A MESSAGE FROM OUR FRIENDS IN LA PLONGE, SASKATCHEWAN
In the spring of 2011, the Dene, Cree, Metis and settler people of northern Saskatchewan discovered that 3 of their communities were being targeted by the Nuclear Waste Management Organization to become “the host” to store all of Canada’s high-level nuclear waste with an open-ended possibility of storing spent nuclear fuel from the USA as well.
Northern Saskatchewan and the traditional lands of the Dene, Metis and settler communities have long been poisoned by the uranium industry. But in the last few years, this despoliation has intensified, with proposed long term storage of depleted uranium. We formed the Committee For Future Generations to resist these plans.
You can support us and stand with us in a number of ways. We are offering for sale prints of Marius Paul’s breathlines painting “Mother and Child” pictured above. You can listen to a recent interview Candyce Paul gave. And you can read more of this message (which includes how to purchase prints).
The B.C. Supreme Court has ruled the B.C. government breached its duty to consult the Gitga'at and neighbouring First Nations on the Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline. The decision, announced Wednesday, is seen as a major victory for First Nations that could have an impact on future oil pipeline projects...
The United States recently struck an expansive free trade agreement, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), with Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, and Vietnam. Eventually, every Pacific Rim nation may be included.
The Sierra Club is deeply concerned about the lack of transparency around the TPP and the deal's environmental implications. Here's why:
Extreme Secrecy. The TPP negotiations took place in extreme secrecy. Still no drafts of TPP texts have been released. And public input has been drowned out by dominant corporate input; more than 600 corporate advisors have actively worked to shape the agreement while the public is being kept in the dark.
Threat to Forests, Wildlife, and Fish.While the TPP environment chapter should set strong and binding rules to address conservation challenges like illegal timber and wildlife trade, its rules will likely be too weak to have an impact on the ground and are unlikely to be enforced, rendering the chapter essentially meaningless. Read more here.
Unfettered Rights to Corporations. The TPP will include provisions that give corporations the right to sue a government for unlimited cash compensation -- in private and non-transparent tribunals -- over nearly any law or policy that a corporation alleges will reduce its profits. Using similar rules in other free trade agreements, corporations such as Exxon Mobil and Dow Chemical have launched over 600 cases against more than 100 governments. Dozens of cases attack common-sense environmental laws and regulations, such as regulations to protect communities and the environment from harmful chemicals or mining practices. Read more here about how harmful investment rules included in other trade pacts have led to the attack of climate and environmental policies.
Increase in Dirty Fracking. The TPP may allow for significantly increased exports of liquefied natural gas without the careful study or adequate protections necessary to safeguard the American public. This would mean an increase of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, the dirty and violent process that dislodges gas deposits from shale rock formations. It would also likely cause an increase in natural gas and electricity prices, impacting consumers, manufacturers, workers, and increasing the use of dirty coal power. Read our factsheet on the TPP and natural gas exports here!
The evidence for a new geological epoch which marks the impact of human activity on the Earth is now overwhelming according to a recent paper by an international group of geoscientists. The Anthropocene, which is argued to start in the mid-20th Century, is marked by the spread of materials such as aluminium, concrete, plastic, fly ash and fallout from nuclear testing across the planet, coincident with elevated greenhouse gas emissions and unprecedented trans-global species invasions...
A study examining measurements taken from forests 60 to 120 kilometers away from the crippled Fukushima Daiichi power plant revealed that cesium levels doubled in 2013...
...Scientists are hesitant to speak about the severity of the Fukushima catastrophe. Revealing unauthorized information about the facility is a criminal offense with a sentence of up to ten years in prison.(2)...
...In May, a Buddhist monk named Koyu Abe launched a project called Make a Wish Upon Flowers, which set out to plant sunflower seeds, field mustard, amaranthus and cockscomb throughout Fukushima to adsorb the radiation.(4)...
