For affected indigenous communities in the United States and Canada, new oil and gas pipelines snaking across their lands represent a new kind of attack. Dirty, polluting, dangerous, and built without the communities' consent, these pipelines are the inevitable outcome of North America's hydraulic fracturing and tar sands oil "revolutions" that have played out in recent decades. These indigenous frontline communities must bear the disproportionate costs brought about by developed nations' continued addiction to fossil fuels, all without seeing most of the benefits. In a special preview episode of Season 2 of the Connect the Dots podcast, CPR President Rob Verchick explores this poignant case study of environmental injustice with the guidance of Rachel Rye Butler, the head of the Democracy Campaign at Greenpeace.
As Rachel tells Rob, the First Nations people in Canada and Native Americans in the United States have been protesting the development of the pipelines for several years in order to stop their unbridled expansion. The most successful movements Greenpeace has seen are those led by the indigenous peoples who are on the front lines of this struggle. In the last decade, not one of the five tar sands pipelines that has been proposed – including, most famously, the Keystone XL pipeline – has been built, largely thanks to the indigenous-led movement.
Of course, these successes have not gone unnoticed by the powerful oil and gas industries, which have gone to extreme lengths to defeat protest efforts. Just last week, one of the more outlandish of these measures was formally resolved when a judge dismissed a $900 million lawsuit brought by Energy Transfer, a large pipeline company, against Greenpeace under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, or RICO.
If you watch enough gangster films, you probably recognize RICO as the statute that Congress created to help bring down mobsters and organized crime outfits. Yet apparently, the oil and gas industry was desperate enough to try to manipulate this law as a means for attacking an environmental nonprofit organization that was helping Native Americans exercise their rights to protect their property and health. Fortunately, justice – and good sense – prevailed.
But this enormous suit – seeking nearly a billion dollars in damages – based on "Hail Mary" legal theory demonstrates just how large the stakes are in the fights that Native Americans are waging against oil and gas pipelines. Rob's interview with Rachel offers a detailed look behind the scenes of these fights, including the courageous actions being taken by Native American communities, the efforts of Greenpeace and other public interest organizations that support these communities, and the changing economic and political dynamics that are aligning against the construction of new pipelines. Be sure to tune in to learn more.
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James Goodwin | February 21, 2019
For affected indigenous communities in the United States and Canada, new oil and gas pipelines snaking across their lands represent a new kind of attack. Dirty, polluting, dangerous, and built without the communities' consent, these pipelines are the inevitable outcome of North America's hydraulic fracturing and tar sands oil "revolutions" that have played out in […]
David Driesen | February 20, 2019
Originally published in The Regulatory Review. Reprinted with permission. President Donald J. Trump has declared a national emergency to justify building a wall on the U.S. southern border, which Congress refused to fund. But Mexicans and Central Americans coming to our country in search of a better life does not constitute an emergency. Immigration at the […]
Joel A. Mintz | February 19, 2019
This op-ed was originally published in The Hill. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released an annual report Feb. 8 on its enforcement activities in fiscal 2018. After wading through a bushel full of cherry-picked case studies and a basket of bureaucratic happy talk, the report paints a dismal picture of decline in a crucially important […]
Daniel Farber | February 18, 2019
Originally published on Legal Planet. Trump finally pulled the trigger and declared a national emergency so he can build his wall. But if illegal border crossings are a national emergency, then there's a strong case for viewing climate change in similar terms. That point has been made by observers ranging from Marco Rubio to Legal Planet's […]
Frank Ackerman | February 14, 2019
Originally published on Triple Crisis. Second in a series of posts on climate policy. Find Part 1 here. According to scientists, climate damages are deeply uncertain but could be ominously large (see the previous post). Alternatively, according to the best-known economic calculation, lifetime damages caused by emissions in 2020 will be worth $51 per metric ton of […]
Frank Ackerman | February 11, 2019
Originally published on Triple Crisis. The damages expected from climate change seem to get worse with each new study. Reports from the IPCC and the U.S. Global Change Research Project, and a multi-author review article in Science, all published in late 2018, are among the recent bearers of bad news. Even more continues to arrive […]
Daniel Farber | February 7, 2019
Originally published on Legal Planet. Climate change is not just a long-range problem; it's one that will get much worse in the future unless major emissions cuts are made. For instance, sea levels will continue to rise for centuries. But the people who will be harmed by these changes can't go to court: they haven't […]
James Goodwin | February 4, 2019
Tomorrow morning, Neomi Rao, the current administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), is set to appear before the Senate Judiciary Committee for a hearing on her nomination to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. If confirmed, she would fill the open seat once occupied by Supreme […]
Daniel Farber | January 31, 2019
Originally published on Legal Planet. Conservatives, with full support from Donald Trump, have come up with a menu of ways to weaken the regulatory state. In honor of National Backward Day – that's an actual thing, in case you're wondering, and it's today – let's think about reversing those ideas. In other words, let's try […]