Category: RT Newswire

The Gathering near Camp Anna Mae on Black Mesa has been postponed from June 1-3 until September…more on this later as this evolves. The RTNA Climate Action Tour will still be on Black Mesa in early June.

From Aotearoa (New Zealand) indymedia: http://indymedia.org.nz/index.php

The Save Happy Valley Coalition has begun a blockade of the main rail line
that coal miner Solid Energy uses to transport coal between the West Coast
and Christchurch. There are two people locked into the railway tracks in
prelaid concrete, much like a blockade in 2005, and they have thus far
resisted efforts by police to remove them.

The blockade began around midday, and about 20 protesters clambered over the
first stopped coal train and displayed a 22 metre banner reading "Solid
Energy: Govt Sponsored Climate Chaos".

From their media release: "Solid Energy is ever increasing its production,
leaving decimated ecosystems and waterways in its wake. Already, they are
responsible for annual carbon dioxide emissions approximately equivalent to
New Zealand's entire transport fleet. Saying "no" to new coal mines would be
an easy first step in actually addressing climate change," said Simon
Riddel, one of the activists locked to the tracks.

Update
2.30pm: The blockaders have been declared prisoners, and a police line has
formed around them. Their support person has been arrested for communicating
with prisoners while trying to get water to them.
3:15pm: After about 3 and a half hours, police managed to dig a large enough
hole and drag one of the blockaders through, and have since managed to cut
open the lockbox Three arrests in total..

LONDON – Companies and individuals rushing to go green have been spending millions on “carbon credit” projects that yield few if any environmental benefits.A Financial Times investigation has uncovered widespread failings in the new markets for greenhouse gases, suggesting some organisations are paying for emissions reductions that do not take place.

Others are meanwhile making big profits from carbon trading for very small expenditure and in some cases for clean-ups that they would have made anyway.

The growing political salience of environmental politics has sparked a “green gold rush”, which has seen a dramatic expansion in the number of businesses offering both companies and individuals the chance to go “carbon neutral”, offsetting their own energy use by buying carbon credits that cancel out their contribution to global warming.

The burgeoning regulated market for carbon credits is expected to more than double in size to about $68.2bn by 2010, with the unregulated voluntary sector rising to $4bn in the same period.

The FT investigation found:

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