Posted by Evan Sparling

I couldn’t sleep last Saturday night. It was my second night in Anchorage, having arrived the day before to help lead an exchange that brought Evenk people from Russia’s Republic of Sakha-Yakutia and environmentalists from the island of Sakhalin to Anchorage and Barrow to discuss indigenous rights vis a vis oil and gas development.

But all I could think about was Kyrgyzstan, the country that I called home for the year before I came to Pacific Environment last fall. The country had been embroiled in political turmoil since earlier in the week, when soldiers opened fire on a group of protesters that eventually stormed the government’s headquarters. That evening, the mobs tore up much of the city; searching for loot or just looking to smash things. Photos showed bodies lying on streets that I had crossed every day. The supermarket next to my apartment had been looted and burned, and two professors from my university were dead. In the following days I discovered that all of my friends were safe, but the images followed me north.

What bothered me the most on that Saturday night wasn’t so much the actual violence, but rather the coverage of the events in the American media, which focused entirely on the revolution’s potential implications for an American airbase located in the capital. One lead-in to a CNN story illustrated this perfectly. “It’s hard to spell, and hard to pronounce,” announced the smirking journalist as video of Kyrgyz riot police played in the background, “so why should YOU care about political upheaval in Kyrgyzstan? We’ll tell you, after the break.” The implication, of course, was that if it doesn’t directly affect us, we really shouldn’t care about people being shot in the street. But to me those people being beaten in the place with the funny name were potentially my friends, people who are like family to me.

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Posted by David Gordon

The 40^th anniversary of Earth Day provides a great opportunity to look back at the progress of the environmental movement – and how we are doing meeting the growing environmental challenges of the day.

As luck would have it, I am spending the 40^th anniversary of Earth Day in Moscow.  Since I have spent a significant amount of time the last 20 years working with grassroots environmental groups throughout Siberia and the Russian Far East, reflecting from Moscow seems somehow appropriate.

What have we learned in the last 40 years?  First, the environment is about people.  To protect the environment, we have to work with people.  We have found that building an effective, widespread environmental movement is critical to our success.  The environmental movement has been criticized for not reaching out broadly enough.  Time and again, we have proven that the environmental movement is not narrow.  The environmental movement is not limited to scientists and bird-watchers.  The environmental movement is made up of poor people, rich people, everyday people, people from labor unions, journalists, teachers, kids, parents, and many more. (more…)

Posted by Carole Holley

While working with communities is core to Pacific Environment, we also need to build from those efforts and strengthen our support of critical environmental laws such as the Clean Air Act and Endangered Species Act — both of which are currently under threat.

The EPA, which enforces the Clean Air Act (CAA), is under attack from special interests and their representatives in Congress.  Special interests are advocating removal of the EPA’s ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions under the CAA, which they won in the Supreme Court in 2007. Currently, there are two bills in Congress that would slow or kill the EPA’s new regulations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Two West Virginia Democrats, Sen. Jay Rockefeller and Rep. Nick Rahall, have co-authored a bill that would freeze the agency’s move for at least two years and “protect clean coal state economies.” Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska introduced a bill that would undo the EPA’s ruling that greenhouse gas emissions pose public harm. The state of Texas is also challenging the EPA’s attempts to regulate greenhouse gases claiming that the agency’s finding that “gases blamed for global warming threaten public health” is “based on flawed science and would harm the state’s economy.”

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Posted by Carole Holley

Global climate change needs to be addressed on many fronts.  Looking globally in scope, international efforts to stop or slow down global warming are essential.  Communities in Alaska and around the Arctic are being impacted by bigger storm surges, thin or no ice which is impeding seal and whale hunts and creating extremely dangerous conditions for people to practice their subsistence way of life.  Additionally, global warming threatens many species of wildlife including polar bears, Pacific walrus and seals.  We must work together to get commitments from the US and other countries to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 350 parts per million, meaning greenhouse gas pollution from the United States and other developed countries should be reduced by 45% or more below 1990 levels by 2020.

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Posted by David Gordon

On the first day of climate talks in Copenhagen, I have been thinking a lot about rhetoric vs. reality.  The last few days have been abuzz with rumors that the climate talks will result in a deal.  Obama changed his plans to attend the final day of the conference, befitting his role as a major world leader.  The pressure will be on U.S. negotiators to make sure that Obama’s trip is not in vain.

I hope that they are right and that we will get a real, enforceable, meaningful international agreement that leads to reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.  Our planet is crying out for this.  Kudos to the newspapers around the world that banded together to prove that an international agreement is, in fact, possible (at least among newspapers) by printing the same editorial calling for a meaningful agreement:  http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/dec/06/copenhagen-editorial

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Posted by David Gordon

One of the best things about the Arctic Council is information sharing and learning about some of the impressive scientific work going on around the Arctic.  Today’s meetings were dominated by scientists and working groups reporting on the diverse variety of projects that they have taken on.

Alaska glacier. Photo by Britt Constantine, mother and lifelong Alaskan.

Posted by Rachel James

In continuation of our circumpolar work focusing on the impacts of the petroleum industry to the Alaska’s Arctic people and wildlife, I traveled with George Edwardson, president of the Inupiat Community of the Arctic Slope, to Norway, to work with fishermen and to connect with Norwegian media on Arctic issues.

Hosted by the World Wildlife Fund, Norway, we participated in a conference attended by fishermen and local advocates in Svolvaer, Lofoten, which is located in northern Norway above the Arctic Circle in the Barents Sea.  The fishermen are concerned about impacts of seismic testing in their fishing grounds.

While in Oslo, we met with many members of the media, including the indigenous Saami media, to raise the issue of the presence of the Norwegian StatoilHydro’s newly purchased leases in Alaska’s high Arctic Sea, the Chukchi. This area is critical to Inupiat subsistence communities and is critical habitat for bowhead whales, polar bears, ice seals, and walrus. StatoiHydro does not allow petroleum activity in areas of the Barents Sea that are ice-covered due to lack of oil spill clean up technology.  However, in February they purchased leases in the Chukchi, which is covered in ice over 9 months of the year.

The Norwegian National media had a great interest in the issue. The Norwegian Broadcasting (NRK) covered the issue and ran several stories. This included a top story on their main evening news, focusing on Norwegian double standards regarding petroleum activity in high Arctic waters.

Offshore drilling with push polar bears closer to the brink of extinction.

Posted by Sarah Kagan.

While Congress debated hotly contested energy packages, the Department of Interior was exposed for rampant corruption, drug use and sexual misconduct in a report issued last week.  With such high gas prices, Americans deserve real solutions to our energy security problems and honest, trustworthy agencies to implement them. Until the Department of Interior cleans house and reevaluates their entire culture of corruption, Congress should not authorize new drilling plans for the agency to implement.

The Minerals Management Service—the hotbed of the scandal—is in charge of managing our offshore drilling programs. This means that those entrusted with deciding how to use American’s resources were getting drunk at Shell-sponsored golf games or were literally in bed with oil company reps. Our government was cheating on America with Big Oil. Now that they’ve been caught, will things change?

Currently, Big Oil and their government friends are trying to jam through energy packages in Congress that will continue special treatment of oil interests and increase oil companies’ profits—at the expense of the average American citizen and special ecological areas that deserve protection. Senator Bill Nelson from Florida said it best: “The rest of the United States government doesn’t need to jump in bed with” the oil industry. Instead, we need to find real solutions to the current energy crisis.

We already know we can’t drill our way to energy security—even oil tycoon T. Boone Pickens admitted that. A recent national energy poll indicates that 83% of Americans support a plan to end our addiction to oil through investments in clean energy—some 20% more than those who support increased offshore drilling. Furthermore, the costs of drilling outweigh the benefits. According to the Department of Energy, offshore drilling will bring no relief at the pump. So for no economic advantage, Americans are being asked to increase our dependence on polluting and finite fossil fuels and put coastal communities, wildlife and ecosystems at great risk.

We’ve already seen the MMS recklessly sell off over 70 million acres of America’s rapidly changing Arctic waters to Shell and other oil companies—despite clear evidence that doing so will increase global warming, push polar bears closer to extinction and threaten the subsistence lifestyles of Alaska Native communities. Even the MMS’s own Environmental Impact Statement on the Chukchi Sea estimates there is a 40% chance of one or more spills spewing more than 42,000 gallons of oil into Arctic waters. What’s more, the environmental conditions in this icy region preclude even cursory clean-up efforts, and no reliable method exists for cleaning up oil in broken sea ice. Proposals to expand oil and gas exploration pose unacceptable risks to a system that is already badly stressed by global warming. They will also perpetuate our addiction to fossil fuels while further worsening the impact of climate change.

Instead, we need energy plans that will actually make a difference. A serious national commitment to renewable energy will put our economy back on the path to prosperity by bringing energy costs under control, creating over 820,000 new jobs, and making us more energy independent. The honest answer to our oil problem is to use less of it, and that means better fuel economy and a shift toward renewable energy. Instead of the failed policies of the past, it’s time to break our addiction to fossil fuels by shifting our priorities—and our policies—toward clean energy sources like wind and solar power and efficiency measures.

We shouldn’t have to watch MMS’s walk of shame. Congress needs to take a stand. They plan to hold hearings in response to this report; they should also stop any new drilling plans. Its time for government to break-up with Big Oil and push forward real energy solutions that actually help Americans and increase our energy security.

Sakhalin-II caused severe environmental and social damage

Posted by Rachel James and Leah Zimmerman.

On the morning of September 7, 2008, Exxon and Sakhalin Energy prepared to face off in a much-anticipated soccer match to celebrate Oil Workers’ Day. Meanwhile, we (Rachel and Leah, two Pacific Environment staffers) packed a vehicle and headed north on the island with two staffers from Sakhalin Environment Watch, including Dmitry Lisitsyn, a superstar of the Russian Far East environmental movement. We traveled with Dmitry and Katya for three days along the Sakhalin-II pipeline route, a several hundred mile gash running the length of the otherwise wild island.

Dmitry’s questions are relentless. Whether addressing us, shopkeepers on the side of the road, or construction workers on the pipeline route, Dmitry is able to disarm and charm, while extracting critical information with measured precision. For us, time with Dmitry is a lesson in the art of community organizing as well as a lesson about Sakhalin-II itself.

We are struck time and time again by similarities between Shell’s activities on Sakhalin Island and the company’s current strategies in the Alaskan Arctic. Shell could easily write a textbook on how to break promises, give and take bribes, buy off scientists, employ divide and conquer tactics with local opposition, and emasculate environmental assessment processes.

Sakhalin Island was once a prison destination. Today, oil and gas pipeline infrastructure crisscross the island and inflation from the flux of oil executives and construction works has seriously changed the capital city, Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk. A two-room apartment goes for an exorbitant $1600/month, food prices are among the highest in Russia, and luxury SUVs can be counted by the dozens. While oil executives enjoy a luxurious lifestyle on Sakhalin, Sakhaliners bear the brunt of the grossly inflated costs for food and housing in addition to the devastating environmental, social and economic damage Sakhalin-II brought.

Now that construction of Sakhalin-II is nearing completion, Sakhalin Environment Watch predicts its next great battle will be poaching. We saw first-hand this week how Sakhalin’s rivers, like many on Kamchatka, are being raped by poachers who operate without fear of punishment from disempowered or corrupt government agencies. Imagine thousands of salmon returning to spawn in the river where they were born after years at sea. Now imagine a net stretched across the entire mouth of the river, preventing only a handful of fierce jumpers from among the thousands to return upstream to spawn. After a few years of this, we don’t understand why people are surprised that there are no fish left in the rivers. And so, Dmitry and SEW plot their next move …