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"Fossil fuels industries"
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A climate for business: global warming, the state and capital
This article challenges accounts of global environmental politics which come from a liberal institutionalist position and focus on the development of international regimes. We argue that a perspective which starts from the role of the state in promoting capital accumulation can much better explain the content both of state policies and of particular international agreements. We first outline the way that fossil fuel companies have been able to secure their interests in state policies on global warming. We then develop the argument that their ability to do this is best explained in terms of the structural power of capital, deriving from the role of the state within capitalist societies. Finally, we suggest that this may also be producing transformations within global warming politics, as insurance companies in particular become involved. Such involvement, particularly given the heightened power of finance under conditions of globalization, suggests the possibility of constructing coalitions which may turn the constraints which the structural power of capital has produced to date into opportunities to promote attempts to deal with global warming.
Journal Article
The politics of fossil fuel subsidies and their reform
\"Fossil fuel subsidies strain public budgets, and contribute to climate change and local air pollution. Despite widespread agreement among experts about the benefits of reforming fossil fuel subsidies, repeated international commitments to eliminate them, and valiant efforts by some countries to reform them, they continue to persist. This book helps explain this conundrum, by exploring the politics of fossil fuel subsidies and their reform. Bringing together scholars and practitioners, the book offers new case studies both from countries that have undertaken subsidy reform, and those that have yet to do so. It explores the roles of various intergovernmental and non-governmental institutions in promoting fossil fuel subsidy reform at the international level, as well as conceptual aspects of fossil fuel subsidies. This is essential reading for researchers and practitioners, and students of political science, international relations, law, public policy and environmental studies. This title is also available as Open Access\"-- Provided by publisher.
Book
Academic capture in the Anthropocene: a framework to assess climate action in higher education
Higher education institutions have a mandate to serve the public good, yet in many cases fail to adequately respond to the global climate crisis. The inability of academic institutions to commit to purposeful climate action through targeted research, education, outreach, and policy is due in large part to “capture” by special interests. Capture involves powerful minority interests that exert influence and derive benefits at the expense of a larger group or purpose. This paper makes a conceptual contribution to advance a framework of “academic capture” applied to the climate crisis in higher education institutions. Academic capture is the result of the three contributing factors of increasing financialization issues, influence of the fossil fuel industry, and reticence of university employees to challenge the status quo. The framework guides an empirical assessment evaluating eight activities and related indices of transparency and participation based on principles of climate justice and the growing democracy-climate nexus. The framework can be a helpful tool for citizens and academics to assess the potential for academic capture and capacity for more just and democratic methods of climate action in higher education. We conclude with a series of recommendations on how to refine and apply our framework and assessment in academic settings. Our goal is to further the discussion on academic capture and continue to develop tools that transform higher education institutions to places of deep democracy and innovative climate education, research, and outreach to meet the challenges of the Anthropocene.
Journal Article
Carbon nation : fossil fuels in the making of American culture
\"Fossil fuels don't simply impact our ability to commute to and from work. They condition our sensory lives, our erotic experiences, and our aesthetics; they structure what we assume to be normal and healthy; and they prop up a distinctly modern bargain with nature that allows populations and economies to grow wildly beyond the older and more clearly understood limits of the organic economy. Carbon Nation ranges across film and literary studies, ecology, politics, journalism, and art history to chart the course by which prehistoric carbon calories entered into the American economy and body. It reveals how fossil fuels remade our ways of being, knowing, and sensing in the world while examining how different classes, races, sexes, and conditions learned to embrace and navigate the material manifestations and cultural potential of these new prehistoric carbons. The ecological roots of modern America are introduced in the first half of the book where the author shows how fossil fuels revolutionized the nation's material wealth and carrying capacity. The book then demonstrates how this eager embrace of fossil fuels went hand in hand with both a deliberate and an unconscious suppression of that dependency across social, spatial, symbolic, and psychic domains. In the works of Eugene O'Neill, Upton Sinclair, Sherwood Anderson, and Stephen Crane, the author reveals how Americans' material dependencies on prehistoric carbon were systematically buried within modernist narratives of progress, consumption, and unbridled growth; while in films like Charlie Chaplin's Modern Times and George Stevens's Giant he uncovers cinematic expressions of our own deep-seated anxieties about living in a dizzying new world wrought by fossil fuels. Any discussion of fossil fuels must go beyond energy policy and technology. In Carbon Nation, Bob Johnson reminds us that what we take to be natural in the modern world is, in fact, historical, and that our history and culture arise from this relatively recent embrace of the coal mine, the stoke hole, and the oil derrick. \"-- Provided by publisher.
Book
CCUS: A Panacea or a Placebo in the fight against climate change?
Carbon Capture, Utilization, and Storage (CCUS) is a crucial technology for achieving carbon neutrality, but it faces significant challenges. Despite substantial investments and policy support, CCUS projects have underperformed due to technical difficulties, high costs, and controversies surrounding the fossil fuel industry's involvement. The effectiveness and feasibility of CCUS in reducing carbon emissions remain uncertain. This viewpoint provides a comprehensive analysis of the current state of CCUS technology, examining its potential to reduce carbon emissions, the challenges hindering its deployment, and the strategies needed to overcome these barriers. We discuss the need for a combinatorial approach to unlock CCUS's full potential, and also emphasize the importance of selecting optimal CO₂ utilization pathways to maximize economic benefits and CO₂ absorption. Although CCUS faces technical, economic, and social barriers, it can still play a valuable role in mitigating emissions from hard-to-abate sectors when supported by comprehensive strategies and collaborative efforts among governments, industries, and research institutions. By addressing these challenges and investing in innovation, CCUS can contribute to achieving carbon neutrality and building a sustainable, low-carbon future.
Carbon Capture, Utilization, and Storage (CCUS) is a groundbreaking technology that captures and stores underground carbon dioxide produced by human activities, the only carbon removal path besides natural carbon sinks. Despite CCUS being a crucial pathway for deep CO2 reduction, the potential, feasibility, and socio-economic benefits of different capture and storage methods vary significantly. Thus, CCUS is among the most controversial emission reduction technologies and is currently inefficient, capturing only 0.1 % of global emissions in 2023. With heavy investments on one side and strong opposition on the other, how should we view the role of CCUS in the carbon neutrality process?. [Display omitted]
•CCUS is crucial for carbon neutrality but faces technical, economic, and environmental challenges.•Governments and industries invest in CCUS despite its underperformance and fossil fuel industry involvement.•Unlocking CCUS's potential requires global monitoring, local pioneers, enterprise leadership, and industrial integration.•Balancing high-profit and high-volume CO2 utilization pathways is crucial for economic viability.
Journal Article
Weighting analysis on air pollution among recent years in China via grey theory models
The priority of national development has always been economic development during the recent decades in China, so a lot of energy consumption was needed to support rapid economic development, accompanied by a number of different air pollution emissions, including SO 2 , NO 2 CO, and PM 2.5 . Based on awareness of environmental protection and sustainable energy development, researchers aimed to propose strategies to reduce the amount of air pollution generation in China derived from intense industrialization. The calculation of the correlation coefficient showed high values, so the correlation of air pollutants is highly related. This study aimed to realize the outcome of the implementation of air pollution reduction acts. Therefore, the grey relational grade and grey entropy were used to analyze the air pollution trend from 2013 to 2020 due to the specific function of the grey theory. The results of this study showed that the curves of SO 2 , PM 2.5 , and CO showed a clear decreasing trend. Furthermore, the SO 2 curve still decreased in the periods of 2018–2020. The most important index for air pollutants is SO 2 after the calculation of grey entropy, which corresponds to the fact that the coal resource is the main energy source in the fossil fuel industries for economic growth. However, the effects of these implementations regarding air pollution reduction sufficiently control air pollution emission, especially SO 2 emission.
Journal Article
Petroturfing
How social media has become a critical tool for
advancing the interests of the Canadian oil industry
Petroturfing presents an incisive look into how
Canada's pro-oil movement has leveraged social media to rebrand the
extractive economy as a positive force. Adapting its title from the
concept of astroturfing, which refers to the practice of disguising
political and corporate media campaigns as grassroots movements,
the book exposes the consequences of this mutually informed
relationship between social media and environmental politics.
Since the early 2010s, an increasingly influential network of
pro-oil groups, organizations, and campaigns has harnessed social
media strategies originally developed by independent environmental
organizations in order to undermine resistance to the fossil fuel
industry. Situating these actions within the broader oil culture
wars that have developed as an outgrowth of contemporary right-wing
media, Petroturfing details how this coalition of groups
is working to reform the public view of oil extraction as something
socially, economically, and ecologically beneficial.
By uncovering these concerted efforts to influence the \"energy
consciousness,\" Jordan B. Kinder reveals the deep divide between
Canada's environmentally progressive reputation and the economic
interests of its layers of government and private companies
operating within its borders. Drawing attention to the structures
underlying online political expression, Petroturfing
highlights the limitations of social media networks in the work of
promoting environmental justice and contributing to a more
equitable future.
eBook
Global Climate Change Action as a Jus Cogens Norm: Some Legal Reflections on the Emerging Evidence
This article analyzes the possibility of environmental obligations acquiring the status of jus cogens (peremptory) norms from six perspectives, namely, domestic legislation of States, national judicial decisions, academia and international organizations, United Nations documents and initiatives, treaties and international State practice, and international tribunals. Additionally, it is argued that the economic and political interests surrounding the military and fossil fuel industries and the vast resources dedicated to them hinder the world’s climate change efforts. Thus, the article presents two research questions. First, what are the possibilities of environmental obligations becoming peremptory norms of international law? Second, if these obligations currently do not meet the requirements to be recognized as jus cogens, what would be required for them to obtain this status?
Journal Article