Edinburgh Castle, symbol of the Scottish capital, whose university has just decided not to disinvest in fossil fuels. Photo credit: Kim Traynor/CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons

By Kirsty Haigh, Eric Lai, and Ellen Young
EDINBURGH, May 17 2015 (IPS)

The University of Edinburgh has taken the decision to not divest from fossil fuels, bowing to the short-term economic interests of departments funded by the fossil fuel industry, with little to no acknowledgement of the long-term repercussions of these investments.

The decision, which was announced on May 12, exemplifies the influence that vested interests have gained over academic institutions in the United Kingdom.“Our university has decided to take a reactionary approach to climate change, failing to make any statement of commitment to the staff and students who have been demanding divestment from fossil fuel companies for the past three years”

Collectively, U.K. universities invest over eight billion dollars in fossil fuels, more than 3,000 dollars for every student. The University of Edinburgh has the country’s third largest university endowment, after Oxford and Cambridge, totalling 457 million dollars, of which approximately 14 million is invested in fossil fuel companies, including Total, Shell and BHP Billiton.

Our university has decided to take a reactionary approach to climate change, failing to make any statement of commitment to the staff and students who have been demanding divestment from fossil fuel companies for the past three years.

Announcing it decision, the university said: ”The university will withdraw from investment in these [fossil fuel consuming and extracting] companies if: realistic alternative sources of energy are available and the companies involved are not investing in technologies that help address the effects of carbon emissions and climate change.”

However, given the fossil fuel industry’s continued destruction of the planet, the university’s approach leaves far too much to the imagination and indeed allows for the potential to not divest from harmful industries at all.

We are going to find our existence completely altered – and in a way that we do not want – if   we do not stop extracting and burning fossil fuels, and we know the big fossil fuel companies have no intention of stopping.

Climate change not only poses a massive economic threat but also presents the world’s biggest global health hazard – and its effects are hitting the poorest parts of the world hardest. The University of Edinburgh is fundamentally failing to acknowledge the part it is playing in funding climate chaos.

Our university claims to be a “world leader in addressing global challenges including … climate change” but if the university had any desire to take the moral lead, it would have divested. Divestment would have seen Edinburgh join a global movement of universities and numerous other forward-thinking organisations in divorcing itself from the tightening grip of the fossil fuel industry.

The University of Edinburgh came down firmly on the side of departments funded by the industry which have been scaremongering throughout the process

Freedom of Information (FOI) requests have revealed, for example, that the university’s Geosciences Department has received funding from a range of fossil fuel companies over the past 10 years, including BP, Shell and ConocoPhillips, as well as grants and gifts of money from Total and Cairn Energy.

Sixty-five students in the university’s School of Engineering have already signed an open letter to the Head of the School, Prof Hugh McCann, angered by his public opposition to fossil fuel divestment.

Their letter states: “The School of Engineering has and will continue to have a pivotal role in the university’s future. It is after all engineers who will be on the frontlines of the transition to a low carbon society.

“By basing its argument against divestment on engineering students’ chances of employment in one dead-end industry, the school appears to be failing to prepare its students for careers in the rapidly changing energy markets of the 21st century, whilst neglecting the faculty’s broader responsibility to the student body as a whole. As a consequence, they gamble employment against our common future.”

Divesting is a way of taking on and dismantling the big fossil fuel companies and the power they hold over our society and governments. We rightly condemn companies that do not pay their taxes or who exploit their workers, and so we must do this to the companies who are threatening our very existence.

Divestment is also about creating more democratic institutions where those who are part of universities can have a say in how their money is spent and invested. The university’s announcement has shown that we still have a long way to go in creating transparent, democratic and ethical institutions. It brings into question the validity of the university’s decision-making process.

For the past three years, students, staff and alumni have supported full divestment – yet the University of Edinburgh has ignored their calls. The consultation run by the university found staff, students and the public in favour of ethical investment. A year later we still have zero commitment to change.

A process which began with promise has been allowed to descend into a complete breakdown in communication between students and the university. Serious questions need to be asked about why the decision was taken in favour of the views from the university’s Department of Geosciences, which freely admits its vested interested in maintaining the status quo for financial reasons.

The University of Edinburgh needs to invest in alternatives to dirty and unhealthy energy sources. These alternatives will create new jobs, so that when the fossil fuel industry ceases to exist there is something to replace it and our students are trained to work in it.

Edited by Phil Harris    

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, IPS – Inter Press Service. 

Excerpt:

President of Fishermen and Friends of the Sea (FFOS) Gary Aboud is arrested near the International Waterfront in Port of Spain. Credit: Peter Richards/IPS

By Peter Richards
PORT OF SPAIN, Nov 21 2013 (IPS)

The demonstration took place on land and sea simultaneously. In the end, police had arrested three people, including Gary Aboud, president of the Trinidadian NGO Fishermen and Friends of the Sea (FFOS), but protesters were undaunted. They would be back.

“We are going to re-assemble and go back to the drawing board. The action gave the government a clear indication of how serious we are,” Aboud told IPS. He now faces charges of resisting arrest, obstructing the police and protesting without permission on Nov. 13."Each air gun is emitting almost double the sound of a single jet and is equivalent to sound that occurs when you use explosives." -- Gary Aboud

At the centre of the dispute are the seismic surveys in which energy companies searching for oil and hydrocarbons in the seabed deploy air guns, which are towed behind ships and release intense impulses of compressed air into the water.

According to the U.S. -based Natural Resources Defence Council, seismic surveys have been shown to cause catch rates of some commercial fish to plummet – in some cases over enormous areas of ocean.

“What we are asking is for is the same thing every country in the world has asked for,” Aboud said, noting that the issue has become controversial enough that the International Maritime Organisation and U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) will convene a meeting in London next February to highlight ways of minimising the impact of seismic surveys.

FFOS also says a government-appointed committee is skewed heavily in favour of people closely affiliated with the energy sector here.

“It only has two fisherfolk representatives and 14 government representatives – that is an imbalance. We are recommending one scientist be appointed by the fisherfolk, one scientist by the government and the two scientists appoint a third scientist,” he said.

“The government has appointed a lot of yes men and people who work for the energy sector. If you work for the energy sector we can’t expect justice,” Aboud told IPS.

Food Production Minister Devant Maharaj, speaking at the end of the weekly cabinet meeting, disputed these assertions.

“Seismic surveys are routinely conducted as part of the exploratory process in an effort to obtain information on the location and the quantum of raw hydrocarbon in the various strata of rocks,” he said.

Maraj said that several studies have been done regionally and internationally, and documentation on the effect of seismic surveys on different species of fish can be found in a policy document titled “The National Seismic Operations of Trinidad and Tobago.”

“A draft version developed in July 2010 was circulated to committee members and other major stakeholders for comment. The policy document was also submitted to the Ministry of Energy for its consideration,” Maharaj said.

Critics argue that there should be a moratorium on seismic testing while the government creates a regulatory framework that will include making it mandatory for companies to submit an independently-conducted Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) before testing.

“All the oil companies know that the EIA is a standard procedure…so it is not just something we are saying, it is standard procedure around the world,” Aboud told IPS.

He added that a judge in Mexico recently ruled “that you cannot do seismic bombing where the fishes are spawning (and) where there is a migratory path”.

The fisherfolk here have directed their anger mostly at British Petroleum (BP) and the state-owned Petroleum Company of Trinidad and Tobago Limited (PETROTRIN). Aboud said he has already started talks with the trade union movement here.

He also plans to hold talks with religious leaders in the hope they would empathise with what he called the “national plight” of the fishing industry.

But PETROTRIN has hit back, saying that its plans for an Ocean Bottom Cable (OBC) seismic survey was being undertaken in “conformance with the licence requirements” from the relevant authorities as well as putting in place “measures to ensure that the seismic survey is conducted in conformance with international safety and environmental best practices”.

In a full page-newspaper advertisement this week, PETROTRIN said that research has indicated that the “effects of seismic surveys on fish stock have indicated little or no negative impact” and that the mortality caused by air-emitting devices on fish eggs and larvae might amount to an average of 0.0012 percent a day.

“In comparison to the natural mortality rate of 5-15 percent per day, the seismic induced damage is insignificant,” the oil company asserted, adding “we stand by our statement that the decibel levels of the underwater pulses are similar to the naturally occurring sounds in the ocean.

“The sound from the survey does not exceed 250 decibels which can be compared to a ship sound, close to the hull, which emits 200 decibels and a bottlenose dolphin click which emits 229 decibels.”

At the start of the year, BP conducted a 275-million-dollar seismic study that the company’s regional president Norman Christie said “has given reason for even more confidence in the future of Trinidad and Tobago’s hydrocarbon industry.

“This survey will allow us to improve our understanding of our existing acreage to ensure we are maximising the recovery of the resources. The survey has stirred up quite a bit of excitement as it is the first time we are using this specialised seismic technology in the BP world,” he added.

Aboud says the oil companies’ arguments simply don’t hold water.

“They are saying they are not using explosives. We never say they are using dynamite. We say that the air gun blasts are 260 decibels. A jet aircraft is 140 decibels and human ordinary pain is 130 decibels.

“We are also saying the seismic ships are using 20 to 35,000 individual air guns and each air gun is emitting almost double the sound of a single jet and is equivalent to sound that occurs when you use explosives,” he told IPS.

A group of Mexican citizens are preparing the first civil lawsuit in the Mexican courts against British oil company BP for the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

The plaintiffs are bringing the class action lawsuit under a 2011 reform of the Mexican constitution that allows a large number of people with a common interest in a matter to sue as a group.

The civil lawsuit encompasses “damages to people living in the area or who own residential and commercial property along the coast, and people indirectly affected” by the spill, lawyer Óscar Preciado, with the law firm Rincón Mayorga Román Illanes Soto y Compañía, told IPS.

Sea turtles are among the larger animal species whose reproduction was hurt by the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill. Credit: Mauricio Ramos/IPS

“Without a doubt, this will set an important precedent. Class action lawsuits have been brought, but in questions relating to consumer, rather than environmental, rights,” said the lawyer, whose firm is representing the plaintiffs.

On Apr. 20, 2010, the Deepwater Horizon oil rig, owned by Swiss-based Transocean Ltd and under lease to BP, exploded off the coast of Louisiana, leaving 11 workers dead and 17 injured. It sank two days later.

By Jul. 15, 2010, when the oil leak was finally sealed, nearly five million barrels of oil had been spilled – only 800,000 of which were recovered – and at least 1.9 million gallons of toxic chemical dispersants had been injected into the Gulf of Mexico.

The spill poses a long-term threat to flora, fauna and fishing resources in the Gulf of Mexico, which bathes the coasts of the Mexican states of Tamaulipas, Veracruz and Quintana Roo, and to tourist sites, although the final extent of the damage is unknown, experts say.

“The government and BP can be sued in Mexico. The government was guilty of omission in this case,” René Sánchez, the coordinator of Colectivas, told IPS. The non-governmental organisation was born in November 2012 to provide advice to organisations and individuals with respect to filing class action lawsuits.

However, the 2011 law on collective action, which allows groups of consumers and PROFECO, Mexico’s federal consumer protection agency, to sue public and private companies, does not contemplate reparations.

The Gulf of Mexico disaster gave rise to a massive class action lawsuit involving more than 130,000 plaintiffs, known as multi-district litigation 2179 (MDL-2179), overseen by federal Judge Carl Barbier in New Orleans.

In January, BP pleaded guilty to 14 criminal counts and was sentenced to pay 4.5 billion dollars in penalties and fines. However, the amount is expected to climb as the lawsuit continues to wind its way through the courts.

The following month, TransOcean was found guilty by a U.S. federal judge of violating the U.S. Clean Water Act, and was fined 1.4 billion dollars.

Barbier set a Jun. 21 deadline for the attorneys to file their conclusions about evidence presented in the first phase of the trial.

In April, the government of conservative Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto sued BP and other companies in a U.S. court, after his predecessor Felipe Calderón (2006-December 2012) failed to do so.

The government’s lawsuit will fall under MDL-2179.

In 2010, the state governments of Tamaulipas, Veracruz and Quintana Roo, as well as several companies, had brought legal action against BP and TransOcean for damages to the marine environment, the coastline, and local estuaries.

Government agencies in Mexico spent more than 11 million dollars on studies, assessments, lab tests, training and overflights related to the disaster, the state governments argued.

BP Mexico did not respond to IPS’ queries about the government or class action lawsuits.

The dearth of studies on the magnitude of the damages in the Gulf of Mexico has been the Achilles’ heel of the environmental organisations and lawyers involved in preparing the class action lawsuit in Mexico.

“That is the question that has limited us the most,” Preciado said. “The Mexican state has not been very participative.

“The damages will appear over the course of years, and this won’t be easily resolved. But we are not frightened of taking on BP – on the contrary, we are very motivated,” added the lawyer, who is working on another class action lawsuit against Mexico’s state-owned oil monopoly Petróleos Mexicanos (Pemex) involving oil spills in the southeast state of Tabasco.

The class action suit will pose a challenge to the Mexican judges, who are not accustomed to environmental litigation, when it is presented to a federal court in the capital on a date that has not yet been established.

Colectivas’ Sánchez said “we have to see how the judges prepare, and the state of the judiciary’s bureaucracy. One of the first steps is for the plaintiffs to be recognised as a class,” as occurs under the U.S. justice system.

Sánchez is also preparing a collective lawsuit against the eventual approval of commercial planting of genetically modified maize in Mexico.

Despite the 2010 Gulf of Mexico disaster and a September 2008 blow-out on a BP rig in the Caspian Sea off the coast of Azerbaijan – which was covered up – Pemex signed a technological agreement with the British company in 2012 for deep-sea operations in this country’s Gulf of Mexico waters.

“It is an aberration,” Preciado remarked.

The U.S. justice department is blaming BP PLC for the massive 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, describing in new court papers examples of what it calls “gross negligence and willful misconduct”.

The court filing is the sharpest position yet taken by the U.S. government as it seeks to hold the British oil giant largely responsible for the largest oil spill, as well as the largest environmental disaster, in U.S. history.

Gross negligence

Gross negligence is a central issue to the case, scheduled to go to trial in New Orleans in January 2013. A gross negligence finding could nearly quadruple the civil damages owed by BP under the Clean Water Act to 21 billion dollars.

The U.S. government and BP are engaged in talks to settle civil and potential criminal liability, though neither side will comment on the status of negotiations.

“The behaviour, words and actions of these BP executives would not be tolerated in a middling size company manufacturing dry goods for sale in a suburban mall,” government lawyers wrote in the filing on Aug. 31 in federal court in New Orleans.

The filing comes more than two years after the disaster that struck on Apr. 20, 2010 when a surge of methane gas known to rig hands as a “kick” sparked an explosion aboard the Deepwater Horizon rig as it was drilling the mile-deep Macondo 252 well off Louisiana’s coast. The rig sank two days later.

The well gushed at least 4.9 million barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico for 87 straight days, unleashing a torrent of oil that fouled the shorelines of four Gulf Coast states and eclipsed the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill in Alaska in severity.

Al Jazeera’s Dahr Jamail, who has covered the disaster from the beginning, believes the government’s statement is an accurate portrayal of BP’s actions that led to the disaster, and that it underscores the fact that the impacted areas of the Gulf continue to suffer environmental impacts.

“This filing means that government agencies now stand behind some key allegations made by regional scientists and fishermen,” Jamail said, “And that is that BP isn’t telling the truth when it tries to convince the American people, via an ongoing nationwide PR campaign, that everything is back to normal in the Gulf and that BP is a responsible company. The reality is that the fishing industry continues to suffer, there are ongoing seafood malformations and deformities, and large areas where there is still oil.”

Specifically, errors made by BP and Swiss-based Transocean Ltd, owner of the Deepwater Horizon platform, in deciphering a key pressure test of the Macondo well are a clear indication of gross negligence, the Justice Department said.

“That such a simple, yet fundamental and safety-critical test could have been so stunningly, blindingly botched in so many ways, by so many people, demonstrates gross negligence,” the government said in its 39-page filing.

BP rejection

BP rejects the charge. “BP believes it was not grossly negligent and looks forward to presenting evidence on this issue at trial in January,” the company said in a statement. A Transocean spokesman had no immediate comment.

On Aug. 13, BP urged U.S. District Judge Carl Barbier to approve an estimated 7.8-billion-dollar settlement reached with 125,000 individuals and businesses, asserting its actions “did not constitute gross negligence or willful misconduct”.

The government said Barbier should avoid making any finding about BP’s potential gross negligence when he rules on the settlement. Barbier will hold a fairness hearing on that settlement on Nov. 8.

Barbier should also disregard claims made by BP that minimise the environmental and economic impacts of the spill, the government said, citing environmental harms like severe ill health of dolphins in Louisiana’s Barataria Bay, which saw some of the heaviest oiling from the spill.

Exasperation

The filing does exhibit exasperation on the part of government lawyers. They wrote that they decided to elaborate on BP’s alleged gross negligence because they believed BP was trying to escape full responsibility.

The justice department said they feared that “if the United States were to remain silent, BP later may urge that its arguments had assumed the status of agreed facts”.

*Published under an agreement with Al Jazeera.