U.S. & CANADA

Last summer, consumers experienced unprecedented gas prices at the pump. Suddenly, gas-guzzling SUVs didn’t seem such a good idea. Then the full impact of the US ‘sub-prime’ debacle hit and economies tanked. The price of gasoline – or petrol as Brits call it, has since slumped to more reasonable levels. But is this but a short reprieve? ‘Big Oil’, such as Exxon-Mobile Corp, BP plc and the Saudi giant Aramco, have in recent years; all poo-poo’d any suggestion that global oil supplies have peaked. BP exploration boss Michael Daly recently told oil execs “Peak oil is a long way off and that the exploration of alternative hydrocarbons indicates that the peak oil argument is misplaced or at least premature.”

Daly’s comments fit well with Big Oil spin. In-house economists working for Exxon-Mobile, BP and other multi-nationals, tend to focus on the bottom line and preach an investor-friendly, but not necessarily honest perspective that while commodity prices always go down, ingenuity will always beat scarcity! Bottom-lining, mentioning peak oil is bad for business!

At an offshore oil industry supplier’s convention in Newfoundland, Canada last year, the counter-argument was not well received by delegates attending. An Australian oilman, Jim Buckee, recently retired from heading Talisman Energy Inc, a leading Canadian oil company, warned that the coming oil scarcity could see gasoline prices rocket to $20 a litre. His presentation received polite, but scant applause from the oil pundits listening. Buckee told his audience that crude production had already peaked. The biggest oilfields were 50 years old and output was unsustainable.  No discoveries had been made in recent decades to replace the half-million plus barrels a day mega-oilfields in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Iraq. While demand may be down due to the recession, the equivalent of a new Saudi Arabia is needed to sustain existing reserves into the future.

Buckee suggests the evidence is clear. Population growth continues unabated, especially amongst emerging economies. Once the recession recedes, demand for petroleum will rise again. At the same time, production in OPEC countries will likely shrink, due to rapidly expanding populations of young people putting pressure on domestic consumption. All of this will leave western societies feeling increasingly uncomfortable and in need of some serious thinking about how to cope in the future with gasoline prices in the $10-20 range.

Much has been stated about the wealth in the Alberta tar-sands; however, Buckee considers them overrated as a future source of supply. So far the tar-sands have proven horrendously expensive to exploit, with rapidly escalating labour costs and major environmental challenges such as water supply and contamination as so graphically shown in a recent edition of National Geographic.

The Obama administration has adopted a somewhat opaque stance towards the tar-sands, but looking at the eco-sensitive composition of his team, Alberta’s best chance right now is to take really positive steps to curb CO2 emissions and grapple with other environmental hot potato’s in the present economic lull – and before their southern neighbours start dictating.

Whatever happens, the message is clear; oil is a rapidly depreciating commodity. For society at large, and especially in the West, the future indeed looks troubling, given the degree of economic dependence on hydrocarbons. Ingenuity may yet provide some answers, by way of example, electric vehicles. But priorities will increasingly be forced on us, be it loss of the ubiquitous plastic bag, or decreasing access to foreign goods, due to a paucity of bunker fuel for shipping.

Posted under Environmental News

UNITED KINGDOM

According to Lord Browne of Madingley, former head of BP, ‘Britain must revert to greater state control of energy markets to hit ambitious targets on renewable energy and climate change.’ So calling him Lord Browne Energy is perhaps unfair. Then again, it probably is not. For example, he said the recent decision by Shell to stop investments in wind, solar and hydro-electric power reflected a move ‘back to basics’ for oil and gas companies. He said he sees it as ‘a pure business decision. Oil companies have a tremendous number of things they’ve got to do in developing oil and gas. That’s where their expertise is and that’s probably where they’re focused,’ Browne said, apparently not seeing the conflict.

Shell pulled out of the British wind sector last year. It believes only biofuels, and carbon capture and storage make sense, alongside oil and gas. Warning signs that market mechanisms are failing to deliver the necessary growth in clean energy should come as no surprise. Browne said:

Competition has been the guiding star of UK energy policy since the 1980s and it worked well while there was a surplus of energy infrastructure capacity. But price competition is now failing to deliver the new, more diversified infrastructure that we urgently need to bolster energy security and meet our climate change targets. I remain convinced that the market is the most effective delivery unit available to society. But the market will need a new strategic direction and a new framework of rules, laid down by government. We must fundamentally rethink the objective of energy policy in this country.*

The EU asks of Britain to generate 15% of its energy from renewable sources by 2020 with the bulk of this to be met by the electricity sector. There are proposals for thousands of offshore wind turbines off the UK coast and Lord Browne compared the current need for urgent investment and new infrastructure with efforts to develop North Sea oil and gas fields in the 1970s and 1980s, saying:

High oil prices provided a strong market pull. But governments also gave industry a helping hand, creating generous tax incentives and regulations, and helping to build strategic infrastructure. There’s even more cause for government intervention today. That’s because energy security and climate change mitigation are public goods. They would not otherwise be recognised by the free market.*

For anyone with a cynical view of the world of business in general and the motivation of oil companies in general, Shell’s retreat from renewables could be seen as a way of raising the stakes and negotiate the ‘government intervention’ Browne speaks of to their benefit. One option he suggested:

One option would be for the government to direct state-controlled banks to lend money for green infrastructure projects, as is being done in Ireland. Policymakers must be frank – the cost of supporting renewable energy will be borne by consumers who pay a little more for their delivered energy.*

More precisely, Lord Browne’s logical loops will have the government putting the money up front, consumers footing the bill at the other end and the big energy companies sitting back, avoiding risk and having a fresh market served on a plate to dig into. The smaller or unconventional operators on the other hand, will keep running into problems getting permits or similar setbacks. Ecotricity has already proved that green energy (from renewables) does not have to cost more than brown (coal, oil, gas) energy. (What is happening right now is that carbon offset fee of £50 per year should be added to every ‘Green’ energy tariff, something we will cover in an upcoming article.)

Wrapping it up, Lord Browne said ‘it is vital that environmental policy was at the heart of government’ and went on to say:

It’s essential that we do not compartmentalise climate change as an issue. Environmental integrity should be made a tangible part of other social priorities, such as economic prosperity and national security. This will require a new approach to policy across all levels of government and all government departments.*

There we have it then, straight from the top brass in the inner sanctum of the HQ of our energy future. We should all be well relieved. But, Browne’s ties to brown energy do not make statements with ‘essential’ and ‘environmental integrity’ and ‘priority’ in them very reassuring. There is a lot of manoeuvring to be done before the ship that is the energy future of the world is on the right course with the wind filling its sails. Former heads of oil giants are allies to be wary of.

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* Article ‘State intervention vital if Britain is to meet its green energy targets, says former BP boss’ by Alan Rusbridger and David Adam in The Guardian on the 25th of March 2009, read it here,

Posted under Climate, Corporate, Environmental News, Gas & Electricity

LATIN AMERICA

From one day to the next, automakers and governments are urgently seeking to lower their reliance on oil. Since drastically shifting our lifestyle and accept a lower level of consumption and mobility is such a hopelessly difficult thing to do, the more convenient attitude is to try and substitute the fossil fuel for hybrids and electric vehicles. One of the critical issues to address is where the electricity will come from. Another one concerns the batteries and how to dispose of them as well as how to produce them and more importantly where to find the resources.

Something is brewing in Latin America. As reported in the New York Times.

Circa 50% of the world’s lithium, the mineral needed for the batteries in today’s EVs and hybrids, mobile phones, laptop computers and other appliances, is found in one single country. One of the world’s poorest nations, Bolivia has recently nationalised both oil and gas production and is not about to let go of its treasure. Now that foreign interests are pressing to strike deals over Bolivia’s lithium reserves, a nationalist sentiment about the resource is building quickly in the country’s government.

In response to European and Japanese companies efforts to secure the resource, Bolivian president Avo Morales talks of closely controlling the extraction of lithium. These vast mineral deposits lie beneath the world’s largest salt flat, Salar de Uyuni, and indigenous people living nearby want a share in the bounty. By collecting salt and selling it across the country the people in Uyuni have survived for generations. A leader of salt gatherers and farmers in the salt flats feels that, ‘The lithium may be Bolivia’s, but it is also our property.’

Other uses of Lithium includes the treatment of bipolar disease because of its regulatory capacity, it can ease both mania and depression. From another health and safety point of view, Lithium metal is corrosive and requires special handling to avoid skin contact, something that is largely ignored with current extraction techniques in Bolivia. For example, breathing lithium dust or lithium compounds can irritate the nose and throat and higher exposure to lithium can cause a build-up of fluid in the lungs, leading to pulmonary oedema which can be deadly. In order to mine the resource from the salt flat, technicians need to get brine to the surface, where it is evaporated in pools to expose the lithium which is then handled with primitive methods.

China could also become an important producer of Lithium, tapping into reserves in Qinghai province and Tibet, something that could also cause some stirring sentiments of legitimised robbery and national versus local rights of way.

Rare as it may be, Lithium based batteries [Li-Ion] have been known to explode for different reasons, if built badly or handled carelessly. What will happen to the world’s largest Lithium resource now that we are realising its potential as a way out of oil dependence? Or, will Lithium help a volatile world calm down and cure itself from a manic depressive boom and bust cycle, accelerated by the cheap energy of fossil fuels?

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Read the NY Times article here.

Posted under Cars & Transport, Gas & Electricity, Renewable Energy

For more than a century, internal combustion engine cars have throned as a symbol of personal freedom, fashioned after an American post-war ideal born out of the wealth of cheap oil. Even in the face of the environmental consequences such as air pollution, climate change, peak oil and having our habitat poisoned by thronged highways filled with suburban sprawl commuters, we have continued to buy into this ideal. Therefore, instead of trying to amend the root of a problem which stems from overuse of finite resources for our comfort and enjoyment, we are now trying to find alternatives that will permit us to continue down this ultimately failed path. One of the proffered substitutes is hydrogen, not in itself a source but a carrier of energy.

Honda is readying their hydrogen clean car flagship the for small scale market introduction in… 2010. Too few, too late. The fact that it is happening at a ridiculously slow pace adds to the fuel-cell-as-silver-bullet-charade interpretation. Michael Graham Richard, in the Treehugger Blog article on the FCX, says:

While fuel cell hydrogen cars are impressive technological marvels and we can dream about a world where most transportation only emits water, we should be realistic about the obstacles that need to be overcome before that world is a reality.*

First of all, try to imagine the time it will take to replace all the cars already out there. Secondly, the most common and sensible objection to this technology is the enormous investment required, in both money and energy, to set up an infrastructure for large scale production and widespread distribution of hydrogen. The electric car manufacturing competitors have, with plug-in EVs are mass produced (which is happening right now) and widely accepted(which is coming), an already up and running grid. (Ecotricity’s founder Dale Vince is having a wind powered car built by a team from Lotus. It could have been a vehicle literally propulsed by wind using sails, but it is, logically, his company’s wind turbines providing the fuel. Electricity. He could have had the turbines power hydrogen production plants but that feels, in all honesty, pretty stupid.) Another thing in favor of the EV scenario is that, even if it represents a staggering amount of work and financial investment, conventional cars could actually be ‘upgraded’ by changing the combustion engine to an electric motor. A similar hydrogen ‘upgrade’ is technically all but impossible, mainly due to security issues.

In an interview published in the Wall Street Journal, Honda Motor Co. Chief Executive Takeo Fukui explains why his company is neglecting EVs in favour of hybrids and hydrogen cars:

We feel the practical feasibility of the electric vehicle is very limited. The biggest issue is driving distance. The other issue is the recharging time. The FCX Clarity can be recharged in one minute. With the electric vehicle, it can take several hours. However, this is not to deny the possibility of battery electric vehicles. It’s very useful for vehicles with restricted applications, like golf carts.**

This comment is not in tune with reality. Much of our future transportation is liable to be restricted in any case and if there are no hydrogen fuelling stations in place, the recharging time of the FCX is irrelevant. In reference to the argument that hydrogen cars would allow us the same amount of independence that its gasoline ancestor have it must be said that it is encouraging an unsustainable way of life. When Fukui is asked what went wrong with Honda’s hybrid the Insight which was introduced in the US before the Toyota Prius, he say:

Well, I don’t think anything was wrong. Our intention was not to try to make Insight a mass seller. The significance of the Insight was that at the time, we wanted to establish the best record for fuel efficiency, and we did.**

The research the went into bringing forth record breaking hybrid was not dropped. Why it was not more aggresively pursued is a mystery, Toyota’s best seller came along and became synonomous with green cars. Is the Clarity another in Insight or is it smoke screen? Fukui continues, ‘We have to make strategic choices. The hybrid will be the core product, and after that comes fuel cell and clean diesel.’

The intention with this article was to make a critical analysis of the actual car. What remains is criticism. Not of the car as such -which is to all appearance an engineering masterpiece- but of hydrogen cars in general. For a long time, the industry has promised but not delivered and there is, in January 2009, too much still to be solved and not enough clarity. Sorry Honda.

As EcoSwitch is not able to offer any truly convincing arguments for full scale hydrogen car technology as a solution, look for them here. Best of luck.

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* Blog article ‘Top Gear LOVES Honda’s Hydrogen Car, But…’ by Mike Graham Richard on Treehugger.com, read it here.

** Article ‘Honda CEO Vies For Green Mantle’ by John Murphy in Wall Street Journal Online, read it here.

Leif Ahnland leif ahnland

Posted under Cars & Transport, Companies

The public debate 2008 looked like it was going to continue along the major 2007 thematic, making it Climate Change Year Mk. II. It did not really turn out that way. Starting out with food riots in many parts of the world, rocketing oil prices, looming recession, credit crunch, the Obama phenomenon and election, the environment did get a bit lost. But, even if it sometimes did not seem so, on the political agenda it stayed right up there. Although insufficient by far, Europe committed to reduce their CO2-emissions by 2020 to 20% below 1990. The UK committed to 80% cuts by 2050. In total, more than seventy countries have set CO2-emissions reduction targets. But what took over as the main preoccupation has been the ferocious economic downturn. It is only natural, if you have trouble paying for ordinary food, you will not pay for the usually even more expensive organic alternatives. A volatile and unpredictable tipping point year, it will go down in history:

As the year of interlinked food shortages, climate change and recession. But it was also the year when it may have dawned on governments that hell-for-leather, western fossil fuel-based, car-centred growth only ends in social and ecological disaster. *

On the other hand, in a situation where the transport costs start to heavily influence the price tag, locally produced products and crops could become not only a good choice, picked by those who can afford it for logical and emotional reasons, but actually the best choice for everyone. Oil prices dropped from all time highs this summer to under 40 USD a barrel, delighting car owners but making the choices like the ones mentioned harder once more.

Whether the world weans itself off oil and fossil fuels will probably determine global sustainability over the next 20 years. Low oil prices traditionally push energy efficiency off the policy agenda. Economic recessions have punctured green economic bubbles in the past. When times are tight, the wisdom goes, no one invests in new or risky technologies, and countries stick to cheap and dirty energy. *

US president-elect Barack Obama and UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown have both said that millions of jobs could be created in green building, wind power, solar thermal and other green technologies. Talk is cheap though; Kyoto and its soon to come successor, the EU 20-20-20 agreement, the Green New Deal and all other resolutions, politicians promises, governmental statements and committees reports remain only hopeful and interesting documents until they are put in practice or enforced.

The fact that 2008 was not a heat wave record year and actually the coolest since the year 2000 is nothing to cheer about really, the trend is still warming. So keep [eco] switching.

* Article ‘Change, but at what price?’ by John Vidal in The Guardian 17 December 2008, read it here.

Leif Ahnland leif ahnland

Posted under Climate, Environmental News, Renewable Energy

Providing 100% green electricity from renewable energy sources is a difficult feat to pull off. Good Energy, here in the UK, should be proud to manage to do that (read our article featuring them here). Ecotricity, also UK, are up to a guaranteed 30% from renewables. Well done. We have gotten used to expecting that at least a proportion of the total provided originates from wind turbines or equivalent, most companies do give customers the green option. They tend to promote that fact nowadays, however small the actual percentage is. On the other hand, opting for a few carbon offset initiatives and every once in while staging events by PR-departments is much easier, convenient and not to mention cheap.

Picking up a seemingly cold case – almost two years old in fact – of dodgy fast-track building permits for the construction of new coal fired power plants, we want to see how a crooked player in the energy game is coming along. Slow to admit that an estimated 78Million metric tons a year of CO2-emissions from their new plants would do any real damage, Texas-based TXU Energy tries to approach the problem the green wash way. Just for reference, 78 000 000 000 kilograms of CO2 equals, for example, Japan’s commitment to the Kyoto protocol or adding 14 million cars or surpassing the entire output of countries like Sweden and Denmark. In a press release from April 25th this year, TXU vice president of community relations, Kelli Rod said:

We know the important role trees play as Texas looks to go green, and this additional support will advance this cause. Our six-year relationship with the Texas Trees Foundation is a vital component of commitment to do our part to help improve the environment.

Trees are important. Good job working that out. So what does the company actually do for a greener Texas? According to their web site, among other things that all sound really great, they:

Help maintain the TXU Energy Urban Tree Farm, the largest non-profit urban tree farm in the nation. Throughout 2007, TXU Energy and community volunteers planted approximately 10,000 trees, which will eventually be provided to neighbourhood associations, schools, non-profit organizations, various cities and government entities state-wide. *

Furthermore, in the face of their rush to get all their projected coal plants up and running before regulations come into force, they claim to be:

supporting clean-air initiatives, increasing our renewable energy portfolio, providing smart-usage products and services, and helping customers reduce and better manage their energy consumption, we’re working to keep our air clean and our environment healthy now – and for generations to come. *

Sadly insidious and infuriating as it is, when it comes to PR-schemes, it works pretty well. We buy into it, the culture of appearance in this case is sustained because it is so easy take their word for it, checking it up is simply too much work. And actually researching the current progress of the power plants TXU wants to build shows surprisingly difficult from here. So the question remains what to do with Texas? With the largest energy consumption in the US and infamously close ties between policy makers and the oil industry maintained; it appears the state – will with some minor adjustments – trudge along the beaten track.

* To go see their environmental commitment statement, click here.

Posted under Articles, Companies, Corporate, Gas & Electricity, Renewable Energy

Olduvai sounds like the name of a Tolkien character, a good-natured elf perhaps, helping the hobbits preserve the Shire against evil-doers and annihilation. We might change our minds about it; there are no positive connections to be found. Slightly tweaking the tone of voice, Olduvai could just as well be the name of a Sauron disciples, watching us fail with a fiery eye. But an epic story it is and just like Tolkien told a tale of war and darkness and civilization on the brink of destruction, the Olduvai Theory predicts the end of industrialised society, orchestrated primarily by the oil industry.

Admitted, it could be a possibility to at last achieve a sustainable future, finally we could return to healthier ways of life, if only because brute force and high fuel bills. The only problem is that however little we will drive or heat our house; most of us eat oil, for breakfast, lunch and dinner. The condensed water on the single glazed sash windows in the badly insulated terrace house – an all too common occurrence in the UK – speaks a sad truth, we simply cannot afford to heat it enough. Neither the prices nor the the state of our environment will allow for excess. The Green New Deal claims to deal with unemployment and insufficient insulation in one big blow. The question is if it is not too late. The Just in Time principle of our contemporary and overly optimised supermarkets does not have the margin for failures. And there will be failures.

The current world order, based as it is on continuous growth, is intimately connected to our access to cheap energy. Peak Oil, which by a number of independent studies* is considered to have been reached somewhere between 2003 and 2005. According to the conclusions stated in these studies; from 2008, world production of oil can take only one direction. Shrink. Unfortunately, as far as predictions go, however drastic they may seem, and in the face of evidence contradicting them, much can be said in their favour. The US domestic production of oil, along with the exponential growth worldwide, peaked in 1970; this was the starting point of the oil crisis of the 70′s. Showing virtually no growth from 1979 to 2008, we have now reached the beginning of a steep decline. With the build-up of alternatives such as renewables preceding much too slowly, energy prices will rise dramatically, putting out order our present system. Opting for a positive attitude, the chances are that Climate Change and Credit Crunch together (The CC&CC Scenario?) will swing public opinion and help the enforcement of policies towards action.

An all too complex matter to be explored in a 500 word article, the implications of Peak Oil is already making themselves felt. The credit crunch is sometimes blamed on mortgages but there is a deeper current sweeping us along. To keep us in a state of growth, the illusion has been maintained by the invention of systems where we created wealth from nothing. Comments to this post are welcome and any that will give us the impetus to take action that are not blows in thin air can be collectively investigated and published. There might still be time for an EcoSwitch.

* Download a PDF presenting arguments for the validity of the Olduvai Theory here and another on here.

Posted under Articles, Climate

Posted under Climate, Environmental News, How To's & Guides, Lifestyle & Fashion

A scientist, who a quarter of a century ago found himself musing on the way plants store their energy during the night-time darkness, has made a remarkable advance along the road toward bringing solar panels in as the predominant form of domestic power supply. In doing so, he has made the shift from conventional energy sources, namely those derived from gas and oil supplies, toward renewable, green energies all the more likely.

Solar energy is seen by many scientists and campaigners as offering the potential to move energy production away from the greenhouse-gas releasing methods typical now and towards more environmentally friendly, sustainable processes. Research in this field is currently largely focused on the methods by which sunlight can be converted into the electricity which runs our blenders and computer screens. Most people with solar panels are, at the moment, forced to pass over to the national grid much of the power that they produce during the bright hours, only to have to use the national grid when it gets dark. The reason for this inefficient system is that there is no means for individual households to store the natural energy harnessed during the day for when they need it most.

But now, thanks to a scientist in the states, Daniel Nocera from MIT, there is the chance that solar panels can play a role in bringing energy production away from the environmentally detrimental systems of the past and present and towards the small scale, environmentally considerate future that the planet requires.

Solar technology can, Nocera has discovered, be used to power a catalytic reaction that produces oxygen and hydrogen. These two products can then be used to provide the power for fuel cells, cells which will happily store their electrical charge regardless of a sudden thunder storm or the inevitable fall of the long, dark night.

Nocera has overcome many of the problems that other, similar, catalysts encounter, and has cut the amount of electricity needed to power the reaction down by 90 percent. It does, however, still require the valuable metal platinum, so bringing the system to market may need
some degree of creative representation, and we can expect to wait another ten years before the technology is available to bring such a system into the household.

Solar power does already feature heavily in the energy supply of numerous communities
around the world, though its widespread implementation in regions that do not  receive the best of the sun’s rays, those furthest away from the equator, are reliant on the technology becoming more effective in terms of both generating and storing energy.

Using solar power, a renewable green energy, has gone from the stuff of science fiction to a realistic approach to the problem of global warming and climate change. Way back in 1958 solar panels were first used on a vessel in space: the US satellite Vanguard 1. Now, almost exactly fifty years later, Dr Nocera may have made the breakthrough that allows the same technology become the norm in homes and business across the world.

Posted under Articles, Climate, House & Home, Product Innovations

Two non-profit organisations in the United States, alongside the private research Duke University in North Carolina, have spent the last three years monitoring the actions of gas and oil companies in the western Amazon, and have now completed a comprehensive map covering the area that shows the alarming extent to which the corporations have plans for commencing their destructive trade in their area.

The study identified 180 “blocks” that have been ear-marked for oil and gas exploration, an area that stretches 170 million acres, an area just smaller than that of oil rich Texas. Understandably, these findings have caused a huge amount of concern that the businesses are instigating a plan to begin operating in this delicate, bio-diverse portion of the world. The threat to wildlife and indigenous people is obvious, and the report found that many of the oil and gas blocks overlie areas of the greatest ecological wealth, meaning that any activity in the area would come at the cost of species that are already under threat, amphibians for example.

Environmentalists should be under no illusions as to the amount of pressure that businesses can exert on areas that have been in theory protected from their activities. The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska is an example of an area that was recognised as being environmentally vulnerable was defended through legislation and has still found itself under the avaricious eyes of the Bush administration and their oil drilling friends. When president calls for congress to authorize oil prospecting in a wildlife refuge, you realise that the measured, protective legislation put in place to guard environmentally valuable areas is all too easily brushed aside for the immediate plans of big business.

This study fond that the highest concentration of these ‘blocks’ were concentrated in the most pristine areas of the Amazon, and that even the world famous national parks contained within, such as Bolivia’s Madidi National Park, were earmarked for exploration. Overall, the study found that there are a total of 64 ‘blocks’ in the Peruvian Amazon, covering around 121 million acres or 72% of the total land. Peru, like many other developing, Amazonian countries, has been driving toward increasing its hydrocarbon exploration in its own borders, although it is not currently allowing such activities in its national parks.

The report focused on the impact that road building would have on these remote, potted havens of biodiversity. As well as destroying the rainforest beneath their path, roads make previously inaccessible areas easily accessible to human influence, including illegal loggers and poachers. Illegal logging is already a major problem in the vulnerable Amazon, where the sheer scale of the area makes effective policing very difficult. It is estimated that illegal logging accounts for around half of all logging globally, and would be devastating to a developing Amazonian country as it would cause a loss of biodiversity without bringing any of the economic benefits to the country as a whole due to the loss in tax revenue.

The report went on to highlight the huge impact that opening up these secluded areas of jungle would have to the indigenous people who currently inhabit the area. Many of these communities would be extremely vulnerable to disease brought in from the outside world, and there is a concern that traditional cultures and ways of life would be placed under threat through coming into contact with people from outside the forest.

Posted under Climate, Environmental News, Wildlife