1870, 1870-1900, 1900-1913, 1913-1940, and 1940-1950. Figure 2. Projected Rise in CO2 Emissions and World GDP (2010-2030)

Source: International Energy Outlook 2009, Energy Information Administration

1950

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minded pursuit of prot. However, the decisions made by these corporations are often in conict with the interest of society as a whole. Indeed, under this system, goods and services are produced not to fulll basic human necessities and improve human welfare but to generate prot for businesses. In the words of Bolivian President Evo Morales, In the hands of capitalism everything becomes a commodity: the water, the soil, the human genome, the ancestral cultures, justice, ethics, death and life itself. Everything, absolutely everything, can be bought and sold and under capitalism. And even climate change itself has become a business. Peoples needs and desires are satised only to the extent that they can afford to pay for these commodities. The pursuit of prot is not just about greed. Competition among business owners compel them to accumulate capital for whoever has more capital is able to control more or better equipment, raw materials, adopt new techniques and thereby prevail over rivals. A shrewd businessman knows that he can only expect to increase his prots if he continuously accumulates capital, control more means of production, depress workers wages, cut down on production costs and expand the scale of his production. To do otherwise is to risk failure and bankruptcy in competition. Hence the pre-occupation of business leaders with growth, expansion, and globalization. But continuous expansion in production of commodities requires ever more raw materials, energy, labor, and other material inputs in production. Moreover, for expanding production to actually realize prots, it must be matched by increasing consumption which, in turn, requires more environmental resources for assimilating waste. Capital accumulation therefore entails continuously increasing demands on nature for material provisions and ecological services for sustaining and regenerating the conditions for production and consumption. The rapid growth in production and consumption in the world since the start of capitalist industrialization is now breaching ecological limits. For instance the reported amount of marketable minerals extracted globally was 9.6 billion tons in 1999, nearly twice as much as in 1970. As a result nearly all commercially important mineral reserves may be depleted within the rst half of this century assuming a mere 2% growth in the rate of extraction, utilizing the existing state of technology, and assuming same prices and patterns of use. Based on these estimates, silver reserves are expected to last less than a decade, copper less than two decades, nickel just over two decades, iron less than ve decades, and aluminum under seven decades, unless primary extraction rates of these minerals

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are reduced signicantly.

Why does corporate globalization give rise to imperialist plunder and war? The industrial revolution greatly intensied the demand for raw materials in Europe and later in the United States. By the eve of the 19th century, the titans of the new industries, with their insatiable appetites for prots and their compulsion to accumulate capital, needed new sources of raw materials, cheaper labor, and new market outlets. In other words, under monopoly capitalism, the concentration of capital had reached the point wherein further wealth accumulation required corporate interests to expand overseas, particularly towards the unindustrialized countries of the South. The international scope of their economic operations require big business to seek decisive political inuence or control over foreign territories in order to secure and further their investments. They must be assured that their properties overseas would not be expropriated, for example; or that their exchange transactions and contracts would be honored and their loans would be repaidin short, they must be assured of continued prot extraction. For this they must employ the extensive coercive powers of the imperialist state. Monopoly capitalists thus compete directly via their transnational corporations (TNCs) as well as their states. Competition among global corporations and rich nations for resources and greater market shares have led to the colonial and neocolonial subjugation of Southern peoples, denying them rightful ownership and control of their resources. Colonialism and neocolonialism has transformed the economies of the global South away from diversied and self-reliant systems towards economies dependent on capital from and access to markets in the North. This has resulted in the ecological devastation and exhaustion of land, forests and other natural resources which directly affect the livelihood of innumerable communities in the South. Monopoly capital has thus created a single world economy divided into numerous nation-states occupying fundamentally different positions in the international division of labor. This system is dominated by monopoly capital based in the imperialist countries where nance capital as well as advanced technologies and associated skills are concentrated. A few middle income countries are the preferred locations for labor-intensive and highly polluting assembly of less sophisticated manufactures and, increasingly, for services outsourced from the major economies such as business processing and information technology. Low-

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income countries remain largely dependent on agriculture, natural resources, and extractive industries which are also dominated by foreign capital and dependent on foreign markets. This status quothe underdevelopment of the South and the economic and political dominance of Northern powersis maintained through unequal exchange in the form of unjust trade, debt, and investment policies and property rights in favor of monopoly capital. The neoliberal globalization policies imposed by multilateral institutions such as the International Monetary Fund, World Bank, and World Trade Organization over the last three decades have greatly eased the penetration of monopoly rms into the South and accelerated the exploitation of the people and the raw natural resources in these areas. But the economic and ecological exploitation of the South is ultimately enforced by violence and oppression. Atrocious campaigns of wars of aggression have been waged by imperialist states to expand their territories, gain direct or tighter control of land, energy, and other natural resources and widen their spheres of inuence in behalf of monopoly capital. World War I and II were horric examples of this, but even todays wars are still very much fuelled by the same dynamic. For instance, the US considers the control of global oil resources to be in its national interest. This is not surprising considering the heavy dependence of all industries and commerce on oil, with the US being the biggest oil consumer of all. Thus it has a long history of intervention in the Middle East and continues to fortify its military presence in the oil-and-gas-rich regions around the Persian Gulf, the Caspian Sea Basin (Central Asia) and the Gulf of Guinea (West Africa), going so far as to invade and occupy Afghanistan and Iraqkilling tens of thousands in the process. The US declared the Philippines, Indonesia and Southeast Asiaa region known for its oil, natural gas and other natural resourcesits second front against terrorism. It has relentlessly undermined the government of Venezuela, which has the biggest oil resources in Latin America and is continuously expanding its inuence in other Latin American countries (Colombia) and several African countries to tap potential oil and other mineral resources. Imperialist states have thus plundered the natural resources and exploited the people of the South since colonial times, and have used up a much greater share of the global commons than poorer countries. The recent wars of aggression of the US and its allies have not only increased the production, sale, and use weapons of mass destruction but have also caused the massive destruction and contamination of human property, health, and environment (i.e. use of depleted uranium, etc.) in the Balkans, Afghanistan, Iraq and other war-ravaged countries. Forest clearings and land conversions, necessitated by continued military exercises in different parts of the world led by the US, pollute the environment and

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lead to the destruction of natural habitats. Toxic wastes from current and previous US military bases continue to wreak ecological havoc in the surrounding areas. US military joint exercises bring with them not only direct US military aggression but the dangerous weapons and waste from these activities. As a result of all these, the communities that are also the most vulnerable to environmental backlashes, which come in the form of oods, droughts, and other occurrences, are also the ones deprived or dispossessed of the resources that they need for their survival. People are displaced from their homes by drought and sea level rise, and declining food production. Women and children shoulder the greater cost of these circumstances because of wider risks to their health, and added complications to their productive and reproductive functions. While global warming has already brought extreme impacts on livelihood and survival of entire populations, poor and marginalized communities in the South are made more vulnerable by structural inequities in their own societies.

What are the main drivers of climate change under the global capitalist system and what is the role of TNCs in them? Energy System The energy sector is the primary driver of GHG emissions. In 2005, energy-related activities were responsible for 63% of total GHG emissions and 77% of all CO2 emissions. 28% of GHG emissions and 36% of CO2 emissions came from electricity and heat generation.8 Energy production and use is an important keystone of the modern industrial economy. Energy powers economic activity. Its constant and increasing supply is crucial to drive industrialization and economic growth. It is no exaggeration to say that large-scale and efcient mass production has been made possible by the large-scale exploitation, production, and use of the carbon energy stored in fossil fuels (coal, oil, and natural gas). Fossil fuels pack much more energy per unit volume than biomass (e.g. wood and plant matter) which had been the primary energy source in pre-industrial times. Burning fossil fuels produces signicant amounts of energy, far greater than the energy expended to produce it. Their large-scale use has enabled industrialization, urbanization, and mass consumption. Fossil fuels became the dominant energy source in the last century, and remain so today, accounting for 81% of world total energy supply and 67% of nal consumption in 2007. Oil is the chief fossil fuel, accounting for 63% of fossil fuel consumption and 41% of fossil energy supply.9

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Other sectors of the industrial economy co-evolved with a fossil-dependent energy system. Therefore, technologies, production, investment patterns have become carbon-dependent as well. Transportation infrastructure, the automobile industry, power generation and transmission systems, urban and suburban expansion, large-scale food production and distribution, international trade these are systems organized for large-scale, fossil-fuelled operation. Consumption patterns are also shaped according to this structure, reinforcing the carbondependence of the whole system. Integrated oil companies are the largest and most inuential in the industry. They have control over every level of the global value chain, from extraction,
Table 1. Top Oil and Gas Companies Top 10 Oil and Gas Companies, by Production (2005) Company Saudi Aramco (Saudi Arabia) Gazprom (Russia) National Iranian Oil (Iran) ExxonMobil (USA) Pemex (Mexico) BP (UK) Royal Dutch Shell (Netherlands/UK) CNPC/Petro China (China) Total (France) Sonatrach (Algeria) Total production, in BBOE* 4.148 3.608 1.81 1.725 1.666 1.572 1.482 1.119 0.997 0.991

Top 10 Oil and Gas Companies, by Revenue (2009) Company Royal Dutch Shell (Netherlands/UK) ExxonMobil (USA) BP (UK) Chevron (USA) Total (France) Saudi Aramco (Saudi Arabia) Conoco Philips (USA) Sinopec (China) ENI (Italy) National Iranian Oil (Iran) Note: Companies in italics are Supermajors.
*billion barrels of oil equivalent; ** 2008 revenue, from Yahoo! Finance; ***2005 revenue, from IBON, 2008

Revenue, in billion USD 458.36 442.85 367.05 263.15 234.67 233.30** 230.76 207.81 159.34 145.50***

Source: www.petrostrategies.org; UNCTAD, World Investment Report 2007; 2009 Fortune Global 500

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to production, to rening, distribution, and the marketing of fuel. Today, stateowned oil and gas corporations from the oil-rich regions of the South make up the worlds top companies in terms of reserves and production volume. The industrys Supermajors,10 the six largest private Euro-American TNCs that traditionally dominated the industry, still lead in terms of revenue, foreign assets, and foreign production11 (see Table1).

Agricultural and Food System Agriculture contributes signicantly to global GHG emissions. In 2005, agriculture accounted for 13.8% of GHG emissions. These GHGs are mainly in the form of CH4 and N2O. The sector is responsible for 51.4% of global CH4 emissions, and 84.7% of N2O emissions, making it the largest source of both GHGs.12 What has been driving emissions, however, is not agriculture per se, but a specific type of agricultural productionnamely, large-scale industrial agriculture. Industrial agriculture is the dominant model of producing food under capitalism, promoted by TNCs and international lending institutions. It is based on largescale farms that specialize in single animal products or cash crops. Production is resource-intensive, involving the heavy use of machines, chemical inputs, and energy in order to increase yields. Produce are processed and shipped around the world, but end up mainly in the North for their consumption. Emissions arise from almost every stage of industrial food production. First, it requires tremendous amounts of energy. The manufacture of inorganic fertilizers and other synthetic agrochemicals such as pesticides consumes fossil fuels, and thus results in CO2 emissions. Fossil fuels also power irrigation and farm machinery, including those that apply the chemicals on farmland. More fossil fuels are used in processing, packaging, refrigerating, transporting, and storing the food. The actual use of fertilizers generates N2O emissions. Only about half of the nitrogen contained in fertilizers are absorbed by crops, with the rest accumulating in the soil and released into the atmosphere as N2O. Fertilizer application degrades the soil, creating the need to apply more fertilizers. Livestock raised in conned and overcrowded conditions such as in factory farms produce large emissions of CH4 during digestion and from animal manure. This kind of agricultural system is perpetuated by TNCs which control the entire food chain. Seed, fertilizer, and agrochemical companies control the upstream segment of the food chain as producers of inputs to production. The power of TNC suppliers of inputs is signicant, especially when they control key technologies. In 2007, the top ten seed companies and top ten pesticide rms accounted for 67% and 89% of their respective markets.13 The development of

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seeds and agrochemicals as co-dependent products allows the largest TNCs to have an interlocking presence in both sectors. Four corporationsMonsanto, DuPont, Syngenta, and Bayercontrol about half of both the seed and pesticide markets (see Table 2). Food and beverage manufacturers, supermarkets, and fast foods dominate the downstream segment of the food chain. The top ten food and beverage processors and grocery retailers, respectively, control a quarter of their respective markets.14 These TNCs inuence production by imposing standards on contracted farmers, driving them, for instance, to limit their choice of seed suppliers or adapt specific farming patterns such as using fertilizers and pesticides. Their dominance of processing and distribution favor the expansion of large-scale, capital intensive, mono-cropping farming operations.
Table 2. Top Seed Companies (2007) Company 1 Monsanto (USA) 2 DuPont (USA) 3 Syngenta (Switzerland) 4 Groupe Limagrain (France) 5 Land O'Lakes (US) 6 KWS AG (Germany) 7 Bayer CropScience (Germany) 8 Sakata (Japan) 9 DLF-Trifolium (Denmark) 10 Takii (Japan) * sales in million USD Source: ETC Group, 2008 Seed sales* 4,964 3,300 2,018 1,226 917 702 524 396 391 347 Market share % 23 15 9 6 4 3 2 <2 <2 <2 Top Pesticide Firms (2007) Company 1 Bayer (Germany) 2 Syngenta (Switzerland) 3 BASF (Germany) 5 Monsanto (USA) 6 Dupont (USA) 7 Makhteshim Agan(Israel) 8 Nufarm (Australia) 9 Sumitomo (Japan) 10 Arysta (Japan) Agrochemical sales* 7,458 7,285 4,297 3,599 2,369 1,895 1,470 1,209 1,035 Market share % 19 19 11 10 9 6 5 4 3 3

4 Dow Agro Sciences (USA) 3,779

Transportation system Transportation accounts for 12.2% of 2005 total GHG emissions, 15.8% of CO2 emissions, and 18% of energy-related CO2 emissions. Emissions from international bunkers, or fuel used for international shipping and aviation, contribute another 2.1%% of GHG emissions and 2.8% of CO2 emissions.15 The sector is oil dependent. Oil use amounts to 96% of transportation energy supply and produces 97% of transportation emissions in 2000.16

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Road transport is the biggest contributor to transportation emissions. In 2000, emissions from motor vehicles were responsible for 72% of emissions within the sector.17 Since 2007, the world has been producing upwards of 70 million commercial motor vehicles per year, up from 58 million in 2000, and 30-40 million in the 1990s. Passenger cars make up 70% of total production. Today, there are over 600 million cars travelling the worlds highways and streets, and 80% of these are in developed countries.18 Apart from the GHGs and pollutants they directly emit from car travel, automobiles cause other related problems. Cars are resource-intensive and inefcient. Plastic, glass, rubber, electronics, and around 20 different metals and alloys are required to construct a 2-ton car that, when sold, will transport a 150-pound person by burning enormous amounts of fossil fuels. Because they make living farther away from workplaces in cities possible, cars promote the dispersed suburban living patterns, the construction of road networks, and thus, more car use. This in turn drives land conversion and deforestation to make way for more roads and residential spaces as urban frontiers expand further out into surrounding areas. Northern TNCs dominate the automobile industry. The ten leading auto manufacturers produce nearly 70% of the global motor vehicle supply, with the top twoToyota and General Motorsaccounting for 25%. Through their market shares, as well as their design and production standards, auto TNCs determine the fuel economy of the worlds motor vehicle eet. They have also had a role in reducing possibilities for alternative and more efcient modes of transportation (see Box 1).

Table 3. Top Motor Vehicle TNCs, by Production Company 1 Toyota (Japan) 2 General Motors (USA) 3 Volkswagen (Germany) 4 Ford (USA) 5 Honda (Japan) 6 Nissan (Japan) 7 PSA Peugeot (France) 8 Hyundai (South Korea) 9 Suzuki (Japan) 10 Fiat (Italy) Output (2008), in millions 9.23 8.28 6.43 5.40 3.91 3.39 3.32 2.77 2.62 2.52 % of total 13.3 11.9 9.3 7.8 5.6 4.9 4.8 4 3.8 3.6 Revenue (2009), in billion USD 204.35 148.98 166.58 146.28 99.65 83.98 79.56 72.54 29.91 86.91

Sources: International Organization of Motor Vehicle Manufacturers (www.oica.net); 2009 Forbes Global 500

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In 2005, international marine and air transport was responsible for 900 MtCO2eq (million tons) of GHG emissions, or about 2% of the global total. This may seem small, but it exceeds the combined GHG emissions of all 49 Least Developed Countries. International aviation and marine transportationbut especially the latterhave become more important with the internationalization of production and the expansion of global trade. Ocean shipping carries more than 80% of internationally traded goods (see Box 2). Why are advanced industrialized countries principally responsible for causing climate change? Examining the source of GHGs by country, science also points out that the advanced industrialized countries are the source of the lions share of the GHG emissions stock in the atmosphere that is causing global warming. This is conrmed by Table 4 below which shows that the Group of Eight (G8) leading industrialized countries alone account for over half of cumulative CO2 emissions
Box 1. General Motors undermining of American mass rail transportation In the United States, automobile corporations played a major role in the decimation of rail transport. In the 1920s, when the United States market for cars showed its rst signs of saturation, vehicle, oil and tire producers adopted specic strategies to create additional demand for road vehicles by diverting rail passengers and freight to buses, cars and trucks. General Motors, in particular, set up intercity bus services starting 1926 and, in 1932, began buying up, operating, and then converting electric railway and streetcar systems to diesel buses Success with intercity buses moved General Motors to use similar approaches within cities, acquiring and replacing local electric transit systems with buses. When it was censured in 1935 for this self-serving actionit then shifted to more indirect methods and combined with other corporations to achieve the same end. The worlds largest electric streetcar system in New York City was converted to buses in only 18 months. From 1936 to 1945, a holding company, organized by General Motors together with Firestone Tire, Standard Oil and Mack Truck, bought up and destroyed streetcar systems in 45 cities in the United States. Similarly destructive strategies for freight transport were followed by corporations. From 1939 to 1972, United States railroads lost not only 50 per cent of their passenger trafc, but also nearly 75 per cent of all freight revenue. In addition, the General Motors diesel locomotives were less durable, less efcient and more polluting than the electric locomotives they replaced. Relative protability of road or rail transport is also substantially affected by government subsidizing of different elements in the total cost, such as in the construction of highways. In 1932, the president of General Motors played a leading role in establishing the National Highway Users Conference with a view to channeling state and local gasoline taxes and highway taxes solely for highway purposes, and developing a continuing program of highway construction.

Source: UN Center on Transnational Corporations, Climate Change and Transnational Corporations: Analysis and Trends, Environment Series no. 2 (New York: United Nations, 1992), 57-58.

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Box 2. Ecologically wasteful trade The growth of international trade is one of the most marked aspects of capitalisms global expansion. Over the last six decades, the value of merchandise exports grew more than 200-fold, from $62 billion in 1950, to $16 trillionabout a quarter of world GDPin 2008.19 The increased ow of goods between countries relates especially to the dominance of TNCs and the internationalization of production. TNCs disperse segments of production to countries with the biggest subsidies and lowest costs, and integrate them into a central production chain, creating interdependent economies. This means supplies and inputs may be produced in one country, shipped to another for processing, and transported to another for nal assembly, before delivery and sale in the market. Intra-rm trade, or trade between entities of the same TNC, account for roughly one-third of all trans-boundary trade, and roughly another third is attributable to trade between TNCs and related parties.20 Because the global economy now systematically encourages trade, transport and shipping activity have increased. More energy is expended now than ever before to moving supplies and nal products, in faster rates and longer distances. Consider food. In the United States, it is calculated that transporting food accounts for 20% of all domestic transport of commodities, resulting in 120Mt (million tons) of CO2 emissions. Another 120Mt of CO2 come from the import and export of food. This does not include CO2 produced in transporting inputs to industrial farms, transporting plastic and paper to packaging sites, and moving consumers to their supermarkets. Food processing, freezing, and packaging account for around 20% of the energy consumed in the US food system.21 More wastage comes into sight when we consider how much of the trade ows are redundant. Identical products of almost similar quantities are simultaneously being shipped in and out of countries. For instance, the US imports almonds from such countries as Turkey, Germany, and China, despite being the worlds largest almond grower.22 China is a top citrus and grape producer, but still imports the same commodities from California.23 In 2004, the United Kingdom imported 1.5 million kilos of potatoes from Germany, only to send them 1.5 million kilos of the same crop; imported 10.2 million kilos of milk and cream from France, and exported 9.9 million kilos of the same; imported 20 tons of butter from the US, and sent them 34 tons of the same; imported 44,000 tons of frozen boneless chicken cuts, and exported 51,000 tons of fresh boneless chicken cuts.24

in the atmosphere since 1950 even as their combined population is less than 15 % of the world. The wealthy group of countries belonging to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) contributed 60 % of cumulative CO2 emissions since 1950 and more than three times as much as the world average on a per capita basis. This even understates the share of the advanced industrialized countries because the current ofcial CO2 accounting framework followed by the UNFCCC ascribes all GHG emissions to the country where these were generated regardless of whether the associated output produced is for local consumption or for export.25 So the GHG emissions generated by a European TNC that operates a manufacturing plant in China that exports all of its output to the US, Japan and/

23

or back to the EU would be counted entirely as GHG emissions from China. Dieter Helm, Professor of Energy Policy at Oxford University, estimates that if this carbon outsourcing is factored back in, the UKs impressive emissions cuts over the past two decades dont look so impressive anymore. Rather than falling by over 15 % since 1990, they actually rose by around 19 %.26
Table 4. Cumulative CO2 Emissions (energy) from top 20 emitting countries, 1950-2004 Country/ Economy United States of America China Russian Federation Germany Japan United Kingdom India Ukraine France Canada Poland Italy South Africa Mexico Australia Kazakhstan Spain Korea (South) Brazil Iran Memo items Top 25 Emitters G8 European Union (25) OECD World 759,473.10 501,118.30 191,770.00 526,871.60 887,716.00 85.55% 56.45% 21.67% 59.35% 100.00% 193.4 583.8 418.3 454.5 140.2 Million metric tons (MtCO2) 236,064.70 87,444.30 83,565.60 50,802.40 42,696.20 31,974.20 22,918.40 21,252.30 20,252.30 19,562.60 17,072.00 16,200.30 11,770.20 10,985.00 10,568.50 9,271.80 9,008.40 8,888.10 8,794.70 7,460.20 Rank 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 Share of World Cumulative share Total of World Total 26.67% 9.88% 9.44% 5.74% 4.82% 3.61% 2.59% 2.40% 2.29% 2.21% 1.93% 1.83% 1.33% 1.24% 1.19% 1.05% 1.02% 1.00% 0.99% 0.84% 26.67% 36.55% 45.99% 51.73% 56.55% 60.16% 62.75% 65.15% 67.44% 69.65% 71.58% 73.41% 74.74% 75.98% 77.17% 78.22% 79.24% 80.24% 81.23% 82.07% Tons CO2 Per Person 803.9 67.5 580.9 615.7 334.2 534.4 21.2 448 334.6 611.5 447.1 278.5 253.9 107.6 526 617.6 211 184.9 47.8 110.8 Rank 2 91 12 9 32 13 123 18 31 10 19 39 45 78 14 7 52 58 99 75

Source: Climate Analysis Indicators Tool (CAIT) Version 5.0. (Washington, DC: World Resources Institute, 2008).

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PART 2
Market-based and prot-oriented false solutions

While many corporations, and most governments, and international nancial institutions do acknowledge the gravity and urgency of the climate crisis, the solutions they offer fall far short of delivering the far-reaching changes that are necessary to transition away from fossil-fuel dependence and towards a sustainable development path. Business leaders and policy-makers prefer to promote technological solutions (such as nuclear energy, biofuels, carbon capture and storage, genetically climate-readied crops, geoengineering, etc.) and market mechanisms (such as carbon-trading , and carbon offsets) because these do not seriously threaten their bottomlines, at least within the forecasting horizons of corporate boardrooms. But these maintain the unjust and unsustainable corporate-led and prot-centered economic system that ultimately engenders this crisis. Indeed, these false solutions may even make things worse as they pose threats to the health, security, and livelihood of local and indigenous communities.

What is wrong with carbon trading and offsetting? Carbon trading, also called cap-and-trade, is essentially the trading of rights or permits to dump GHGs into the atmosphere. The system starts with governments setting mandatory caps on the overall quantity of CO2 that emitters (countries or companies) are allowed to emit. The capped emissions are then allocated among emitters, each one receiving an emissions allowance. Authorities then issue emitters an equivalent number of permits, representing their right to emit within their allowance. Finally, emitters trade the permits among themselves. In theory, the supply of carbon permits will drop progressively, making them scarcer and more expensive, while at the same time forcing a reduction in the overall level of emissions. The cap part of the equation sets a legal limit on levels of allowable emissions within a given period. The trade part of the equation does not actually reduce emissions. Instead of making each polluter implement measures to actually reduce their emissions, trading gives polluters that presumably face high mitigation costs the exibility to simply buy the spare permits of those who are able to reduce their emissions more cheaply. Companies that

25

want to keep on polluting save money, while those that reduce emissions beyond their legal requirements to do so prot by selling excess permits. The principle is that trading allows for overall economy-wide emissions reductions costs to be reduced to a minimum. Another exibility that carbon trading schemes afford polluters is carbon offsetting. Under offsetting arrangements, emitters who are subject to emissions caps fund cheaper GHG-saving projects elsewhere. Most offsetting projects take place in the South where mitigation actions are thought to be cheaper than domestic actions. Offset project types include forestry projects that trap carbon; GHG capture and destruction; energy efciency; and renewable energy. Funding for these projects ostensibly help poor countries develop along low-carbon pathways. Offset projects earn carbon credits, which are equivalent to the amount of GHG emissions saved, removed, or avoided by the project than would have been emitted in the projects absence. Emitters can use these credits to offset their emissions in order to stay within their allowances, or trade them with other polluters looking to offset their emissions. The main problem with carbon trading is that it provides a mechanism for the polluting sectors of the economy to delay the immediate, drastic, and necessarily costly steps that need to be taken in order to transition into a sustainable, non-fossil fuel future. The existence of the least-cost option that carbon trading and offsetting provides (purchasing cheap emissions permits backed by easy emissions reductions that do little to overcome fossil fuel dependence) eases the pressure on societies especially of the North to make the necessary adjustments on the way their economies operate. Carbon trading is, by design, not even primarily concerned with reducing emissions, which direct government regulation without any trading could well achieve. It is mainly about giving polluters a legitimate way to comply with their emissions obligations in the cheapest or most protable manner. Carbon trading does this by treating different kinds of emissions and emissions reductions done anywhere, in whatever economic sector or country, at whatever cost and whatever manneras equivalent and therefore tradable. As Larry Lohmann puts it, Abstracting from place, technology and history, carbon trading achieves its economies by putting off technological change and investment in a long-term non-fossil future. It confuses investment in the sense of short-term money-making venture with investment in the sense of foundation for a secure future.27 For governments and large corporations, mainly of the North, the appeal of carbon trading is that they give the appearance of addressing climate change but do not mandate an immediate start to structural change in existing energy practice, production or consumption patterns.28

26
Box 3. CDM in China Back in November 2008, International Rivers conducted an investigation of the site of the Xiaoxi Dam on the Zishui River in China. Their research documented a long series of problems, including the forced eviction of 7,500 people, the failure to restore pre-eviction incomes, arbitrary and inadequate compensation for displaced villagers, no legal recourse for those suffering losses, and a biased Environmental Impact Assessment process. As one evicted villager described it, Nobody asked if we wanted to move The government just posted a notice that said, Your home will be demolished. Adding insult to injury, the dam received carbon offsets that would allow German company RWE, located 7,500 kilometers away, to build more dirty coal plants in Europe. Thats because Xiaoxi is part of the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), a controversial program set up under the Kyoto Protocol that allows developed countries like Germany to offset their emissions reductions through carbon credits purchased from projects in developing countries. RWE is one of the biggest CO2 emitters in Europe and intends to buy CDM credits from Xiaoxi so that it can legally meet its emission reduction commitments while continuing to expand its coal-red electricity generation. RWE is legally allowed to emit 450,000 tons of greenhouse gases above their emission reduction targets each year, thanks to the Xiaoxi credits. Altogether, RWE intends to buy 14 million credits by 2012 from 41 projects. These would allow RWE to emit 14 million metric tonnes of emissions above its legal target more than 1% of Germanys annual emissions. As of October, China has at least 910 hydro projects in the CDM approval pipeline and is adding an average of 25 a month. By 2012, those projects alone are expected to generate more than 300 million certied emission reductions, each supposedly representing the reduction of one tonne of carbon dioxide. Those credits would be worth billions of dollars. From: Katy Yan, Chinese Dams Under Fire, But Germany in the Hot Seat, World Rivers Review, December 2009, 11.

Carbon trading also locks in Southern societies to unsustainable pathways through carbon offsetting projects. Many of the GHG-saving projects in the South that receive funding from offset credit purchases involve large polluting corporations making minor technical adjustments to their operations. For instance, over 200 million carbon offset credits or Certicate of Emissions Reductions (CERs)54% of all CERs issued so farare due to projects that destroy hydrouorocarbon (HFC) emissions.29 Because HFC has a warming potential 11,700 times that of CO2, a single ton of HFC reduction is equivalent to 11,700 offset credits. Just over 40,000 tons of HFC emissions have to be avoided in order to produce 200 million offset credits, which is enough to offset nearly all of the Netherlands 2006 CO2 emissions.30 However, HFCs are easy to burn or capture through low-cost measures. Destroying the HFCs requires a simple and relatively cheap piece of equipment called a scrubber. Many US and European manufacturers voluntarily eliminated their HFC emissions in the 1990s. The potential windfall prots from destroying HFC using offset credit revenues may be large enough to dwarf earnings from selling actual products. This gives industrial

27

gas manufacturers in the South a perverse incentive to increase their production of refrigerants in order to generate more HFCs to be destroyed and earn more CERs. Offsetting also funds similar non-transformative projects such as monoculture tree plantations, hydroelectric dams, and methane-burning from waste dumps or factory farms. Currently, there are proposals to allow emissions reductions achieved from other projects to be eligible for offset funding. These include carbon capture and storage, biochar, agrofuels, nuclear energy, and ocean fertilization, which are similarly non-solutions to the root causes of climate change. In many cases, industrial or energy units that receive offset funding have impacted surrounding communities through displacement and repression (see Box 3).

What is wrong with carbon capture and storage (CCS)? Carbon capture and storage (CCS) is a mitigation technology based on capturing CO2 emissions from fossil fuel use, transporting them, and injecting them into geologic formations deep underground for long-term or permanent storage. CCS is primarily considered for coal power plants. While the component technologies are currently deployed on industrial scales, CCS has not yet been deployed at a commercial-scale coal power plant. It is unclear that it will work or that it will be commercially viable in time to have a signicant impact on the mitigation of climate change. Even proponents recognize that CCS is unlikely to be widely operational until at least 2030, too late if we were to avert climate catastrophe. CCS is quite different from other mitigation strategies in one respect. It is not an attempt to wean society away from fossil fuel use. It assumes that we can keep on burning fossil fuels or even expand their use by being able to bury CO2 safely. But safety is a serious issue for CCS. It is reasonable to assume that some CO2 will leak, either from the storage sites underground or from the pipelines through which the gas is moved. If CCS were to become the main route of CO2 reductions, thousands of people may in the future nd themselves sitting on a giant bubble of CO2. This would be a hazard because CO2 at high concentrations is an asphyxiant. CO2 can escape through cracks and faults underground and pool in unforeseen locations. An earthquake strong enough to shake the CO2 loose or cause pipeline failure could trigger the sudden release of large amounts of CO2. This could result in the immediate death of both people and animals living close by. The sustainability of CCS is also suspect. In the US, the storage wells that are

28

needed to be drilled annually in order to bury all the countrys additional CO2 emissions and keep them at 2005 levels exceeds the rate by which new oil and gas wells are currently being drilled by a factor of seven (300,000, compared to 40,000).31 Construction costs alone could well exceed $3 trillion by 2030. This is not to mention the energy costs entailed in mounting such an effort, as well as the monetary and energy costs needed to maintain and constantly monitor CCS installations to avoid leakages. All told, CCS is too costly for a strategy that is unsafe, and that encourages our dependency on fossil fuels and centralized energy systems.

What is wrong with nuclear energy, megadams, and agrofuels? Nuclear energy Currently, there are more than 400 commercial power-generating reactors operating worldwide, with about a quarter in the US. Collectively they produce about 6% the worlds energy supply, and 15% of its electricity. Nuclear energy is presented as a clean stand-in for fossil fuel energy since it does not emit CO2 to generate electricity. In reality, only reactor-operation is CO2-free. But vast energy supplies are consumed in every other stage of the process. Nuclear plants have to be constructed; uranium has to be mined, milled, fabricated, enriched, and transported; nuclear waste has to be stored; and eventually the plant has to be decommissioned. All these actions consume fossil fuel energy and produce carbon emissions. The mining for uranium, the fuel for the nuclear cycle, occurs largely in vast open-cast pits. Most uranium mining is volume-intensive. About 1,000 tons of typical-grade uranium ore needs to be crushed in order to produce just one ton of useful fuel. The other 999 tons of radioactive rock is left in the environment where its radioactive particles are free to leach out. Mining also entails the production of large amounts of tailings100 to 1,000 times the amount of the actual uranium extracted. Like fossil fuels, uranium is a not a renewable resource. Uranium production is likely to peak in the next 30 to 40 years, which means we can expect nuclear fuel to become more expensive and scarce in the coming decades. Already, the best reserves have been depleted, as evidenced by the signicant decline in the average grade of uranium ore mined in recent years. It is possible to recycle the fuel and employ alternatives to uranium, but the technology to do this has not yet been developed. Constructing and operating nuclear power plants are extremely costly, and take far longer to build than most other energy sourcesso much so that only with taxpayer money (through government subsidies) covering initial costs is nuclear

29

power at all an energy option. Lifecycle monetary and energy costs include waste disposal, storage, and plant decommissioning.

Megadams Hydropower currently supplies of 19-20% electricity worldwide, with 15% coming from large hydropower. This represents 6% of the global energy supply.32 It is the most widely used form of renewable energy. Hydropower relies on the potential energy stored in water kept behind dams to generate electricity. Because hydroelectric dams produce signicant amounts of energy without burning fossil fuels, they are seen as viable alternatives to fossil-powered plants. However, hydroelectric dams, especially the large ones, still have signicant negative ecological and social impacts. Dams kill ecosystems by ooding hundreds or thousands of hectares of forest. The decomposition of trees and other ooded organic material produces GHGs, especially methane (CH4), a GHG twenty-one times more potent than CO2. The GHGs are released when water is discharged through spillways or through bubbles that bubble up from the reservoir bottom. Seasonal changes in water depth mean there is a continuous supply of decaying material. In the dry season, plants grow on the banks of the reservoir as the water retreats, only to be submerged again when the water level rises. It is reported that dam reservoirs worldwide release up to 70 million tons of CH4 and around 1 billion tons of CO2 annually. This is equivalent to about 20% of total anthropogenic CH4 emissions and 4% of anthropogenic CO2 emissions. Further, it is calculated that on average, hydro emissions from reservoirs located in the tropics produce 200-3,000 gCO2-eq/kWh (grams of CO2-equivalent per kilowatthour). By comparison, a coal-red power plant releases 1,000 gCO2-eq/kWh.33 The ooding of upstream habitat due to dam construction kills not only plants but also communities. Large dam and reservoir construction have physically displaced about 40 to 80 million people worldwide, most of whom have never regained their former livelihoods. In many cases, communities that resist are brutally-evicted by government force. While dams have improved energy access especially in developing countries, their benets have mostly accrued to foreign corporations in need of increased and constant energy supply. The marginal benets they provide the poorsuch as power, and water for drinking or irrigationwhenever present, hardly justify the social costs they exact on upland and upstream communities.

Agrofuels Agrofuels are liquid fuels manufactured from plants grown in large-scale monoculture crop plantations. Ethanol and biodiesel are two main types of agrofuels.

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Ethanol can be manufactured mainly from crops with high sugar content such as sugarcane, and crops with rich starch content, such as corn. Biodiesel comes from oil crops, such as rapeseed, palm, soybean, and jatropha. The surge in demand for these plant-based fuels have been triggered by Northern governmentssuch as in the European Union and the USsetting targets for blending agrofuels with conventional gasoline for running their cars. Ethanol production has seen a high annual growth rate of 15% between 2000 and 2006. In 2008, over 17 billion gallons of ethanol were produced globally, of which the US and Brazil accounted for 89%. Biodesel production meanwhile has been growing 40% per year between 2002 and 2007. Total biodiesel production in 2006 was 5-6 million tons. There are many problems associated with agrofuels. First is the fact that they are produced to power technologies, most notably automobiles, designed to run on fossil fuels. This means they are giving these fossil fuel technologies and the associated infrastructure (e.g. the transportation system, described above) a new lease on life, instead of being replaced altogether. Auto manufacturers now produce cars whose engines can run on a blend of agrofuels and gasoline. Second is that it requires vast tracts of land to grow the feedstock necessary to produce agrofuels at a scale that could even slightly dent the dominance of conventional fossil fuels. One reason is that agrofuels are a poor substitute for liquid fossil fuels. They contain only a fraction of the energy stored in gasoline or crude oil, such that agrofuels have to be consumed in larger amounts in order to produce the same amount of energy from fossil sources.34 Consequently, they will have to be grown more extensively. Consider the following. It is estimated that even if the US used all the corn it grows to produce ethanol with nothing left for food or animal feeds, ethanol would only displace 15% of the domestic gasoline demand.35 Similarly, if the UK decided to use all its land to produce rapeseed biodiesel and corn bioethanol equivalent to its current diesel and petrol energy use, it would need land the size of around one and a half UKs (36 million hectares). Finally, if bioethanol were to displace global petrol production by just 10%, Brazil would have to increase its ethanol production by a factor of 40, which would result in the destruction of around 35% of the remaining Amazon rainforest.36 Increased deforestation, and the diversion of grain and arable land from food to agrofuel production, especially in the South, are direct consequences of growing agrofuel production. The spike in grain prices and the resulting food shortages in the 2007-2008 are widely attributed to the expansion of agrofuel production. The expansion of palm oil plantations is a main driver of deforestation in Indonesia and Malaysia. In Brazil, the expansion of sugarcane and soy plantations encourage deforestation, both in the Amazon and its Atlantic coastal forests. A third problem is that agrofuels are produced through industrial agriculture.

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As discussed above (see Agricultural and Food System), industrial agriculture produces GHG emissions due to extensive fossil fuel, chemical use, as well as deforestation. GHG emissions produced during the lifecycle of an agrofuel far outweigh its mitigation contributions as a fossil fuel substitute. Deforestation for ethanol production alone causes the release of CO2 17 to 420 times greater than the CO2 saved by the displacement of fossil fuels. Further, it is estimated that it will take 100 years for the climate benets of biodiesel production from each acre of land to make up for the CO2 emissions from losing the rainforest. Another study found that making corn ethanol requires 29% more fossil fuel than the net energy produced, and that making biodiesel from soy results in a net energy loss of 27% (more energy expended than created).37

What is wrong with geongineering? Geoengineering refers to the intentional, large-scale human intervention in the environment to counteract global warming and climate change. It is a techno-x
Table 5. Some SRM Geoengineering Technologies Geoengineering Technology Description Pumping aerosolized sulfates into the stratosphere to block sunlight, thereby lowering the Earths temperature. This has no effect on the level of GHGs in atmosphere. Trillions of small, free-ying spacecrafts would be launched a million miles above the Earth to form a cylindrical cloud 60,000 miles long, aligned with the orbit of the sun, which should divert about 10% of sunlight away from the planet. Putting a superne reective mesh of aluminum threads between the Earth and the sun. Countries of Key Researcher/ Advocate

Aerosolized sulfates in the stratosphere

Germany, Russia, USA

Space sunshades

USA

Space mirrors

USA

Cloud whitening

Spraying seawater into clouds to increase their condensation nuclei; the clouds will UK be whiter and will reect more of the sunlight away from Earth. Covering large expanses of deserts with reective sheets to reect sunlight away from the Earth. USA

Desert covering

Arctic ice covering

Covering snowpack or glaciers in the Arctic with insulating material or a nano-lm USA to reect sunlight and prevent melting.

Source: Diana Bronson, Pat Mooney, and Kathy Jo Wetter, Retooling the Planet? Climate Chaos in the Geoengineering Age (Stockholm: Swedish Society for Nature Conservation, 2009), 19-20.

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to problems that result from human activities. Geoengineering schemes include shooting sulfates into the stratosphere to reect the suns energy back into space; pouring iron and other nutrients in the oceans to grow CO2-absorbing plankton populations; whitening clouds by spraying seawater on them; and engineering climate-ready crops that have reective leaves. There are two main geoengineering approaches. They are solar radiation management (SRM), and carbon dioxide removal (CDR). SRM techniques focus on countering global warming by reducing the radiation absorbed by the Earth and increasing the radiation of sunlight back into space. SRM technologies do not seek to address, much less stop, the unsustainable increase of GHGs in the atmosphere. They are only intended to counter its warming effect. By not even requiring absolute reductions in GHG emissions, SRM interventions are non-solutions. Further, because they focus only on reducing or reecting the suns heat, their sudden removal or malfunctioning would lead to drastic and quick temperature increases. As much as 2-4C in temperature change per decade could occur if SRM interventions terminated abruptly, in the context of CO2 concentrations that was left to increase.38 Another blind spot in SRM interventions is the problem of ocean acidication. Theoretically, with SRM technologies, atmospheric GHGs can increase without the commensurate temperature rise. But oceans will continue to absorb more CO2 from the atmosphere as a result of the increased CO2. When oceans absorb CO2, they become acidic. Ocean acidication causes coral bleaching and other negative effects. CDR interventions are geoengineering schemes that seek to remove or sequester CO2 from the atmosphere through the use of mechanical devices, or the manipulation of carbon sinks in order to increase their CO2 absorption. Most CDR schemes involve modifying complex ecosystems which are likely to cause unpredictable side effects. Many of these techniques require extensive access to land and oceans, and changes in the way they are used. This can affect poor and marginalized people who depend on them for livelihood. Both CDR and SRM are relatively under researched technologies. Specically with respect to SRM, there has been limited consideration in these proposals on the impact of continued increases in CO2. To date, no large-scale geoengineering projects have been undertaken. Most technologies still do not exist. But conservative scientic and political circles from the North are already warming up to the idea. Ocean iron fertilization is at an advanced stage of research, with small-scale research trials and global modelling having been completed. Only the worlds richest countries and corporations can mobilize the nancial and technological resources to research, develop, and deploy such planet-scale

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schemes. It is likely that the major geoengineering players of the future will be the same energy, chemical, forestry, and agribusiness corporations that are in the forefront of climate change in the rst place. Research and implementation of some geoengineering interventions require the use of commons, such as the atmosphere and oceans. This means adverse effects will be trans-boundary. This may also mean that decisions over how these commons are used are handed over to geoengineering companies. For instance, a patent granted to the CEO of the company Ocean Nourishment Corporation grants him legal ownership over any sh caught from that patch of the ocean where his sh-attracting method of dumping urea for fertilization was used.39 Moreover, if geoengineering schemes that require the extensive use of land and seawater were made eligible to receive offset funding, companies will have the incentive to effectively enclose these resources and subordinate their other ecological functionse.g. as sources of food and livelihood for peopleto their prot-making functions as emissions offsetters or sinks.
Table 6. Some CDR Geoengineering Technologies Geoengineering technology Description Adding nutrients to ocean water to stimulate the growth of CO2 -absorbing phytoplankton to promote carbon ocean sequestration of CO2. Using pipes to bring up nitrogen or phosphorous enriched seawater to the surface to cool surface waters and enhance ocean sequestration of CO2. Increasing alkalinity to promote carbon ocean sequestration of CO2. Burning biomass through pyrolisis (in low oxygen environments so carbon is not released) and burying the concentrated carbon in the soil. Countries of Major Researcher/ Advocate Australia, India, USA

Ocean fertilization with iron or nitrogen

Ocean upwelling or downwelling enhancement Adding carbonate to the ocean

UK

Australia, UK New Zealand, UK, USA

Biochar

Carbon sucking machines

Extracting CO2 from the air by using liquid sodium hydroxide, which is convertCanada, UK, USA ed to sodium carbonate, then extracting the CO2 in solid form to be buried. Engineering communities of synthetic microbes and algae to sequester higher levels of carbon dioxide, either for altering ocean communities or for use in closed ponds

Genetically engineered algae and marine microbes

USA

Source: Diana Bronson, Pat Mooney, and Kathy Jo Wetter, Retooling the Planet? Climate Chaos in the Geoengineering Age (Stockholm: Swedish Society for Nature Conservation, 2009), 21-22.

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PART 3
The Way Out: Building sustainable and equitable societies

What is sustainable human development? Human development is about enhancing the quality of peoples lives and enlarging peoples choices. This has numerous dimensions including greater access to knowledge, better nutrition and health services, more secure livelihoods, greater security against crime and physical violence, more satisfying leisure hours, greater political and cultural freedoms, stronger sense of community and more meaningful participation in decision-making. In the words of Mahbub ul Haq, Founder of the UN Human Development Report, The objective of development is to create an enabling environment for people to enjoy long, healthy and creative lives.40 The Declaration on the Right to Development denes such right as an inalienable human right by virtue of which every human person and all peoples are entitled to participate in, contribute to, and enjoy economic, social, cultural and political development, in which all human rights and fundamental freedoms can be fully realized.41 The Right to Development includes: full sovereignty over natural resources self-determination popular participation in development equality of opportunity the creation of favourable conditions for the enjoyment of other civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights. The most frequently quoted denition of sustainable development is from the Brundtland Report, entitled Our Common Future:42 Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. It contains within it two key concepts:

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the concept of needs, in particular the essential needs of the worlds poor, to which overriding priority should be given; and the idea of limitations imposed by the state of technology and social organization on the environments ability to meet present and future needs. However, the universal measure of progress used by policy makers throughout the world is growth in Gross Domestic Product (GDP). This measures the increase in the total market value of goods and services produced in society but is treated by economists and government ofcials as if this necessarily reected improvements in peoples well-being. So for example, higher medical costs due to rising incidence of respiratory infections associated with pollution are considered positive contributions to GDP . As with the cost of cleaning up toxic spills, the production of weapons of mass destruction, and so on. Neither does GDP capture environmental degradation and the depletion of natural resources such land, as mineral and other subsoil assets, timber, and nontimber forest resources, marine resources; and the disruption of vital ecosystem services such as the water cycle, the carbon cycle, and the climate. These are obviously vital for the well-being of people today and well into the future. GDP also takes no account of intangible assets (e.g. trust among people), institutions (e.g. effective government, civil society), relationships (kinship networks, friends), or goods and services that are not bought and sold in the market (such as womens care work). These are all immeasurably valuable to people and vital to the healthy functioning of society. GDP (even GDP per capita) also fails to capture the adverse implications of social inequalities on society as a whole, not just on the poor. For instance a recent study by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett43 shows that highly unequal societies have higher incidence of drug abuse, alcohol abuse, obesity, mental problems, teenage pregnancy, violent crime and suicide rates, lower literacy and shorter life expectancynot just among the lower income groups but across income levels. This is because, according to the authors conclusion, inequality erodes social solidarity and breeds stress across the full spectrum of society, not just among those at the lower rungs. So the obsession with growth in marketable goods and services under the dominant economic paradigm not only fails to improve peoples well-being in all its interrelated dimensions, it is actually anathema to sustainable human development. This is because the unbridled expansion in the production and consumption of commodities is now resulting in resource depletion and environmental degradation (as discussed in Part 1). Moreover, in their insatiable drive for more prots and capital accumulation, the corporate giants who control the economic and political levers of society today are unrelenting in their attempts to lower wages, speed up work, extend working

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hours without raising pay, replace workers with technology, and prevent workers attempts at organizing themselves to ght for higher wages and better conditions. This is why even in the richest countries in the world, workers who depend on wages for their keep have been buried deep in debt in order to maintain their levels of consumption. Competition among global corporations and rich nations for resources and greater market shares have led to the colonial and neocolonial subjugation of Southern peoples. Imperialist states have plundered the natural resources and exploited the people of the third world since colonial times, and have used up a much greater share of the global commons than poorer countries. In short, the process of wealth expansion for the global elites in the current economic system means the deprivation and dispossession of the mass of humanity in the global South as well as the steady erosion of working and living conditions for the majority of the working population in the North. In contrast, sustainable human development emphasizes interconnectedness of people in society, both in space and in time, between people and nature, between economic production and social organization. The focus is on raising the quality of life for all, not just the quantity of consumption or material wealth for a few.

Does sustainable human development require de-growth and de-industrialization? In poor and underdeveloped countries of the South, only a tiny minority of the populations enjoy material standards of living comparable to that of middle or upper classes in the North. But the vast majorityin their billionssuffer the dehumanizing conditions of poverty, hunger, unemployment, homelessness, lack of access to essential services, insecurity, and violence. So while unbridled growth, reckless industrialization, and mindless consumerism drive climate change, underdeveloped countries are still confronted with the challenge of developing their productive forces in order to provide the material conditions for meeting the basic needs of their populations without remaining dependent on foreign capital and imports. Poor countries need to develop agricultural production to feed the population, produce raw materials and inputs for industry, employ vast swathes of the population, and generate surplus for reinvestment. They need to develop industries for the processing and manufacture of food, clothing, medicine, books and other consumption goods as well as machinery and equipment for transportation, communications, construction and water, energy, and other utilities. This will also employ vast numbers of people, develop the scientic and technical skills of the population, spur more innovation, and help accelerate economic development overall. Even the provision of essential services such as health, education,

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housing, and so on are co-dependent on the development of agriculture and industry. In other words, the economic development of poor countries entails increasing levels of production and consumption compared to the present. This would necessarily impact on the natural environment. This does not mean, however, that poor countries should renounce growth and industrialization. Rather, what poor countries need to undertake is a different kind of economic development. Not the kind of development based on corporate free trade, liberalization of investments, privatization of the natural and public commons, deregulation, and export-oriented productionall of which merely serve to increase the size and power of global corporations. Poor countries need to follow an alternative development path that is not based on the exploitation of people and the exhaustion of the planet (this shall be discussed further below). On the other hand, in the advanced industrialized countries, economic development has reached the point where production and consumption levels can more than meet the needs of the entire population. The fact that a large part of the population in the North is unemployed or underemployed and denied access to quality education, health care, housing and other basic needs attests to the irrational distribution of resources in these countries rather than low productive capacity. In fact, overproduction and overconsumption is a real problem in this context. For instance, in a study of economic and social indicators in 20 wealthy economies, Wilkinson and Pickett found that measures of well-being or happiness no longer rise with economic growth. In fact some indicators such as rates of depression and anxiety have risen over the last fty years or so. The authors conclude that as personal levels of consumption and material accumulation increase beyond an approximate level of satisfactory comfort and security, a sense of happiness and well being does not steadily advance at the same rate and may in fact diminish because of increased levels of stress. As another analyst puts it, For societies that now adhere to the media-hyped images of the good life based on hyper consumption of commodities, new strategies for the use of less resources, less accumulation, and more modest standards of living also become arguments for greater personal fulllment, less stress, more time for family, friendship, nature, creativity, recreation, and leisure which are all now in short supply. Truly, among presently over-consuming societies, less would be more. 44 In the Wilkinson and Pickett study, they found that among rich countries, greater equality is the key to improvements in the quality of life rather than more economic growth. One clear implication is that in the advanced industrialized countries, sustainable human development necessitates a major redistribution of resources both within these countries and towards the less developed countries of the South.

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What are the fundamental requirements for shifting towards sustainable human development? First, there is a need to democratize ownership and control over productive resources. Second, there is a need to democratize decision-making and governance. And third, there is a need to rethink our relationship to nature. These are all interrelated and inseparable requirements for shifting towards the path of sustainable human development.

Democratizing ownership and control over productive resources At present, the richest 1% in the world own 40% of all land, physical properties and nancial assets in the planet. The richest 2% own 51%, while the poorest half of world population own barely 1% of global wealth. By virtue of their control over key productive resources, the global elites are able to determine patterns of production and distribution in the world. But the interests of these captains of industries are not the same as the public interest. Indeed, under this system, the production of goods and services is not intended to fulll basic human necessities and improve human welfare but to generate prot for their businesses and to further accumulate capital. To shift to sustainable human development therefore requires the redistribution of productive resources and environmental space within and between countries to ensure that the needs of all, especially the poor and marginalized, are met without breaching ecological limits. The range of property rights regimes must move decisively away from an overwhelming emphasis on private property rights towards more democratic, cooperative, and community-based forms of property ownership and control. This will restore peoples sovereign control over the resources that they need for collective survival and development. In agriculture this means breaking the monopoly control of agribusiness corporations and landlords over land, water, seed, energy sources, and other inputs and productive assets. These must be redistributed to those whose livelihood depend on these resources. The primary beneciaries of such reforms should be small producers particularly women and other marginalized sectors. Egalitarian and cooperative land tenure and land use systems should also be promoted to ensure the collective control and ecologically sustainable use of land, water, forest and marine resources by farmers, shers and local communities. Given secure land tenure, farmers can better take care of the land, conserving biodiversity and protecting the long-term health of soils. Irrigation and other support infrastructure must also be assured. Food production must be primarily geared towards meeting the needs of local communities. Access to food must be premised on the absolute right to food of

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every personfood that is nutritious, safe, culturally appropriate, and affordable. The realization of this right must not be contingent on the purchasing power of consumers. Without the monopoly control of agri-TNCs, it would be easier to depart from a prot-oriented system of global food production and industrial agriculture towards diversied and ecologically-sound agricultural production that prioritizes achieving food security and self-sufciency, creating rural employment and meeting the demands of domestic industries and households. Likewise, the grip of giant corporations on the social infrastructure of industry, energy, transportation, trade and the whole economy must be dismantled. The energy sectorfrom sourcing to production to distributionshould be based principally on public ownership. This would allow the public to exercise democratic control over the overhauling of existing fossil-fuel based and other largescale energy systemssuch as nuclear and hydro powertowards sustainable, renewable, and scaled-down energy systems. Communities can choose from a blend of renewable energy sources such as solar, wind, geothermal, mini-hydro, wave, and biomass; while promoting less consumption and more energy efciency. Public ownership will also be the basis for promoting mass transportation systems, such as light and high-speed rail systems. Failing giant car companies should be taken over immediately by the state and the entire transport sector should be regulated to discourage resource-inefcient private motor vehicles. This will help decongest roads, improve health, and of course lower carbon emissions. The nance sector is another strategic sector that must be placed under public control. This will help stamp out nancial speculation and re-subordinate nance to the needs of the real economy. By socializing banking, nancial resources may be redirected towards investments in renewable energy, public transportation, sustainable agriculture, low-carbon industrial production, energy-efcient urban systems and recycling. At the international level, sustainable human development requires the equitable reallocation of global resources through payment of reparations for past imperialist plunder and inequities in resource use that underlie present economic disparities between nations. Transnational corporations and unaccountable global bureaucracies such as the WTO and international nancial institutions should be disempowered. Neoliberal globalization policies that promote corporate interests and reinforce unjust economic relations between countries should be reversed. This would also reverse the Northward ows of Southern wealth through unfair trade, debt, and investment transactions. Patents on commercial technologies that prevent the more rapid and widespread restructuring of energy, manufacturing, transport, agricultural and urban sys-

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tems towards low-carbon systems should be removed. This should go along with the removal of trade rules that prevent the transfer of such low-carbon technologies to developing countries. Environmental resources, such as the atmosphere, lands, forests, and their carbon-cycling services, should be respected as commons that enable everyones capacity to live, and therefore may not be abused or appropriated.

Democratizing decision-making and social planning On the basis of public, cooperative, and community-based forms of ownership, participatory and inclusive modes of planning and decision making will help ensure that the economy is geared towards meeting broader social goals such as employment, health, education, food security, and ecological sustainability. This will reorient the economic system away from its current pre-occupation with private accumulation of wealth and wasteful competition. The locus of decision-making should be devolved to the lowest level of government with the competence to deal with the issues concernedas close as possible to the people most affected. This encourages citizen participation and discourages bureaucratism. Participatory social planning can better regulate and allocate the use of resources to avoid unproductive, resource-wasteful, and socially or ecologically harmful activities. Through it the economy can be directed towards achieving self-reliance; prioritizing domestic demand and local consumption over international trade and export markets; increasing public welfare, creating jobs, and sustaining livelihoods while minimizing energy, resource use, and waste in the process. Enterprises should be rooted in communities. Food production must be decentralized and located as close to local population centers as possible. Doing so would obviate the need to maintain the long chain of fossil-fueled processes (food manufacturing, packaging, and transportation) that stand between the food and end consumers. Farms and factories should be managed by workers and the communities they serve rather than distant shareholders removed from local conditions. Work should be valued and rewarded accordingly while the workweek may be shortened as warranted by levels of productivity. Without the necessity to accumulate and grow production limitlessly, and with the benets of production more equally distributed in society, the economy demands less time from workers to spend in the workplace. Paid work hours can be more evenly distributed among the people in order to address unemployment and allow people to spend more time on recreation, culture, discourse, and building relationships. Social planning at multiple levels can help improve cooperation among enter-

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prises within and between sectors, localities, and regions. This can help reverse urban sprawl and urban congestion by promoting diversication, decentralization and a more even development between regions and between urban and rural areas. At the international level, new cooperative institutions and arrangements between countries, and regions are also necessary for the responsible stewardship, conservation, and equitable and sustainable use of global and trans-boundary commons and resources such as the atmosphere, oceans, forests, river systems, and so on. These institutions should be based on principles of equity and solidarity among nations.

Rethinking the nexus between society and nature With the reality of climate change and ecological crisis now looming in our consciousness, it should be easier to acknowledge that humanity is part of both society and nature, and that the economy is embedded in ecology. This means fostering greater concern and sensitivity to the ecological consequences of human activities rather than regarding nature as an inexhaustible source of materials for human consumption and a bottomless sink for waste. This can be done by investing more public resources into public education and cultural institutions that reclaim peoples aspirations lost to individualism and consumerism, and instill ideals that value community, solidarity, diversity and respect for nature. Modern science should be combined with traditional knowledge and practices of indigenous peoples and other communities to help people achieve greater understanding of the metabolic relationship between social systems and ecological systems. Science, education, research and development should be re-oriented to remove the bias in knowledge production for commercially protable proprietary technologies. Open and collaborative research and development of new technologies should be encouraged and supported. Agricultural production should be weaned away from chemical-intensive, largescale industrial monoculture farming towards ecologically sound, sustainable methods of production which rely on local ecosystems and traditional knowledge as well as appropriate farmer-controlled technologies. Public institutions must help develop and encourage the adoption of crops and farming methods that are adaptable to site-specic conditions; improve soil and water conservation; increase small-scale farm diversication; safeguard biodiversity; reduce the use of fossil fuels and other inputs; and improve labor productivity. The separation of livestock and crop farming has to be undone. Crops and livestock have to be reintegrated in the farm to help bring organic matter back into soils and restore fertility. Patenting life-forms and genetic resources must be prohibited.

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The productivity of industries should be continuously improved not necessarily to increase output but always to reduce inputs of labor, energy and raw materials. The recycling of waste products back into the production cycle should also be promoted. Enterprises and governments should practice full lifecycle cost accounting of goods and services in the economy. This means taking into account all the negative social and environmental costs of production, distribution, consumption, waste and recycling. This should also reect the costs of maintaining the health and well-being of workers, the community, and the environment.
Box 4. Cubas Organic Revolution Cubas highly industrialized, capital-intensive farming practice came to a screeching halt in 1989 when the Soviet Union collapsed. Cuba lost 85 percent of its foreign trade, including food, agricultural imports and petroleum. Already crippled by the U.S. embargo, the country was nancially devastated with its food supply hit hardest. The Cuban response was to go organic, a much cheaper alternative to conventional chemical farming that doesnt rely on imports. The states priorities shifted to food production, the scientic community began focusing on organic practices and city dwellers were mobilized as urban farming became a vital source of food. With limited gasoline to transport, refrigerate and store food from the countryside, food production was brought to the cities. Cuba now has one of the most successful urban agriculture programs in the world. The State is making unused land available to edgling urban farmers and thousands of empty lots have been turned into organic oases. In Havana alone there are 8,000 organic gardens producing a million tons of food annually. The gardens range in size from a few meters to several hectares. The urban farmers primarily grow lettuce, bok choy, onions, chard, radishes, tomato, cabbage and broccoli. Gardens can employ anywhere from one to 70 people depending on the size of the garden. And people from all walks of life are participating. The state is supporting the new urban gardeners through extensive university research into sustainable organic practices, including soil health and fertility. Cubas scientic community is also developing breakthrough biological fertilizers and pesticides using naturally occurring organisms and insects. According to Food First executive director Peter Rosset, there are more than 200 biotech centers in Cuba producing and distributing cutting-edge, non-toxic biofertilizers and pesticides based on local microorganisms. Biological controls, such as Bt, a common organic pesticide, are available in the U.S., but Rosset says by focusing so much of its research resources in this arena, Cuba is way ahead of the rest of the world. In Havana, the Urban Agriculture Department was formed to educate and assist the neophyte city gardeners in implementing these new techniques. Small state run stores were established to sell seeds, hand tools, pots and some biological controls and serve as educational sites, offering workshops and advising the urban farmers and gardeners.

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The Cuban gardeners incorporate some traditional organic practices, such as the use of worm compost-castings (worm poo) from redworms fed a diet of kitchen scraps. Worm compost is generated quickly and is higher in nitrogen that is more quickly accessible by crops than regular compost. They also rely heavily on interplanting--where diverse crops are planted together--which discourages the pests that accompany monocrop farming. This is a major shift from contemporary industrialized farming, with its acres of corn that provide a veritable buffet for bugs, as well as monocropping's inherent dependency on pesticides. The gardeners are also experimenting with their soil by leaving their crop residue (the stalks, vines, and anything else left after the harvest) on the eld instead of clearing it off. A layer of worm compost is added on top to create rich soil another old-fashioned organic idea. The city farmers are also tackling the lack of medicine in Cuba. A casualty of the trade embargo, Cuba can import neither medicine nor the ingredients to make it. Even aspirin is a rarity in Cuba. Rieux says she saw a lot of people growing green medicine in their urban gardens. "I saw a beautiful green medicine garden grown by one man," she says. He's growing oregano, marjoram, lemon grass, sage, tila (a kind of sedative), chamomile, calendula, aloe. The herbs are processed as teas and tinctures. In half an hour he had eight or nine customers, a steady ow of business." Cuba's advanced organic farming techniques have led to major cultural shifts as many citydwellers have become farmers. But what happens when the Cuban economy shifts and the embargo is lifted? Now that they are such capable organic growers, will they revert to chemical farming? Amanda Rieux of the San Francisco League of Urban Gardeners' Gardening and Composting Educator Training Program thinks otherwise. Rieux joined a trip to Cuba with a Food First Sustainable Agriculture delegation to see organic practices in use on a nationwide scale and a chance to assess the implications for all of us. "Yes, there are people who believe some of the gardeners will revert to the old practices, but many people will still farm organically. Even when the embargo lifts, the small farmer will make more money organically because he spends so little. He's not going to start buying chemicals. He won't have to. He has the knowledge now. For the rest of the food-eating world, the Cuban agricultural greening shows that when a government decides to, it can put its strength behind sustainable, protable, non-toxic agriculture. "The shift towards sustainable agriculture has been very successful in Cuba, people are eating better there now than they did ve years ago," says Rieux. (Sustainable agriculture refers to an integrated system whereby the gardener works within natural biological cycles and uses only naturally occurring resources.) "And, there is an understanding that these methods have social and environmental values, as well as economic. It has been an empowering movement for the Cuban people. Granted, Cuba was in a tough, hungry place that made willingness to experiment essential. But at a time when we are dumping ever-increasing amounts of chemical pesticides on our crops, poisoning our aquifers and sterilizing our soil, this large-scale experiment should be watched by all. Lisa Van Cleef, The Big Green Experiment: Cubas Organic Revolution, reprinted from the San Francisco Chronicle, Wednesday, March 15, 2000; published in The Trowel, #11, spring-summer 2000, by San Francisco League of Urban Gardeners, accessed from http://westgatehouse.com/ art9.html

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PART 4
Immediate tasks of social movements ghting for a just and sustainable future

With the failure of ofcial international processes to deliver climate justice, more people are convinced of the need to look for alternative frameworks for dealing with the climate crisis. In this context, it is high time to promote an alternative compact that comes from the grassroots. One that is not just a list of demands but a framework around which people and communities around the world could set their own goals and plan their own actions to stave off climate disaster and ght for justice, especially for those who did not cause the problem but are now feeling its worst effects. A shared framework or platform that links disparate actions and builds a stronger global movement working for political and social change necessary to address the climate crisis along with other social and economic injustices. The Peoples Protocol on Climate Change (PPCC) offers such a framework. It is a product of a two-year process of awareness-raising and movement-building among Southern civil society and social movement organizations from Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Middle East. It has been ratied by peoples assemblies in 11 countries held in December 2009. The PPCC proposes a ve-point platform of action for peoples movements struggling for climate justice and social change: 1. Continue pushing for comprehensive and equitable global effort to achieve rapid emissions reductions to stabilize CO2 concentrations at 350ppm or less. Demand reparations for Southern countries and the poor by Northern states, TNCs, and Northern-controlled institutions to redress ecological debt and other historical injustices. Reject false solutions that allow Northern states and corporations to continue harming the environment and communities, provide new and greater opportunities for prot, and reinforce and expand corporate control over natural resources and technologies.

2.

3.

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4.

Struggle for ecologically sustainable, socially just, pro-people, and long-lasting solutions to the climate crisis. Build, strengthen and advance a peoples movement on climate change.

5.

This platform of action can and should be pursued at various levels -- from the local community, to the national and international levels. In building the movement, there are at least three tasks that are of immediate importance in the current period. First is the need to devote more of our efforts to grassroots organizing and mobilization. We must intensify our education and organizing in communities, schools, workplaces, churches, and other social spaces to raise awareness about the systemic roots of and genuine solutions to the climate crisis and other social crises that we are confronting today. We must remain vigilant of false solutions being peddled by corporate interests and their spokespersons in the academe, media and government. We must continue to push forward our own alternative vision and program for social transformation. Even where governments have expressed support for a progressive agenda, we must hold them accountable through popular participation and mobilization, always critical of attempts to compromise the interests of the majority and the marginalized. Second is the need to link and combine the struggle for climate justice with other social justice struggles, especially struggles over control of productive resources. Indeed, for the people most affected by climate change, their lack of access or control over land, seeds, water, forests, energy, factories, etc. is the principal source of their vulnerability and marginalization. Hence their struggle for food sovereignty, for decent work, for peace and self-determination, for human dignity are all inseparable. Climate struggles are also related to struggles against unfair trade, illegitimate debt, militarization, and human rights violations inasmuch as they are also instrumental to perpetuating the drivers of climate change and the exploitation of peoples, especially on the global South. Making these linkages helps broaden the movement and weakens the system from all sides. Third is the need to combine oppositional politics with the active promotion of concrete alternatives. There is a wealth of traditional knowledge and practice among indigenous peoples and other communities that are more ecologically sound at the same time based on an ethos of solidarity and reciprocity that challenges the logic of the dominant order. There are also important lessons to be learned from actual peoples experience with democratic control and planning of social production according to peoples needs and with respect to ecological limits. One can look for examples in the national experiences of revolutionary China, Cuba, Bolivia, and Venezuela as well as in particular communities such as in Mexico, Colombia, India, and many other countries today (see Box 4). These

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help inspire people to think out of the box, to learn from one another, to innovate and cooperate and continue to challenge and ultimately change the prevailing unjust and unsustainable system.

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ENDNOTES

1 Based on unit CO2-eq (carbon dioxide equivalent).Timothy Herzog, World Greenhouse Gas Emissions in 2005, WRI Working Paper (Washington, DC: World Resources Institute, 2009), available from http://www.wri.org/publication/navigating-the-numbers, 2; Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Climate Change Science 2007: Synthesis Report, Summary for Policymakers, 5. 2 Kevin Baumert, Timothy Herzog, Jonathan Pershing, Navigating the Numbers: Greenhouse Gas Data and International Climate Policy (Washington DC: World Resources Institute, 2005), 4, 86, 91; IPCC, Climate Change Science 2007, 5. 3 4 Average 1950-2006 annual growth rate of 3.9%. 3.6% average annual growth from 1820-2006.

5 The global GDP grew from $ 690 billion in 1820 to $ 50.97 trillion in 2008 (in 1990 GearyKhamis dollars). Angus Maddison, Statistics on World Population, GDP and Per Capita GDP , 1-2008 AD, available from http://www.ggdc.net/maddison/. 320 billion tons of carbon, equivalent to 1.17 trillion tons of CO2, were released from fossil fuel sources from 1820 to 2006. T.A. Boden, G. Marland, and R.J. Andres, Global Fossil-Fuel CO2 Emissions, (Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center, Oak Ridge, Tennessee: Oak Ridge National Laboratory, 2009) available from http://cdiac.ornl.gov/trends/emis/tre_glob.html. 6 Energy Information Administration (EIA), International Energy Outlook 2009 (US Department of Energy, Washington, DC: 2009) available from http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/ieo/ index.html, 124, 131; International Energy Agency (IEA), World Energy Outlook (WEO) 2009 Fact Sheet, available from http://www.worldenergyoutlook.org/. 7 IEA, WEO 2009 Fact Sheet.

8 Climate Analysis Indicators Tool (CAIT) Version 7.0, GHG Emissions by Sector in 2005 (Washington, DC: World Resources Institute, 2010), available from http://cait.wri.org. 9 International Energy Agency (IEA), Kew World Energy Statistics 2009 (Paris: International Energy Agency and Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, 2009), 6. 10 The Supermajors are ExxonMobil, British Petroleum, Chevron, Royal Dutch Shell, ConocoPhillips, and Total. The rst four emerged from mergers within the so-called seven sisters which dominated the oil industry between 1945 and 1970. 11 UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), World Investment Report 2007: Transnational Corporations, Extractive Industries and Development (New York and Geneva: United Nations, 2007). 12 13 CAIT Version 7.0, GHG Emissions by Sector in 2005. ETC Group, Who Owns Nature? Corporate Power and the Final Frontier in the Com-

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modication of Life, Communiqu, no. 100 (ETC Group, 2008), 11-16. 14 15 Ibid., 21-22. CAIT Version 7.0, GHG Emissions by Sector in 2005.

16 Baumert, Herzog, and Pershing, Navigating the Numbers: Greenhouse Gas Data and International Climate Policy, 63. 17 Ibid.

18 Jean-Paul Rodrigue and Brian Slack, Road Transportation, in The Geography of Transport Systems (New York: Routledge, 2009) available from http://people.hofstra.edu/geotrans/ eng/ch3en/conc3en/carprodeet.html; International Organization of Motor Vehicle Manufacturers (OICA), 2008 Production Statistics, available from http://oica.net/category/productionstatistics/. 19 World Trade Organization Statistics Database, Total merchandise trade, 1950-2008 (World Trade Organization, 2010), available from http://stat.wto.org/. 20 Helge Hveem, The Politics of Transnational Production Systems: A Political Economy Perspective, Department of Political Science, University of Oslo, available from http://www2. warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/csgr/events/conferences/conference2007/papers/hveem.pdf 21 7. GRAIN, The international food system and the climate crisis, Seedling, October 2009,

22 Kathy Mamen, Steven Gorelick Helena Norberg-Hodge, and Diana Deumlig, Ripe for Change: Rethinking Californias Food Economy (Berkeley, CA: International Society for Ecology and Culture, 2004), 27. 23 Ibid, 25.

24 Andrew Simms, Don Moran, and Peter Chawla, The UK Interdependence Report (London: New Economics Foundation, 2006), 22-23. 25 This is also the accounting framework followed by the Climate Analysis Indicators Tool (CAIT) version 5.0. (Washington, DC: World Resources Institute, 2008) available at http://cait.wri. org. 26 27 1073. Dieter Helm, Sins of Emission, Wall Street Journal, 13 March 2008. Larry Lohman, Climate as Investment, Development and Change 40, no. 6 (2009):

28 Tamra Gilbertson and Oscar Reyes, Introduction, in Carbon Trading: How it Works and Why it Fails? (Critical Currents, no. 7, Occasional Papers Series) (Uppsala: Dag Hammarskjold Foundation, 2009), 14. 29 UNEP RIS Centre, CDM/JI Pipeline Database 1 March 2010, available from http:// cdmpipeline.org/cdm-projects-type.htm#6. 30 31 CAIT Version 7.0, Yearly Emissions, 2006. Carbon Sequestration: Injecting Realities, Energy Tribune, March 19, 2008.

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32 Richard Heinberg, Searching for a Miracle: Net Energy Limits and the Fate of Industrial Society (CA: International Forum on Globalization and Post Carbon Institute, 2009), 35. 33 International Rivers Network, Warming the Earth: Hydropower Threatens Efforts to Curb Climate Change (Berkeley, CA: International Rivers Network, 2003) available from http://www. internationalrivers.org, 2. 34 There are approximately 45 MJ per kilogram contained in both nished gasoline and crude oil, while ethanol has an energy density of about 26 MJ per kilogram and corn has only 16 MJ per kilogram. In general, this means that large amounts of corn must be grown and harvested to equal even a small portion of existing gasoline consumption on an energy-equivalent level. Heinberg, Searching for a Miracle, 48. 35 36 Ibid. Simms et al., Growth Isnt Possible, 96.

37 The study is by Cornell University agriculturalist David Pimentel and UC Berkeley engineering professor Ted Patzek. Brian Tokar, The Real Scoop on Biofuels, available from http://www. commondreams.org/views06/1101-32.htm. 38 Simms et al., Growth Isnt Possible, 100.

39 Diana Bronson, Pat Mooney, and Kathy Jo Wetter, Retooling the Planet? Climate Chaos in the Geoengineering Age (Stockholm: Swedish Society for Nature Conservation, 2009), 29. 40 From http://hdr.undp.org/en/humandev/.

41 UN General Assembly, Article 1, Declaration of the Righ to Development resolution / adopted by the General Assembly, 4 December 1986 (A/RES/41/128) available from http://www. unhcr.org/refworld/docid/3b00f22544.html. 42 G. Bruntland, ed., Our Common Future: The World Commission on Environment and Development, available from http://www.un-documents.net/wced-ocf.htm. 43 Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett, The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better (Allen Lane, 2009). 44 Robert Constanza, A New Development Model for a Full World in Development, Development 52, no. 3 (2009): 369-376.

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