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"As long as the Clinton-Gore Administration lets the Sierra Club and other environmental organizations dictate our nation's energy policies, we will never reach a vital balance in our energy policy."
Press Release from Rep. Don Young (R-AK) "Sierra Club Urged To Allow Clinton-Gore Administration To Implement Comprehensive Energy Policy" https://www.house.gov/resources/press/2000/20000317oilcrisis.htm
CONTENTS: Featured Action: HUMAN RIGHTS AND THE ENVIRONMENT CAMPAIGN
EXXONMOBIL: OIL TITAN THREATENS ENVIRONMENT IN CENTRAL AFRICA
1) GLOBAL WARMING I: Urge your Representative to support the Clean Car Letter
2) WILDLANDS CAMPAIGN -- URGENT -- HELP PROTECT THE ARCTIC
3) PROTECT WILD FORESTS
4) HUMAN RIGHTS AND THE ENVIRONMENT: Mexican Environmentalists Need Your Help
5) CLEAN WATER: Hold Factory Farm Owners Accountable for Pollution
6) SPRAWL: Support Better America Bonds
7) STOP "CLEARCUT FOR KIDS" BILL IN SENATE
8) POPULATION: Support Fairness in Contraceptive Coverage
9) POLITICS: DO A LITTLE OR DO A LOT
Featured Take Action************************** Human Rights and the Environment Urgent Action Alert
EXXONMOBIL: OIL TITAN THREATENS ENVIRONMENT IN CENTRAL AFRICA
Imagine what you would do if the largest oil company in the world aggressively sought to build a poorly planned, environmentally hazardous oil pipeline through your neighborhood. As an experienced Sierra Club activist, you would surely organize a grassroots movement to publicly pressure your local, state, and/or federal officials to block the project.
But what if you lived in the most corrupt country in the world (according to Transparency International) where the government regularly uses military troops to threaten, harass, arrest, even torture environmentalists for simply speaking out against environmental destruction?
This is precisely the dilemma faced by environmental advocates in Chad and Cameroon.
US-based ExxonMobil, the world's largest oil company, is apparently not satisfied with polluting America's environment -- they want to pollute Africa's as well. The company continues to callously ignore the human rights and environmental threats posed by the construction of a 600-mile oil pipeline through the Central African countries of Chad and Cameroon, which border Nigeria to the east and south.
In spite of the serious threats to rainforests and wildlife and to the people who depend on the land for survival, ExxonMobil has joined with corrupt and oppressive regimes in Chad and Cameroon to actively lobbying the World Bank to provide a $365 million loan to cover a 15 percent share in the joint venture, which would be the largest development project in Africa. World Bank funding is important to ExxonMobil and the countries in order to shore up political support for the project.
The World Bank appears to be supportive, but the Bank's Board of Directors has not made a decision on whether to approve the loan, in part because of the lack of resolution regarding the oil companies involved. A decision could come as soon as the next few weeks.
The Sierra Club and Amnesty International are working together to increase public pressure on ExxonMobil to agree to a new consultation process with local environmentalists.
What can you do? Write or call the office of US Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers, who has the most direct impact on World Bank policies of anyone in the Clinton administration. Urge him to:
· Instruct the US Executive Director to the World Bank to call for the establishment of an independent evaluation panel before the Bank's Board of Directors reaches a decision on the project.
· Agree to a moratorium on a decision on whether to support the project should be established at the World Bank until a set of minimum conditions ensuring sustainable development are in place. These include functioning judicial systems that are respectful of the rule of law, respect for human rights, and environmental protection.
Mr. Lawrence H. Summers Secretary of the Treasury 1500 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW Washington, D.C. 20220
Phone: 202-622-2000 Fax: 202-622-6415
For more Background, please e-mail Alejandro Queral: alejandro.queral@sierraclub.org, or call (202) 547-1141. You can also request a copy of our new Human Rights and the Environment report, "Environmentalists Under Fire: 10 Urgent Cases of Human Rights Abuses." You can also visit our Web site at: www.sierraclub.org/human-rights
Thank you.
1) GLOBAL WARMING AND ENERGY: Urge your Representative to support the Clean Car
Letter
OPEC is once again reminding us that we are dependent on oil. The biggest single step we can take to save oil and curb global warming is to raise miles per gallon standards for cars and light trucks. PLEASE call or write your Representative and urge them to sign the letter that Reps. Boehlert (R-N.Y.), Dicks (D-Wash.), Greenwood (R-Pa.), and Waxman (D-Calif.) are circulating in support of fuel economy standards. The Boehlert/Dicks letter to President Clinton urges him to "work with Congress to implement" the law setting automotive fuel economy standards. The anti-environmental rider that has frozen CAFE standards since 1995 starts in the House. It is time to stop it so we can stop guzzling gasoline and slash pollution! Please urge your representative to sign the Boehlert/Dicks Clean Car letter.
YOUR CALLS ARE WORKING!!!! There are now more than 60! co-signers to the Clean Car Letter. Several of our more recent signers have stated that they are hearing from their constituents. Your voices are being heard, so keep up the efforts. For more information contact jeffrey.bourne@sierraclub.org
2) WILDLANDS CAMPAIGN -- URGENT -- Your calls are needed RIGHT AWAY to keep the Arctic Refuge off-limits to oil drilling
Some Senators are using the current hike in gas prices (a hike due to OPEC's manipulation of the oil market) to vie for opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas drilling. The coastal plain of the Refuge is the last sliver of Alaska's North Slope (5% of the North Slope) not currently available for oil and gas development. Moreover, no one even knows if -- or how much -- oil is actually there. At best, estimates show less than a six-month supply, which will take ten years to bring online. Besides, no speculative long or short-term benefit is worth exploiting one of America's most unique natural treasures.
The latest attack on the Refuge is a provision in the Budget bill that would encourage drilling by using imaginary revenues from drilling in the coastal plain to determine overall budget levels.
You can help fend off this attack. Please take these quick but vital actions to help protect the Arctic Refuge. Call your Senators and urge them to vote in favor of an amendment to the Budget bill that would help protect the Arctic Refuge coastal plain from the threat of oil and gas drilling, and to co-sponsor S. 867, the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge Wilderness Act by Sen. William Roth.
And please call Senator Bob Smith (R- New Hampshire), Chairman of the Senate Committee that has jurisdiction over the Arctic Wilderness bill. He made a bold move this week, and stated his commitment to seeing that the Refuge remain off-limits to oil exploration and be protected permanently as Wilderness. Please call the Senator at (202) 224-2841 and thank him for his leadership in protecting the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge -- his support is critical to securing permanent protection for this great wilderness.
3) PROTECT WILD FORESTS
At the end of last year, the Sierra Club launched a massive grassroots effort to support the President's Wild Forest Protection Plan - a historic initiative that could lead to the protection of 60 million acres of our last unspoiled wild forests. But our work to protect these wild forests is far from over. Timber industry allies and off-road vehicle enthusiasts are mounting a massive campaign to delay and defeat this proposal. Please help demonstrate the broad public support for protecting our last wild forests by writing a letter to the editor of your local newspaper. Some points to address in your letter: Our national forests should be protected from logging and all damaging activities; I support the protection of all wild forest roadless areas over 1,000 acres, including the Tongass National Forest in Alaska. I urge my elected officials to publicly support this historic plan. If your letter is published, please send a copy to the Sierra Club in DC at 408 C St NE, Washington DC 20002, ATTN: Wild Forest Campaign. Thank you.
4) HUMAN RIGHTS AND THE ENVIRONMENT: Mexican Environmentalists Need Your Help
For 10 months, Mexican anti-logging activists Rodolfo Montiel and Teodoro Cabrera have been in a prison in Iguala, a city in the state of Guerrero, Mexico. Following their arrest last May, they were beaten and gruesomely tortured until they confessed to trumped-up charges of weapons possession and drug-trafficking. In reality, their only "crime" was organizing local farmers to protest the increased logging in one of the last frontier old-growth forests remaining in North America.
The case is now in the last stages of the hearing process, after which the trial and sentencing phase will begin. We must increase the international pressure on the Mexican government as well as on local officials. Please write to Mexican Attorney General Jorge Madrazo Cuellar and urge that he drop the charges against Rodolfo and Teodoro. A sample letter can be found on our Web site at: www.sierraclub.org/human-rights/Mexico/letter.asp (Remember: a 1 ounce letter to Mexico costs about $0.46)
Lic.Jorge Madrazo Cuellar Procurador General de la República Paseo de la Refor 65 Esq. Violeta Col. Guerrero México, D.F., 06300. Fax: 53-46-09-04.
7) CLEAN WATER: Hold Factory Farm Owners Accountable for Pollution
Believe it or not, the giant corporations who own the livestock at many poultry and pig factories bear no legal responsibility for the massive water pollution these operations cause. To escape accountability, Perdue, Smithfield, Tysons and the other industrial corporations contract with independent growers to raise the animals. When EPA or state agencies issue Clean Water Act permits, the legal responsibility for complying with pollution requirements lies with the contract growers. The big corporations are off the hook, so they have no incentive for making sure that livestock waste doesn't pollute the water.
That's not fair. These huge corporations deliver the animals to an independent grower, prescribe their medications, provide the feed, dictate terms under which the animals must be raised, and then take them to the processing plant. They should also take some responsibility for making sure that their animals' waste does not pollute water. Making the companies responsible for the massive amounts of waste that enters our rivers and streams could be accomplished by having the EPA and state agencies issue Clean Water Act permits that identify both the corporation and the grower as "co-permitees."
Sierra Club and other environmental groups have long urged EPA to take this step, and the Agency's draft Clean Water Act guidance for issuing permits to Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) recommends issuing co-permits. But these wealthy, influential corporations strongly oppose this provision that would hold them accountable for their polluting practices, and EPA may back down and delete it from the final guidance.
Please urge EPA Administrator Carol Browner to require co-permits and hold corporate livestock facilities responsible when they pollute our water. Write her at: U.S. EPA, 401 M Street SW, Washington DC 20460.
For more information, you can also visit the Sierra Club CAFO web site at https://www.sierraclub.org/cafos.
6) SPRAWL: Support Better America Bonds
As poorly planned development continues to eat away at Americans' quality of life, Congress can help stop sprawl by supporting the Better America Bonds Act, H.R. 2446 in the House of Representatives and the Community Open Space Bonds Act, S. 1558 in the Senate. These bills would help local communities by financing smart growth measures, revitalizing urban areas and removing open space from the path of development.
These companion bills would set up a voluntary program allowing communities to carry out their own conservation priorities by using zero interest bonds to purchase open space, protect water quality, improve access to parks, and redevelop abandoned industrial city centers. Call your Representative and Senator and urge them help promote smart growth initiatives that protect open space by cosponsoring these bills.
7) STOP "CLEARCUT FOR KIDS" BILL IN SENATE
An outdated law known as "Payments to Counties" creates a perverse incentive for affected communities to support high levels of logging by giving a portion of logging receipts to some rural counties. In recent years, because of a decrease in logging in some communities -- due to both unsustainable logging practices and various protection measures -- payments to counties have declined, and some rural school systems have suffered. The Clinton administration has proposed de-linking county payments from timber cuts, to provide stable funding for schools and reduce the incentive to continue an unsustainable logging program.
But Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Larry Craig (R-ID) are pushing a bill that would continue the link between county payments and logging quotas and increase logging incentives. Now the bill is headed for the Senate as S. 1608. Communities should not have to sacrifice clean drinking water, jobs and wildlife habitat to fund their children's education.
TAKE ACTION: Call your Senators today through the Capitol Hill switchboard at (202) 224-3121 and urge them to OPPOSE S.1608 and HR 2389. Urge em to support a responsible proposal to decouple rural education funding from National Forest logging levels.
8) POPULATION: Support Fairness in Contraceptive Coverage
The Equality in Prescription Insurance and Contraceptive Coverage Act (EPICC) would require all insurance companies that offer prescription drug coverage to also cover prescription contraceptive drugs and devices. Similarly, the measure would require that health plans offering coverage for outpatient medical services also provide coverage for outpatient contraceptive services. EPICC would make contraceptives more affordable and accessible for all Americans, begin to bring parity to health care costs for men and women, improve women's and children's health, and protect the environment.
EPICC (S.1200 and H.R. 2120) has been introduced in both houses of Congress. It is sponsored by Olympia Snowe (R-ME) and Harry Reid (D-NV) in the Senate and Jim Greenwood (R-PA) and Nita Lowey (D-NY) in the use.
For more information visit our website at www.sierraclub.org/population or contact Carol Schlitt at carol.schlitt@sierraclub.org.
9) DO A LITTLE OR DO A LOT
Rep. John T. Doolittle (R-CA04) is planning a full-out attack on the environmental movement. He is already trying to put together a committee to dismantle much of the progress made over the last seven years --- like the wild forest protection plan and better auto emissions standards.
To quote one insidious line: "What I am working to do is not merely reverse the damage done but to enable the executive branch to work its will to counter that entire movement and undercut their sources of power."
Ironically, he is calling the group "Project Evergreen." He has asked people to "respond with your suggestions via mail at the address below or via email at project.evergreen@mail.house.gov."
Office of John T. Doolittle ATTN: Joan Willis 1526 Longworth Building Washington, DC 20515
See also: www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/2000-03/08/144l-030800-idx.html March 22, 2000
"I was quite excited."
Ghillean T. Prance, former director of the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew (England), commenting on the fact that research on earlier blooming dates for 89 plant species, done by the Smithsonian Institution, coincides with research in England. The Smithsonian study notes that Washington's famed cherry blossoms are making their appearance a week earlier than 30 years ago and attributes this to global warming -- warmer winter and spring nights.
Curt Suplee, Washington Post, 3/22/2000
CONTENTS:
1. ENDANGERED SPECIES: Nebraska Sierra Club Victory!
2. CRUDE BEHAVIOR: Sierra Club report on oil, the Arctic and fuel economy
3. NUCLEAR WASTE: House votes on Nuke Waste Bill
1. ENDANGERED SPECIES: Nebraska Sierra Club Victory!
Nebraska Sierra Club scored a victory for endangered species in the state with the help of attorney Pat Knapp. This victory is much to the chagrin of the Home Builders Association. The Home Builders opposed the new listings, including that of the Salt Creek tiger beetle, which Knapp felt was critical to list.
In the Lincoln Journal Star, Knapp is quoted: "It appears to me the science is so solid on the listings (that) if you went the other way, you'd have a problem."
The story goes on: "In particular, she emphasized the need to protect the Salt Creek tiger beetle. The predatory insect is found only in the saline wetlands of northern Lancaster County, where more than 90 percent of the salt marshes have been destroyed. As the result, the beetle has one of the most restricted distributions of any insect in the nation.
'We think (commission staff have) underestimated the threat,' Knapp said. She mentioned growing residential and commercial development north of Superior street in Lincoln as a serious threat to the beetle."
This is the first time in 15 years that the state has added species to its list. Newly listed species include the Colorado butterfly plant and the small white lady's-slipper, as well as the Salt Creek tiger beetle. [The Lincoln Journal-Star, March 19, 2000 :BY JOE DUGGAN]
2. CRUDE BEHAVIOR: Sierra Club report on oil, the Arctic and fuel economy
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE CONTACT:
March 22, 2000 Allen Mattison, 202-547-1141
On Eve of Exxon Valdez Anniversary, Sierra Club Releases "Crude Behavior" Report on Oil Industry Influence Over Energy Policy
Washington -- The Sierra Club today released a new report, Crude Behavior: The Oil Industry's Influence Over Our Nation's Energy Policy, detailing ways petroleum corporations and their Congressional allies have contributed to America's dependence on foreign oil, and outlining paths to energy independence. Solutions to America's rising gas prices include restoring the ban on exporting Alaskan oil in the short term, and improving automobile fuel economy and reforming the campaign finance system in the long term.
"Some members of Congress are using the oil price hike as an excuse to renew their calls for drilling the Arctic Refuge," the report states. "Clearly, destroying one of the most spectacular places on the planet is too high a price to pay for politics as usual. Instead of using the last quarter-century to reduce America's oil dependency, Congress has kowtowed to the oil companies and auto industry -- refusing to encourage American car companies to make more fuel efficient cars and voting against research and incentives for alternate energy use."
In early 1989, President George Bush was gung-ho to drill for oil in the fragile Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. And the oil industry's Congressional allies were charging full-steam-ahead to open the area for drilling. Only the Exxon Valdez disaster on March 24, 1989 stopped them dead in their tracks. Seeing oil-slicked birds, dead otters and blackened beaches gave Americans pause about Alaskan oil exploitation.
Since then, however, America has done little to protect itself. Our nation's dependence on foreign oil drew us into military conflict in the Persian Gulf. Fuel economy for our nation's fleet has fallen to its lowest level since 1980. In each of the past five years, Congress has prevented the Clinton Administration from even considering increasing fuel economy standards. The oil industry continues to buy influence, donating more than $56 million to political candidates between the Valdez spill and the 1998 election (www.opensecrets.org). And turn over a few rocks on the beach at Sleepy Bay on Alaska's Latouche Island, and oil from the Exxon Valdez will still ooze from the muck.
Short-Term Solution: Restore the Ban on Exporting Alaskan Oil
· Those clamoring loudest for drilling the Arctic to "lower" prices are the same people who fought to lift the export ban on Alaskan oil in an effort to raise prices five years ago.
· During the debate five years ago, the Anchorage Daily News reported, "For British Petroleum, the North Slope's largest producer, lifting the oil-export ban is a piece of a larger market strategy to drive up prices."
· The General Accounting Office found that "lifting the export ban raised the relative prices of Alaskan North Slope and comparable California oils between $.98 and $1.30 higher per barrel than they would have been had the ban not been lifted."
· The President can restore the ban on exporting Alaskan oil with a stroke of his pen. This immediate step will provide relief to families and protect our environment. Members of Congress, led by Reps. George Miller and Peter DeFazio, this week called on the President to exercise that power, and they have introduced legislationto restore the ban, if the President does not act more quickly.
Long-Term Solution: Raise Fuel Efficiency
· Raising Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards to 45 miles per gallon for cars and 34 mpg for light trucks would save 2 million barrels a day: more oil than we import from the Persian Gulf, mid-range estimates of oil in the Arctic, and off-shore oil combined. · With hybrid engines, the technology exists today to improve fuel economy without impeding safety or inconveniencing motorists.
Long-Term Solution: Reform Campaign Finance
· During the 1997-98 election cycle alone, the Big Oil and Automotive lobbies handed out $33.5 million in political contributions. (www.opensecrets.org/pubs/bigpicture2000/index.htm)
· Big Money's control over Congress leads to favors such as the Congressional rider forbidding the Department of Transportation from even studying the issue of raising fuel economy.
· Real reform, such as passing the McCain-Feingold proposal, would eliminate the influence of Big Oil's lobby and its allies in Congress whose actions keep America dependent on foreign oil.
The report will be available at the Sierra Club's Arctic website on Thursday, March 23, (www.sierraclub.org/wilderness/arctic/index.asp). To get an immediate copy, please call Jon Schneider at (202) 547-1141.
# # #
3. NUKE WASTE VOTE
Today, March 22, the House voted on the Nuclear Waste Policy Act Amendments of 2000, S. 1287. The vote was 253 for the bill, 157 against. This is a bad bill that undermines the EPA's authority to set critical radiation standards to govern the proposed permanent repository at Yucca Mountain and it also would initiate the largest nuclear waste transportation project ever. It would send waste through 43 states bound for a cement parking pad in the Nevada desert.
Friends of the nuclear industry haven't learned. The Senate voted on the bill in January, with a margin sufficient to uphold the president's promised veto. The president has again pledged to veto the bill.
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