Green masks
There was a host of subjects presenting themselves for the editorial this time as developments seem to go very fast.
Quite prominent currently is the realisation that bio-fuels are becoming an environmental danger in many ways and places, albeit not all, and the link that has been set between the food-shortages and the bio-fuels.
What has become clear however, is that the food-shortage, and the subsequent famine at some of the poorest countries, is not due to food-shortage. As the case is, several of the most important food-exporting countries have just been limiting or stopping export, mainly to protect their own population for the extremely high prices, which are due to speculation, partly as a result of the “food-for-fuel” rush.
The reason behind these protective measures is that due to “free-market”-principles enforced by World Bank and World Trade Organisation on many countries in the world, food-storage was “discouraged” to “not distort market-principles”. This is now resulting in a situation in which some producer countries close their borders and others have no reserves, and therefore no food. But “the Market” is making mega-profits.
We can only question what will happen, now that it is exactly the World Bank, together with the UN, that have come together to come up with a solution.
Another interesting relation was laid bare between biofuels and deforestation in the Americas: Because soybean farmers in the US can earn more with corn for bio-fuels, the production of soybeans is now moving to Latin America, especially Brazil. The space now used for growing soybeans was before occupied by the cattle-growers for the meat-industry. They on their turn, now are burning down the rainforests to clear the space for their cattle. It is all linked together.
A third appearance is happening in Africa. Here again vast amounts of money are being invested in large-scale plantations to create bio-fuels. That this will result in displacement of people from ancestral lands, destruction of social structures, over-usage of limited fresh-water resources and the pollution of vast swaths of land with fertilizer and weed-& insect-killers is less readily expressed. But the rich countries will be able to “off-set some of their own greenhouse-gas emissions”, at least on paper.
It ever more looks like our attempts at a more environmental-friendly way to sustain our way-of-life and our “economic dreams” are turning into a nightmare.
Another example is “the greatest sustainable development project, offering Africa a unique chance for interdependence and prosperity” as it was called. It concerns here a gigantic hydropower-project in Congo: 150 meter high, $ 80 bn in investment and 40.000 MW of power. The drivers here are the “offsetting of greenhouse gas emissions for the industrialized countries” and “the banks and corporations earning high returns from the global carbon offset market and the UN climate change credits”, as was stated by the initiators.
That these are nice words for an ugly things becomes clear when it is considered that such a dam will devour many thousands of square kilometres of pristine forests, killing billions of animals, displacing whole populations and in the end will do nothing for the climate, and very little for Africa, apart from bringing destruction and poverty, as in the end the countries involved will pay the bill.
It is already quite some time known that hydro is not climate-friendly at all, as the forests it floods, starts rotting, emitting methane and other greenhouse-gasses in quantities that have been vastly underestimated till recently (and kept still). The debris that is normally washed away by the rivers is getting stuck and is filling up the reservoirs, resulting in less water, more emissions and less power.
Thereby comes that as a result of the climate-change in many places there will be much more water for some time,
possibly resulting in over-flooding the dam, and in other places there will be much less, which would result in
drought, if not before, then certainly after the dam.
So the picture is not very nice and we can only hope that there will arise some kind of collective intelligence (and
morale) that starts to call these practices to a halt and start to consider the consequences of what we do, in a
broader way than just the profits that can be made.
Keep strong,
Alexander
P.s.: For those interested in background-information about two important conflicts in the world, Sudan and Afghanistan, you are invited to read: “Sudan and Natural resources: The connections that nobody is talking about” and “About the reason for US war with Afghanistan”
Responses are always welcome at Alexander@gas-oil-power.com
