Pitfalls and Pipelines - Philippine Indigenous Peoples Links

76 Pitfalls and Pipelines: Indigenous Peoples and Extractive Industries
The necessary cuts in greenhouse gas emissions cannot
be achieved without significant changes to the nature of the
global economy. These seem to be even more difficult to
achieve if you consider the domestic pressure in major economies
to protect jobs and standards of living during the fallout
of the global financial crisis. It can be argued that changes in
economy do not have to mean reductions in overall employment—indeed,
climate campaign groups specifically advocate
investment in new, “green” jobs in industrialized economies. 23
Neither should it necessarily involve huge reductions in
energy use. But it does require radical changes in the sources
of energy used. Some scientists argue that 95 percent of the
world’s energy needs could be provided by renewable sources
by 2050. 24
King Coal’s Tarnished Crown
And that is where the major industries who are dependent
for their very existence on their exploitation of the carbon
resources of the world are fighting back. The oil and gas industries
are mostly the first to spring to mind when thinking
of fossil fuels, but the mining of coal itself is a direct and major
contribution to global warming. Coal mining and burning coal
for energy remains one of the major engines behind global
warming (see Box 2, Coal’s contribution to carbon emissions).
Mining for coal can be a double contributor to global
warming where it destroys standing forest to clear the way
for coal strip mining which, on use, will further contribute to
carbon dioxide emissions and the release of even more potent
greenhouse gases, including methane. In the USA, 26 percent
of energy-related methane release is a direct result of coal
mining as it escapes from buried coal strata. 25
There is a massive contradiction between government and
business statements and commitments to fight climate change
on the one hand, and their current investment plans on the
other. Governments across the world are continuing to encourage
industry to spend hundreds of billions of dollars to
build new coal-fired power stations in the coming years—notably
in the USA, India and China.