Category Archives: Uncategorized

Koch Brother Fronts Flood into Kansas to Attack Wind Industry – REPORT

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Correction: this post listed KS Sen. Julia Lynn as a supporter of the RPS freeze–she is not and her name was removed below.

A recent flood of Koch-supported think tanks, junk scientists and astroturf groups from inside and outside of Kansas are awaiting the outcome of a bill this week that could stall progress on the growth of clean energy in Kansas.

States around the country, including Texas, Ohio, Missouri and North Carolina are poised to cut back on government support for clean energy jobs using model legislation from the American Legislative Exchange Council. ALEC, which brings companies together with state lawmakers to forge a wish list of corporate state laws behind closed doors, is coordinating this year’s assault on state laws that require a gradual increase of electricity generated by clean energy sources.

ALEC and a hoard of other Koch-funded interests operating under the umbrella of the State Policy Network have hit Kansas legislators hard with junk economic studies, junk science and a junk vision of more polluting energy in Kansas’ future. Koch Industries lobbyist Jonathan Small has added direct pressure on Kansas lawmakers to rollback support for clean energy.

This fossil fuel-funded attack ignores the good that wind energy has done for Kansas, a state known for its bipartisan support for its growing wind industry (see key report by Polsinelli Shughart). The state now has 19 operating wind farms that have brought millions to farmers leasing their land and millions more to the state, county and local levels (NRDC). The American Wind Energy Association says that Kansas wind industry jobs have grown to 13,000 with the help of incentives like the renewable portfolio standard.

Unfortunately, clean energy is not palatable to the billionaire Koch brothers or the influence peddlers they finance. Continue reading →

Mercenary Admen: 5 ways one PR group has hijacked politics for corporate gain

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Most people have never heard of the DC lobbying and public relations firm DCI Group. When DCI Group does it’s job right, most people never do. That’s because DCI is a prime example what a highly effective, professional, and well-funded Public Relations firm can do. Are you a cigarette company that wants grassroots support for cigarette smoking? DCI can do that. Are you an Indonesian timber conglomerate that wants the “freedom” to sell illegal rainforest pulp? DCI can enlist thousands of liberty-lovin Americans to protect that freedom. Do you want people mobilized, in the streets, demanding that the government relax pollution laws and other regulations on your coal or oil corporation? DCI actually did that. It was called the Tea party.

CASE STUDIES

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VIDEO: Hear from those in Japan still feeling Fukushima

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Two years have passed since the Fukushima nuclear disaster began but little has changed for the people still struggling with the fallout from the triple meltdown that forced 160,000 from their homes.

The vast majority of those that have lost their homes remain stuck in limbo without proper compensation for their losses from the plant operator, TEPCO, or support to move on with their lives. Families are separated, communities are disintegrating and the level of mistrust in the government’s promises is growing.

Hear below from Fukushima victims and their reality two years later.

Dirty Front Groups’ Secret Piggybank: Donors Trust & Donors Capital Fund

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For those familiar with the effort of ExxonMobil and the Koch brothers to bankroll a network of organizations denying basic climate science, a new article in the Guardian offers some revelatory information on the secret funding network that outweighs even top denier sugar daddies like Koch and Exxon.

Donors Trust and Donors Capital Fund, based out of the DC suburb of Alexandria, VA, have sent $118 million to the ‘climate denial machine‘ from 2002-2010, according to a Greenpeace analysis featured in the Guardian. The graph above, from the article, illustrates the significance of this money as compared to giants like Koch and Exxon.

Of course, the Koch brothers are part of the Donors Trust network, using the DONORS groups to hide their own giving to a variety of corporate front groups. Because of the obscurity provided by DONORS, we don’t know exactly who is getting exactly how much of the Koch payments to Donors Trust and Donors Capital Fund. Continue reading →

January 2013 Photo of the Month

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Storm-driven waves smash into the Shell drilling platform Kulluk where it lies hard aground on the southeast side of Sitkalidak Island, Alaska, in the January 2013 Photo of the Month by Jonathan Klingenberg of the United States Coast Guard.

 

Kulluk Aground

The Kulluk battered by waves while grounded in Alaska.

The image has drama, but not as dramatic as the Coast Guard rescue of 18 crew members from the 18,681-ton, 266-foot-wide conical rig or the air lift of a ton of engine parts to the tug Aiviq, one of three support vessels towing the Kulluk in 20-30 foot seas when the towing cables broke. Continue reading →

Duke Energy Flip-Flop: ALEC Leads Attack on North Carolina Clean Energy with Duke Funding

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Corporate polluters are taking aim this year at states with renewable energy laws, starting with an attack on North Carolina’s clean energy economy by a corporate front group known as ALEC with support from Duke Energy, ExxonMobil, and Koch Industries.

NC Rep. Mike Hager: ALEC member and former Duke Energy employee.

North Carolina state Representative Mike Hager says he is confident that he has the votes needed to weaken or undo his state’s clean energy requirements during his second term. Rep. Hager is a former Duke Energy engineer and a member of the American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC. Duke and Progress Energy (now legally merged) have given Rep. Hager $14,500 for his last two election bids, outspent only by the NC Republican Party.

This is where ALEC makes things awkward for Duke Energy: the law that Rep. Mike Hager is targeting (2007 SB3) was created with input from Duke Energy, and Duke explicitly opposes ALEC’s “Electricity Freedom Act,” the model law to repeal state Renewable Energy Portfolio Standards (REPS). Duke Energy re-asserted its support for North Carolina’s REPS law to the Charlotte Business Journal last April and Progress Energy publicly supported the law before merging with Duke.

Apparently, Duke forgot about supporting North Carolina’s clean energy incentives somewhere along the way. Duke Energy remains a paying member of the American Legislative Exchange Council. Continue reading →

December 2012 Photo of the Month

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The December 2012 Photo of the Month by Christian Åslund turns perspective perpendicular. One of many actions in an imaginative global campaign that got Levi’s to commit to working with their suppliers to stop the release of hazardous chemicals into waterways, Danish activists staged a vertical fashion show on the side of a Levi’s store in Copenhagen.

Vertical Catwalk

An activist "model" walks up the side of a Levi's store

I picked the picture for the way the “model” appears close to the camera balanced and poised taking a step forward as the photographers lie flat on the ground to shoot is well balanced and the flash firing brings it all together. Continue reading →

November 2012 Photo of the Month

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The November 2012 Photo of the Month by Thitima Bunhumasuta shows two women posing in a blue boat at the edge of a waste water pond across from a factory with smoking chimneys. They hold shopping bags bearing the messages ‘Fashion Without Pollution” and “Stop Our Water from Becoming a Fashion Victim.”

Toxic Fashion Shoot

Continue reading →

VIDEO: Greenpeace Activist Confronts Coal Lobbyist at Energy Event

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Today at a well-attended energy forum hosted by Politico, I shed some light on the role of coal lobbyist Jeffrey Holmstead in blocking pollution reductions for his coal utility and mining clients after he said we can’t “regulate our way to clean energy.” Here’s the video:

(Click for transcript of interruption)

UPDATE 11/16: Holmstead was later confronted on camera by Gabe Elsner of the Checks and Balances Project after the disruption at the Politico forum. Watch Holmstead re-write the history of his attacks on mercury pollution laws:

Greenpeace's Climate Crimes Unit distributed WANTED posters of Jeff Holmstead.

As I waited inside for Mr. Holmstead to step on stage, members of Greenpeace’s Climate Crime Unit stood outside handing out WANTED posters of both Holmstead and chief oil lobbyist Jack Gerard of the American Petroleum Institute, who was also present.

Jeff Holmstead, who is often quoted in newspapers as a former Air and Radiation Administrator for the George W. Bush Environmental Protection Agency or a “partner” (read: lobbyist) at Bracewell & Giuliani’s corporate law firm here in DC, is rarely credited as an influence peddler for some of the most notorious polluters in the country.

Polluters like Duke Energy, Southern Company, and Arch coal are paying Holmstead’s bills. Continue reading →

Greenpeace ViewBug.com Photo Contest Winner

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And the Winner is…….People!

ViewBug Contest winner by yesyoudid

Greenpeace USA partnered with ViewBug.com, an online photographer community, to run a photo contest around the theme of power, asking what does that look like? Power, as in what powers your life? Power as the visual form of energy – human energy, physical energy, the energy of nature, energy infrastructure, energy generation, human power, people power, water, wind, solar, living power, imaginative power, the power of life. Continue reading →