Huge win for the environment

Friends of the Earth Australia (FoEA) is congratulating Esso Australia for saying it has rejected the idea of dumping retired oil and gas platforms into the ocean to form fishing reefs.

In Melbourne consultations today, Esso told FoEA the good environmental news that they would now remove the platforms — including the long steel support structures or ‘jackets’ — from the ocean.

In doing so, Esso (a company owned by ExxonMobil) said it acknowledged the science that does not support the artificial reefs idea. Esso is planning to remove 13 retired oil and gas platforms from Bass Strait in coming years. 

Media Release ‒ Friends of the Earth Australia ‒ 18 July 2023

The Federal Court has today quashed the declaration of a proposed nuclear waste dump site near Kimba in SA, citing ‘pre-judgement’ and ‘apprehended bias’. The court case was initiated by Barngarla Traditional Owners, who are unanimous in their opposition to the proposed nuclear dump.

Dr. Jim Green, national nuclear campaigner with Friends of the Earth Australia, said:

“Today’s decision is an incredible victory for Barngarla Traditional Owners. Now Prime Minister Albanese must kill the nuclear dump plan stone dead".

5 June 2023, Paris   The second round of negotiations for a new global treaty to end plastic pollution has concluded in Paris, France.  After five days of negotiations important steps forward in the process towards ambitious global action have been made, key outcomes of the negotiations  included;

• agreement to develop a zero draft treaty text for future binding treaty on plastics
• discussions on the 12 core obligations options for the new plastic treaty 
• Australian government active as part of ‘high-ambition coalition’ for the binding treaty with over 50 other countries
• support by many governments for global measures to reduce plastic production, regulate the waste trade, ensure chemical transparency and ban single use plastics
• the third round of negotiations will be held Nairobi, Kenya in November 2023.

A slew of unmeasured methane leaks from platforms and pipelines off Australia’s coast have released large amounts of the dangerous greenhouse gas into the atmosphere, but we will never know exactly how much, and it will certainly not be included in Australia’s emissions calculations. Methane, which is otherwise known euphemistically as “natural gas,” is more than 80 times worse than carbon dioxide for global warming.

Friday 4 November 2022, Sharm El-Sheikh (Egypt) - To stem runaway climate change, COP27 must steer away from seductive-sounding ‘nature-based solutions’ and geoengineering fixes, and instead focus on cutting fossil fuel emissions at source, say Friends of the Earth International on the eve of the UN climate talks.

August 4, 2022. The House of Representatives has passed the Climate Change 2022 bill. After nine years of delay and denial by the Coalition government, Friends of the Earth Australia welcomes the rapid action by the Albanese government to enact it’s signature climate commitment.

The Labor government, the Greens, community independents and Liberal MP Bridget Archer all voted to support the bill. Sadly, the Coalition opted to remain on the wrong side of both the science and history and voted against the bill.

Friends of the Earth Australia welcomes the release of the ​​national State of the Environment report. Although required to produce them every five years, the previous Coalition government held up the release of the report, delaying Australia’s ability to respond to the biodiversity crisis outlined in the document.

Australia has produced a national state of environment report every five years since 1995. They assess every aspect of Australia’s environment and heritage, covering rivers, oceans, air, land and urban areas. They show that our natural environment is in continuous decline.

This report is the first to consider how our declining natural environment is impacting on the health and well-being of Australians. It is also the first to include Indigenous co-authors. 

Once again, the IPCC’s findings have become a political battleground. Climate justice campaigners fear that climate scientists’ core message – that we must make an urgent just transition away from fossil fuels to limit the risk of runaway warming – is being undermined by the legitimisation of a 1.5 degree overshoot in modelled scenarios, and pathways that include unproven and speculative technologies to supposedly cool the planet later down the line.

Activists and experts from Friends of the Earth International, the world’s largest grassroots environmental federation, gave their responses.

After almost two years, the Australian National Contact Point has made a determination on the international climate complaint by Bushfire survivors and Friends of the Earth Australia. The complainants express their disappointment that the determination finds ANZ’s practices are ‘consistent’ with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Guidelines on Multinational Enterprises.

With the new Omicron strain of the COVID virus threatening the world and other ongoing COVID outbreaks, the need to end the global vaccine apartheid is more urgent than ever.   

Less than 5% of people in most low-income countries have received COVID-19 vaccines, while rich countries are reaching 80% or more. Millions are dying while new more infectious strains of the virus develop.