Energy Justice
Indigenous peoples in the United States, Canada and the Americas have experienced systematic and repeated violations by oil, gas, and mining industries infringing on our inherent right to protect our traditional lands and our treaty rights. These industries violate our human rights and create unconscionable destruction to traditional territories that have sustained us for time immemorial.
Oil and gas developments are neither sustainable nor renewable.
Good Jobs For All:
Presentation by Clayton Thomas-Mueller
Clayton Thomas-Muller from Glen Richards on Vimeo.
REDD oneOone UNPFII Mililani Trask
Indigenous Peoples’ Guide
FALSE SOLUTIONS TO CLIMATE CHANGE
Our planet is heating up at an alarming rate, threatening our very survival. What needs to be done is simple: The pollution and destruction of Earth must be stopped immediately. But instead, there is a lot of greed, false solutions and lies about how to save our future. It seems that leaders of the world are more concerned about making money than solving the climate crisis.You have in your hands a quick guide to the truth about false solutions to climate change. These market-based scams allow polluters to avoid reducing their pollution, continue to destroy nature and make millions while they are at it. The United Nations, the World Bank, industry, multinationals, governments and even some NGOs promote this climate fraud. Could it be that crimes against humanity and the planet are being committed and nobody knows?
But what does all this have to do with Indigenous Peoples?
Unfortunately, most of these false solutions are violating not only the law of nature but also Indigenous Peoples’ rights. Many of these so-called “solutions” to Climate Change are grabbing our land and devastating our territories. Indigenous Peoples need to know what’s going on so that we can fight back.
Click Here to Read/Download (PDF)
Una Guia para los Pueblos Indígenas
FALSAS SOLUCIONES al CAMBIO CLIMÁTICO
Nuestro planeta se está calientando de una forma alarmante, amenzando nuestra sobrevivencia. Lo que hay que hacer es obvio: La contaminación y la destrucción del mundo se deben detener de inmediato. En cambio, hay mucha avaricia, falsas soluciones y mentiras sobre cómo salvar nuestro futuro. Parece que los líderes del mundo se preocupan más por hacer plata que por resolver la crisis climática.Tienes en las manos una guia rápida a la verdad sobre las falsas soluciones al cambio climático. Esas tranzas del mercado permiten que los contaminadores esquiven su obligación de reducir su contaminación, sigan destruyendo la natureleza y al mismo tiempo ganen muchos milliones de dólares. Las Naciones Unidas, el Banco Mundial, las industrias, las empresas multinacionales, los gobiernos y incluso algunas ONGs promueven este fraude climático.
¿Acaso se están cometiendo crimenes contra la humanidad y el planeta y nadie se da cuenta?
¿Pero qu é t i en e qu e ver todo eso con los Pu e bl os In d ígenas ?
Desafortunadamente, la mayoria de las falsas soluciones están violando no solamente la ley de la natureleza pero también los derechos de los Pueblos Indígenas. Muchas de las llamadas “soluciones” al cambio climático están robando nuestra tierra y devastando nuestros territorios. Los Pueblos Indígenas necesitamos saber qué pasa para que podamos defendernos.
Haga clic aquí para descargar. (PDF)
Please Sign On To the Energy Justice in Native America: A Policy Paper for Consideration by the Obama Administration and the 111th Congress
Dear Friends & Colleagues,
The undersigned organizations are writing to ask you for your signature on the attached policy paper (click here to read or download) urging the Obama administration to adopt the recommendations we have laid out for them regarding sustainable energy development on tribal lands. This is a collaborative document created to draw attention to the growing opportunities found throughout Native America. Indian country has extraordinary potential for renewable energy that must not remain untapped. Our policy initiatives demand the government take action and give tribal lands the attention they deserve.
Clean energy and green jobs will provide a positive benefit to Indian reservations more so than non-renewable coal, oil or nuclear power combined. Dirty power created from nuclear substances and dead fossil fuels on tribal lands merely expose Native people to the dangers of shortsighted energy development. The land and its inhabitants end up paying an expensive price for dirty energy cultivation.
All the while, tribal reservations maintain a high potential for wind and solar energies. The incoming administration must address the cultural, health and economic burdens dirty energy creates by taking action to terminate all government incentives and financial backing for investment in non-renewable energy. In place of dirty investment, the incoming administration must provide the financial subsidies necessary to encourage clean energy investment within Indian lands.
By signing onto this policy paper, you are promoting clean energy opportunities throughout Native America. Your adoption of these initiatives will help provide the persuasion and weight necessary to influence our new administration. In celebration of your support and others like you, we will send this policy paper to the Department of Energy in response to their request for information regarding deployment of renewable energy in Indian Country. We will also be sending this paper to the Secretary of Energy, the Secretary of Interior and other cabinet members to gain support for this initiative. Therefore, we strongly urge you to promote these efforts by signing onto this document and passing along this request for other organizations to do the same.
To sign your organization or tribal government onto this document for submission, please e-mail your name, title, organization, and contact information to Jihan Gearon at ienenergy@igc.org and Nellis Kennedy at greeneconomy@honorearth.org.
In Solidarity,
Indigenous Environmental Network
Honor the Earth
Intertribal Council On Utility Policy
International Indian Treaty Council
IEN INFORMATION SHEET:
ENERGY: FOSSIL FUELS
And Impacts to Indigenous Peoples
Statement of Fact on Energy Policy and its Impact to Indigenous Communities of North America Indigenous peoples in Canada, the United States and throughout the Americas hold valuable land and water resources that have long been exploited by the provincial, state and federal governments and by corporations trying to meet the energy needs of an industrialized world.
Indigenous peoples have disproportionately suffered impacts due to the production and use of energy resources - coal mining, uranium mining, oil and gas extraction, coal bed methane, nuclear power and hydropower development - yet are among those who benefit least from these energy developments. Indigenous peoples face inequity over the control of, and access to, sustainable energy and energy services. Territories where Indigenous peoples live are resource rich and serve as the base from which governments and corporations extract wealth yet are areas where the most severe form of poverty exists.
FACTS ON THE IMPACTS OF FOSSIL FUELS
Fossil fuels supply over 80% of the world’s energy needs. All fossil fuels, whether solid, liquid, or gas, are the result of organic plant materials being covered by successive layers of sediment over the course of millions of years.Human consumption of oil, gas, coal bed methane and coal (fossil fuels) increases the production of greenhouse gases - carbon dioxide (CO2) that is a major cause of climate change, global warming and changes in weather patterns.
Oil drilling and related activities fragment the landscape, leading to increased symptoms of neo-colonization, development, and deforestation. It also pollutes the land and water causing irreparable damage to fragile ecosystems. Read or print the rest of this document
Note: To save any of the documents on our site, simply copy and paste into a Word doc or other text program. You can also print by using the "Print Screen" function on your keyboard.
Indigenous Message to Obama to Issue a Presidential Order to Halt All Processes for Approval of the Expansion of Oil Sands Pipeline Infrastructure Entering the United States and to Support Alberta First Nation Chiefs Demand to Canada for a Moratorium on all Expansion of Canadian Tar Sands Development.
The Indigenous Environmental Network and Rainforest Action Network produced this statement in response to a lobby effort in Washington DC by Treaty One Chiefs of Manitoba, Canada on January 8, 2008 regarding the Enbridge Alberta Clipper and the TransCanada Keystone Project. This statement that focuses on providing an Alberta First Nations perspective on the Tar Sands issue. Read the Story: Canadian Indigenous Community to Deliver Message of Oil and Human Rights to Preseident-Elect Obama
ENERGY JUSTICE IN NATIVE AMERICA AND THE NEXT ADMINISTRATION
Save the Planet from Capitalism - A Letter from President Evo Morales about Climate Change and the International crisis
IEN at the Americas Social Forum - Listen to Radio Interview
Two area uranium projects under review
Archives :
The following are links to documents, position papers, press releases, etc., that have been issued by IEN, and community groups effected by fossil fuel production.
Oil:
ENERGY DEVELOPMENT IN INDIAN COUNTRY
ON THE UPSURGE WITH CONCERNS FROM TRIBAL GROUPS
Bemidji, Minnesota - Energy development in Indian country is again becoming big business. The Osage in Oklahoma and Crow tribes are pursuing coal-bed methane projects, while the Three Affiliated Tribes of the Fort Berthold reservation in North Dakota are entering the oil refinery business. The Southern Ute and Ute Mountain Ute tribes in Colorado are pursuing oil development with an eye towards coal-bed methane development. The Fort Mohave tribe along the lower Colorado River in Arizona and California are leasing their land to California based energy company, Calpine Corporation, to build a natural gas electrical generating plant. Easements allowing the building of electrical transmission lines throughout Indian country are being negotiated, often without adequate input from grassroots tribal members. Read the rest of this document.
Gas:
Nine Mile Canyon, UT:
Drilling for gas seen as threat to rock art
Concerns about protecting archaeological treasures are pitted against hopes to develop natural gas leases in Nine Mile Canyon. Drilling gas exploration wells could damage pictographs and other ancient treasures in the canyon and a tributary, according to the curator of archaeology at the College of Eastern Utah museum, Price.
Indian art on the canyon walls covers three cultures - the archaic, Fremont and Ute. The earliest may be 2,000 years old. Agency officials say they mailed copies of the assessment to 30 groups and individuals. They also posted a brief notice on the state BLM web site. Read the rest of this document.
Coal bed methane project worries ranchers, irrigators
Some South Dakota and Wyoming ranchers and irrigators are worried about an oil company's proposal to dump millions of gallons of water from Wyoming coal bed methane wells into the Cheyenne River drainage. They say the water will be high in sodium bicarbonate and other salts, which could ruin irrigated land and harm aquatic life, streamside vegetation and wildlife. They also say the higher water levels would disrupt river crossings for landowners. Read the rest of this document.
