Essay by Eric Worrall
All that separates us from a Venezuelan style economy where ordinary people search the trash for food is politicians listening to the wrong advice.
The UN can set a new course on “critical” transition minerals
Published on 20/08/2024, 4:51pm
Comment: A high-level panel is working to define principles for responsible mining, which will be presented to the UN General Assembly in September
By Claudia Velarde, Stephanie Weiss and Jessica Solórzano
Claudia Velarde is Co-director of the Ecosystems Program at the Interamerican Association for Environmental Defense (AIDA), Stephanie Weiss is a Project Coordinator at AIDA, and Jessica Solórzano is an Economic Specialist at AIDA.
The global push toward renewable energy, intended to reduce climate-aggravating emissions, has revealed how the environmental and social costs of extracting the minerals it requires fall disproportionately on local communities and ecosystems.
Many argue that electromobility and renewable energy technologies will help mitigate climate change – but adopting them on a large scale would require a massive increase in the mining of minerals such as lithium, which are key to their development.
…
Our reflection on what the Panel cannot ignore points to three elements: a status quo approach to “development”; a high level of technological optimism concerning mining; and a lack of urgency regarding ecosystem limits and communities’ rights.
First, we acknowledge that the Panel is under pressure from powerful actors, but it will need to resist the assertion that mining is always beneficial to the economic growth and prosperity of nations. This status-quo perspective reinforces the notion of unlimited natural resources for human consumption, mirroring the economic development promises of the early 20th century, which contributed to the current climate crisis.
The Panel must not fail to consider the possibility of degrowth or the imposition of limits on mining activities that could lead to reduced material and energy consumption. Nor should it neglect other forms of traditional and local knowledge that may offer possibilities for alternative development.
Then, on the impacts, pollution and other ecosystem disruptions caused by mining, it is consistently stated that assessments and evaluations are necessary – and that these can preserve ecosystem integrity.
…
Read more: https://www.climatechangenews.com/2024/08/20/the-un-can-set-a-new-course-on-critical-transition-minerals/
I don’t think we should ignore these glimpses into what I believe it the true agenda of the green movement – the dismantling of the industrial revolution, and a return to a medieval peasant economy.
Did you know Venezuela was per capita the 4th wealthiest nation on Earth in the 1950s? There is no path to reduced consumption which does not include immense suffering and economic dislocation. Whether the reduced consumption is due to economic imbalances, price controls or government imposed sanctions on critical economic activities like mining, the result is always an economic recession or a new great depression, or in extreme cases total collapse.
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But of course! If it benefits people, the Green Blob will oppose it.
” … the economic development promises of the early 20th century, which contributed to the current climate crisis.”
Can the three authors give us a definition of what a climate crisis is and bring actual data showing we are actually in a climate crisis ?
If not, they should step down, with all their colleagues, and get an actual job.
I hope they wind up working in a gas station! (F. Zappa song)
It’s a 2-edged sword. Yes they used “climate crisis” but their focus on how mining has consequences is a pursuit worthwhile.
But they are doing their job so well!
The rapid decline of Venezuela from near the top of economic success to the very bottom over a period of a few decades illustrates what inevitably happens when some kleptocrats take control of what was a mostly competent government and begin doing what kleptocrats do. It should be more widely published.
Interestingly, crime in Venezuela is dropping as they export criminal gangs and criminals in general to the U.S.
There’s probably nothing worthwhile left to steal in Venezuela, so they’ve decamped to where the pickings are better. /s
It’s not just the mining, but also the *refining*. The two are some of the most environmentally damaging activities known to man.
Mining and refining are some of the most environmentally damaging activities known to man. Hmmm, I would dispute that statement, because I reckon that wind turbines are much worse. As you go about your normal daily life, how often do you observe environmental destruction from mining or refining, compared with how often you see environmental destruction from wind turbines?
Mining is especially destructive, environmentally speaking, when done in countries that care not about the environment. Most third world countries can’t afford to be concerned about mitigating potential environmental damages if it becomes too costly monetarily. They’ll just dig and dig with little concern for what happens to their drinking water or their children’s lives
Absolutely, people work dangerous backbreaking jobs because they hate their children. What other reason could there be?
Children mine cobalt and the local groundwater gets contaminated
In those cases, mining isn’t the culprit. The culprit is what keeps the people poor. The same culprit that makes the people slaves.
Yes, wind turbines are highly damaging. In part because of the mining and refining necessary to construct them. Of course, they’re also damaging during their operational service life and again when they break or have reached the end of their life. So I agree wind turbines suck, or should I say they blow?
or, they get blown 🙂
“Blown up” .. would be better !!
How many trees were cut down in Scotland to build windmills that despoil the landscape for truthfully no benefit at all?
14 million and growing!
Without either you have essentially NOTHING that you take for granted in modern human civilization.
So what exactly is your point?
His point was addressing the additional impacts of refining the lithium and rare earths to be useable in the ruinables.
Coal doesn’t need much refining.
Some of the rare Earths required for renewables have absolutely horrendous extraction processes and waste products.
Mining the earth is what creates value or wealth. Of course these anti-human demons oppose it.
Wanting to give the people of those areas a fair shake, eliminate childhood forced labor, irreparable damage to the environment those people occupy is demonic?
Will those people see any economic benefits to foreigners raping their lands?
It seems to be generally controlled from the top. Wealthy foreign interests buy the politicians who then earn their pay by providing results at the lowest possible cost to the foreigners.
Exactly the point.
Dreams of the happy life in “The Shire” fill the minds of greentards….
Reminds me of the Monty Python sketch, “Four Yorkshiremen”, very funny!
“We were happy despite being poor! Because we were poor!”
WEF: You will be poor but happy.
Cold, hungry, in the dark, alone under the bridge waiting for the next next FedDrone™ to confirm your Real ID and deliver your weekly supply of cricket paste.
“under the bridge“
Say what? No bridges. No drones. Catch your own crickets.
Fortunately the arms which empower the people have already been made.
Do those people have access to such arms? Do they have the economic power to procure them?
Totally at odds with 10x additional lithium batteries, solar panels, or windmill generators
You are missing the basic idea. Reduce demand by 10X so all those materials need not be mined.
After all, it has pretty much already been established that procuring those materials in adequate quantities cannot be done, at least within this century.
[PPE] politicians listening to the wrong advice.
REVEALED: MILIBAND’S EXTREME LEFT POLICY TEAM
https://order-order.com/2024/08/12/revealed-milibands-extreme-left-policy-team/
Guiding the UK’s energy policy operation will be climate activist Tobias Garnett, the former coordinator of Extinction Rebellion’s legal strategy team
…
Jonty Leibowitz, whose passion is arguing for socialist reforms to football
…
Eleanor Salter’s focus is “integrating nature into the climate offer“.
etc
Yuck. That should win Farage a few votes in the next election, assuming there is a next election.
Perhaps it’s time to fire your king and elect a new one
There, I fixed it for you. 😉
Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated
Existence, as you know it, is over.
— Climate Borg
The Beatles (1960s) had a song for that. It had the word ‘Revolution’ in it.
Don’t forget Dire Straits.
Wealth is created by exploiting natural resources, ”Farming’, fishing’, ‘forestry’, ‘mining’, and using coal, oil, gas for energy. Wealth, in the modern world is also created by intellectual pursuits.
Wealth is too easily destroyed by ignorance, tyrants, dictators, and government parasites.
Coal, gas and oil mining/drilling are probably the LEAST harmful mining activities associated with getting reliable energy.
The rare Earths are much yuckier because of the sheer bulk of material that needs to be mined, and the noxious chemicals needed for extraction of the necessary minerals.
The biggest problem with rare earth mining is the radioactive waste.
The sludge pools at Baotou
Baotou toxic lake – YouTube
The miners pushing the Green agenda will not like this. They are heavily invested in the transition; recognising it will underpin massive growth and economic power for them.
When you, or any living person, breathes in, that is mining of oxygen from the natural global endowment named the atmosphere. When you breathe, you deprive needy other people of what Nature created for us all.
Similar logic applies for the taking of minerals from the natural endowment named the Earth’s crust. Each gram of coal that is mined and burned reduces the natural endowment and takes from another person.
Life is ever a process of taking and giving. The.ultimate aim is to use resources like coal and oxygen in such a way that benefits exceed harms. This causes some people to become judges of what is benefit and what is harm. Such people require some qualifications to be valid judges. That skill has traditionally come from experience with the product. We all have experience with breathing oxygen but only a tiny, tiny few have hands-on experience with mining, so the pool of experienced judges is limited.
Those involved in mining are mostly free to leave it if they find they do not like it, with minor exceptions that are getting media attention lately, like child miners of Congo cobalt. This is a topic where ignorance runs rife and we see unqualified people becoming pseudo-judges by doing no more than repeating and relaying the words of others. In real life, a child with simple tools can produce insignificant quantities compared to machinery, so this child labour is more about the choice of the child to work and get food, or to starve. Their choice.
The people quoted here about their views on evil mining are abnormal people with abnormal views. They offer no significant remedy for their allegations of harm.
The involvement of the United Nations is a large, immediate problem. The UN was formed to try to reduce the impact of war. They have no charter to be manipulating public attitudes to mining. If it comes to the test, the UN has no power to force companies or individuals to do anything. That is not their charter, so they can be told to go away. As they will be. This matter of continued Mining is all too important to allow untrained, inexperienced, often low intelligence bleeding heart people to prevail.
Geoff S
“so this child labour is more about the choice of the child to work and get food, or to starve. Their choice.”
That is a choice?
“a return to a medieval peasant economy”
And that society will also have an aristocracy and royalty. The greens will fill those roles of course.
“The greens will fill those roles of course.”
The greens think they will fill those roles, of course.
There is one thing I can think of that needs to be limited. That is the US’s money going to the UN. If we stop propping them up they will quit being such a pain in the backside. By stop propping them up I mean stop all money to the UN, we give them nothing.
Kick the UN out of NYC and repurpose the building for housing for the homeless.
Safe some bucks. Save some people.
The United Nations? That quango claiming we should have a One World Government headed by the UN? That UN?
Yea. That UN.
.”The UN … need[s] to …” not be a government.
The true agenda is less people doing less things that require external energy and consuming less things. But the medieval lifestyle is not for all: the wealthy elite powerbrokers will still have their big boats, private jets, fast cars, mansions by the sea, excellent food and travel. Because Good Lifestyles and Consumption are NOT the bug bear: the problem is having too many people having it. A 1% population living like AL Gore is fine, by the narrative.
You know this is true by the antinuclear rhetoric. Limitless cheap energy is a threat to the “Green” activists: it would expand consumption and travel. They want expensive energy that the rich can afford but the masses can’t. 15 minute towns are NOT for the rich elites, just the unwashed plebs.
The rub is this: neither robotics nor AI can replace the human labor needed to create and maintain the elite upper lifestyle. That needs cheap and numerous grunts. Think North Korea or China: most citizens are poor and restricted to where they live and confined to their jobs. Because machines can’t do the work at an economic level. But that work is required to provide a 1st World lifestyle for the ruling class.
The Green vision of the future is a kind of soft feudal existence. Consumption of energy and goods is limited for the 95% working class of humanity, somewhat restricted for the 4% management class (they require bribery), and unlimited for the 1% ruling class. In this way Consumption is at “sustainable” levels, which is the Green goal, but the goodies are not eliminated for the Green Gods. A top-down authoritarian regime prevents the underlings from demanding more – it’s not sustainable!
Cheap, widespread nuclear power liberates humanity, it allows a rising across the board. We’d all like a yacht. But that’s not sustainable or would require the super yacht crowd to downsize. Which sure as he’ll ain’t gonna be allowed to happen.
Population control is the hidden desire. You CAN have a lot of cheap energy and also a sustainable economy – if population numbers are low enough. But that’s an existential problem for the Greens also: the White (and some Asian) populations are already in serious decline. If you want to drop the global population, you have to target the Black and Brown of the world. And next to colonialism, that’s just White Supremacist racism.
Can’t do that, either.
I owe my soul to the company store.