We stood outside Euston Gardens, gathering placards and people amid the rallying cries of change-makers. I weaved through the crowd reading the signs, ‘the seas are rising and so are we’, ‘system change, NOT climate change’, and ‘last warning, stop the warming’.

Bold red letters conveyed the sense of urgency that we all felt, the urgency that is so necessary if we are to reduce the impact of climate change, which is, I’m confident to say, the defining crisis of our time.

As we set off for the march, the unusually torrid midday sun beat down upon us like a confirmation, further evidence of our changing planet.

We left the brown, brittle grass of Euston Gardens and proceeded on our two mile walk to Parliament Square and, although we didn’t have thousands of people, we made up for it in passion as we chanted through the megaphones and flaunted our placards, feeling an overwhelming sense of solidarity.

I know of the stigma that clings tightly to the word ‘activist’ and I have, in the past, even experienced that sense of unease as I watched gaggles of seemingly gregarious activists marching for change.

Yet somehow when you want change you completely forget those inhibitions. You form an intense opposition to any policies that suggest apathy or bigotry and you want people to understand the importance of the issue immediately.

My involvement

I became involved with ‘This Is Zero Hour’ because of my role as a Born Free Foundation Youth Ambassador.

I have always had an interest and love of wildlife and animals in general, yet I only became deeply involved with conservation after being greatly inspired by the wonderful works of the Born Free Foundation.

I saw how climate change was having such adverse effects on so many species and I couldn’t sit back and watch as we walk obliviously into this sixth mass extinction.

Orangutans are being affected by forest fires, amphibians are impacted by temperature change and polar bears by ice melt. In fact, every species on earth is, or will be, affected by climate change.

Fortunately, it’s not too late at the moment and we still have time to take a stand against it. However, people are dissuaded from acting on this issue for several reasons.

Firstly, they feel an overwhelming sense of hopelessness because of the immensity of the issue.

Secondly, some deny climate change and deem themselves ‘realists’. They dispute the evidence and hide behind a facade of fallible statistics, yet shy away from hard scientific evidence that proves the warming of the climate system and human influence, which is unequivocal.

Lastly, they feel that they do not have the resources to effect change. However, as written in a previous article by Kathleen Maclay, “implementing measures to reduce the effects of climate change may cost money, but the results of global warming can be far more costly, particularly the rise in natural disasters”.

Furthermore, when we talk about climate change  we are not discussing a transient issue that may or may not affect us, this is quite possible humanity’s biggest challenge yet and, for this reason, we need to ensure that everyone is involved in the solution.

Youth involvement

As a result of the need for all-inclusive action, This Is Zero Hour was created as a youth-led movement to empower my generation to lead, or at least involve themselves in the fight against climate change. 

As much as I hate to say it, young people don’t have as much of a voice as we should be permitted. When we formulate opinions, we are seen as ‘indoctrinated’ or ‘influenced’ and this is part of the reason why Jamie Margolin founded This Is Zero Hour.

She is a connoisseur of youth empowerment and has implanted a sense of urgency within tens of thousands of people of all ages. This is now more important than ever.

Just four men own 80 percent of the press in the UK and for this reason it is vital that the voices and stories of those truly affected by climate change are promoted and provided with a platform.

Visceral and personal stories are always more effective than disconnected statistics. The video of a sea turtle with a straw lodged in its nostril began the ‘last straw’ campaign.

The footage of an orang-utan protecting its home from an intruding bulldozer galvanised people to abstain from using palm oil. Now we need to promote stories that will innervate people to act upon climate change.

The march

‘HEY HEY, HO HO, FOSSIL FUELS HAVE GOT TO GO!’

We chanted as we walked through Trafalgar Square. Throngs of people lifted their phones to video our congregation and it was with immense pride that we lifted our megaphones to our mouths and projected our very important message that would now be encapsulated in their camera rolls.

Upon arrival in Parliament Square our group assembled and, while we waited for our microphone and speaker to arrive, we all wrote down why we wanted to preserve our planet and what individual actions each of us was taking to protect it.

My eyes tracked the pens as they busily scribbled upon the papers. The papers contained hundreds of reasons why we should stay hopeful.

Each word bolstered my confidence in the human capacity for change. Once the paper was a vibrant kaleidoscope of hope, our microphone had arrived and I approached the platform with an intense feeling of responsibility.

The next words I spoke would need to be so impactful that they would help create a paradigm shift in humanity’s approach to climate and our planet. I began my speech…

This Author

Bella Lack is Born Free Foundation youth ambassador.

There are a few things that Sarah Ockwell-Smith is passionately against. One is stickers – when used to reward children for ‘eating up’ their meals.

Another is age restrictions on certain foods. Raising children who are really ‘good eaters’, she argues, is not about encouraging them to finish everything on their plates or dictating what they should eat. It’s about teaching them how to listen to their bodies.

Ockwell-Smith is a leader in gentle parenting, an approach that encourages parents to follow their children’s instincts rather than imposing regimes on them.

She is the author of nine books, the first of which, BabyCalm: A Guide for Calmer Babies and Happier Parents, came as a response to the rising popularity of sleep training, in particular the ‘cry-it-out’ method promoted by the author Gina Ford, which teaches parents to leave their children to cry so they can learn to settle themselves and sleep through the night.

Ockwell argues that this leads to unnecessary stress, can damage a child’s bond with their parents and potentially impact on their development.

Instead, she suggests parents are led by their babies, allowing them to feed or cuddle whenever they need to. Her latest book, The Gentle Eating Book, uses these principles in the context of food.

Healthy eating for children is currently a popular topic in the media. According to the government, on average children consume three times more sugar than is recommended, around half of which comes from unhealthy snacks and sugary drinks. Childhood obesity is increasing, and a reported rise in teeth extractions among under-18s is being blamed on sugary food and drink.

No ‘naughty’ foods

On the surface then, it might make sense to restrict access to these foods, and this is being done through a variety of channels. One campaign, launched by Public Health England in January this year, recommends that parents give their children a maximum of two 100-calorie snacks per day. Schools are advised not to provide more than two portions of deep-fried food each week.

Recently, some supermarkets have imposed a ban on the sale of highly caffeinated energy drinks to children under the age of 16. However, these measures, Ockwell-Smith argues, are misguided and potentially damaging.

“What parents don’t realise is that the more they restrict when their child is younger, the more likely the child is to go crazy when they are older because they don’t know how to self-regulate,” she says.

“The whole ethos of gentle parenting is to trust the child and give the child more autonomy to do things more naturally,” she adds. “If you use baby-led weaning, so not making a baby eat puréed food off a spoon, you see how easily babies self-regulate.”

An important part of teaching children to self-regulate is understanding eating habits from an evolutionary perspective.

Ockwell-Smith argues that a preference for sweet foods in young children is one way nature has protected them from being poisoned, because toxic foods tend to be bitter. In the same way, refusing to eat unfamiliar foods could have saved our distant ancestors from snacking on something inedible when they were toddlers. From this angle, ‘picky eaters’ are not seen as negative, but as having a natural response to their environment.

Allowing children to follow their instincts means learning to recognise and act upon hunger cues, Ockwell-Smith writes.

This means eating when hungry, not for the sake of eating, and understanding what makes them hungry. She suggests that should not be associated with emotion. To this end, we should avoid anthropomorphising food, not describing it as ‘naughty’ or ‘good’. Her advice even extends to using food as terms of endearment, like ‘honey’, ‘pumpkin’ or ‘cupcake’.

“If you’re calling children something like ‘cupcake’, they are going to subconsciously associate food with feeling good,” Ockwell-Smith says. When food becomes emotional, it is no longer mindful, and it can risk being used as an emotional prop.

Taking food personally 

The biggest thing that this approach conflicts with is the idea of sharing a meal and sitting around a table enjoying it together.

“It’s important, but it’s at odds with whether their children are hungry or not,” Ockwell-Smith says. “Say your child is hungry but it’s only 4pm, and dinner’s not until 6pm.

“Really, it’s better to give them their dinner at 4pm than to make them wait, because you’re getting the social side of things but they’re not learning about hunger.”

An integral part of Ockwell-Smith’s advice is self-reflection. She says she still struggles with feelings of guilt if she doesn’t finish everything on her plate, and finds it hard to regulate her eating.

“I know where my food issues stem from,” she writes in The Gentle Eating Book, “but they are so hard to overcome.” That’s why, before even thinking about how to encourage mindful eating in your children, you have to start with yourself, she says.

Problems can range from binge-eating to orthorexia – an unhealthy obsession with otherwise healthy eating.

“I work with a lot of parents who are into natural and green things, and I would say a lot of their attitude to eating is psychologically unhealthy because of their worries about organic, not having refined sugar, not having processed cereals, so I think you have to strike a balance,” Ockwell-Smith says.

“Prohibiting foods that contain these things isn’t going to raise a child with healthy eating habits. They will most likely develop orthorexia, or when they are older they might completely rebel and eat fast food.”

It’s difficult not to take food personally, and parents often feel judged on their children’s appetite, Ockwell-Smith says. She uses the example of her first child, who for the first year of his life polished off everything he was given with gusto.

“I felt like a good mum,” she says – but things quickly changed. “Around two months after his first birthday, my ‘good eater’ son pretty much stopped eating. Foods he had previously wolfed down were left untouched, met with grimaces and tears.”

The result was a knock in her confidence. “I felt like a complete failure. Each day I felt as if I was failing my son, failing to keep him healthy, failing to provide him with the nutrients he needed to grow big and healthy.”

The answer, she discovered, was to relax. “I educated myself about eating in early childhood. Once I understood his eating, or rather lack of it, I could relax, which was possibly the most powerful thing I did.”

In the end, learning to relax is an integral part to raising a child with a ‘healthy’ appetite, Ockwell-Smith says.

“In order to trust children, you have to trust yourself, and as children we were all taught we couldn’t be trusted. There’s so much we have to undo from our own upbringing. I can’t self-regulate, so how can I teach my children to? But they do.”

This Author 

Marianne Brown is Deputy Editor of Resurgence & Ecologist. To find out more about Sarah Ockwell-Smith’s work, visit her website. The Gentle Eating Book is published by Piatkus.

Illegal and dangerous pesticides and weedkillers are widely available for sale to UK shoppers on the online marketplace eBay, an Unearthed investigation has found.

Trading standards authorities have launched an investigation and pledged to “halt the sale of illegal biocides and pesticides” after being alerted to our findings.

In test purchases on eBay.co.uk and eBay.com, we were able to buy five different pesticides and herbicides unauthorised for sale in the UK.

Unacceptable

They included atrazine, a weedkiller that has been banned across the European Union for more than a decade, and which researchers have found “wreaks havoc” with the sex lives of male frogs.

They also included Chinese “Miraculous Insecticide Chalk”, misleadingly labelled as “harmless” to humans and animals – a practice that is specifically prohibited under European law.

US environmental regulators have warned that this chalk is “especially hazardous to children as it mimics colouring chalk”, and say there have been “hundreds of cases” where children have become ill from accidentally swallowing it.

Ebay removed the listings after it was alerted to them by Unearthed.

Michael Warhurst, executive director of the environmental charity CHEM Trust, told Unearthed it was “unacceptable” that eBay had been found “allowing their platform to be used to sell illegal pesticides and biocides”.

He added: “This also highlights the need for the government to radically strengthen the enforcement of laws banning the sale of such products, to ensure that they cannot be sold in the UK, whether in shops or over the internet.”

‘Illegal items’

Westminster City Council is the “primary authority” for all trading standards issues associated with eBay in the UK.

Council cabinet member for public protection and licencing Ian Adams said: “The council takes any allegation of the sale of unlawful goods by companies based in Westminster extremely seriously, and will work with all parties involved to halt the sale of illegal biocides and pesticides.

“We are currently investigating these claims, and speaking to eBay about the listings in question.”

More investigations

• Carmakers’ own tests show many of the newest diesels are still ‘dangerously’ polluting
• Plastics crisis set to intensify as more countries look to restrict foreign waste
• A hard-Brexit think tank accidentally published its plans for US-UK ‘shadow trade talks’

Ebay removed listings for Atrazine, a pesticide banned in the EU for more than a decade, after the company was alerted to them by Unearthed.

Unearthed understands that the Trading Standards Authority will look into specific listings highlighted in our findings, and work to ensure this is prevented from happening in the future.

An eBay spokeswoman said: “We work closely with the regulators like the [Health and Safety Executive] to ensure that all listings comply with the law. There are blocks in place to prevent the listing of illegal items, and we also constantly monitor our marketplace to enforce this.”

Unearthed understands that some of these listings were non-compliant with eBay policies and others had slipped through a filter that should have blocked them from being visible on the UK site.

Ebay.co.uk’s pesticides policy states that private sellers are not allowed to sell pesticides, and that no one is allowed to sell pesticides that are “not authorised by the authorities for use in the UK”.

Amazon case

The news comes after eBay competitor Amazon was forced, earlier this year, to pay $1.2m in a settlement with the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), after allowing third party sellers to market and distribute illegal pesticides to American customers.

According to the US regulator, Amazon removed the illegal pesticides from its site after the EPA began enforcement action against the online retail giant in 2015. Repeated searches by Unearthed found that none of the six products targeted by the EPA were available through Amazon’s UK site.

However, Unearthed found two of the products involved in the Amazon case – insecticide chalk and a Thai mosquito repellent called Ars Mat 12 – were widely available for purchase by UK customers on eBay. Both products are also unauthorised for sale in the UK.

Unearthed also found products containing chemicals that are illegal to use in pesticides anywhere in the European Union. These included a Ukrainian ant powder containing diazinon, an insecticide that has been banned in the EU since 2011 on grounds that it is “very toxic to aquatic life”, and an aerosol containing propoxur, a pesticide that is highly toxic to humans and aquatic life.  

But one of the most readily available banned biocides on eBay was atrazine, a weedkiller and pesticide that – controversially – is still widely used in the US, although it has been banned in the European Union for 15 years.

As with the Amazon case in the US, the illegal pesticides available for sale on eBay are offered by third party sellers, based overseas. Ebay earns a commission – typically 10% of the final amount paid – on any items sold through the site; it also charges listing fees to sellers who want to advertise large numbers of items at the same time.

Out of reach

Unearthed’s investigation highlights the difficulties posed by online markets for the authorities charged with enforcing UK law on biocides and pesticides.

Under European Union and British law, active chemicals cannot generally be used in biocidal products unless they have been carefully evaluated and approved by the European Commission.

Companies that want to produce or import the chemical for biocidal use need to go through a long and expensive process to provide evidence of its safety and effectiveness. Once a chemical is approved, any products containing the chemical need to go through a UK-based evaluation and approval process before they can be sold in the UK.

It is an offence to make an unauthorised biocidal product “available on the market”, punishable by an unlimited fine or up to six months imprisonment at magistrates court, and up to two years imprisonment at crown court.

However, sellers based outside of the EU who market the products through websites like eBay are “effectively out of reach of controls on pesticides and biocides in the UK”, according to a statement from the Health and Safety Executive.

Westminster City Council cabinet member Ian Adams said the law did allow trading standards to take action against host platforms like eBay “but only if the host platform has knowledge of an illegal activity and fail to take action.”

A spokesman for the HSE, which is the “competent authority” for biocides regulations in the UK, said that the regulations imposed a duty on anyone making a biocidal product “available on the market”. The extent to which these duties applied to host websites like eBay “depends on the role they are playing in the supply chain”.

He added: “Each case is considered on its own merits and will determine any subsequent enforcement action.  

“Local Authority Trading Standards have the lead in enforcing duties relating to advertisement and supply to consumers.  The [Biocidal Products Regulations] and [Plant Protection Products Regulations] can only place duties on legal entities established within the EU.  All of the sellers referenced are from outside the EU.”

What we bought

Miraculous Insecticide Chalk

When the Environmental Protection Agency took action against Amazon.com for aiding the distribution of Miraculous Insecticide Chalk in the US, the EPA warned that “children can easily mistake insecticide chalk for blackboard chalk or put it in their mouths” leading to health problems “including vomiting, stomach pains, convulsions, tremors, loss of consciousness, and serious allergic reactions.”

The US regulator said it is “aware of hundreds of cases where children have become ill from accidental ingestion of these types of unregistered insecticidal chalk products”.

After ordering the chalk on eBay.com, we received two boxes of Miraculous Insecticide Chalk by mail from Cambodia. They were labelled with a customs declaration describing the product as a “magic medicine pen”.  The box of chalk itself gave no indication of the active substance in the chalk or its concentration, but was marked “harmless to human being and animal. Safe to use” – language that is specifically prohibited by European biocides law.

Atrazine

Atrazine has been banned in the EU since 2004, with European lawmakers citing concerns over the chemical’s long-term environmental and human health impact, but that didn’t stop Unearthed buying it on eBay and ordering it to the UK.

As well as “wreaking havoc” with the sex lives of male frogs, a separate study in 2011 found that women in the US drinking water with low-levels of atrazine experienced hormone irregularities. On the customs declaration on the package of Atrazine,  the item was simply described as “plant care”.

Invader insecticide

Invader insecticide contains propoxur, a biocide not approved for sale in the EU which is highly toxic to many bird species, according to this draft briefing by the European Commission.

The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health in the US states that exposure to propoxur can cause blurred vision, diarrhea, vomiting and muscle twitching. Ebay appears to have successfully removed listings of Invader from its site.

Ars Mat 12

A Thai mosquito repellent called Ars Mat 12 was widely available for purchase by UK customers on eBay, despite not being authorised for sale in the UK. The product contains active substances the EPA says can cause vomiting, palpitations, and blurred vision. We bought it for £5.99, excluding postage and packaging.

Muracid

This Ukrainian ant-killer contains diazinon and was purchased from eBay.co.uk for just £2.20, excluding postage and packaging.  The chemical – which is not approved in the EU for use as a biocide – has been found to have a detrimental impact on wildlife. An EU reportrecommended that diazinon not be approved, in part due to “the acute risk to insectivorous birds”; “long term risk to insectivorous mammals” and “the high toxicity to aquatic organisms”.

This Article

This article first appeared at Unearthed, from Greenpeace.

When we think of Hawaii many of us will entertain conventional images of paradise – idyllic, lush and beautiful, with stunning beaches and balmy sunsets – and for the photographer David Ulrich it is, too. Yet this, it turns out, is not the main reason he felt drawn to make it his home.

Thirty-five years ago, at the age of 33 and at the peak of his photography career, Ulrich was chopping wood in his backyard when, suddenly, a splinter flew up into his face, and he sustained an injury that was to change his life. Despite hours of surgery he lost the sight in his dominant right eye. Devastated, he could not imagine how his future would unfold.

In his autobiographical book, The Widening Stream, Ulrich recalls the moment of realisation that changed his attitude and gave him an unshakeable sense of courage: “A question unexpectedly arose in my mind: If I cannot let go of something as relatively insignificant as one eye, one small part of my body, what will happen when I have to completely let go of my entire body, when I die?”

Right seeing

Once he had yielded to the shocking and unexpected change, Ulrich was able to focus on the positive aspects of having survived such a traumatic event. He now embraces the experience as a profound life lesson in letting go.

“A transformation had occurred on many different levels, physical, emotional, psychological and spiritual, due to the effects of the injury. It served to break down many of the unquestioned and crystallized attitudes my psyche had developed as an armour; and provided an opportunity for renewal, for a regathering of my energies under different conditions.”

On a photography trip to Hawaii a few years later, Ulrich was drawn to the transformative and “phoenix-like” nature of the landscape, and after several more visits he realised that he “was a part of the place, and the place was a part of me”. Hawaii, fertile, vibrant and colourful, would not exist without the force of the volcanic eruptions that have taken place there, and it was this juxtaposition of destruction and beauty that had resonated with him – although it took him years to realise it.

Something of that growing realisation is revealed in Ulrich’s latest book, Zen Camera, in which he brings his Buddhist principles to bear on the subject of his chosen art form and its many talented practitioners – and, in particular, muses on how spiritual techniques of creativity and consciousness can be used in the modern era of smartphones and digital images.

Speaking to Resurgence & Ecologist from his home in Honolulu, Ulrich argues that Zen Camera encourages us to cherish the uniqueness of personal perspective and develop an authentic way to simply “see what is”. Right Seeing, the first step on the Buddhist Eightfold Path, implies not only a positive, life-affirming attitude, but also a genuine effort toward direct and conscious perception, Ulrich believes. His book describes how Zen practice can be interwoven into a daily photography regime to become a powerful and highly creative form of self-expression.

Creative flow 

“Zen tradition teaches that at every moment in our lives we have a choice. We can be present to the moment and all that it contains, or we can stay in our usual distracted, often self-centred state of being. With a camera in our hand we are encouraged to cultivate mindful attention and strive towards a holistic awareness that simultaneously encompasses self and subject equally.”

A digital photograph can be viewed instantly by a global audience via social networks. That reach, however, doesn’t mean the image will be particularly profound. Ulrich is puzzled why so many people share such shallow content on Instagram – such as selfies and shots of their latest meal – when social media holds such powerful capabilities as a publishing platform with global reach. “There’s power in numbers. Look what happened with the Arab Spring, where people used social media to communicate, to nurture and cultivate their activism. We also need that for the environment,” he tells me.

Ulrich points out that, for most of their day, many people – teenagers especially, perhaps – are experiencing the world through a screen. He refers to the work of Jennifer Roberts, a Harvard University professor of the history of art and architecture, who is striving to create opportunities for students to engage in deceleration, to address the need for immersive attention in the digital age of endless distractions. As the capabilities of digital technology increase, so there is increasing potential for humanity to become dependent upon it. Ulrich believes that there is a growing cultural need to use technology with greater awareness and vision.

I start to wonder at this point how Zen Camera’s approach might contribute to greater understanding between people. Ulrich tells me: “When you begin to break through the crust of your conditioning and recognise your own depth, you also recognise that all human beings have that depth and that all human beings deserve equal respect and care. I think it’s much harder to be violent or to hurt somebody else when you’re inwardly connected to yourself.”

The Indian thinker and writer Krishnamurti described Zen practice as “choiceless awareness”, a place where intuitive thought leads. Ulrich says that time and peace are required in tandem for this state to be realised. He also cites Zen master Takuan Sōhō’s observation that “the mind must always be in the state of flowing” to pave the way for creativity – often referred to as ‘cre­ative flow’ or, in Zen Buddhism, ‘No Mind’.

Stay curious

The six main lessons in his book focus on observation, awareness, identity, practice, mastery and presence. Ulrich suggests that photographers exploring these ideas build a practice of visual journaling, keeping a daily record, as they progress. He encourages his students to take notice of whatever intuitively draws them in, allowing their natural perceptive style to emerge before even lifting the camera. Motivational tools are provided for readers to use as they develop their skills in the key elements of photography: frame, light, use of colour, sensitivity to the moment and the nature of the subject.

“Using a camera can be approached as an inner practice that leads you more fully into a rich engagement with the world, and a platform for sharing your questions, observations and discoveries,” Ulrich maintains.

Ulrich’s book is infused with the reassuring sentiment that it’s never too late to learn: “You’re never too old or too busy to find your own vision or voice. I would say that to anybody,” he tells me.

He adds: “The challenge for me, and I think for many of us, is to maintain our curiosity, our sense of hope and engagement, and our sense of ‘not knowing’. As soon as we think we know, we close off many possibilities.”

We are all beginners.

This Author

Grace Rodgers is a freelance writer and photographer. David Ulrich’s book Zen Camera: Creative Awakening with a Daily Practice in Photography is published by Watson-Guptill.

This article was first published in the current issue of Resurgence & Ecologist magazine, which is available now.

Members of Parliament are unaware of both the low cost and popularity of onshore wind power in Britain – even as the Government moves to further expand offshore wind expecting the sector to reduce household bills , according to the latest polling.

The YouGov survey, commissioned by the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit, shows that just eight percent of MPs know that onshore wind farms are now the cheapest way to add electricity generating capacity in the UK.

Alarmingly, 12 percent believe that large nuclear power stations, like Hinkley Point C, provide the cheapest new capacity.

Particularly popular

The poll also shows that MPs consistently overestimate opposition to onshore wind. The most recent Government survey shows that just two percent of the population strongly opposes the technology – but only nine percent of MPs think that the figure is less than five percent.

More than half of MPs – 52 percent – believe the level of strong opposition to be above one in five.

The MPs’ survey comes as a separate poll of the British public, by YouGov for RenewableUK, revealed that a majority of voters support lifting the Government’s de facto ban on new onshore wind projects.

Richard Black, director of the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit, said: “It’s somewhat alarming to find that MPs don’t know the facts on onshore wind, particularly how popular it is with the public – seventy-five percent backing in the Government’s most recent survey, and rising.

“With just two percent of Britons expressing strong opposition, the myth that onshore wind is unpopular or divisive should now be put to bed once and for all.

Democratic safeguards

“It’s a damaging myth, because investing in onshore wind is likely to reduce energy bills – so this is really something that MPs and anyone else who professes to care about energy bills should be getting their heads around.”

RenewableUK’s public survey found that 66 percent would support a change in policy so that onshore wind farms can be built in areas where they have local backing.

Separately, a report by the National Infrastructure Commission also found last week that the Government could boost green energy in Britain by investing in wind and solar power, without increasing bills.

Simon Clarke, Conservative MP for Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland, said: “People are telling us something really important – namely, that new onshore wind should no longer be ruled out of our energy mix for political reasons.

“With appropriate planning and democratic safeguards, the Government’s blanket ban can be revised and allow this cheap, clean and popular technology to move forward as it should.”

This Author

Brendan Montague is editor of The Ecologist. This article is based on a press release from Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit.

Bees living in suburban habitats are still being exposed to significant levels of pesticides despite the EU ban on the use of neonicotinoid pesticides on flowering crops, new research from University of Sussex scientists shows.

While the introduction of new EU restrictions on the use of neonicotinoid chemicals five years ago has reduced exposure of bees living in farmland, the study found that overall more than half of all pollen and nectar samples collected from bee nests in Sussex, Hertfordshire and Scotland between 2013 and 2015 were contaminated.

The study is the first of its kind to highlight the risk to bees in urban areas posed by garden use of pesticides.

Bee-attractive

The scientists at the University of Sussex are urging gardeners to ditch their bug sprays immediately in favour of encouraging natural predators such as ladybirds or lacewings, and the use of physical methods such as hand-removal of pests, and netting or sticky traps.

Dr Beth Nicholls, postdoctoral research fellow in evolution, behaviour and environment at the University of Sussex and the study’s lead author, said: “Our findings suggest that the EU’s recent decision to extend the neonicotinoid moratorium to include all field crops is likely to have a positive effect on bees, relieving some of the stress on our already struggling pollinator populations.

“However, given that bees in suburban gardens appear to remain at risk post-moratorium, further work is needed to understand the sources of neonicotinoid exposure in these areas and to find ways to reduce it.

“Our study indicates that limiting the public sale and use of neonicotinoid-based bug sprays, which are currently unaffected by the moratorium, is needed if we are to protect bee populations living in and around our towns and cities.”

In 2013 the European Commission instated a EU-wide moratorium on the use of three types of neonicotinoid (thiamethoxam, clothianidin and imidacloprid) on bee-attractive flowering crops such as oilseed rape. The ban will be expanded to include all field crops from 2019.

Continued contamination

The study, with colleagues at Stirling University and Rothamsted Research, found that neonicotinoid exposure for rural bumblebees declined after the ban’s implementation in 2015 but the risk to bumblebees in suburban gardens remained largely the same.

As well as bug sprays, contaminated ornamental plants sold in garden centres play a key role in spreading neonicotinoids through suburban areas. A previous study by the University of Sussex revealed that 70 percent of bee-friendly plants sold at a range of garden centres had traces of neonicotinoids.

For nectar samples collected from rural bumblebee colonies, concentrations of the pesticide thiacloprid, an active ingredient in many bug sprays sold in garden centres and not included in the EU restriction, significantly increased between 2013 and 2015, replacing the banned chemicals.

Researchers were also concerned to find bee food was often contaminated with imidacloprid, a neonicotinoid which is very rarely used against crop pests any more.

Its continued presence raises concerns about the persistence of chemicals in agro-environments even after their application has stopped. The researchers believe that the continued contamination could also be due to pet flea treatments, which still often contain this chemical.

Vegetables and flowers

The study found many bee populations are still subject to pesticide levels that previous studies have shown could lead to slower colony growth and the production of fewer new queens, as well as detrimental impacts on foraging and navigation, immunity and worker mortality.

Professor Dave Goulson, professor of biology at the University of Sussex, said: “Who knows what Brexit will mean for the future of this country but one thing it desperately needs to include is the continuation of the EU’s ban on neonicotinoids.

“Gardeners can do their bit; for there is no need for pesticides in gardens. I grow lots of fruits, vegetables and flowers in my garden without chemicals – there is just no need.”

This Author

Brendan Montague is the editor of The Ecologist. This story is based on a press release from the University of Sussex.

We have associated them with light, summer and the promise of sweetness – honeybees, Apis mellifera. They have been mythologised perhaps more than any other creature.

Cave paintings depicting humans collecting honey from wild bees demonstrate our long association; we have sanctified them with stories as the beehive became a metaphor for the ordered and charitable life.

Now we know more about this sensitive, complex, intelligent organism, and we understand that bees are under pressure. Colonies are sickening and collapsing, and bees are threatened.

Matt Somerville is a skilled woodworker based in Hampshire who, after realising that bees were disappearing from his orchard, was prompted to take action.

Armed with his know­ledge of trees and tools, and inspired by successful bee programmes in Poland and France, he began to produce “bee-kind” hives. This form of sympathetic, natural beekeeping is designed to bene­fit the health and sustainability of bee colonies, enabling them to thrive.

‘Freedom hives’

As Winnie-the-Pooh observed, bees like to be high up in the trees – away from the cold ground, and out of reach of predators.

Matt has designed log hives to be placed in trees – these ‘freedom hives’ are chosen by bees naturally. They are better-insulated and more sparsely placed than the more intensive hives we have used in recent times, thus reducing stress and the spread of disease.

“About 150 years ago the thin-walled hive was invented,” Matt told me. “The important development was the removable frame. Up to then, bees were kept in straw skeps [baskets], and harvesting consisted of cutting the comb out and pressing it to recover the honey.

“Most villages would have a skep or two in their orchards, and swarms were captured locally every May. In some cases the colonies were killed in the process of harvesting honey.

“The new hives gave the beekeeper more access to the colony, and with the use of excluders to restrict the movement of the queen, a smaller ‘super’ box could be added.

“This method allowed for honey to be easily harvested and the comb reused after the beekeeper had spun off the honey, facilitating management of a colony.”

Because they are removing excessive amounts of honey, beekeepers feed sugar to their bees, but this has none of the natural minerals and other nutritional ingredients bees need.

Couple with this the loss of traditional wild-flower foraging, the use of systemic insecticides, and the arrival of new pests and diseases, and we can begin to see why bees might be becoming increasingly stressed.

“Bees want to choose and build their own structures more naturally, but the comb that is fixed in an artificial, thin-walled hive could present an added stress to the bee,” says Matt.

Comb sheets, known as foundation, are imprinted with hexagons determining the size of each cell. The cells are the size of worker bees – the infertile, ever-busy females.

But bees in the wild normally choose to make up to 17% percent drone comb, which has larger cells. Although drones are believed to only serve to mate with the queen, and only about 15 drones will actually mate with her, the colony has evolved to want these male bees.

Matt explained the issue of the special properties of wax in the natural comb. “Part of a natural comb’s job is to remove any toxins from the hive, and these are absorbed into the wax, but in the artificial comb is a cocktail of chem­icals that the bees don’t like. If there is no other option bees will build on it, but a swarm will never choose to go into a hive with this prospect. Another stress.”

Bee kind 

A further issue beekeepers should consider, he says, is propolis, a substance the bees make using plant saps and resins, which is the immune system for the bee.

It is antifungal and antiviral and is useful for sticking things together in the hive. Bees can use it to envelop a foreign body – even covering a whole mouse corpse in it – to stop the spread of disease. In a wild colony it is spread everywhere.

Bees particularly like rough surfaces, but a thin-walled hive is made from planed timber and they often only deposit propolis in corners and use it to stick the top board down. This is an irritation to the beekeeper, who might miss the point of why propolis is so important to the bee.

Thomas Seeley, the author of Honeybee Democracy, says we need to acknowledge that the bee is the best beekeeper. He suggests that the bee knows what it wants and that we need to listen.

He has coined the term “Darwinian beekeeping”, whereby we allow natural selection to choose the right bee instead of trying to select bees that may not be as well adapted as we think.

Matt Somerville’s bee-kind hives, designed for minimum intervention, reduce stress and disease in the bees.

Many beekeepers are well-intentioned and want to help bees; a shift towards bee-kind log and freedom hives that are insulated, placed high in trees or on strong stilts designed to avoid too many interventions, may be just what the bees need. Matt runs courses to help aspiring natural beekeepers make their own hives. 

Bees evolved over millions of years, and the threats and challenges they now face are complex; bee-kind hives may be one way of helping.

The highly evolved super-organism of the swarm is able to choose what it needs. With a shift towards this form of sustainable beekeeping, we can take a step back and trust while the bee colony is ‘rewild­ed’, regaining resilience and beginning to thrive once more.

Matt Somerville’s four ways to help the bees

1. Flowers/forage

Grow more plants and trees that feed bees and other insects through each season. Stop poisoning them with neonicotinoids and other pesticides. Only harvest honey when there is a genuine surplus.

2. Fur

Keep bees in warm, insulated hives.

3. Freedom

Allow bees to organise the inside of the hive as they wish. Bees don’t choose preformed wax sheets or plastic comb. They like to design their own deep comb, with the queen free to roam.

4. Faith

Bees have been around for millions of years and have survived through many climate changes. We need to have faith that they will continue to survive without our interference. We must restrain ourselves from fiddling, and let the weaker bees die to allow for natural selection to take back control.

This Author

Miriam Darlington’s latest book, Owl Sense, is published by Guardian Faber. The Natural Beekeeping Trust is organising a conference, Learning from the Bees, in Holland this autumn. 

This article was first published in the current issue of Resurgence & Ecologist magazine, which is available now. 

Major companies face serious material business risks for their involvement in creating plastic waste, a new report shows.

The report Risk unwrapped: Plastic pollution as material business risk details four types of business risk that companies may be exposed to and sets out the legal obligations on their directors to take action to deal with these risks.

These include companies facing significant transition risks from fast-moving regulation, as well as major reputational damage for being perceived to be exacerbating the plastic crisis.

Unresponsive

The report’s author, ClientEarth wildlife lawyer Tatiana Lujan, said: “With the amount of plastic waste literally choking our marine environment, there are serious risks for companies that don’t move fast enough in responding to the business risk associated with plastic waste.

“Governments are acting really quickly on regulation and companies in general are unprepared. Within the space of a few months, we’ve already seen outright bans on single-use products and higher recycling targets as well as proposals for new taxes and expensive ‘polluter pays’ type schemes.

“Earlier this year the share price of European packaging producer RPC fell 15 percent over fears of potential plastic regulation. And with as much as three quarters of company value tied to reputation, brand damage is a significant risk for plastic-intensive companies unresponsive to their consumers, shareholders and investors.”

Loss or damage

The four main areas of material business risk include:

Transition risks – including increased regulatory burdens arising from the transition to a more circular economy, with unresponsive firms hit with new laws and reforms that will have a significant impact on the demand for plastic products and materials.

Reputational risks – companies perceived to be a source of plastic pollution could suffer reputational damage, with a loss of value to their corporate brand, a loss of investor interest and the potential danger of losing their licence to operate, e.g.- recent pressure on major coffee retailers over waste caused by single-use disposable cups.

Physical risks – arising from plastic pollution in the environment, which will impact infrastructure and productivity, while disrupting supply chains and causing resource scarcity, e.g.- the impact of plastic marine litter on the fishing and tourism industries, and

Liability risks – companies could face legal challenges from parties who have suffered loss or damage from plastic pollution. The results of asbestos, tobacco and ongoing climate litigation should alert intensive plastics users or producers to future liability risks of what many still consider a risk-free business model.

corporate regulation

Lujan added: “Currently plastic waste is an externality for most companies, with society and the natural world bearing the burden of plastic pollution. Little thought is given to things like packaging once the product it contained has been consumed and profits generated for its creator.

“However, this is changing and plastic-intensive companies need to be prepared for transitional, reputational, physical and legal risks from their involvement in the plastic pollution crisis.”

The report reminds companies that the law requires them to manage and disclose these risks. It also recommends that existing corporate governance, risk management and disclosure practices be revisited to ensure corporate regulation keeps up with the public and political momentum demanding action to reduce plastic pollution.

Lujan will present the findings of the report during a speech on the topic at a Klosters Forum event today in Switzerland.

This Article

This article is based on a press release from ClientEarth.

You’ve probably seen the startling headlines — “Air pollution linked to spikes in hospital and GP visits”, “Air pollution causes nearly 15,000 cases of type 2 diabetes in UK each year”, “Young girl’s death first to be linked to illegal levels of air pollution”.

It’s obvious that the UK has a major air pollution problem.

Earlier this year, the World Health Organisation found 47 UK towns and cities had either reached at or had gone beyond air pollution limits. The issue has been widely covered, with the NGOs, the press and opposition politicians quick to criticise government inaction.

Industrial traffic

The backdrop to all this is the ‘dieselgate’ scandal. As far back as 2015, car manufacturers including German giant VW were accused of cheating emissions tests, with their vehicles found to be much dirtier than the companies suggested. Ever since, cars’ contribution to the UK’s poor air quality has come under deep scrutiny.

But it can’t just be cars, can it?

After three years, countless pages of analysis and enquiry and multiple court cases, policymakers must finally be getting on top of the ‘car issue’, right? Surely, something else must be driving the country’s terrible air quality?

DeSmog UK spent six months trawling through local data and air quality reports to find places where air pollution wasn’t just a road traffic problem. There weren’t many.

The problem is that almost all roads are clogged up by commuter and industrial traffic.

Entirely urban

Nonetheless, our detailed analysis of hundreds of pages of local authority reports did throw up some examples of where local idiosyncrasies exacerbate the car problem. And councils are being asked to deal with the problem, despite lacking the resources and expertise to do so, as a previous DeSmog UK investigation revealed.

From volcanic hills to river causeways, slurry to home heating, and Russian winds to Mediterranean cruise ships, here are four cases from each of the home nations where something other than commuter traffic is creating dirty air.

Dundee, Scotland’s fourth largest city, was somewhat surprisingly the only UK-entry in Lonely Planet’s latest guide to ‘must see cities in Europe’, and was described as a “thriving, creative” place. But tourists beware: It also has a serious air pollution problem.

Scotland has stricter air pollution limits than the rest of the UK. And the whole of Dundee has been declared a special Air Quality Management Area (AQMA), with certain spots in the city regularly breaching standards.

Dundee is almost entirely urban and suburban. But it is also a hub for many inland transport routes.

Slopey roads

It is connected to Fife by the Tay road and rail bridges. The biggest inroad for road traffic, the A92, crosses the Tay and emerges in the centre of Dundee. There is an inner ring road, the Marketgait, and five arterial routes.

Many of these roads get congested, with the air pollution exacerbated by a quirk of Dundee’s topography — the city was built on top of an old volcano.

That means many of the main roads are on a gradient, causing cars to emit more as they drive up hill, with high buildings creating a roofless tunnell where the emissions accumulate.

Friends of the Earth Scotland conducted an analysis of Scotland’s road pollution, and found 10 streets continued to breach European limits. Two of those streets — Seagate and Lochee Road — are in Dundee, with both roads having nitrogen dioxide levels over the limit.

But Dundee’s air pollution problems reach far beyond its volcanic, slopey roads.

Car journeys

Every now and again, on a windy day, Dundee’s air pollution levels will spike significantly due to agriculture not in farms surrounding the city, but in fields in Russia and continental Europe.

As Dundee is on Scotland’s east coast, pollution from farms in Russia and Northern Europe can travel swiftly and largely uninterrupted across the North Sea on windy days. Chemicals in fertilisers and emissions from livestock can be converted to harmful particulate matter as they travel several days over the seas to reach the Scottish coastline.

Once or more a year, this causes levels of a specific pollutant, a large particulate matter called PM10, to get so high that emissions from traffic seem comparatively insignificant.

This causes quite some headache for Dundee’s local policymakers. Not only do they have to tackle the challenge currently defeating the rest of the UK – getting people out of their cars – but they also have to compete with issues caused by an ancient volcano and Putin’s farmers, too.

Still, the council identifies road traffic emissions as “the main source of pollution in the area”, with “additional emissions from industrial sources”. Across Scotland in 2016 an estimated two thirds of car journeys were for just one person.

Nitrogen dioxide

The city recently unveiled a fleet of 400 low emissions buses, ahead of a low emissions zone being implemented. And Dundee council is running a series of events on Clean Air Day on June 22nd to highlight the “small changes we can all make that will contribute to cleaner air”.

Every year, 1.7 million ruddy-faced holidaymakers pass through Southampton’s port, boarding mega-ships to take them on adventures through Norway’s fjords or to the white beaches of Spain’s Costa Blanca.

Perhaps unwittingly, they’re also bringing a lot of air pollution with them.

The WHO identified Southampton as one of 17 places in the UK that was on the limit of breaching its air quality standards. Southampton Council estimates that exposure to Particulate Matter alone is estimated to contribute to 110 premature deaths each year.

Currently there are 10 hotspots in Southampton. All 10 of Southampton’s AQMAs exceeded the annual nitrogen dioxide air quality standard. Recent estimates suggest that around 60 to 70 percent of nitrous oxide emissions come from road traffic. But while congestion on the roads is the main cause of this, the port also has a significant role to play.

Principal routes

Southampton’s port is the busiest cruise terminal and second largest container port in the UK. Its continued success is vital to the city’s economy. But it is responsible for about seven percent of the city’s nitrogen dioxide emissions, according to local council analysis.

Analysis of activity at the docks showed ships ‘hotelling’ — using their engines while docked — was the main component of port emissions. The effects are felt city-wide; docked ships account for up to 6% of nitrous oxide emissions throughout Southampton.

Dr Matt Loxham, an air pollution toxicologist at the University of Southampton, previously told the Independent, “Cars are not the only sources of emissions in our air. Ships are more fuel efficient than road vehicles, but they use fuels which produce greater levels of emissions than road diesel”.

“This, in combination with the concentration of vessels in relatively small port areas and shipping lanes, is the reason why there is concern around shipping emissions.”

As part of an effort to clean the air, Southampton City Council has declared a number of AQMAs around some of the principal access routes to and from the Port.

Hilly topography

But as the port grows, so will emissions. Government analysis suggests pollution from the port will increase until at least 2035.

And the port continues to sow the seeds of the country’s major air pollution foe — it is the UK’s biggest importer of cars.

Southampton does have plans to try and limit the damage from air pollution: including a mandatory Clean Air Zone by 2020with a charge of £100 per day for heavily polluting HGVs and buses.

It is currently consulting on a new Clean Air Zone, with plans to charge the most polluting vehicles. It says that “importantly,  the charges will be set at levels designed to reduce pollution, not to raise additional revenue beyond recovering the costs of the scheme”.

Derry is characterised by its distinctively hilly topography. The River Foyle forms a deep valley as it flows through the city, making Derry a place of very steep streets and sudden, startling views.

Ammonia emissions

Derry & Strabane District Council has eight special air quality management areas (AQMAs): the highest no. for any district council in Northern Ireland. In 2010, the council estimated that annually 339 years of life were lost due to air pollution in the area.

The AQMAs for nitrogen dioxide are mainly small areas with very localised pollution — these are busy narrow streets, often on roads with houses near to kerb. Northern Ireland was found to have the highest proportion of vehicles with a cheat device in the UK, with 20 percent of those inspected fitted with the device, compared to nine percent registered in Great Britain.

Where there are AQMAs for PM10 in the area, it’s normally due to emissions from domestic fuel burning. Many use wood, gas or oil to fuel their heating systems. Derry’s cold, calm weather conditions exacerbate the problem.

The city is also surrounded by agriculture, which brings more unusual problems.

In 2017, the Northern Ireland Environment Agency (NIEA) recommended the rejection of plans for a farm with around 60,000 pigs in the area. It said it wanted further detail on how nitrogen deposition from ammonia emissions might impact sites around the facility and in areas where slurry would be spread.

Additional funding

A government report from December 2017 described how ammonia emissions can cause health problems by reacting with other molecules in the atmosphere to form compounds that are precursors to particulate matter.

A working group for Northern Ireland’s Department of Agriculture found that about 91 percent of the country’s ammonia emissions came from agriculture. It said the issue of reducing these emissions had started to cause delays in agricultural planning applications.

The WHO found Derry’s particulate matter emissions to be just above safe levels in May 2018. There’s no space for complacency however, as air pollution from a car-use culture persists at above-safe levels.

The local authority is making efforts to improve — some obvious, some a little more creative.

In 2016, then Environment Minister Mark Durgan announced that Derry would be one of ten councils in Northern Ireland to receive additional funding to tackle air quality.

Gradual replacement

The funding will enable councils to continue monitoring air pollution, including funding for staff and equipment.

Derry City and Strabane district council was awarded £24,206, the second highest amount in the UK after Glasgow.

And in February 2018, Derry announced The Life Tree project, where every birth, death and marriage will be marked by planting a tree in a bid to cut air pollution.

Newport — you’ve probably driven through it. And that’s precisely the problem.

Newport is the third largest city in Wales, with a population of just over 140,000. There has been a steady decline in heavy industry over the past three decades resulting in the gradual replacement of industrial buildings with new residential housing.

The most significant single source of air pollution in the authority is the thing Newport is probably most famous for — the M4 motorway — that transects several of Newport’s residential suburbs.

Worsen pollution

There are currently nine air quality management areas in Newport. They are all small, and along stretches of road. Four of the nine relate to pollution from the M4. Newport Council is expecting an increase in traffic when the toll on the M4 bridge is dropped in January 2019.

Pollution levels are particularly high at Junction 25 of the M4. Just behind a bank of vegetation lies a stretch of housing and a secondary school.

A relief road is being considered by Welsh Government. The new route, once completed, should generally improve air quality by diverting traffic away from particular hotspots.

But the build-time for that road is expected to be around four years. Ironically, the construction of the road would likely worsen pollution during that time.

If anywhere is proof that road traffic is the problem, it’s Newport.

Easy solution

A council spokesperson told the South Wales Argus in November 2017, when the World Health Organisation highlighted the city’s illegal levels of air pollution:

“The city’s road network has developed over hundreds of years and been adapted to accommodate an ever increasing number of motor vehicles.

“Data from the Department for Transport indicates a 17 per cent increase in road vehicles in Newport over the last 15 years.

“In most cases little can be done to the road network, given the current traffic volumes. Ultimately, to improve air quality, the volume of road vehicle traffic needs to be reduced.”

There’s clearly no easy solution. Cars need motorways and the M4 is and will remain one of the UK’s main arteries, pumping exhaust pipes through Newport.

Limits expected

But at least local authorities and the Welsh government are starting to take the issue seriously.

In January 2018, Newport City Council announced four new air quality management areas, which it said in a statement showed “the council’s commitment to improve the environment and wellbeing of the city”.

And in April 2018, Wales’ Environment Minister Hannah Blythyn announced a £20 million package of measures to improve Wales’ air quality. The announcement came after the Welsh government was taken to court by environmental lawyers Client Earth in January.

At the High Court hearing, the government admitted its plans were insufficient and pledged to work with experts to formulate an effective strategy.

One of the Welsh government’s new proposals is for a clean air zone between Junctions 25 and 26 on the M4, with a 50mph speed limits expected to reduce emissions by up to 18 percent.

Air quality crisis

So the problem is road traffic. Pretty much every official DeSmog UK spoke to made this point: If road traffic could be alleviated, better air quality is a given.

But that’s a big ask. Getting people out of their cars requires investment in better public transport and road networks. It requires a plan to make petrol vehicles cleaner and, ultimately, electric.

The national government has been slow to take the lead.

It’s ‘Road to Zero’ strategy, launched in July 2018, promises policies to ensure all new cars are “effectively” zero-emissions by 2040. But critics say that in the context of the UK’s air quality crisis, that’s simply not soon enough.

Reacting to the plan, Jon Lamonte, chief executive of Transport for Greater Manchester told Air Quality News:

Smog thickens

“The government’s road to zero strategy is heading in the right direction, but at the wrong speed. We need to act far sooner than 2040 to ban conventional vehicles if we are to improve air quality within our cities. The lack of incentives to discourage people from using conventional cars – particularly diesel vehicles – will also make it more difficult to reduce emissions.”

Official government advisor, the Committee on Climate Change, also criticised the plan for failing to provide enough clarity on how the UK would actually transition to a low carbon transport, saying the plan fell “short of expectations”.

There are some problems local authorities simply can’t solve — from Volcanic topography to the direction of polluted winds. There are others that government can address, however — like getting people out of dirty diesels into freshly charged EVs.

But progress is slow. And while the public waits, the smog thickens.

This Article 

This article first appeared at Desmog.uk.

Bosnia and Herzegovina is stepping-up its game – after building a new coal-fired power plant in Stanari just two years ago. Two more power plants are in the final phase of financial planning, while five more are in the earlier stages. Serbia and Greece are also building new coal-fired power plants.

Most of the projects in Bosnia have been financed or built by Chinese companies and banks. The 300MW power plant in Stanari was financed by the China Development Bank. Block 7 of the Tuzla Thermal Power Plant, and the proposed power plant in Banovići will be financed by Chinese banks.

State guarantees ensure that these developments come at a low financial risk for Chinese banks. Most of these projects have been planned by state-owned power companies, placing the burden of payment on citizens.

Greater risks

Block 7 is in the final phase of financial agreement. The World Health Organisation has already identified its home, the town of Tuzla, as having the second highest air pollution levels in Europe. Bosnia and Herzegovina has the second highest morality rate from air pollution in Europe. 

Denis Žiško, programme coordinator from the Center for Ecology and Energy (CEE) in Tuzla, argued: “Newer technologies might lower the pollution, but not entirely. For these kind of projects to be cost-effective, power plants have to work for at least 40 or 50 years, so in this case our citizens would be poisoned for decades to come.

“To somebody who has lung cancer or some other pollution-related disease, it does not matter if the pollution came from coal combustion in a new or in an old power plant.” 

A CEE analysis showed that there is likely a connection between pollution from the power plant and increasing rates of disease and death among residents living close to the plant and its landfill of slag and ashes. 

Citizens of Tuzla could be at increased risk of respiratory diseases, malignant tumours and cardiovascular problems.

Systemic failure

Žiško complained that the media is presenting new power plants as significant “postwar investments that will save thousands of workplaces”.

Advocates of coal-fired plants argue that all the coal burned locally is also mined locally, and that miners’ jobs need to be saved. This local coal is brown coal or lignite, whose combustion is most devastating for the environment and people’s health.

All five power plants currently operating in Bosnia and Herzegovina have environmental permits, which prescribe the measures of protection the owners are obliged to follow. This system is not functioning and is far behind the standards of Western Europe.

Žiško claimed that: “it is very rare that inspectors conclude that some law has been violated, and even rarer that the perpetrators are punished.”

‘Stranded assets’

Bosnia and Herzegovina is already producing enough energy for its needs. In 2015, Bankwatch, the University of Groningen, and The Advisory House investigated what would happen if Balkan countries actually built all the planned centres for electricity production. They calculated that the region would export 56% of the electricity. 

Pippa Gallop from Bankwatch, an international NGO specialising in monitoring public finance institutions, noted: “It is obvious that a country with 3.8 million people does not need that many power plants, especially with the existing hydropower plants and the new coal power plant that just started working in 2016.

“There is a very big risk that these new projects might become ‘stranded assets’. If the electrical energy is not cheap enough, nobody will buy it.” 

In 2014, the multinational electricity company Enel announced that 23 Italian coal and gas power stations, with a combined capacity of 13GW, are to be scrapped within five years.  For comparison, coal power plants from the Western Balkans have a combined production capacity of 8.3GW.  

Gallop continued: “As far as cost-effectiveness is concerned, there is very little information publicly available. We have some information for the Kostolac B3 plant in Serbia, and Gacko II in Bosnia and it is unlikely that they will be profitable.

“For an example, they did not account for the costs of CO2 emissions that will have to be paid in the future, and also the calculations are based on the overestimated price of electricity.”

EU directives

Gallop argues that “the Balkans offer a gateway to Europe”. 

The majority of these projects don’t comply with EU pollution control standards, and environmental impact studies are of a low quality. As the EU is not offering the Balkans quick access to the Union, encouraging them to comply with standards is a difficult task.

Gallop stressed that while the EU focusses on regional issues such as Kosovo and migration, it has a long way to go in other sectors:

“All the Western Balkan countries have signed the Energy Community Treaty, which obliged them to follow EU directives on energy and environment. The Energy Community Secretariat in Vienna is really trying to assure that the laws are followed but they don’t always have the support from European Commission.

“The EU must offer concrete advantages for these countries if they follow EU directives, either through the increase of EU funds available to them or through mutual cooperation mechanisms.

“They should also be much more strict about corruption and judiciary system functioning and adjust funds accordingly.”

Local action

Despite Chinese funding and European passivity, Žiško looked closer to home: “We should stop blaming others for our mistakes. Nobody is making our politicians build coal power plants, or hydropower plants on every stream in Bosnia and Herzegovina”

He argued that it is local politicians who make these decisions: “The only question is how much they profit from it.”

This Author

Marina Kelava is an environmental journalist based in Zagreb, Croatia.