Argentina Proposes Nationalization of Biggest Oil Company. Argentine President Cristina Fernandez has proposed a bill to seize back major oil shares from the country's biggest oil company YPF, owned by Spain's Repsol. The move is facing aggressive opposition from the corporation and from the Spanish government, threatening that Argentina will become "an international pariah". Argentina's President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner holds a test tube containing petrol during a ceremony at the Casa Rosada presidential palace in Buenos Aires April 16, 2012. (Photo: Reuters/Stringer) "We are the only county in Latin America, and I would say in practically the entire world, that doesn't manage its own natural resources," Fernandez said. She said her proposal "is not a model of statism" but "the recovery of sovereignty. " Associated Press: Argentine leader moves to nationalize oil shares Fernandez said in an address to the country that the measure sent to congress on Monday is aimed at recovering the nation's sovereignty over its hydrocarbon resources.
Shell Oil Sues Environmentalists Over Arctic Drilling. Over the past five years, the Center for Biological Diversity and our allies have successfully blocked offshore oil development in the Beaufort and Chukchi seas. In 2009, a federal court threw out a Bush-era five-year plan for offshore development because it ignored the Arctic’s environmental sensitivity; in 2010 we won a court order stopping drilling activities in the Chukchi Sea due to poor environmental review; and in 2011 we successfully challenged Shell’s air permits.
As a result, Shell Oil — slated to drill in the Arctic every year since 2007 — has not yet stuck its drills in the water. In the wake of the BP Gulf disaster, we put pressure on the government to reject BP’s plans to drill the world’s longest horizontal well in the Arctic Ocean via a project it dubbed “Liberty.” Thanks in large part to our pressure, BP has postponed Liberty. Also in the wake of the BP disaster, we challenged the U.S. Why is Shell Oil suing the Center? But we’re not leaving. Related Stories: Groups Galvanize Against US Senate with 24 Hour 'Signature Bomb' Beginning at noon today, a coalition of over a dozen environmental groups, progressive organizations, and socially minded businesses -- including 350.org, NRDC, Sierra Club, MoveOn.org and companies like Patagonia and Northface -- are launching a 24 hour “signature bomb” with the goal of sending the Senate over 500,000 messages opposing Keystone XL and urging Senators to block any amendments that reverse the President's pipeline rejection.
UPDATE: (4:35 PM EST) According to reports: Senate Republicans officially filed an amendment Monday afternoon to the transportation bill that would authorize the Keystone XL pipeline. The amendment is sponsored by Sens. John Hoeven, Mitch McConnell, Richard Lugar, David Vitter, Mike Johanns and Orrin Hatch. And 350.org reports: Click here to add your name to our growing movement wide petition to stop Keystone XL -- there are over 300,000 signatures and counting: 350.org/kxl Earlier: Twitter updates show that the numbers are growing rapidly:
Valentine’s Day March Planned at Senator Chuck Schumer’s Office. Activism Published on February 13th, 2012 | by Don Lieber Chuck Schumer, via Wikimedia Commons. (Credit: U.S. Senate) New Yorkers concerned about new efforts by GOP leaders in the US Senate to ‘fastrack’ approval of the controversial Keystone XL pipeline will march on Valentine’s Day to the Manhattan office of Sen. “Chuck Schumer should know we are watching him” said Zack Malitz, a Senior at C.U.N.Y. and one of the march organizers, “and on Valentine’s day we will deliver a very clear message to him: “DON’T BREAK OUR HEARTS CHUCK – SAY NO TO THE DIRTY KEYTSONE PIPELINE.” The march will begin at Das Hammarskjold UN Plaza (47th Street, between 1st and 2nd Ave) at 12:00 noon, and culminate at Schumers’ office at 780 Third Avenue, in Manhattan,12:30 pm.
In the next few days the US Senate will be considering whether to force approval of the pipeline, overriding President Obama’s previous rejection. About the Author. Kyra Sedgwick | Kyra Sedgwick Makes Desperate Attempt To Block U.S. Keystone Pipeline. SOPA Blackout Was Biggest Online Protest In History, Backers Say. IP-Watch Interns Summer 2013 IP-Watch interns Brittany Ngo (Yale Graduate School of Public Health) and Caitlin McGivern (University of Law, London) talk about their Geneva experience in summer 2013. 2:42. Submit ideas to info [at] ip-watch [dot] ch! We welcome your participation in article and blog comment threads, and other discussion forums, where we encourage you to analyse and react to the content available on the Intellectual Property Watch website. By participating in discussions or reader forums, or by submitting opinion pieces or comments to articles, blogs, reviews or multimedia features, you are consenting to these rules. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9.
Quantitative Analysis Of Contributions To NETMundial Meeting For IPW Subscribers A directory of IP delegates in Geneva. A guide to Geneva-based public health and intellectual property organisations. Monthly Reporter Access the Monthly Reporter Archive > ‘Citizens United’: A Supreme Court decision that is widely misunderstood. Two years ago this weekend the Roberts Supreme Court issued its most controversial ruling to date. Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission overturned long-standing campaign finance laws restricting corporate political expenditures, reasoning that the political speech of corporations was as important to the marketplace of ideas as the voices of human citizens. As is well known, denunciations of the opinion, which allowed groups to raise and spend unlimited amounts supporting or opposing candidates, were loud and widespread. President Obama even took the rare step of criticizing the court while delivering his 2010 State of the Union address — while some of the justices sat before him.
As the rise of super PACs has already shown in the Republican primaries, the coming presidential election will be swamped with cash, and our democracy will not be better for it. Unfortunately, the most prevalent critique of the decision — Corporations are not people! — is simplistic and dangerous. The poor are the Americans no one wants to talk about. The political debates on free markets or the privileges of the 1 percent seldom touch on the actual struggles of citizens — say, living in the shadow of foreclosure, or attending a failing school, or surviving in a gang-occupied neighborhood.
Ideology is abstract. Hardship is lived concretely. I like a good political philosophic debate as much as the next columnist. Give me a soy latte and a libertarian, and I’m set for the night. Ideas do have consequences. But many Americans are being overlooked in this bipartisan conspiracy of economic abstraction. A significant and growing portion of the population lives in poverty. GOP candidates seldom mention the problems of the poor, for fear of being viewed as ideological weaklings. Yet a debate on poverty is needed. Conservatives naturally focus on equal opportunity rather than on equal outcomes.
Liberals often fail to recognize that income redistribution, while preventing penury, is not identical to social equality. Michaelgerson@washpost.com. Aptera Motors Is Shutting Down. Canada: Climate Criminal. At the dawn of the 21st century a new political regime has transformed Canada from global hero – once standing up for peace, people, and nature – to global criminal, plunging into war, eroding civil rights, and destroying environments. What happened to Canada? Oil. And not just any oil, but the world’s dirtiest, most destructive oil. Canada’s betrayal at the Durban climate talks – abandoning its Kyoto Accord commitments – is the direct effect of becoming a petro-state. By the late 20th century, oil companies knew that the world’s conventional oil fields were in decline and oil production would soon peak, which it did in 2005.
Shell Oil opened operations in the tar sands in 2003. In Durban, in December 2011, after mocking climate science and common decency, Canada’s Environment Minister, Peter Kent announced that Canada would abandon the Kyoto deal, abrogating a legally binding international agreement, which Canada had signed seven years earlier. Life as an oil resource colony. Separate oil and state. Forget being responsible to the desires of Canadians and democratic process (remember Bill C-311?).
On the energy and climate change file, the Harper government is more responsible to the desires of industry and tar sands advocates, working together to promote a false image of the tar sands and lash out at critics. Here are, but three examples (this blog could go on and on and on, like the blog that never ends…) Funding from 'foreign special interest groups' This recent news is so full of contradictions, it makes my head spin.
Does the finger-pointing at environmental groups by Prime Minister Harper and Minister of Natural Resources Joe Oliver sound familiar? It should. EthicalOil.org, an NGO dedicated to promoting the tar sands that doesn't accept money from foundations or governments, but does accept money from individuals and businesses, launched a campaign on this topic in the New Year. Huh. CAPP gives a hand to Harper on polishing tar sands image Opposition to EU FQD. Multinational oil companies are hijacking Canadian energy decisions | Susan Casey-Lefkowitz. Rather than preparing to listen respectfully to community members in British Columbia, the Canadian federal government is acting as a spokesperson for Big Oil accusing opponents of the proposed Northern Gateway pipeline of being “radicals” and “foreigners.”
When it comes to tar sands pipelines, multinational oil companies are hijacking a Canadian process with a recent series of accusations from tar sands interests trying to minimize the very valid Canadian public concerns. The Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline would bring tar sands oil west from Alberta across British Columbia for export to Asia and California. It will drive tar sands expansion, accelerate global warming, and put globally important rivers and coastal ecosystems under threat. This pipeline proposal has long been of concern to the people of British Columbia. First Nations’ opposition has been so strong over the years that the project proposal even went on hold at one point. Comments are closed for this post. Rebecca Tarbotton: Top Five Ways to Change the World in 2012. 2011 saw more people power than I could have dared to hope.
Last New Year's Eve, who could have predicted that the protests in Tunisia, just then making the news, would lead to the ousting of its president of 23 years not two weeks later; that this would inspire citizens throughout the Arab World to pour into the streets demanding change in their own countries; that this in turn would kindle popular resistance in cities and Occupy encampments spanning the U.S., from Oakland to Wall Street; that corporate power and income inequality would become fodder for conversation at the dinner table? And now here we are, at the dawn of another new year.
Who knows what we can do? Now is the time for change, but the question becomes: How can we keep this momentum going? As we head into 2012, I invite you to think about what you can do to shake things up, make your voice heard, and make 2012 another banner year for people power. Here are five of my favorites, in no particular order: Our Decision | Canada's Northern Gateway Pipeline. Pipeline politics: Don’t demonize the charitable sector. Efforts by Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his Natural Resources Minister to characterize charitable organizations as dangerous radicals assaulting the national interest is far removed from the truth.
Such dubious claims reflect either a willful ignorance of the truth or a willingness to bend it to favour their own interests. Particularly heinous to Mr. Harper, and to the internationally funded oil companies working in the tar sands, is the fact that non-Canadians have been among the funders of some environmental non-governmental organizations. This has been characterized by the industry and its acolytes as foreign interference in Canadian sovereignty. The modern philanthropic and charitable sector is increasingly global in its activities and funding. Most issues are not constrained by national borders. So the philanthropic and charitable sector has been adjusting to do its work more effectively. . • Issue- and problem-based, rather than driven by donors’ personal whims. The Expert's Report that Damns the Northern Gateway Pipeline. Veteran energy analyst David Hughes calculates three reasons the project is bad for Canada. Enbridge pipeline construction in the Athabasca region.
Source: Enbridge. A slide presentation by geologist David Hughes includes charts showing the wide discrepancy between commonly accepted growth scenarios for the Alberta oil sands, and significantly higher projections put forth by Enbridge and other proponents of fast build-out of oil sands infrastructure. The slides also include satellite views of the oil sands showing growth over nearly three decades.
View the slides here. The Northern Gateway Pipeline will explosively increase the scale of oil sands production at a level not in the national interest, says David Hughes, one of Canada's foremost energy analysts. By tripling oil sands production rates above 2010 levels, the project will "compromise the long term energy security interests of Canadians, as well as their environmental interests," charges Hughes.
Three strikes against Slow and steady. OP-ED | McMahon Is Wrong About Keystone Pipeline. By Ben Martin | Jan 13, 2012 11:59am (19) Comments | Commenting has expired Posted to: Opinion Recently Linda McMahon declared that the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline is in the national interest and described it as a “gift horse”. She is wrong. It is neither. A more accurate description of the project would be a “poison pill” or a “dirty needle used to feed our oil addiction.” The jobs figures Ms. McMahon cites to support her argument are misleading at best and, at worst, utterly false. According to studies conducted by the US State Department and Cornell University’s Global Labor Institute, these figures come from a study funded by TransCanada (the company proposing Keystone XL) and are wildly inflated.
TransCanada has misinformed, paid off, and otherwise pressured land owners to give up their land rights for this pipeline according to Randy Thompson and other land owners in Nebraska. Tags: keystone pipline, Linda McMahon, environment, Ben Martin Share this story with others. (19) Comments. Keystone XL Tar Sands Pipeline is Not a Jobs Plan, But an Oil Export Plan. By Climate Guest Contributor on January 13, 2012 at 4:52 pm "Keystone XL Tar Sands Pipeline is Not a Jobs Plan, But an Oil Export Plan" The Oil Goes to China, the Permanent Jobs Go to Canada, We Get the Spills, and the World Gets Warmer by Danielle Droitsch, cross posted from NRDC’s Switchboard You’ll hear the GOP, the American Petroleum Institute, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce make wild claims about the job creation potential of the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline.
Don’t be fooled. The debate over whether Keystone XL creates jobs is a convenient diversion from something oil company backers don’t want you to know: this is an export pipeline to help them access foreign markets and bypass the United States. CNN posted this interview with a TransCanada executive who admits that permanent jobs would only number “in the hundreds, certainly not in the thousands” from Montana down to Houston: Steven M. The laser-focus emphasis on Keystone XL by House Republicans, the U.S.