LNG – Der Flüssige Weg ins Klimachaos

Categories

Fossil Fuels

 

Hier geht’s zum LNG-Papier (Deutsch).

‘Liquefied Natural Gas’ (LNG) – Flüssigerdgas steht im Rampenlicht. Die Kosten für fossiles Gas steigen seit 2021 und die furchtbare Invasion der Ukraine durch russische Streitkräfte zwingt Regierungen sich mit der Frage zu befassen, wie die Abhängigkeit Europas von fossilen Energieträgern aus Russland beendet werden kann. Zusammen mit der Notwendigkeit so schnell wie möglich von fossilen Brennstoffen wegzukommen, um die Auswirkungen des Klimawandels zu begrenzen und die globale Erwärmung unter 1,5°C zu halten, haben diese Realitäten Aufregung um LNG erzeugt. Was jedoch ist LNG und warum ist es wichtig? Das vorliegende Papier ist als Warnung davor zu verstehen, was die Ausbreitung von LNG als vermeintliche Lösung für Fragen der Energiesicherheit in Europa anrichten könnte. Es wird zehn Hauptargumente anführen, die die zahlreichen Probleme aufzeigen, die LNG mit sich bringt.

Lesen Sie hier das LNG-Papier auf Deutsch

MEPs fail to end Europe’s fossil fuel dependency, locking Europe into further gas volatility

Categories

Fossil Fuels

BRUSSELS, 9TH MARCH 2022 – Today, Members of the European Parliament voted to approve a list of priority energy projects, including 30 cross-border gas mega projects

Most MEPs voted in favour of the so-called fifth Projects of Common Interest (PCI) list, giving the 30 cross-border gas infrastructure projects faster permitting procedures and the opportunity to access EU public funds [1].  

Eilidh Robb, Fossil Fuel Campaigner at Friends of the Earth Europe commented: 

“Today MEPs have voted to pour yet more public money into fossil fuel infrastructure that will lock households into a dirty energy system that people and planet simply cannot afford.  Parliamentarians have failed to break the cycle of destruction and to speed-up the transition we desperately need away from fossil fuels and to warm homes and clean, secure, renewable energy.”

Frida Kieninger, Director of EU Affairs at Food & Water Action Europe states: 

“The dark times we live in show clearer than ever that Europe’s fossil fuel dependence brings harm, energy poverty and insecurity. The answer to this must not be creating more fossil gas dependence through 30 massive fossil gas pipelines and LNG projects worth €13 billion. The answer must be putting all possible support behind 100% renewable energy and energy efficiency.

***

Notes to Editor: 

Please note that MEPs were asked whether or not they wanted to vote in support of the motion of rejection, or against the motion of rejection.This means that a + vote is a vote to reject the 5th PCI list and a – is a vote to accept the 5th PCI list as it stands.

 

[1] 5th PCI List Plenary Vote Resolution B9-0137/2022: 696 total votes, 497 against the motion for rejection, 177 in support of the motion for rejection, 22 abstained. 

4th PCI List Plenary Vote Resolution B9-0091/2020: 648 total votes, 443 against the motion for rejection, 169 in support of the motion for rejection, 36 abstained. 

 

Relevant Links: 

Motion for Rejection of 5th PCI List 

5th Projects of Common Interest List 

FAQ on Rejecting the 5th PCI List

 

Contact:
Eilidh Robb (EN) +32 (0) 493 93 50 79, [email protected]

Frida Kieninger (EN, DE, ES, FR) +32 (0) 487 24 99 05, [email protected] 

EU energy ministers decide to extend subsidies for fossil fuels in the revised energy infrastructure legislation stranding EU’s climate objectives and the European Green Deal

Categories

Fossil Fuels

Brussels, 11 June 2021 – Europe’s energy ministers have decided to extend subsidies for  fossil gas in today’s approval of the Energy Council’s position for the revision of the energy infrastructure legislation (TEN-E) – a move highly criticised by climate groups and which is not in line with  EU’s climate targets.

Despite its stated intent to stop funding fossil gas infrastructure, the Council’s TEN-E revision contains an extraordinary loophole. As climate organisations recently warned, this means that fossil gas pipelines could be retrofitted to transport an undefined mix of fossil gas and hydrogen, known as blending, over the next nine years Financial support from the EU however would stop in 2027.

While 11 countries spoke out clearly against new gas projects, the final compromise was that  pipelines and import terminals would carry a “blend” of these gasses. However, with no definition of what percentages of each gas could be transported and given the substantially higher costs of producing and transporting hydrogen, it is likely that fossil gas will continue to dominate new projects. Moreover there are no provisions for the blended hydrogen to be sourced from renewable hydrogen only.

“Today, energy ministers decided to perpetuate climate-damaging fossil gas use. The nine year transition period during which existing gas infrastructure can be upgraded to carry hydrogen blends is totally at odds with an already well oversupplied European gas grid and the recent IEA Net Zero Report which gave a red card to fossil gas infrastructure extension. Today politics have not contributed to bringing the  EU closer to the Paris Agreement goal  to limit temperature increase to 1.5°C,” said Esther Bollendorff, Senior Gas Policy Advisor at CAN Europe.

Furthermore, the Council’s proposal also includes support for a new generation of energy infrastructure, which at first glance looks promising: transporting hydrogen and making existing infrastructure “smart”. But a closer look reveals a disappointing truth. The proposal would allow for projects that support fossil fuel infrastructure and so-called “smart gas grids” under the auspices of “low carbon” gasses. An undefined term that in reality includes a plurality of gasses regardless of their climate impact. If such projects are allowed, it would seriously undermine the EU’s ability to meet its climate objective to accomplish at least 55% net emission reductions by 2030 and climate neutrality by 2050.

The Council’s TEN-E revision also undermines the EU’s efforts to fight the climate emergency by continuing to support two large fossil gas infrastructure projects. On one hand, the EastMed project, an unabashed, €6 billion effort to provide the EU with a new source of fossil gas Europe cannot use. If operating at full capacity – 20 billion cubic metres of gas per year – the pipeline’s gas would, when burned, emit as much carbon dioxide as Europe’s current worst polluter, the Bełchatów coal-fired power plant in Poland. On the other hand, the Melita pipeline would keep Malta hooked on gas, with the capacity of transporting an immense 2 billion cubic metres of gas per year to a country with a population of only 500,000.

“We are in a climate emergency. There is no room for new support for fossil gas infrastructure, without exception. It’s hard to see how either the EastMed and Melita pipelines fit into this crucial analysis It’s now down to MEPs to step in and bring a halt to more subsidies for fossil fuel projects – no exceptions, no loopholes,” said Frida Kieninger, Senior Campaigner at Food & Water Action Europe.

Lastly, fossil gas companies that profit from EU gas infrastructure policy and subsidies will continue to hold sway over key energy decisions. Despite some Member States concerns, under the Council’s proposal gas lobbyists – operating through the trade body ENTSOG – would have the power to forecast how much energy Europe needs and to assess and prioritise new infrastructure projects. Like suggestions made by the European Commission, the Council’s proposal continues to grant companies considerable influence rather than handing powers to an independent body which the climate NGO community have called for. Ultimately, the EU cannot wean itself from fossil fuels while this conflict of interest lies at the heart of its decisions on energy infrastructure policy.

“The Council is again letting the fox guard the henhouse siding with fossil gas companies by proposing that they continue to define Europe’s gas policies. If the EU is serious about meeting its climate targets it must remove this conflict of interest, and start listening to science over profiteers of the crisis,” said  Gligor Radečić, Gas Campaigner at Bankwatch.

The Council was badly divided in its decision, with multiple countries abstaining in protest, and “no” votes from Austria, Luxembourg, Germany and Spain, leaving the Council’s position weaker as the text now enters negotiations with the European Parliament. MEPs in the Energy Committee are due to vote on 15 July. The three-way negotiations, known as trilogues, between Commission, EU governments and MEPs could start immediately. Alternatively they may be delayed until after all MEPs have voted on the Parliament’s position in plenary, which is likely to take place in September.

—ENDS—

EU Ombudswoman Acknowledges Commission’s Climate Failures

Heavily subsidized fossil gas projects lack real  climate impacts analysis

Brussels, 19 November 2020

In a final decision published today, the EU Ombudswoman confirmed that since 2013 the EU Commission has failed to conduct adequate climate/sustainability assessments for the fossil gas projects on the Projects of Common Interest (PCI) list.

Initially the EU Commission ignored any climate impacts of PCI projects and in 2019 the European Network of Transmission System Operators for Gas (ENTSOG) was tasked with including a sustainability assessment in its cost/benefit analysis that they had been doing since 2013. Unfortunately, ENTSOG’s proposed approach was based on the assumption that all gas projects would automatically show only positive benefits towards CO2 mitigation, erroneously claiming a shift from coal to gas would be good for the climate, ignoring negative impacts, such as increases in greenhouse gas emissions.

In February, the EU Ombudswoman opened an official inquiry into the failure of the European Commission to consider the climate impacts of subsidized projects on the PCI list, some of which are directly linked to imported fracked gas from the United States. The inquiry is a direct result of an official complaint filed with the Ombudsman on October 29 of last year by Andy Gheorghiu, Policy Advisor for Food & Water Europe, an environmental NGO based in Brussels.

Despite the increasing pressure on the European Commission to avoid additional fossil fuel infrastructure, it adopted the Delegated Act establishing the fourth list of PCI projects – ignoring the overwhelming scientific evidence about the negative climate impacts of fossil gas, and instead relying on this flawed analysis from ENTSOG to justify more fossil fuel infrastructure.

With today’s decision the EU Ombudswoman confirms core points of the complaint, stating that “the sustainability of gas projects that were included on the fourth PCI list (and previous lists) has not been sufficiently taken into account,” and that “the Ombudsman finds it regrettable that the Commission did not attempt at an earlier stage to improve the available data and the analytical methodologies applied, so that a ranking of candidate gas PCIs based on their sustainability would have been possible”.

In its assessment, the Ombudswoman also notes that the EU’s objectives concerning climate change targets and sustainability have gained urgency with the increasing awareness of the accelerating climate crisis and concludes: “As the Commission is working on improving the methodology and data collection for assessing the sustainability of candidate gas projects for the PCI-list, the European Ombudsman considers that no further inquiries are justified at this point.”

The work on PCIs is coordinated by regional groups, dedicated to each type of energy infrastructure. The 5th PCI process already kicked-off with a meeting of TEN-E cross-regional groups on electricity, gas, smart grids and CO2 thematic areas on November 17, 2020  – with ENTSOG entering centre stage again.. The final EU Parliament’s vote on the next PCI list is expected to happen by the End of 2021.

In response to this decision, the complainant Andy Gheorghiu states:

“The Ombudswoman clearly confirms the lack of crucial climate assessments of highly subsidized fossil fuel projects for all PCI lists so far.The Commission must walk the talk and truly deliver on real climate analysis in the next list. Unfortunately, the Commission still plans to work with ENTSOG, whose biased assessment is at the very heart of the problem. A more rigorous and independent sustainability test is necessary for future PCI’s.”

***

For more information contact:

Andy Gheorghiu, Policy advisor, Food & Water Action Europe

Tel. +49 160 20 30 974, email [email protected]

Official complaint

Letter of the EU Ombudswoman

Assessment/Conclusion of the EU Ombudswoman

Global Environmental Activists Ask UN to Support Worldwide Fracking Ban

Group represents frontline communities from Europe, Mexico and Pennsylvania, along with researchers and international climate campaigners

New York, NY — A group of environmental activists, public health professionals and campaigners who are fighting fracking, climate change, petrochemicals and plastic pollution met with the United Nations to discuss the harms and threats of gas drilling and petrochemical expansion in their communities, and the necessity of stopping further extraction to combat the global climate crisis.

Activists from Mexico, Ireland and Germany were joined by frontline residents and campaigners from Pennsylvania and New York in the meeting with Satya Tripathi, UN Assistant Secretary-General and Head of New York Office at UN Environment.

The meeting was the result of an open letter sent to the United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres last September. That letter — organized by Food & Water Action, its European arm Food & Water Europe and the Breathe Project in Pittsburgh — was signed by nearly 460 grassroots groups, faith communities, celebrities, activists and organizations, including actors Mark Ruffalo, Emma Thompson and Amber Heard, authors and activists Naomi Klein, Bill McKibben, fashion icon Vivienne Westwood and her son Joe Corré as well as iconic children’s singer Raffi.

As the groups wrote to Secretary General Guterres, the “continued production, trade and use of fracked hydrocarbons for energy, petrochemicals and plastics torpedoes our global efforts to tackle climate change and violates basic human rights.”

The groups appealed to the United Nations to consider the critical findings it has issued over the years. The Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (CESR) and the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) have expressed concern that fracking will make it all but impossible to achieve emissions reductions targets outlined by the Paris Agreement, as well as the impacts of fossil fuel drilling on human rights. As early as 2012, the U.N. Environment Programme (UNEP) issued a “Global Alert” on fracking, concluding that it may have adverse environmental impacts under any circumstances.

All speakers will appear at an evening event, “Global Impacts of Fracking: From Pennsylvania to Europe and Back,” at the CUNY School of Law in Long Island City on the evening following the UN meeting. They will be joined by Rolling Stone journalist Justin Nobel, who will discuss his bombshell article on fracking and radioactivity.

Quotes:

“Fracking has been linked to radioactive brine, higher rates of cancer and nervous, immune, and cardiovascular system problems,” highlights Dr. Sandra Steingraber, Concerned Health Professionals of New York together with Dr. Ned Ketyer, Physicians for Social Responsibility Pennsylvania. “The gathered scientific evidence shows that women, industry workers, communities of color, and the poor are especially vulnerable to environmental injustices and harm to health and safety from fracking.”

“The petrochemical industry has teamed up with the fracking industry to benefit from cheap fracked ethane to produce more unneeded and environmentally destructive plastic,” says Michele Fetting, Breathe Project together with impacted local activist Lois Bjornson. “Families are suffering from the effects of contaminated air and water and there is increasing fear as fracking activities and the petrochemical build-out show no sign of slowing down.”

The promise of our current president to stop fracking in Mexico has not been met. All legislation favors the industry in disregard of the rights of communities in extraction areas, underlines Claudia Campero, Alianza Mexicana contra el Fracking, Mexico.

Eddie Mitchell, Love Letirim, Ireland, adds: “Now that we stopped fracking in Ireland, we’re also forced to fight the fracking industry from infiltrating our energy markets through import pipelines and LNG terminals – undermining all our efforts to move forward towards a clean energy future.”

“After over four years of evidence gathering, the Permanent Peoples Tribunal judges on Human Rights, Fracking and Climate Change recommended in 2019 that fracking be banned and that the Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and the Environment be asked to investigate the violations of the rights of humans and nature by the Unconventional Oil and Gas Extraction industry,” said Scott Edwards and Andy Gheorghiu, Food & Water Action US and EU. “It’s time for the UN take action and finally recommend a global ban on fracking to tackle one of the worst crises in human history.”

Talk Fracking founder Joe Corré says: “Countries like Britain are employing smoke and mirrors strategies to continue fracking while pretending they’re not. The United Nations must impose a global fracking ban for the sake of humanity. Fracking simply puts another log on the fire of the Climate emergency. It’s no bridging fuel. It’s fossil fuel’s last stand.”

Fashion icon Dame Vivienne Westwood adds: “If we’re serious about saving the planet from Climate devastation, then Fracking – or any other form of extreme energy extraction under a different name – like Acidisation – must be totally outlawed”.

EU Ombudsman Opens Inquiry Into Lack of Climate Assessment for Fossil Gas Projects

Activists push for scrutiny of subsidized fossil gas Projects of Common Interest list

Brussels—On Wednesday, 12 February, the European Parliament voted in favour of the 4th list of so-called Projects of Common Interest (PCI) list, which includes 55 fossil gas projects, some of which are directly linked to imported fracked gas from the United States. But the EU’s handling of this list is coming under increased scrutiny, with the EU Ombudsman opening an official inquiry into the failure to consider the climate impacts of this new infrastructure.

The inquiry is a direct result of an official complaint filed with the Ombudsman on October 29 of last year by Andy Gheorghiu, Policy Advisor for Food & Water Europe, an environmental NGO based in Brussels. Despite the increasing pressure on the European Commission to avoid additional fossil fuel infrastructure, it adopted the Delegated Act establishing the fourth list of PCI projects – ignoring the overwhelming scientific evidence about the negative climate impacts of fossil gas.

In addition to being bad policy, the 4th PCI list is non-compliant with EU Law and the Paris Agreement. At the Committee on Industry, Research and Energy (ITRE) meeting on October 17, 2019, Deputy Director of DG Energy Klaus-Dieter Borchardt admitted that the sustainability review mandate for PCI list-proposed projects, including the much needed climate/environmental assessment, has been ignored for over 6 years, calling into question the legality of every list to date, including the one just approved.

While the decision of the EU Ombudsman is highly welcome, the timing of its announcement raised concerns.

“The European Commission was notified about the EU Ombudsman’s inquiry. just two days before the vote of the European Parliament on the PCI list, and the public found out only after the vote”, said Andy Gheorghiu, Policy Advisor for Food & Water Europe. “Knowing about the Ombudsman’s decision to open up an inquiry into whether or not the PCIlist is non-compliant with EU Law and the climate targets would have influenced the decision of many MEPs to reject this list and return it to sender for review.”

Climate activists are calling on the EU Commission not to grant any actual funding to any of the fossil fuel projects on the current list before a proper comprehensive climate assessment has been conducted.

For more information contact:

Andy Gheorghiu, Policy advisor, Food & Water Europe
Tel. +49 160 20 30 974, email [email protected]

Official complaint

Letter of the EU Ombudsman