sustainable living blog
Showing posts with label fighting oil in NZ. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fighting oil in NZ. Show all posts
Monday, February 27, 2012
Shell profiteering climate change in the Arctic
http://greenpeace.org/savethearctic
On 24 Feb 2012, 7 people - including Lucy Lawless, occupied a Shell oil drilling ship to raise awareness about Shell drilling oil in the Arctic - a place only accessible due to climate change (caused by burning of fossil fuels such as oil). 77 hours later, they were arrested - but by that time 200,000 emails [March 4] were sent to Shell Oil by people protesting Shell's profiteering climate change (and also worsening climate change).
Lucy Lawless, NZ:
"I am here today acting on behalf of the planet and my children. Drilling for deep sea oil is bad enough, but to go into the Arctic, one of the most magical places left on the planet, is going too far.
"A melting of the sea ice is a warning to humanity, not an invitation to drill for more of the stuff which caused the problem in the first place.
"And yet Shell claims that they can manage a 90% cleanup of an oil spill in the harsh arctic, and I call BS. An oil spill in the Arctic would make the Gulf of Mexico [oil spill] look like a children's party.
"What Shell is doing is climate change profiteering. We don't have to go to the ends of the Earth to extract every last drop of oil. We've got to smarten up and move to a clean energy economy now."
Saturday, January 21, 2012
Forest and Bird post about problems of EEZ bill (to replace RMA) and sharky oil companies with plans to drill thousands of wells on East Coast of NZ
January 27 is the deadline for submissions on a sneaky bill that would allow environmental considerations to be outweighed by economic gain - the 100 km of sea floor from NZ on East Coast of NZ would be ripe for oil wells
I am so disgusted. I am glad I was alerted to this posting by Claire Browning (Forest & Bird) - which can be found here (but re-posted below for safekeeping).
Basically, the East Coast of NZ is rich in oil. A very aggressive oil company in particular called TAG Oil(with expanding operations currently in Taranaki), is appealing to investors to turn the East Coast of NZ into the "Texas of the south", and drill thousands of oil wells. (And there are many other oil sharks circling as well - trying to secure exploration consents. Reference: Fairfax News, article here.)
At the same time - there is a bill currently being considered by the government called the "Exclusive Economic Zone and Continental Shelf (Environmental Effects) Bill" or EEZ which may actually allow this to happen. It is to the sea floor off NZ's coast what the Resource Management Act is on land. However, where the RMA's purpose is to “promote the sustainable management of natural and physical resources” (and section 8 of the Fisheries Act says that “The purpose of this Act is to provide for the utilisation of fisheries resources while ensuring sustainability”), the EEZ Bill is meant to balance protection with “economic wellbeing" . Clause 61, for example - states that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) may grant an application for marine consent “if the activity’s contribution to New Zealand’s economic development outweighs the activity’s adverse effects on the environment”.
That is screwed up.
Apparently we have until 27 January to make a submission on the bill. You can make a submission online here (scroll down to the button at the bottom of the page!) or in writing (2 written copies needed!).
Forest & Bird's submission on the EEZ bill is here.
"Without sustainability, we are lost. "
- Claire Browning
"How does destruction of the natural environment benefit New Zealand economically?"
- Myself
Claire's article on the bill (and sharky oil companies) follows, from http://blog.forestandbird.org.nz/the-exclusive-economic-zone-for-sale/comment-page-1/#comment-88244:
The Exclusive Economic Zone: for sale
Tue, 17 Jan 2012 9:28 am – Posted by Mandy No Comments
Blogger: Forest & Bird's Conservation Advocate, Claire Browning
TAG Oil is very excited. It wants to turn the East Coast of the North Island – “literally leaking oil and gas”!! – into the “Texas of the south”, hosting thousands of oil wells.
If you thought that the EEZ Bill, currently before select committee, would be a major weapon in the government’s armoury to protect this unique and extensive environment – if you believed what responsible Minister Dr Nick Smith has said – you were wrong.
Each country’s EEZ stretches from its coast to out to 200 nautical miles. New Zealand’s marine environment, which also includes the continental shelf, is 23 times bigger than our land environment.
The EEZ Bill is supposed to protect it. However, it has what, according to the very charitable interpretation of the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment (PCE), can only be a “serious error”.
The Bill is, all on its own, an environmental risk.
New Zealand is a party to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). It is from UNCLOS that our right to use the EEZ for economic purposes comes. It is this that gives us the authority and the exclusive privilege. It does that on condition of a requirement to “protect and preserve” this environment.
New Zealand waters are a breeding ground and transit route for many marine and seabird species, including threatened and endangered species. There are risks for them, and marine conservation, from accidents that may result from activities in the EEZ, particularly offshore oil activities.
Despite encouragement to comply with UNCLOS (“protect and preserve”), the Marine Reserves Bill has been stuck in Parliament since 2002. A woeful 0.4 percent of the EEZ is protected in marine reserves.
By contrast, around one-third of our land is public conservation land.
Dr Smith has promised to prioritise the Marine Reserves Bill and get it passed in the next three years. It will be reported back from select committee on February 29, with the EEZ Bill. This is good. It is an important part of the protection package.
But it is not, on its own, good enough. No less important is managing the competing uses of the parts of the marine environment that we do not set aside in reserves. It is all the same environment.
The MV Rena’s grounding on the Astrolabe Reef, and oil spill, has taught us about the importance of prevention. Forest & Bird is among those calling for an independent inquiry into the circumstances of this accident – into New Zealand’s oil spill response capacity, but more importantly, stopping accidents in the first place.
That means making good judgements about what activities are allowed offshore, by whom, and on what conditions.
The EEZ Bill is one tool for doing this. It establishes a decision-making process to manage activities in the exclusive economic zone (EEZ) and on the continental shelf beyond 12 nautical miles.
It has the same job as the RMA, which applies on land, and to 12 nautical miles offshore.
Beyond 12 nautical miles, out to 200 miles, the law is complicated and has gaps. To all intents and purposes, it is currently unregulated. In this sense, the EEZ Bill is a good and a necessary thing.
The Bill is modelled on the Resource Management Act (RMA). And it should be: there is no reason, in principle, for the philosophies of the two Acts to differ. If anything, UNCLOS requires a higher, not a lesser, standard of protection.
However, the Bill does differ from the RMA in some important, and quite malign, ways.
The purpose of the RMA is to “promote the sustainable management of natural and physical resources”. It says this in section 5. Similarly, section 8 of the Fisheries Act says that “The purpose of this Act is to provide for the utilisation of fisheries resources while ensuring sustainability”.
The EEZ Bill is concerned with “economic wellbeing”.
It “seeks to achieve a balance between the protection of the environment and economic development”: the purpose clause in section 10. It does not talk about sustainability, at all. It directs decision-makers to consider the “efficient” use of resources, not their sustainable use.
Responsible Minister Hon Nick Smith has said that for the small number of decisions under the EEZ Bill (around 10-20 consents per year), the level of complexity in the RMA is not justified. Also, that the RMA requires consideration of some factors, such as social and cultural factors, which are not applicable offshore; therefore, the focus needs to be on economic and environmental factors.
We agree. However, we think that the Minister’s logic is still wrong.
The Bill can be more simply and appropriately drafted. But its basic purpose and philosophy still apply. Without sustainability, we are lost. No environmental protection, no long-term economic wellbeing – so that, in fact, the current drafting of the Bill inadvertently undermines its own stated goal.
We support the Minister’s desire to “simplify and streamline”, provided it can be achieved without doing damage to our own goals of properly protecting the environment. We think that it can.
For example, it would be more “simplified and streamlined” to have at least approximately the same law on both sides of the 12 nautical mile line. At the margins (ie, in cases that cross or are close to the 12 mile limit), and when talking about species that migrate between the two, totally different philosophies makes no sense.
Beneath this is a more fundamental, non-negotiable point. New Zealand is already party to another law, UNCLOS, that requires it.
Beyond the purpose clause, the EEZ Bill differs from the RMA in other ways. The RMA prioritises decision-making factors, into “matters of national importance” (which are about environmental preservation and protection), and “other matters”.
The EEZ Bill lists them all together, with no indication about relative weight, except that on the list of eight items, the conservation ones come last. This is backed up by clause 61, which provides that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) may grant an application for marine consent “if the activity’s contribution to New Zealand’s economic development outweighs the activity’s adverse effects on the environment” or “may refuse the application if the adverse effects of the activity on the environment outweigh the activity’s contribution to New Zealand’s economic development”.
This is a direct trade off of economic benefits against environmental costs. In effect, it says that provided the economic rewards are sufficiently high, any lesser amount of environmental destruction or damage may be consented to by the EPA.
It fails to recognise that there are environmental limits which should not be breached irrespective of the economic benefits. And in many cases it is neither possible nor appropriate to try to put a monetary value on environmental damage, such as the irreversible loss of a species or unique habitat.
It is this, concluded the PCE, which must be a “serious error”.
It says that if what you find out there in the EEZ is worth enough, it’s all for sale. What the Bill does is state its price. It does not set in place any bottom line – any fence, if you like, against risk of environmental destruction.
It is the Schedule 4 policy leftovers warmed up, in a more remote place, where the government hopes we will neither notice nor care.
Do you?
If so, please speak for the blue whales and their calves, the wandering albatross who died cloaked in tar from the Rena, the many, many other less charismatic megafauna out there in the EEZ, and those who are not charismatic at all – but important, and with whom we are privileged to share this environment.
It’s not too late to make a submission to the Local Government and Environment select committee which is dealing with this Bill. They close on 27 January. Forest & Bird’s submission is here.
I am so disgusted. I am glad I was alerted to this posting by Claire Browning (Forest & Bird) - which can be found here (but re-posted below for safekeeping).Basically, the East Coast of NZ is rich in oil. A very aggressive oil company in particular called TAG Oil(with expanding operations currently in Taranaki), is appealing to investors to turn the East Coast of NZ into the "Texas of the south", and drill thousands of oil wells. (And there are many other oil sharks circling as well - trying to secure exploration consents. Reference: Fairfax News, article here.)
At the same time - there is a bill currently being considered by the government called the "Exclusive Economic Zone and Continental Shelf (Environmental Effects) Bill" or EEZ which may actually allow this to happen. It is to the sea floor off NZ's coast what the Resource Management Act is on land. However, where the RMA's purpose is to “promote the sustainable management of natural and physical resources” (and section 8 of the Fisheries Act says that “The purpose of this Act is to provide for the utilisation of fisheries resources while ensuring sustainability”), the EEZ Bill is meant to balance protection with “economic wellbeing" . Clause 61, for example - states that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) may grant an application for marine consent “if the activity’s contribution to New Zealand’s economic development outweighs the activity’s adverse effects on the environment”.
That is screwed up.
Apparently we have until 27 January to make a submission on the bill. You can make a submission online here (scroll down to the button at the bottom of the page!) or in writing (2 written copies needed!).
Forest & Bird's submission on the EEZ bill is here.
"Without sustainability, we are lost. "
- Claire Browning
"How does destruction of the natural environment benefit New Zealand economically?"
- Myself
Claire's article on the bill (and sharky oil companies) follows, from http://blog.forestandbird.org.nz/the-exclusive-economic-zone-for-sale/comment-page-1/#comment-88244:
The Exclusive Economic Zone: for saleTue, 17 Jan 2012 9:28 am – Posted by Mandy No Comments
Blogger: Forest & Bird's Conservation Advocate, Claire Browning
TAG Oil is very excited. It wants to turn the East Coast of the North Island – “literally leaking oil and gas”!! – into the “Texas of the south”, hosting thousands of oil wells.
If you thought that the EEZ Bill, currently before select committee, would be a major weapon in the government’s armoury to protect this unique and extensive environment – if you believed what responsible Minister Dr Nick Smith has said – you were wrong.
Each country’s EEZ stretches from its coast to out to 200 nautical miles. New Zealand’s marine environment, which also includes the continental shelf, is 23 times bigger than our land environment.The EEZ Bill is supposed to protect it. However, it has what, according to the very charitable interpretation of the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment (PCE), can only be a “serious error”.
The Bill is, all on its own, an environmental risk.
New Zealand is a party to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). It is from UNCLOS that our right to use the EEZ for economic purposes comes. It is this that gives us the authority and the exclusive privilege. It does that on condition of a requirement to “protect and preserve” this environment.
New Zealand waters are a breeding ground and transit route for many marine and seabird species, including threatened and endangered species. There are risks for them, and marine conservation, from accidents that may result from activities in the EEZ, particularly offshore oil activities.
Despite encouragement to comply with UNCLOS (“protect and preserve”), the Marine Reserves Bill has been stuck in Parliament since 2002. A woeful 0.4 percent of the EEZ is protected in marine reserves.
By contrast, around one-third of our land is public conservation land.
Dr Smith has promised to prioritise the Marine Reserves Bill and get it passed in the next three years. It will be reported back from select committee on February 29, with the EEZ Bill. This is good. It is an important part of the protection package.
But it is not, on its own, good enough. No less important is managing the competing uses of the parts of the marine environment that we do not set aside in reserves. It is all the same environment.
The MV Rena’s grounding on the Astrolabe Reef, and oil spill, has taught us about the importance of prevention. Forest & Bird is among those calling for an independent inquiry into the circumstances of this accident – into New Zealand’s oil spill response capacity, but more importantly, stopping accidents in the first place.
That means making good judgements about what activities are allowed offshore, by whom, and on what conditions.
The EEZ Bill is one tool for doing this. It establishes a decision-making process to manage activities in the exclusive economic zone (EEZ) and on the continental shelf beyond 12 nautical miles.
It has the same job as the RMA, which applies on land, and to 12 nautical miles offshore.
Beyond 12 nautical miles, out to 200 miles, the law is complicated and has gaps. To all intents and purposes, it is currently unregulated. In this sense, the EEZ Bill is a good and a necessary thing.
The Bill is modelled on the Resource Management Act (RMA). And it should be: there is no reason, in principle, for the philosophies of the two Acts to differ. If anything, UNCLOS requires a higher, not a lesser, standard of protection.
However, the Bill does differ from the RMA in some important, and quite malign, ways.
The purpose of the RMA is to “promote the sustainable management of natural and physical resources”. It says this in section 5. Similarly, section 8 of the Fisheries Act says that “The purpose of this Act is to provide for the utilisation of fisheries resources while ensuring sustainability”.
The EEZ Bill is concerned with “economic wellbeing”.
It “seeks to achieve a balance between the protection of the environment and economic development”: the purpose clause in section 10. It does not talk about sustainability, at all. It directs decision-makers to consider the “efficient” use of resources, not their sustainable use.
Responsible Minister Hon Nick Smith has said that for the small number of decisions under the EEZ Bill (around 10-20 consents per year), the level of complexity in the RMA is not justified. Also, that the RMA requires consideration of some factors, such as social and cultural factors, which are not applicable offshore; therefore, the focus needs to be on economic and environmental factors.
We agree. However, we think that the Minister’s logic is still wrong.
The Bill can be more simply and appropriately drafted. But its basic purpose and philosophy still apply. Without sustainability, we are lost. No environmental protection, no long-term economic wellbeing – so that, in fact, the current drafting of the Bill inadvertently undermines its own stated goal.
We support the Minister’s desire to “simplify and streamline”, provided it can be achieved without doing damage to our own goals of properly protecting the environment. We think that it can.
For example, it would be more “simplified and streamlined” to have at least approximately the same law on both sides of the 12 nautical mile line. At the margins (ie, in cases that cross or are close to the 12 mile limit), and when talking about species that migrate between the two, totally different philosophies makes no sense.
Beneath this is a more fundamental, non-negotiable point. New Zealand is already party to another law, UNCLOS, that requires it.
Beyond the purpose clause, the EEZ Bill differs from the RMA in other ways. The RMA prioritises decision-making factors, into “matters of national importance” (which are about environmental preservation and protection), and “other matters”.
The EEZ Bill lists them all together, with no indication about relative weight, except that on the list of eight items, the conservation ones come last. This is backed up by clause 61, which provides that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) may grant an application for marine consent “if the activity’s contribution to New Zealand’s economic development outweighs the activity’s adverse effects on the environment” or “may refuse the application if the adverse effects of the activity on the environment outweigh the activity’s contribution to New Zealand’s economic development”.
This is a direct trade off of economic benefits against environmental costs. In effect, it says that provided the economic rewards are sufficiently high, any lesser amount of environmental destruction or damage may be consented to by the EPA.
It fails to recognise that there are environmental limits which should not be breached irrespective of the economic benefits. And in many cases it is neither possible nor appropriate to try to put a monetary value on environmental damage, such as the irreversible loss of a species or unique habitat.
It is this, concluded the PCE, which must be a “serious error”.
It says that if what you find out there in the EEZ is worth enough, it’s all for sale. What the Bill does is state its price. It does not set in place any bottom line – any fence, if you like, against risk of environmental destruction.
It is the Schedule 4 policy leftovers warmed up, in a more remote place, where the government hopes we will neither notice nor care.
Do you?
If so, please speak for the blue whales and their calves, the wandering albatross who died cloaked in tar from the Rena, the many, many other less charismatic megafauna out there in the EEZ, and those who are not charismatic at all – but important, and with whom we are privileged to share this environment.
It’s not too late to make a submission to the Local Government and Environment select committee which is dealing with this Bill. They close on 27 January. Forest & Bird’s submission is here.
Monday, October 17, 2011
Anadarko in NZ (US deep sea oil exploration vessel)
Photo from Greenpeace Aotearoa on FB. "Greenpeace activists...protest in front of the Polarcus Alima in Port Taranaki late this afternoon. It is due to leave shortly to start exploring for deep sea oil off Raglan on behalf of the US oil giant Anadarko. Greenpeace NZ is campaigning against the Government’s sell-off of deep water drilling rights in New Zealand." Greenpeace / Amos Chapple
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - AND - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Police protect US oil giant Anadarko's survey vessel in Port Taranaki "Blogpost" by Nick Young, October 17, 2011 at 11:13,
This morning, a team of Greenpeace activists were met by an overwhelming police presence at the Port of Taranaki.
Early this morning the Polarcus Alima - a survey vessel chartered by the US oil giant Anadarko - slipped in to the Port of Taranaki.
They no doubt hoped to keep a low profile before embarking on their scheduled assignment to explore for deep sea oil reserves off the coast of Raglan but we cannot let this go unnoticed. This is the pointy end of the looming deep sea oil rush in New Zealand coastal waters.
Greenpeace had a small team there to meet it with a peaceful protest but the police seem unusually interested in preventing anything coming between Anadarko and New Zealand’s promised deep sea oil reserves. How did they know we were coming? We’re not sure. But what is clear is that someone is determined to keep any protest well away from the Polarcus Alima, including the news that they are in town.
The situation is still unfolding so watch this space.
John Key was completely wrong when he said there there is no correlation between the Rena oil spill and his Government’s deep sea oil drilling plans. Anyone with even a modicum of common sense can see that.
The Rena has spewed oil into the Bay of Plenty and demonstrated with jarring clarity just how damaging an oil spill can be, and just how impossible it is to prevent the damage once the oil has spilled.
Deep sea oil drilling would expose New Zealand’s coastline to catastrophic oil spills.
So to push ahead with dangerous deep sea oil drilling as oil continues to wash ashore on beaches in the Bay of Plenty adds insult to injury.
If the Anadarko’s survey is successful, the drilling of wildcat oil wells off Raglan could begin as early as next year, in waters possibly even deeper than the Deepwater Horizon Macondo well in the Gulf of Mexico.
Anadarko were part owners of the ill fated Deepwater Horizon well which leaked 780 million litres of oil into the Gulf of Mexico last year. By comparison the Rena spill represents about 2 teaspoonfuls of the bucket that spilled into the Gulf of Mexico and we are struggling to deal with even that.
The ship will later go on to prospect in deepwater areas off Stewart Island, a formidable area for weather let alone oil prospecting, in a permit area due to be taken over by Shell Oil.
It’s time for the government to stop spending millions enticing the deep sea oil industry to New Zealand.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Article ends- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -The following photos in this post were posted by Greenpeace Aotearoa's Facebook presence:
"The Polarcus Alima arrives at Taranaki Port. It is due to leave shortly to start exploring for deep sea oil off Raglan on behalf of the US oil giant Anadarko." Greenpeace/Amos Chapple
"The Polarcus Alima arrives at Taranaki Port. It is due to leave shortly to start exploring for deep sea oil off Raglan on behalf of the US oil giant Anadarko." Greenpeace/Amos Chapple THANKS SO MUCH GREENPEACE AOTEAROA -Nonnie
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