Dalhousie University in Nova Scotia assists Anglo American PLC with Corporate Greenwash Sustainability Campaign

It's an interesting sign of the times when the chairman of a mining company notorious for illegally evicting subsistence farmers to increase international coal exports is invited to lecture on "sustainability".

But that is what happened when Dalhousie University in Nova Scotia, Canada invited Sir Mark Moody-Stuart, chairman of Anglo American plc, the world's second largest mining company, to address a packed house about "Sustainability Challenges for Extractive Industries Operating Globally".

"There is a lot of buzz in the crowd, which is great," said Ray Cote, a professor of environmental studies, in introducing Sir Moody-Stuart, as student activists passed out leaflets about Anglo American's alleged transgressions in Colombia.

"This company, through its stake in the Cerrejon mine, is responsible for forcibly displacing hundreds of subsistence farmers in northeastern Colombia," said Bronwen White, a fourth-year international development studies student at Dalhousie who passed out critical leaflets prior to the event.

The village of Tabaco, a sustainable farming community populated primarily by Afro-Colombians, was destroyed by Cerrejon's bulldozers in 2001-2002 to make way for more coal exports. "This is not the kind of person who should be speaking about sustainability," White told IPS.

Sir Moody-Stuart is no stranger to this sort of controversy. With gentile candour and huge bushy white eyebrows, Moody-Stuart (he was knighted in 2000) once headed up Shell Oil's controversial Nigerian operations.

Because of his work at Shell and the ensuing allegations that the company had collaborated with Nigeria's military to murder environmental activists, Moody was featured in the popular documentary "The Corporation"; he serves tea to radical earth-first environmentalists as they protest on his front lawn.

While most corporate honchos don a pinstriped suit for these sorts of engagements, Moody-Stuart wore a rumpled blazer atop an un-ironed blue shirt, with several pens stuffed into the breast pocket.

He says he doesn't believe profit should be the driving force for corporations. "The ultimate goal of a company is to produce quality goods and services," he told the audience. "There is not much trust in big business these days."
Activists, however, weren't buying what Sir Moody was selling. One audience member, a master's student at Saint Mary's University, accused him of "corporate green washing" while others held colour photos of Colombian families displaced by Anglo American's operations.

The Cerrejon mine, owned by Anglo American and two other multinationals, is the largest open pit coal mine in the world.

Bronwen White and other students showed video footage of Tabaco's destruction prior to Sir Moody's presentation. In it, a small girl with pigtails and pink overalls cries and pushes against the shields of Colombian riot police as bulldozers ram her family's home while other community members scream and wail.

Prior to its destruction, Tabaco boasted a school, health clinic, good farmland and a telephone exchange. Today, most former residents have joined three million internally displaced Colombians eking out a living however they can.

"Cerrejon employs thousands of Colombians, paying high wages," Moody-Stuart told IPS in an interview prior to the event. "The original relocation [of Tabaco], I think, was carried out in accordance with Colombian law." However, he adds, "We have always said that we don't think it [the displacement] was perfectly executed."

When pressed about whether shipping coal, tainted by allegations of human rights abuses, from Colombia to Canada represents a sustainable business practice, he said, "We can stop producing coal, but your lights are going to go out."

In 2007, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) launched an investigation of BHP Billiton, an Australian multinational with a stake in the Cerrejon mine, for the eviction of Tabaco. Moody-Stuart thinks an OECD investigation of Anglo American is a realistic possibility.

In response to human rights concerns around Anglo American's operations, Moody-Stuart told IPS his company has struck a committee, chaired by the President of Cape Breton University and consisting of NGOs from Chile, a Colombian economist and other notables to investigate allegations around Cerrejon. Their report is due out soon.

Moody-Stuart maintains that only "a small number" of families from Tabaco were not compensated for their property. After interviewing more than 60 families displaced from the community, Dr. Avi Chomsky at Salem State University came to a different conclusion.

"We heard the same story again and again," Dr. Chomsky told IPS in an e-mail after completing the most comprehensive research available on the Tabaco displacement. "'We are peasants, we are farmers,' people told us," said Chomsky. "'We used to be productive people; we used to support ourselves and our families. We were not rich, but we worked our land and we provided our children with what they needed. Since the company took our town and our land, there is nothing for us to do. There is no work'."

Cerrejon produced 30 million tonnes of coal last year and hopes to expand to 38 million to 42 million tonnes by early next decade. This means more communities will soon be displaced.

"Four more villages -- Roche, Pantilla, Chancleta and Tamaquito -- are threatened with displacement in the next few years," said Garry Leech, a lecturer at Cape Breton University who has interviewed scores of farmers displaced by Moody-Stuart's mining operations.

"Cerrejon has been harassing people living in these communities, demanding that they leave the area," Leech told IPS in a phone interview, adding that the mine refuses to collectively negotiate with the nearby communities.

"Throughout history, people have had to move for industrial projects," said Moody-Stuart in an interview. "The question is how you manage those displacements."

"Everyone can make mistakes," said Bronwen White after Moody's talk and the lively question and answer session which followed. "But it seems like Anglo American's Colombian operations haven't learned anything from the displacement of Tabaco. These aren't just numbers; we're talking about people's homes and lives that will be destroyed."

Here is the full story.

Conflict diamonds. Dirty gold. Blood rubies - These terms reflect the not-so-secret dirty secrets of the jewelry industry.

Reflective Images digs deep for beauty.

These terms reflect the not-so-secret dirty secrets of the jewelry industry, a multibillion-dollar sector that, for the most part, has yet to develop strong guidelines to ensure that the bling around your neck didn’t come at the expense of people and land on another continent.

The film Blood Diamonds helped spur media interest and public awareness about conflict diamonds. But the “ethical jewelry” movement extends beyond one region and one gem. It is concerned with all the factors, from the effect of mining on land to the conditions of the people who do that mining.

For Marc Choyt, president of Santa Fe’s Reflective Images, the seeds of desire to transform the industry began in 1995 when he and his wife, Helen Chantler, founded the jewelry company out of their home.

Choyt was a teacher at the Santa Fe Indian School and Chantler was a bench jeweler at the time.

“We had both traveled a lot internationally,” Choyt, who volunteered in an orphanage in Haiti for two years, says. “I was interested in business from the angle of social entrepreneurship, as a means of creating good in the world. Helen, too, had these ideals. We wanted to create a model that was different from other businesses, a model that could benefit the community and do no harm to the ecology.”

Choyt describes their initial attempts as “spotty” because “when you’re starting out, to implement your ideals, you have to compromise. But it always bothered us that the jewelry sector is a very toxic sector, toxic to the environment and in terms of how it’s treated people around the world, specifically, and more recently, around issues that have come up, such as blood diamonds and dirty gold.”

As the company’s president, Choyt leads the company’s marketing and social activism components. At home, this means providing the 10-person staff with competitive wages, health care and retirement benefits; using wind and solar power; and offsetting carbon emissions from both production and travel by donating to river restoration projects.

At the global level, Choyt’s blog, www.fairjewelry.org, is one of the leading online resources for following the issue of ethical jewelry. The company also created a system known as FRE: Fair, Responsible, Ecological. This system, radical in the industry, promotes complete transparency by allowing consumers to source potential jewelry purchases from Reflective Images on the company’s Web site (www.celticjewelry.com/fre.php). For example, a customer considering buying a capris watch locket can look up the working conditions under which the locket was made, the source of the gold and the silver in the piece, as well as those components of the piece for which the company cannot vouch.

Choyt has documented this practice of transparency in a recently published e-book, The Ethical Jewelry Handbook, to help other jewelers interested in adopting the FRE system.

And, within a year, Reflective Images will be one of two US companies to offer third-party fair-trade gold wedding rings from the UK.

Reflective Images’ line is built on a Celtic design motif that reflects Chantler’s upbringing; she was born in the UK, but spent her teenage years in Southeast Asia. The jewelry uses Southwestern techniques, well suited to European tribal design, but also draws inspiration from indigenous and ancient cultures throughout the world.
Jewelry, Choyt believes, is “a highly emotional purchase that has deep symbolism for people. It represents, basically, some of the highest aspirations we’re capable of. How can it be that the jewelry sector can allow the production of a ring to produce tons of toxic waste from the mining of gold, or the death of 3.7 million Africans in the blood diamond conflict, for which no one in the sector has ever been held responsible?”

Choyt’s concerns were crystallized several years ago when he attended a jewelry trade show in Las Vegas, Nev. The film Blood Diamond had been recently released and a meeting on the topic was attended by more than 700 people. In another room, a discussion about fair trade was only attended by 30 or 40 people, mostly press.

“That level of disconnect was astonishing,” Choyt, for whom diamonds comprise less than 10 percent of his business, says. “Because the whole blood diamond issue is really an issue of fair trade and economic justice.”

Last October, Choyt and others met at the Madison Dialogue Ethical Jewelry

Summit at the World Bank in Washington, DC, to discuss everything from issues of mining and recycled metals to creating a third-party certification for fair-trade jewelry.

“There are 100 million people around the world who are artisan miners, some poor, usually living in rural areas with limited resources,” he says. “If it were possible that these miners could extract in a way that was environmentally sound and in a way that they were given fair wages, it could have a major impact as a development initiative around the world. It could transform tens of millions of people’s lives; that’s what this is about. It’s about connecting the person here in Santa Fe purchasing a piece of jewelry with the person in Africa at the mining cooperative in Tanzania, who is actually mining the stone.”

In the case of Reflective Images, it’s about allowing people to buy jewelry made from recycled metals, with sourced stones, made by local craftspeople who are paid well by a local business.

Although it’s unusual for small-business owners to travel, as Choyt and Chantler do, to Asia to visit directly with suppliers, it’s a natural outgrowth of their commitment to doing good in the world; after the 2004 Asian tsunami, for example, the couple went to Sri Lanka to build houses. For Choyt, public service was ingrained in him as a child growing up in a household where his father was an early pioneer in the civil rights movement; his volunteer work in 1985 in Haiti orphanages further coalesced his commitment.

“The reason why people in Haiti are so poor is directly related to why I live in such abundance and wealth,” he says. “So I always consider my work in that context, but also in the context of nature and my love for the natural environment. What is my debt to natural existence?” he says.

Despite his high ideals, Choyt realizes that his goals for Reflective Images, and for transforming the jewelry sector as a whole, are far off; maybe even, in some cases, unachievable. But that doesn’t stop him.

“For myself, I’ve made a decision that I’m going to work for positive social change in every way that I can, regardless of what’s going on. And everybody can do this. I happen to be in the jewelry sector, so that’s where my work is. I personally have the goal of making it socially unacceptable to purchase jewelry that isn’t made with recycled or fair-trade products. And it should be socially unacceptable, given what jewelry represents.”

Part of making that happen, Choyt believes, is transforming the marketing of jewelry itself.

“The marketing of jewelry has disconnected the purchaser from its true cost,” he says. “Ever since ‘diamonds are a girl’s best friend.’ It’s all about seduction. But what we’re trying to do is create more of a spiritual sparkle.”

Here is the full article.

Top Jewelry Retailers Oppose Alaskan Gold Mine - “There are places where mining does not represent the best use of resources”, says Tiffany CEO

Retailers to hold mine to higher gold standards

[February 12, 2008] Environmentalists want you to buy organic roses, and human rights groups tout conflict-free diamonds.

Now, just in time for Valentine's Day, jewelry retailers are stepping up a campaign that aims to discourage the mining and sale of "dirty gold."

A group of prominent jewelers including Tiffany & Co., Helzberg Diamonds and Fortunoff will announce today that it opposes the massive gold and copper Pebble Mine planned for Alaska's Bristol Bay watershed, site of the world's largest sockeye salmon run.

The jewelers' “Bristol Bay Protection Pledge" marks a new front in the “No Dirty Gold” initiative waged by environmental and human rights groups against destructive mining practices.

It is the first time that retailers, which have hitherto limited themselves to supporting general rules for mining, have joined in a campaign to halt a specific mine.

An estimated 80% of the gold used in the U.S. is for jewelry. And gold mines -- typically huge open pit operations where tiny veins of metal are ground from millions of tons of rock -- produce an average of 76 tons of waste per ounce of gold.

The resulting air and water pollution have made metals mining the leading contributor of toxic emissions in the U.S., according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

"There are places where mining does not represent the best use of resources," Michael Kowalski, Tiffany's chairman and chief executive, said in an e-mail. "In Bristol Bay, we support . . . the salmon fishery as the best bet for sustainable, long-term benefit. For Tiffany & Co., and we believe for many of our fellow retail jewelers, this means we will look to other places to source gold."

Sean McGee, a spokesman for the Pebble Mine, said the jewelers had not contacted the mine's developers, a partnership of Vancouver, Canada-based Northern Dynasty Minerals Ltd. and London-based Anglo American.

"There is a lot of common ground between the Dirty Gold camp and the approach we are taking," he said. "We support high environmental standards for mining. If the fisheries can't be protected, we won't advance the project."

The campaign to clean up gold mines echoes the opposition to so-called blood diamonds, sold to finance conflicts in developing nations.

In the last few years, jewelers, working with nonprofit groups and the mining industry, set up a system to ensure diamonds as "conflict-free." Now the "ethical jewelry" movement is preparing to expand with a certification program for gold and silver.

"It's what's happening in the marketplace," said Stephen D'Esposito, president of Earthworks, a Washington-based advocacy group for mining reform. "Jewelers are highly sensitive to consumer concerns about the impact of the products they buy. It is a trend you see with food, coffee, wood, even sneakers."

At the moment, retailers cannot tell where their gold has been mined. But in the coming year, D'Esposito said, jewelers will take the first steps to establish a chain of custody from mine to store.

A set of standards is under negotiation between mining companies, jewelry retailers and environmental and human rights groups.

So far, 28 companies, including eight of the 10 largest jewelry retailers in the U.S. have endorsed the "No Dirty Gold" campaign's "Golden Rules." The measures seek to ensure that gold is mined without threatening fragile ecosystems,that waste is not dumped into waterways and that workers' rights are protected.

Signatories include Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Sterling Jewelers Inc., which markets Kay Jewelers and Jared the Galleria brands.

Earthworks wants all 28 companies that signed the Golden Rules pledge -- and others -- to also sign the Bristol Bay pledge. So far, only five have done so (besides Tiffany, Helzberg and Fortunoff, they are Ben Bridge Jeweler and Leber Jeweler Inc.).

Wal-Mart, the nation's biggest jewelry retailer, is reviewing the measure.

"We are committed to sourcing gold and other metals produced under the highest social, human rights and environmental standards,"spokeswoman Linda Blakley said.

Worldwide shortages and skyrocketing prices for gold and copper are fueling the push for Pebble Mine, which holds an estimated $300 billion in gold, copper and molybdenum. Northern Dynasty executives say the mine will bring well-paying jobs to an impoverished area of rural Alaska.

If the mine, which lies on the edge of two national parks, gains the necessary permits from the state of Alaska, it would involve excavating as much as 12 billion tons of earth which, after extracting the ore, would fill 10 square miles of impoundments. Two dams would be built to hold the waste.

"These lands were selected by the state of Alaska for their mineral potential, an important part of the rural economy," McGee said.

But Dan Consenstein, head of the Renewable Resources Coalition, an Alaska-based group that opposes the project, said pollution from the mine would destroy the fishery, a globally significant resource and economic backbone of the area.

A coalition of native villages, sports fishing lodges and environmental groups has filed a ballot initiative to stop the mine, but the mining companies are battling it in court.

Here is the full article from the Los Angeles Times.

Alaska Gold Mine Draws Fire from Large Jewelry Retailers – No Dirty Gold Campaign succeeding with US Gold & Jewelry Consumers

As shoppers rush to buy last-minute Valentine's gifts, five of the nation's leading jewelry retailers - Tiffany & Co., Ben Bridge Jeweler, Helzberg Diamonds, Fortunoff, and Leber Jeweler, Inc. - today pledged their support to permanently protect Alaska's Bristol Bay watershed from large-scale metal mining, including the massive proposed Pebble gold mine.

The retailers, who had $2.2 billion in sales in 2006, took this step at the invitation of local Alaskans, who seek to protect wild salmon, clean water, and traditional Alaskan ways of life from the damaging effects of industrial metal mines.

"I am pleased to stand with others in the jewelry industry today in announcing our support for protecting Alaska's Bristol Bay watershed from large-scale mining," said Jon Bridge, Co-CEO/General Counsel of Seattle-based Ben Bridge Jeweler.

"As retail jewelers, we want to be able to tell our customers that the precious metals we use are mined responsibly -- that the materials used in the jewelry they purchase have been mined in environmentally friendly ways, respectful of the Bristol Bay salmon fishery and the communities that depend on it."

The controversial Pebble mine is highlighted in a new report released today by the No Dirty Gold consumer campaign led by EARTHWORKS and Oxfam America. The report, "Golden Rules: Making the Case for Responsible Mining," documents the toll of irresponsible mining on people, water, and wildlife at a time when soaring metals prices are driving new mining development globally. The report describes human rights violations and environmental concerns at metals mines in the United States and around the world. (To download a copy of the report, visit No Dirty Gold

The retailers are among a group of 28 jewelry retailers, representing 23 percent of U.S. jewelry sales, who have endorsed the No Dirty Gold campaign's "Golden Rules" - human rights and environmental criteria for mining. Today's announcement takes those commitments a step further.

"Some of the world's leading jewelers have recognized that the Bristol Bay watershed is a treasure worth protecting. We applaud their principled position and commitment to not source metals from areas of high conservation value," said Payal Sampat of EARTHWORKS.

The proposed Pebble mine is backed by the UK-based Anglo American, one of the world's largest metals mining companies, and Canadian firm Northern Dynasty Minerals. The Bristol Bay watershed, where the proposed mine would be located, supports the world's most productive wild salmon fishery -- which is critical to the state's economy and to the livelihood of many Alaska Native communities.

"We want to express a sincere thank you to these jewelry companies," said Bobby Andrew, a spokesperson for Nunamta Aulukestai (Caretakers of the Land), an association of eight Alaska Native corporations. "The proposed Pebble mine threatens the wild salmon fishery that has sustained the region's economy and our people for generations."

Last year, Nunamta Aulukestai and a diverse group of Alaska Native communities, commercial fishermen, businesses, and sportsmen publicly invited jewelry retailers to express support for the protection of Alaska's Bristol Bay watershed from large-scale mining. The invitation ran as a full-page ad in National Jeweler magazine. (For a copy of the ad and jeweler pledge, see Protect Bristol Bay.

Consumers today are more aware of the human and environmental costs of the goods and services they purchase than ever before. While other business sectors have responded to demand for cleaner, ethically produced goods and services - such as sustainably harvested wood products and fair trade coffee - the mining sector lags behind in terms of embracing an independent system for standards and verification. Some 100,000 consumers in more than 100 countries have signed on to the No Dirty Gold pledge, urging mining companies to provide alternatives to "dirty" gold.

"Consumers and jewelry retailers across the country have clearly signaled their desire for certified, more ethically produced metals," noted Raymond C. Offenheiser of Oxfam America. "The question is: when will mining companies step up to meet this obvious demand?"

The No Dirty Gold campaign urges mining companies to find solutions and implement best practices that can be independently verified -- at both existing and new operations. According to the campaign's new report, mining practices in places like Ghana, Indonesia, Nevada, and other parts of the world continue to pollute air and water, damage farmland and forests, and, in some parts of the world, fuel violent conflict. The report describes damaging practices at 17 metals mines around the world.

These mines include:

-- Grasberg mine in West Papua, owned by U.S.-based Freeport McMoRan, which has been linked to human rights abuses and extensive water pollution.

-- Jerritt Canyon mine in Nevada, owned by Yukon-Nevada Gold Corporation, which is a leading source of airborne mercury pollution in the U.S.

-- Bogoso/Prestea Mine in Ghana, owned by Canadian firm Golden Star Resources, which has contaminated drinking water and local fisheries with cyanide spills in violation of the industry's voluntary "Cyanide Code."

There are promising signs within the industry that some operations are responding to community concerns and consumer demands for more responsibly mined gold. For example, a number of firms have adopted a policy against dumping mine wastes in rivers, while others have publicly committed to disclosing payments made to foreign governments.

Fact sheets, report, and press-ready photos available at: http://www.nodirtygold.org/. Photos of Bristol Bay at: http://media.earthworksaction.org/objects/view.acs?object_id=11088.

U.S. Jewelry Sales, 2006

Company Sales (millions U.S. $)

Wal-Mart *-----------2,800
Sterling *-----------2,652
Zale Corp. *---------2,202
QVC * ---------------1,500
Tiffany * -----------1,326
JCPenney * ----------1,300
Sears ---------------1,100
Finlay Fine Jewelry--920
Helzberg Diamonds *--525
Fred Meyer Jewelers *495

Note: * indicates signatory to the No Dirty Gold campaign's
"Golden Rules."

2006 U.S. Jewelry Sales of Retailers Supporting Bristol Bay Protection

Retailer Sales in million $ Rank in U.S. sales

Tiffany-------1,326 5
Helzberg------525 9
Ben Bridge----250 24
Fortunoff---- 160 30
Leber ------- n/a

Note: These retailers represent $2.26 billion in U.S. jewelry sales.
Total U.S. sales in 2006 were $62 billion.

Here is the full article.

President Clinton Acts on Yellowstone Gold Mine – Parallels with the Geocom-Kinross Gold Mine in Chile’s Futaleufu River Valley (Part 2)

In this series of articles we revisit the plans of Canadian mining conglomerate, Noranda Inc. to open a Gold Mine a few kilometers from Yellowstone National Park and how the project was halted by the Clinton Administration.

President Clinton is vacationing this year in western Wyoming, playing golf and reveling in the wonders of Grand Teton and Yellowstone national parks. Last Friday, too late for the evening news shows, he took a crucial first step toward protecting Yellowstone and much of the adjacent wilderness from an environmental catastrophe.

This disaster-in-waiting is the proposed New World mine, which a Canadian conglomerate, Noranda, wants to build on land it controls in the upper reaches of Montana's Henderson Mountain, less than three miles from Yellowstone and in the watershed of the irreplaceable Clark's Fork of the Yellowstone River. Conservationists reasonably fear that the 5.5 million tons of waste the company wants to bury in an active earthquake area will ruin this sensitive watershed in America's first and most important conservation zone.

Mr. Clinton toured the mine site by helicopter and then declared a moratorium on mining activity on 4,500 acres of Federal land surrounding the site. The moratorium will not affect the actual site, to which the Canadian company has legal title, and will therefore not by itself stop the mine. But it tightens the noose around the company and signals the need for further action to block the mine if the Canadian company does not read this Presidential order as a signal of American resolve to protect its oldest national park.

The most controversial aspect of the project is a proposed tailings impoundment -- a deep reservoir the size of 70 football fields -- where the company would store acid wastes. Reputable geologists say that given the region's extreme weather and history of earthquakes, any such structure is bound to crack at some point in the future.

The reservoir would be built on 56 acres of wetlands that lie under the jurisdiction of the Army Corps of Engineers. If the Corps denies a permit to build, the company will have to look elsewhere to store its toxic wastes. Nearly every suitable alternate site is on the 4,500 acres the President has ruled off limits. The company may then be forced to truck its wastes to a site miles away -- an operation that could be prohibitively expensive.

This drama is not over. But the President has now ratcheted up the discomfort level. He deserves credit for responding to the rising outrage among the national environmental community over what the miners and some shortsighted Western politicians have tried to portray as a strictly local issue. Heretofore, Mr. Clinton has often disappointed those who thought he would bring a new level of environmental consciousness to Washington. This time he seems to have gotten the message that some places are too precious to sacrifice to a 19th-century mining law that needs to be repealed for both economic and environmental reasons.

Here is the full article originally published on Aug. 29, 1996

Fear not global warming, peak oil, polluted air and water -- big business will take care of everything.

Is Corporate Greenwashing Headed for a Fall?

Imagine you are a communication technician on a planet in another solar system that is facing an ecological disaster and is looking for new solutions. One day you suddenly pick up broadcast signals from Earth that happen to include a man talking to a group of children sitting beside a hulking vehicle he is describing as a "vegetarian" because it uses a fuel called ethanol. The segment ends with the statement: "Chevy: from gas-friendly to gas-free. That's an American revolution."

Then you get a transmission from something called BP that is talking about going beyond -- beyond darkness, beyond fear, beyond petroleum. Another from Toyota shows a vehicle being put together like a grass hut and then disintegrating back into nature without a trace. The messages keep coming -- from General Electric ("eco-imagination"), Chevron (celebrating the miraculous power of "human energy") and so on.

As you receive more of these signals, you rush to your superiors and announce the good news: Planet Earth has wonderful entities call corporations that can solve all our environmental problems.

Residents of our planet may be tempted to jump to the same conclusion. These days we are bombarded with advertisements that want us to believe that major oil companies, automakers and other large corporations are solving the environmental and energy problems facing the earth. Fear not global warming, peak oil, polluted air and water -- big business will take care of everything.

In the late 1990s we saw a hyped-up dot com boom that came crashing down. In the past year or so, we have seen a hyped real estate boom turn into a credit crunch and an unprecedented number of home foreclosures. Are we now seeing a green business boom that will also turn out to be nothing more than hot air?

The "Green Con"

Today's surge of corporate environmentalism is not the first time business has sought to align itself with public concerns about the fate of the Earth. Two decades ago, marketers began to recognize the benefits of appealing to green consumers. This revelation first took hold in countries such as Britain and Canada. For example, in early 1989 the giant British supermarket chain Tesco launched a campaign to promote the products on its shelves that were deemed "environmentally friendly." That same year, Canadian mining giant Inco Ltd. began running ads promoting its effort to reduce sulfur emissions from its smelters, conveniently failing to mention it was doing so under government orders.

In 1990 the green business wave spread to the United States in time to coincide with the 20th annual Earth Day celebration. Large U.S. companies such as DuPont began touting their environmental initiatives and staged their own Earth Tech environmental technology fair on the National Mall. General Motors ran ads emphasizing its supposed concern about the environment, despite its continuing resistance to significant increases in fuel efficiency requirements.

Such exercises in corporate image-burnishing did not have a great deal of impact. For one thing, environmental groups wasted no time debunking the ads. In 1989 Friends of the Earth in Britain gave "Green Con" awards to those companies that made the most exaggerated and unsubstantiated environmental claims about their products. First prize went to British National Fuels for promoting nuclear power as friendly to the environment.

Greenpeace USA staged a protest at the 1990 corporate Earth Tech fair, denouncing companies such as DuPont for trying to whitewash their poor environmental record with green claims. Greenpeace's invented term for this practice -- greenwashing -- immediately caught on, and to this day is a succinct way of undermining dubious corporate claims about the environment.

The general public was also not taken in by the corporate environmental push of 1989-1990. It was just a bit too obvious that these initiatives were meant to deflect attention away from recent environmental disasters such as the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska and Union Carbide's deadly Bhopal chemical leak. It also didn't help that many of the claims about green products turned out to be misleading or meaningless.

'Little Green Lies'

The question today is whether people have become more receptive to corporate environmental hype. One thing business has going for it in the United States is that the Bush Administration has pursued environmental policies so retrograde that even the most superficial green measures by the private sector shine in comparison. Another is that some environmental groups have switched from an outside adversarial strategy to a more collaborative approach that often involves forming partnerships with companies. Such relationships serve to legitimize business initiatives while turning those groups into cheerleaders for their corporate partners. Former Sierra Club president Adam Werbach took it a step further and joined the payroll of Wal-Mart.

On the other hand, the use of the term "greenwashing" is enjoying a resurgence and has entered the mainstream. A search of the Nexis news archive turns up more than 700 mentions of the term in the past six months alone. Even that bible of the marketing world -- Advertising Age -- recently published a list titled "The Green and the Greenwashed: Ten Who Get It and 10 Who Talk a Good Game." Among the latter were General Motors, Toyota, ExxonMobil, Chevron, Wal-Mart, General Electric and Ikea, though Toyota, Wal-Mart and Ikea were also put on the green list for other reasons.

Other business publications have also been taking a more critical approach to green claims. Last September, the Wall Street Journal looked behind GE's eco-imagination campaign and found all was not well. For one thing, there was significant resistance even within GE's managerial ranks and among many of the conglomerate's major industrial customers. Then there was the fact that GE was still pushing big-ticket products such as coal-fired steam turbines that were significant contributors to global warming. Finally, the paper pointed out that the campaign was motivated in substantial part by a desire to increase sales of existing GE products such as wind turbines that could be promoted as eco-friendly.

In October, Business Week published a cover story titled "Little Green Lies." It began with the declaration: "The sweet notion that making a company environmentally friendly can be not just cost-effective but profitable is going up in smoke." The piece featured Auden Schendler of Aspen Skiing Company, a pioneer in adopting environmentally friendly practices. After showing off his company's energy-efficient facilities, he was described as having turned to the Business Week reporter and said: "Who are we kidding?" He then acknowledged that the growth of the company necessarily means burning more power, including the ever-increasing energy needed to create artificial snow during warmer winters. "How do you really green your company? It's almost f------ impossible."

Here is the full article.

Australia to Apologize to its Indigenous Aborigines People in Live Television Broadcast

Aborigines organized breakfast barbecues in Outback communities, giant TV screens went up in state capitals, and schools planned assemblies so students can watch the telecast of Australia's government apologizing for policies that degraded its indigenous people.

The formal apology motion that new Prime Minister Kevin Rudd scheduled for a Parliament vote Wednesday was welcomed as a powerful gesture of reconciliation between the descendants of Australia's original inhabitants and those of the white settlers who now rule.

Aborigines remain the country's poorest and most disadvantaged group, and Rudd has made improving their lives one of his government's top priorities.

As part of that campaign, Aborigines were invited for the first time to give a traditional welcome Tuesday at the official opening of the Parliament session — symbolic recognition that the land on which the capital was built was taken from Aborigines without compensation.

The apology is directed at tens of thousands of Aborigines who were forcibly taken from their families as children under now abandoned assimilation policies.

"We apologize for the laws and policies of successive parliaments and governments that have inflicted profound grief, suffering and loss on these our fellow Australians," the apology motion says.

"To the mothers and the fathers, the brothers and the sisters, for the breaking up of families and communities, we say sorry.

"And for the indignity and degradation thus inflicted on a proud people and a proud culture, we say sorry."

The apology, which was certain to be passed since both Rudd's governing Labor Party and the main opposition parties support it, ends years of divisive debate and a decade of refusals by the previous conservative government that lost November's elections.

It places Australia among a handful of nations that have offered official apologies to oppressed minorities, including Canada's 1998 apology to its native peoples, South Africa's 1992 expression of regret for apartheid and the U.S. Congress' 1988 law apologizing to Japanese-Americans for their internment during World War II.

The reading of Australia's apology and the parliamentary vote was being broadcast nationally, and people across the country made plans for communal watching, from the Outback breakfasts to the school assemblies.

Giant television screens were erected outside Parliament House in Canberra for hundreds of people who could not fit inside. Screens were also set up in parks and other public places in Sydney and other state capitals.

Rudd's motion offered "a new page in the history of our great continent" and "a future where this Parliament resolves that the injustices of the past must never, never happen again."

Aborigines lived mostly as hunter-gatherers for tens of thousands of years before British colonial settlers landed at what is now Sydney in 1788.

Today, there are about 450,000 Aborigines in Australia's population of 21 million. They are the country's poorest group, with the highest rates of jailing, unemployment and illiteracy. Their life expectancy is 17 years shorter than other Australians.

The debate about an apology was spurred by a government inquiry into policies that from 1910 until the 1970s resulted in 100,000 mostly mixed-blood Aboriginal children being taken from their parents under state and federal laws based on a premise that Aborigines were dying out.

Most were deeply traumatized by the loss of their families and culture, the inquiry concluded, naming them the "Stolen Generations." Its 1997 report recommended a formal apology and reparations for the victims.

Rudd ruled out compensation — a stance that helped secure support for the apology among the many Australians who believe they should not be held responsible for past policies, no matter how flawed.

He pledges instead to lift the living standards of all Aborigines, and on Tuesday outlined bold targets for cutting infant mortality, illiteracy and early death rates among indigenous people within a decade.

Aboriginal leaders generally welcomed Rudd's apology, though some said it was empty rhetoric without addressing the issue of compensation.

Noel Pearson, a respected Aborigine leader from Queensland state, wrote in The Australian newspaper on Tuesday that offering an apology without compensation meant: "Blackfellas will get the words, the whitefellas keep the money."

Marcia Langton, an Aborigine academic at the University of Melbourne, also said the question of compensation must be addressed, but celebrated the apology as a huge step forward.

"I think that it's impossible to feel any kind of cynicism at all, if you can understand how much it means to people who have lived through these events and been removed from their families," she told Australian Broadcasting Corp.

Michael Mansell, spokesman for the rights group the National Aboriginal Alliance, said the word "sorry" was one that "Stolen Generation members will be very relieved is finally being used."

Mansell, who has urged the government to establish an $880 million compensation fund, said he still hoped Rudd would be open to the idea.

Bob Brown, leader of the minority Greens party, said he would try to have Rudd's motion amended in the Senate to include a commitment to paying compensation. But the amendment was likely to be rejected by majority parties, and Brown said he would not pursue it further.

Tony Abbott, the indigenous affairs spokesman for the main opposition coalition, said his bloc had reversed its previous objection to the apology in part because Rudd promised there would be no compensation.

"As far as the opposition is concerned, this apology creates no new rights or entitlements. We are guaranteed that by the prime minister," Abbott said.

Here is the full article.

Soaring costs threaten Teck Cominco's Panama copper mine venture

Still reeling from its decision to shelve the Galore Creek project in British Columbia after construction costs more than doubled, Teck Cominco Ltd. is now facing massive inflation at another planned copper mine in Panama where costs have also doubled, throwing the viability of the entire project in doubt.
Teck of Vancouver and its partners Inmet Mining Corp. of Toronto and Vancouver-based Petaquilla Copper Ltd. said an interim engineering report estimates capital costs to build the Petaquilla copper project have surged to $3.5-billion (U.S.) from an original estimate of $1.7-billion published last year.
Teck now has until March 31 to decide whether to acquire a 26-per-cent interest in the Panamanian project. It could also decide to walk away from the endeavour or try to renegotiate the joint venture agreement with Petaquilla and Inmet, said Greg Waller, Teck's head of investor relations.

"It's a great resource. We'd love to find a way of making it work, but clearly these numbers are challenging," Mr. Waller said in an interview.

In development for more than a decade, Petaquilla has been touted as one of the largest untapped copper deposits in the world, with the potential to produce an average 411 million pounds of copper, 95,000 ounces of gold, and 8.6 million pounds of molybdenum a year over a 23-year mine life.

However, if Teck were to decide to exercise its option to acquire the stake in the project from Petaquilla Copper, it would be obligated to fund 52 per cent of the development costs of the project or roughly $1.8-billion.

Following the Galore Creek debacle that saw Teck order construction of the much-heralded copper project halted after cost estimates skyrocketed to $5-billion from $2.2-billion, the company may not be willing to take on the Petaquilla risk, said Canaccord Adams analyst Orest Wowkodaw.

"I think the project is in serious limbo. It's very unclear to me whether this thing can be developed," Mr. Wowkodaw said in an interview.

The analyst said the project's best hope is for Petaquilla Copper, the junior firm that currently owns 52 per cent of the venture, to consider relinquishing more of its interest in the potential mine.

"This is going to come down to Petaquilla Copper and what they are willing to give up. They've got to change the ownership structure or this thing is dead," Mr. Wowkodaw said.

Although Teck has laid out relatively little capital for the project to date, Petaquilla is second in the company's pipeline of copper development projects behind its Andacollo hypogene mine in Chile. A diversified metals producer and Canada's largest base metals miner, Teck is trying to reshuffle its production profile, reducing its exposure to zinc and increasing its copper production.

The loss of Galore Creek and the potential loss of Petaquilla could put the ability to execute that strategy in doubt.

Here is the full article.

Chile Government Endorses the HidroAysen Project - Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) becomes rubber stamp window dressing to appease public

The highly controversial HidroAysÈn dam project received a major boost from Chile’s government late last week. After long reserving judgement on the issue, the Michelle Bachelet administration – much to the chagrin of the project’s many opponents – now appears to endorse the estimated US$4 billion venture.

Last Thursday, Energy Minister Marcelo Tokman joined Interior Minister Edmundo PÈrez-Yoma in announcing a series of measures aimed at alleviating Chile’s current energy crisis. In recent months electricity supply problems have been exacerbated by falling water levels in the nation’s reservoirs and by the closure of a major generating plant in Region V. Among other things, the ministers announced a two-week extension of daylights savings time and called on electricity providers to reduce voltage by 10 percent.

Failing to mention that almost 40% of Chile's electricity goes to the foreign owned mining industry.


But while the announcements themselves came as no surprise, PÈrez-Yoma’s response when questioned about the HidroAysÈn project certainly did. “Do you support pushing forward with the AysÈn dams?” a reporter asked him. “Yes, I’m for it… Of course I am. I think so. With all due respect to the environmental issue,” the interior minister answered.

Leaving little room for interpretation, PÈrez-Yoma on Friday reiterated his support for the project. “What we have is water and we need to take advantage of it… We ought, with as much energy possible, to push forward with construction of the HidroAysÈn reservoir system,” he said.

HidroAysÈn, a joint entity created by Spanish/Italian electricity giant Endesa and Chilean energy company Colb·n, plans to construct five massive hydroelectric dams in Chile’s far southern Region XI, an area also known as AysÈn. Slated for the pristine Baker and Pascua Rivers – the region’s two largest – the project would generate an estimated 2,750 MW of electricity, roughly equivalent to 20 percent of the nation’s current overall generating capacity.

Backers of the project say it would go a long way toward meeting Chile’s growing appetite for electricity (foreign owned mines), which is said to be increasing by more than 6 percent annually. Also, say proponents, the Baker and Pascua Rivers represent a clean, renewable and 100 percent Chilean source of energy that unlike natural gas and petroleum – which Chile imports from abroad – are not subject to international price and supply constraints.

The project, however, is being hotly contested by a coalition of Region XI residents, Chilean environmentalists and NGOs in both the United States and Spain. Critics say the dams will destroy the pristine Baker and Pascua rivers and set the stage for an all out “looting” of Patagonia. Chile ought instead to invest in non-conventional, renewable energy sources such as wind and solar, argue leading dam critics like Juan Pablo Orrego of the Santiago-based NGO Ecosistemas.

“Chile is a country that’s exceptionally rich in terms of renewable energy sources. Exceptionally rich. We could have solar energy in the north, wind energy throughout the entire country, geothermic energy from top to bottom, and tidal generators. But so far in Chile nothing’s been done with all these renewable energy sources. We’ve also done nothing in terms of efficiency,” Orrego said during a recent press conference in Santiago.

Before the moving ahead with the project, HidroAysÈn must first gain approval from the government’s National Environmental Commission (CONAMA). The company has said it will officially enter into the approval process as early as next month, when it plans to submit an Environmental Impact Study (EIS). Critics of the project will then have 60 days to assess the EIS and submit their own data and observations. From there the decision rests solely in the hands of CONAMA. .

Until now, the Bachelet government has been mostly quiet on the issue. Environment Minister Ana Lya Uriarte, for example, said repeatedly that the government will not offer an opinion until after the project has gone through the requisite bureaucratic channels. That no longer appears to be the case.

Not surprisingly, the government’s about-face has raised alarm bells among HidroAysÈn’s environmental critics. Calling for the interior minister’s resignation, environmentalist Patricio Rodrigo of the Chilean Patagonia Defense Council said PÈrez-Yoma’s stance inappropriately biases CONAMA’s environmental assessment process – a process that, in the final analysis, is political. The interior minister, he pointed out, has authority over the nation’s various regional governors who in turn preside of CONAMA’s regional offices.

Socialist Party Sen. Alejandro Navarro had a similar reaction. “We have a process of interventionism with it comes to environmental evaluation processes. Politics are clearly emphasized over technical concerns,” he said.

PÈrez-Yoma’s statements also received a stern rebuke from activists in AysÈn. “I feel disillusioned with this government, which claims to represent the citizens,” said Miriam Chible, president of a Coyhaique-based organization called the Private Corporation for the Development of AysÈn. By commenting on a project that hasn’t even entered into the environmental assessment process, the interior minister is essentially bypassing the laws, she explained.

(Did they expect something different? Endesa Strategy & Tactics I – Revisiting the Ralco & Pangue Hydroelectric Projects on the Rio Bio Bio )

“I’m a business woman, but regardless of my concerns and needs, I must follow the laws. But with his recent statements, PÈrez-Yoma is suggesting that depending on our particular visions, we shouldn’t have to follow the law… It’s pathetic to hear something like that in a country that claims to be legally responsible and respectful,” said Chible.

Here is the full article.

Barrick-Newmont Goldmine Swallowing Historic Town and Literally Shaking its Residents to Their Foundations.

It is Australia's biggest goldmine, swallowing what is known as the world's richest square mile of dirt.

But the Super Pit, in historic Kalgoorlie-Boulder in Western Australia, is also eating the booming city it is helping sustain, and literally shaking its residents to their foundations.

With gold prices hitting record modern-day highs, its North American owners plan to make the Super Pit even bigger, unlocking billions of dollars' worth of extra gold and extending the mine's life through to 2017.

The expansion would make the mine 4km long, 1.6km wide and 600m deep, enough to fit two Eiffel Towers on top of each other.

The only problem is the pit can be extended only in the one direction to follow the gold-bearing ore - west towards the city and to within 200m of the homes of already disaffected residents, who say they have had to put up with noise, dust and pollution for too long.
Locals say Denver-based Newmont Mining and Toronto-based Barrick Gold - the joint owners of the project, who manage the mine through their company Kalgoorlie Consolidated Gold Mines - have put profits ahead of people's livelihoods.

Originally the brainchild of Alan Bond in the 1980s, the mine currently yields close to 850,000 ounces of gold a year, close to $1 billion worth at current spot prices.

It's become the ultimate story of two immovable forces - city versus mine - at a time when the mining industry is going gangbusters.

While guidelines in Western Australia mean that big open-cut mines must have a buffer zone of at least 1500m, the Super Pit could now encroach within 200m of some homes. In Kalgoorlie-Boulder, the locals have warned authorities that the expansion could mean their death or the death of their family members.

The pit's bunt wall is at the end of the street where truck driver Roy Halliday lives and he says the noise and dust are maddening.
Tom Vulhop claims a mighty blast from the pit wrenched a light fitting from his ceiling last March, while Agnes Miller blames the cracks in her floor on KCGM.
Even retirees at the local church group have turned activist against the Super Pit, claiming daily blasts damaged historic All Hollows Church. "We had to put a metal bar across the width of the sanctuary," said church volunteer Kevin Bartle.

Residents of the Aboriginal community of Ninga Mia, on the outskirts of the town, say they will not shift even though they are slowly being surrounded by the mine's waste dumps and the 24-hour hum of the dump trucks that use them.

KCGM spent $268 million with local businesses last year and is the city's biggest employer.

However, it has a poor track record when it comes to keeping pollutants at a minimum and is the nation's biggest-single emitter of mercury.

Williamstown resident Dianne Mills, whose battles with KCGM go back 10 years, said the company's massive financial contribution to the economy and state coffers made it appear untouchable. "In many ways the community feels like it's being eaten alive by this Super Pit," she said.
KCGM general manager Russell Cole sees it differently. "There are many challenges working in close proximity to a major regional city centre," he said. "KCGM works in a very strict regulatory environment, and we continue to strive to meet our ongoing obligations.

"We are a highly regulated company that works within a strict regulatory environment, it is for others to form an opinion of us," Mr Cole said. "Our record shows the Government does not hesitate to use its regulatory strength to control our industry and this operation."

None of the upset locals spoken to are against the mine. To be anti-mining in Kalgoorlie-Boulder is liable to get you run out of town.

But many affected residents come under a local ruling that means their homes are not zoned residential, so they are not protected by the safety zone of 400m, which is unique to the mine and designed to protect them from flying rock.

The mine expansion has been approved by the West Australian Environmental Protection Agency. The final say rests with state Environment Minister David Templeman.
Locals say the EPA has a poor record of protecting citizens, and the Super Pit expansion is no different. They point out that the EPA approved the shipping of lead through Esperance port on the state's south coast and knocked back proposals to protect underground spiders and rare fauna.
Noise from the mine is also a cause for complaint. KCGM has asked the EPA to vary its noise regulations for the mine, which the EPA has approved with a promise of better enforcement. Locals say they were told in 1995 that the then department of environmental protection would prosecute KCGM if it breached the noise regulations that were introduced two years later.

Current noise limits for KCGM are not to exceed a maximum of 51 decibels in the evening or on Sunday at one location, a level just under what could be heard during normal conversation at a distance of two metres. But KCGM's own monitoring shows otherwise.
"Monitoring indicates noise from the existing KCGM operations exceeds the assigned noise levels in the noise regulations at all five reference locations, during both day and night," the company said in applying to the EPA for a variation to the legislation.

It has certainly not been lost on one Boulder resident, who said: "When I knock off from work in the early morning it's so loud it's unbearable."
The EPA claims KCGM has a defence for non-compliance with the regulations because it complied with ministerial conditions for the mine that pre-date the 1997 regulations. A spokesman said the confusion for residents was a "historical accident".

This week, the mine was hit by a massive pit-wall failure on its southern edge, something KCGM said was expected.

KCGM's mine consultants, Snowden, said in preparing a report on the expansion that it still had some doubts about pit-wall failure, despite concluding that the cutback plans "appear adequate".
Here is the full article.

Zambia: A New Kind of Internally Displaced People (IDPs) - Uncompensated Poor Being Evicted for Prestige Projects

Zambia's open-door investment policy is coming under criticism from rights activists for passing on the real cost of development to the poor, who are being evicted to make way for the new prestige projects.

Campaigners describe the victims as 'internally displaced persons' (IDPs) - a description usually applied to people made homeless as a result of conflict or disaster. But it's an analogy that Joseph Chilengi, executive director of the Africa Internally Displaced Persons' Voice, a lobby group championing IDP rights, claims is appropriate.

"Zambia's IDP situation is actually even worse than in conflict-prone areas," said Chilengi. "[At least these] populations have the potential to return to their places when the situation stabilises."

President Levy Mwanawasa's administration has courted foreign investors, offering land and tax breaks as inducements. The policy has been credited with helping fuel an annual growth rate of five percent over the past five years, cutting inflation to single digits, and appreciation of the kwacha against foreign currencies.

But critics argue that the country's growth, as well as a string of environmental protection and tourism promotion programmes, has come at a cost: turfing people out of informal settlements when they are in the way of the developers, with little hope of compensation from the authorities.

The backlog in affordable public housing has compounded the problem and led to mushrooming squatter camps. "We have a deficit of housing units for 1.2 million people, who are now resorting to living in unplanned settlements," acknowledged Local Government and Housing Minister, Sylvia Masebo. With limited rights, the residents are vulnerable to eviction.

George Salano, 57, is one of thousands of Zambians to have lost out to commercial development. His informal settlement in the capital, Lusaka, is located on land that has been allocated to the Chinese government for the construction of a multimillion dollar Chinese economic zone, the second of its kind in Zambia.
"I have personally lived here for many years; my children were born here. Some of my friends have lived here even longer. Now we have been told to relocate to Chongwe town [about 50km east of Lusaka], but we have nowhere to start from - we have no houses there, and we have no farms there," he said.

Compensation was not on the cards, said Masebo. "We don't allocate formal residential land to investors ... but as long as land is illegal [occupied without formal ownership], it can be planned or allocated for anything else."

James Siakalima, 54, is another victim of the developers. He was one of over 2,500 residents of Mazabuka town in southern Zambia, whose homes were erased to make way for Zambia's only nickel mine, Albidon Mine, owned by Albidon Limited of Australia.

The area's opposition member of parliament, Gary Nkombo, encouraged Albidon to build some houses, but the quality was allegedly shoddy. "I lived in their [Albidon] house for just about five months. When the rain started it developed a crack, three weeks later part of it collapsed," said Siakalima. The two cows he was given died because of the lack of pasture in the area where he was relocated.

"We all know that nickel is about the most expensive base metal on the world market, [so] how do you allow such poor quality houses to be built for the people who are the owners of the land?" asked Nkombo.
Dependence

"We are still very far from attaining economic independence because of the manner in which we are displacing our people, who are actually supposed to benefit from all our economic activities. The issue of IDPs resulting from economic activities is very real in Zambia."

Zambia's first experience with large-scale internal displacement was in 1959, with the construction of the Kariba Dam. It created the world's largest man-made lake on the border with Zimbabwe, and cost 57,000 Tonga farmers and pastoralists their homes and livelihoods.

Attempts to help the resettled Tonga have achieved little; a US$50 million project, sponsored by the World Bank, is currently stalled due to the landmines in parts of the resettlement area.

Thomas Mabwe, head of Development Studies at the Zambia Open University, said internal displacement "has been a huge cost to this country; it repeatedly forces government to divert resources meant for other developmental programmes ... It affects people's productivity, causes loss of land and contributes to the culture of over-dependency."

Masebo argues that the vulnerability of the poor is in part the fault of the previous administration of president Frederick Chiliba. Ahead of the 1996 election, the government sold off public housing to sitting tenants for as low as US$3, leaving hardly any money for investment in new homes.

"To address the situation of poor housing we are now encouraging all our local civic authorities [municipalities] to open up more formal land, with basic services being provided, to try and cover the housing deficit quickly," said Masebo.

Here is the full article.

Geocom Resources CEO, John Hiner, to Transform Herbal Supplement Vendor into Gas & Oil Exploration Corporation

SEATTLE, Jan 31, 2008 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Onelife Health Products Inc. (the "Company") (OTCBB:CWOI) is pleased to announce that effective January 28, 2008, the Company began trading on the Over-the-Counter Bulletin Board (the "OTCBB") under the name "Crown Oil and Gas Inc."

In conjunction with the name change, the Company is also pleased to announce that effective January 31, 2008, a forward stock split on an 18 (new) for 1 (old) basis became effective on the OTCBB. The Company's common stock is now quoted on the OTCBB under the symbol "CWOI".

The name change and forward stock split follow the Company's appointment of John Hiner as President, effective January 3, 2008.

Mr. Hiner has been involved in the mining industry for over 30 years. From April 2003 to present, Mr. Hiner has been a director, President, Chief Executive Officer of Geocom Resources Inc. From 2007 to 2008, Mr. Hiner was a director of Villanova Capital Corp. a TSX Venture Exchange capital pool company that acquired Africa West Minerals Corp. From 2000 to 2003, Mr. Hiner operated JEHCORP Inc., a consulting firm to the mining industry. Prior to this, Mr. Hiner was the Vice-President of Champion Resources Inc. Mr. Hiner holds a B.Sc. in geology from San Diego State University, granted in 1972, and a M.S. in geology from the Mackay School of Mines, University of Nevada-Reno, granted in 1978.

The Company believes that the above-mentioned changes will allow it to pursue opportunities in the field of exploration and development of oil and gas properties, as the Company moves away from its existing business of producing quality herbal products for sale to end-use consumers via the Internet.

Here is the full article.

Stopping the Yellowstone Gold Mine – Parallels with the Geocom-Kinross Gold Mine in Chile’s Futaleufu River Valley (Part 1)

In this series of articles we revisit the plans of Canadian mining conglomerate, Noranda Inc. to open a Gold Mine a few kilometers from Yellowstone National Park and how the project was halted by the Clinton Administration.

Congress is in a mood to abandon the preservation of America's ecological heritage. It is therefore imperative that the Clinton Administration muster its resolve and its executive powers to block at least one monumental and irreversible environmental catastrophe. This disaster-in-waiting is a proposed gold mine in the upper reaches of Montana's Henderson Mountain, less than three miles from Yellowstone National Park.
The mine and its lethal wastes threaten not only the original crown jewel of the national park system, but one of the most beautiful and fragile wilderness areas in the country. So grave are those risks that this page suggested last year that Congress appropriate the necessary funds, about $35 million, to compensate Noranda Inc., the Canadian conglomerate that owns the site, for its exploratory expenses and then ask the company to go away.
That is still the best course of action for saving the great national park established by President Ulysses S. Grant. But it is unlikely that the Republican Congress will spend the necessary money or pay attention to various creative strategies offered by opponents of the mine. These include a proposal by Representative Bill Richardson, Democrat of New Mexico, to put the area off limits to mining by declaring it a national recreation area.

But the battle is far from lost. Under the 1872 Mining Law, the Federal Government cannot simply seize claims to which Noranda has already taken lawful title. It can, however, use existing statutes and its regulatory machinery to break Noranda's resolve. This is a company that persists in building a mine that few others want. Washington has enough legal authority, if the White House will wake up, to prevent the desecration of an American treasure by a foreign corporation.

Under the 1972 Clean Water Act, for example, the Environmental Protection Agency, through the Army Corps of Engineers, can prohibit development on wetlands. This is an important power because Noranda proposes to dig out 56 acres of wetlands high on the mountain. There it would build what it calls a "state of the art" impoundment site for storing acid wastes -- a deep reservoir the size of 70 football fields. Reputable geologists say that any such structure, no matter how beautifully engineered, is bound to crack at some point given the region's extreme weather and its history of earthquakes. That will send poisons directly into the surrounding watershed, which includes two of the nation's important wild rivers.
If the E.P.A. and the Corps deny Noranda the necessary permits, the company will have to look elsewhere to store its toxic material. Alternative sites could be prohibitively expensive. But even if the two agencies duck what is an obvious moral obligation, there are other weapons available.

Noranda's 200-acre mine site is in the Gallatin National Forest, which is under the jurisdiction of the Agriculture Department's Forest Service. Noranda owns most of this land but does not yet have clear title to 27 acres that sit directly above a portion of the mother lode of gold, valued by Noranda at $500 million. Environmental lawyers believe that Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt, following a formal request from the Forest Service, has the power under the 1976 Land Policy and Management Act to take permanent title to these acres on behalf of the Federal Government.

If these experts are right, then the Forest Service should promptly ask Mr. Babbitt to declare these acres off limits and the Secretary should rapidly comply. Deprived of some of its potential riches, Noranda might fold its tent.

Two environmental groups -- American Rivers and Trout Unlimited -- have suggested yet another approach to those pivotal 27 acres. They argue that a close reading of the 1872 Mining Law and a handful of court cases suggest that Mr. Babbitt can deny Noranda's claim if he can show that the land has greater value in an undisturbed state than it does as a mine. They also argue that even the $500 million in estimated deposits cannot begin to compare to the ecological and recreational values of Yellowstone and its adjoining ecosystem.

Mr. Babbitt may have trouble quantifying those values, but of course American Rivers and Trout Unlimited are right. The numbers are not important. As a nation, we have to draw a line and announce that some places are simply too valuable and too sacred to our history to be put at risk.

Here is the full story originally published on March 27, 1995.

Residential Electricity Rationing May Begin in Chile as Foreign Owned Mining Industry Consumes Almost 100% of Electricity Produced from Hydropower

Depleted reservoirs, the recent closure of a major generating plant and an expected consumption surge in March have Chilean authorities concerned about Chile’s ability to meet its growing electricity needs.

Chile generates roughly 38% of its 13,000 MW of total electricity with hydroelectric dams.

(Of which almost 100% is consumed by the foreign owned mining industry.)

Last year’s dry winter and unusually warm spring, however, have resulted in dropping water levels in the reservoirs that feed those dams. In fact, water levels in Chile’s reservoirs are down by an average of 40% compared to this time last year. Some reservoirs are drier still.

Region IV’s Cogote reservoir is down more than 55%, while the Peñuelas reservoir in Region V has dropped a staggering 65% in the past year.

Many of those reservoirs now contain barely the minimum amount of water they need to operate properly. Once the reservoirs drop below that minimum, the dams they feed begin functioning as “run of the river” dams, which can mean a sharp drop off in electricity production. For example, Region VIII Ralco dam, the country’s most powerful, has the capacity to generate some 690 MW. But if water levels drop below 692 meters (they’re currently at 703.7 meters, down 18 meters since early February 2007), the Ralco dam (On the Biobio River) would produce just 50 MW of electricity.

Complicating matter even more are predictions for yet another dry winter. Meteorologists say the “La Niña” effect, which involves a notable cooling of the Pacific Ocean water, could mean less than average rainfall for the country.

Chile’s electricity grid also took a hit late last year when a turbine fire forced the closure of Region V’s 370 MW Nehuenco plant. The thermoelectric plant, owned by Chilean energy company Colben, is currently under repair and is not expected to reopen for several months.

“There are two new factors that make this year, especially March, very complicated. We’re talking about the shutdown of the Nehuenco plant and also the low snow accumulation due to high temperatures at the end of last year,” Energy Minister Marcelo Tokman told reporters this week.
“If another large plant goes down, it’ll be next to impossible to avoid rationing. However, given the current situation, we think that with some additional measures we plan to take, we’ll be able to avoid (rationing) in March,” he said.

It’s not yet clear what exactly the government’s soon-to-be-announced measures will entail.

Analysts, however, say one possibility could be a slight voltage reduction. Chilean residences are wired to receive 220 volts of electricity. That voltage can be tweaked by as much as 7% either up or down without damaging household electric devices. The government might also authorize electricity providers to establish rate incentives for customers willing to reduce consumption.

(No plans are in place to limit the mining industry: Ransacking Chile: Fabulous Profits for Multi-Nationals)

This is certainly not the first time Chile’s electricity scenario has captured headlines. Over the past four years significant media attention has gone to the so-called Argentine natural gas “crisis.” Chile traditionally relies on natural gas – used in thermoelectric facilities – for much of its electricity production. However, ongoing supply cuts from Argentina have forced producers to turn to more expensive alternatives. As a result, costs for producing electricity have risen dramatically – up by more than 200% in central and northern Chile.

(A man made problem, not a resource issue: "Cheap" energy costs Argentina billions and more blackouts - The cause of Chile's natural gas shortage? )

The country’s natural gas woes have been used in turn to argue in favor of large-scale hydroelectric ventures such as the controversial HidroAysen project. A joint entity created by Spanish-Italian electricity giant Endesa and Colbon, HidroAysen is planning to build five massive hydroelectric dams in Region XI, an area of Chilean Patagonia also known as Aysen. (More efficient and less environmentally destructive than helping Argentina overcome its energy problem, which would relieve Chile's in turn.)

Slated for the Baker and Pascua Rivers, the five dams would together generate a substantial 2,750 MW of electricity. That energy, say backers of the project, would go a long way toward alleviating Chile’s growing appetite for electricity, said to be rising by more than 6% annually.

(A 6% annual increase in electricity corresponds to a 30% increase in population as Chile's residential customers only consume 17% of the electricity generated.)

The project, however, is being hotly contested by a coalition of Region XI residents, Chilean environmentalists and NGOs in both the United States and Spain. Critics say the dams will destroy the pristine Baker and Pascua rivers and set the stage for an all out “looting of Patagonia
. Chile ought instead to invest in non-conventional, renewable energy sources such as wind and solar, argue leading dam critics like Juan Pablo Orrego of the Santiago-based NGO Ecosistemas.

“Chile is a country that’s exceptionally rich in terms of renewable energy sources.

Exceptionally rich. We could have solar energy in the north, wind energy throughout the entire country, geothermic energy from top to bottom, and tidal generators. But so far in Chile nothing’s been done with all these renewable energy sources. We’ve also done nothing in terms of efficiency,” Orrego said during a recent press conference in Santiago.

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Electricity Rationing Negatively Impacts AngloGold Ashanti Operations in South Africa

Power crisis to dent results of AngloGold Ashanti

Johannesburg - Safety shutdowns and operational woes hit AngloGold Ashanti's fourth-quarter results, hurting its shares yesterday as the gold producer said a power crisis would dent future production.
AngloGold said it expected to produce between 4.8 million and 5 million ounces of gold this year compared with 5.48 million ounces in the past year - a decline of 3 percent.

That outlook follows a power shortage in South Africa which would mean 90 percent power supply for the remainder of the year and cut production by some 400 000 ounces of gold this year, said AngloGold.

A mining analyst at Sanlam Investment Management, Stephen Roelofse, said: "The outlook looks quite dim.
"I hope the company is underpromising and that in reality things won't be that bad."

The power shortages forced gold and platinum producers in South Africa - a leading producer of both metals - to shut down for five days, pushing global prices of the commodities to record highs on supply concerns.

Eskom has said it would only supply up to 90 percent of the power required by big mining firms.

AngloGold chief executive Mark Cutifani, who has made safety a key focus since taking up the post last year, said improvements in its performance depended largely on whether South Africa could solve the power crisis.

"The uncertainty around Eskom power supply is having a significant impact on our operations in South Africa. We have a great deal of work to do on our operational and cost performance," said Cutifani.

During the December quarter, Anglogold cut its hedge book - one of the biggest among its peers - from 10.58 million to 10.39 million ounces of gold.

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Doug Tompkin's Calls Chile's Environmental Evaluation System a Farce - Stacked Deck Like I Have Never Seen

Well- known environmental philanthropist Douglas Tompkins of the United States is taking an active role in an international campaign to block the so-called HidroAysén project.

HidroAysén, a joint entity formed by Spanish-Italian electricity giant Endesa and Colbún, a Chilean energy company, plans to build five massive hydroelectric dams along Region XI’s Baker and Pascua River. The Baker River, Chile’s largest, is in fact just a few miles from Tompkins’ Estancia Chacabuco, a massive stretch of pristine steppe land that Tompkins would eventually like to donate to the Chilean government.

The Patagonia Times recently crossed paths with Tompkins in Region XI, where he met last months with key members of the Chilean Patagonia Defense Council (CDP), an umbrella organization of both Chilean and U.S. activists attempting to thwart the HidroAysén project. The dams are only part of the problem, said Tompkins. Even more alarming is a 2,300-kilometer transmission line Canadian-owned Transelec (Brookfield Management) plans to build in order to transport electricity from the Aysén to central Chile.

Before moving ahead with the project, HidroAysén must first gain approval from Chilean environmental authorities. The company plans to submit an environmental impact study as early as March. According to Tompkins, the approval process is “a farce.”)

Patagonia Times: Given the proximity of this project to your park (Estancia Chacabuco, Region XI), you have to be a concerned neighbor. How actively involved are you in the campaign to stop this thing?

Douglas Tompkins: We’re fully integrated in the campaign. We just had a big meeting here yesterday with the core members of the Consejo (CDP) were all here yesterday. There were about 20 of us. There are different layers. You’ve got 40 some members of the Consejo. And some couldn’t come for some other reasons. There’s a big effort. This is an epic environmental fight here. The biggest one that Chile’s ever seen. And it’s attracting a lot of attention. Because this is a mega-monster project. They’re talking about running these friggin power lines all the way up to Santiago and they’re going to disfigure the landscapes between here and there. And they’re winding all over. You should see a copy of the proposed (route). It’s a spaghetti type of thing. It’s only 1,600 kilometers in a direct line, but it’s a 2,300-kilometer line. It crosses eight or something protected areas. It just disfigures the landscape something terrible. And the impact of the wires is far greater than the dams. Of course they’re trying to concentrate on the dams. The dam guys are saying, ‘well, we’re not flooding that much. The containments aren’t that big.’ But that’s not where the real impact is. They’re talking about 20 million hectares of impact in one way or another all the way to Santiago. This is a big deal.

Patagonia Times: And that impact is a lot more than just an aesthetic problem…

Doug Tompkins: Sure. You’ve got to build the things. They’re cutting a million trees. They’re going to need road access, which has a direct impact on the terrain. And of course the visual impact is terrible. It lowers property values. It affects communities. It’s just got a long list of negatives. All of this unnecessary of course, because of a number of reasons. One being that you have to develop an energy plan. Chile doesn’t have an energy plan. All they’re into is growth, growth, growth. And this is the ideology of the cancer cell. We’re talking about a flawed economic model, a flawed development plan, lack of an energy plan, lack of an overall master plan of where the hell the country’s going. Nobody knows. If they do, it’s the best kept secret in Chile. What is the plan? Where does this stop? Where does development finish up? What is the goal? There is no goal. The goal is nothing but grow and grow and grow and the hell with it. That’s it.

Patagonia Times: I understand that HidroAysén is planning to submit its environmental impact study as early as March.

Doug Tompkins: Yeah, maybe at the end of March. And then you’ve got a complete farce of a system here to evaluate them. They can put in the worst plan you’ve ever seen and then what? You’ve got addendums and they don’t have to have any citizen reviews. It’s a stacked deck like I’ve never seen anything else. Loaded dice.

Patagonia Times: If the government’s environmental approval system is such a rubber stamp, where does the campaign focus its energy?

Doug Tompkins: It’s got to put pressure on government and on so called leadership, and get public opinion to rise up and say ‘hey, this has to be thought out. There’s got to be a plan here.’ There’s no plan…And you’ve got this development mania, and it’s uncontrolled development, and that’s the basic economic model of Chile.
Patagonia Times: You’ve been in Chile a long time. You’ve had interactions with the government over a number of different issues. How does this campaign compare as far as other efforts you’ve been involved in?

Doug Tompkins: This is a big one. This is the biggest one ever. Because it’s an iconographic thing. Mega centrales (dams) with these huge power lines going north. And that’s just only the start of it. There are concessions on 15 rivers down here and they want to run all those up there. There’ll have to be more power lines. So there’s going to be one power line after another cutting through all these different regions. It’ll destroy the economic possibilities of tourism. I mean forget it. Who’s coming here from all over the world to pay good money to come and see a bunch of power lines disfiguring the landscapes…

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