Not one more project that increases greenhouse gas emissions
Immediately cancel any project that increases large-scale emissions in Portugal, including the expansion of the LNG terminal in Sines, the new airport and port and airport expansions, and institute a moratorium prohibiting future projects of this nature. Not allowing the transfer of emissions from Portugal to other countries through new fossil fuel extraction and exploration projects.
There are known reserves of fossil fuels to take us to a planet 6 to 9ºC warmer. In particular, the Arctic would become 17ºC warmer. Of these reserves, just burning those already in exploration will take us beyond 2ºC if there were no new project.
We are currently experiencing 1.2ºC of warming, and climate scientists are talking about us entering uncharted territory. The red line for a habitable planet would be to close at least 60% of existing fossil fuel infrastructure globally.
Knowing this, multinational companies (such as Total, ENI, Equinor, BP, Shell, Petrobras and also Galp) continue to invest more and more money in fossil fuels.
And the same story is true in the case of aviation, automobiles and livestock.
It's one thing to have an open and functional nuclear weapons factory, sending out bombs regularly. Another thing is to open new nuclear weapons factories. The new projects are the most obvious signal given by governments and companies: planetary destruction is a deliberate and coordinated act.
Specifically, in Portugal, this measure implies the cancellation and prohibition of:
- Expansion of the liquefied fossil gas terminal in Sines: Plans to make Portugal one of the main gateways for fossil gas to Europe must be stopped;
- Construction and expansion of airports: A degrowth of more than 90% in aviation is necessary, which is why it is useless to expand Lisbon airport and/or move it to another location, as well as the construction of new airports;
- Construction and expansion of gas pipelines: There are currently plans to build a new gas pipeline from Celorico da Beira to Zamora. Hydrogen pipelines are a blatant lie. On the one hand, all current gas pipelines in Portugal (which should be dismantled) transport, for technical reasons, a maximum of 10% hydrogen. There remains 90% of the space necessarily occupied by fossil gas, one of the main contributors to the climate crisis. On the other hand, there are no technical advantages in transporting hydrogen over long distances. (You can read why HERE)
- Expansion of intensive agriculture with slave labor in Southwest Alentejo: It is necessary to immediately stop exploitation and slavery, as well as the expansion of monocultures with intensive use of external inputs;
- Expansion of eucalyptus monocultures: The paper industry is responsible for large amounts of emissions – with Navigator being the company that emits the most in Portugal – and for the destruction of biodiverse forests. New eucalyptus plantations are equivalent to new time bombs placed by the paper industry, which, when they explode, kill hundreds of people, burn down houses and release even more CO2
- Construction of new energy production plants using biomass: Biomass projects are based on the idea that planting and destroying forests is a viable alternative to cutting emissions. It is not! Forests are important CO2 sinks, and fulfill several functions essential to the sustainability of ecosystems;
- Construction of new highways: They represent the vice created by fossil and automobile companies. These are expensive, involve more material with emissions and divert public funding from the maintenance and growth of the railway and other renewable public transport projects;
- Exploration of minerals in deep seas in territorial and international waters;
• Current lithium exploration contracts (and other minerals) in Portugal: These contracts are part of an energy expansion plan, empirically visible throughout the world and also in Portugal. We reject an abstract discussion of lithium. Only after the cancellation of these contracts are we willing to talk about lithium as something strategic for energy policies – through energy democracy that ensures that decisions are made by the people, including local communities, and for the people, taking into account the which are the real needs and the existing alternatives. The current contracts signed do not refer to any effective replacement of combustion cars or any other transition – thus, not only will they not cut emissions but they will increase unnecessary consumption. Lithium (and other minerals) will be extracted to be sold on the market. At the moment the sale of electric cars is increasing, but so are SUVs. What is happening is an increase in cars in traffic – which is no transition. If the companies win the conflict, it is only guaranteed that more electric cars (and more cell phones) will be sold. This is not climate policy. It is a natural resource extraction business.
• Expansion of fossil fuel extraction by Portuguese companies in any territory: Although the climate movement has won the battle against the exploitation of fossil fuels in Portugal, today Galp has projects for new fossil fuel exploration in the global south, namely in Mozambique, Angola and Brazil. Additionally, Mota-Engil has often been involved in the construction of these infrastructures.
Recommended Readings:
The Sky’s Limit – Oil Change International, 2023: https://priceofoil.org/2023/08/16/skys-limit-data-update-shut-down-60-of-existing-fossil-fuel-extraction-to-keep-1-5c-in-reach/
Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty, 2019: https://fossilfueltreaty.org/
Relatório Drill Baby Drill – Glasgow Agreement, 2022: https://glasgowagreement.net/en/drillbabydrill/
End all public investments in fossils
Public money must stop being used to finance social and climate collapse. Currently the Portuguese state spends 3.3 million euros per day on subsidies for fossil fuels.
This investment must be transferred directly and immediately to stop the climate crisis.
Each euro given to fossil fuels is a euro stolen from just transition. And when we say “each euro”, we are actually talking about state support of 13 million euros per minute (7 billion euros per year) globally. Fossil subsidies are increasing. That is: governments, aware of the climate emergency, are giving even more money to the civilizational collapse.
At the same time, the world's 60 largest banks have financed fossil fuels for $5.5 billion since the signing of the Paris Agreement. In 2022 alone, they gave 669 billion dollars to the fossil industry.
The same story applies to aviation, industrial agriculture, mobility and the military. And everything that is said about world governments in this case applies, letter by letter, to the Portuguese State.
This is a revealing situation: if companies and banks talk about the transition as an abstraction while adding fuel to the fire, what would be an appropriate reaction? If governments sign papers on the climate, but at the same time give money to those who set fire to our house, this ceases to be a crime of inaction: it becomes a premeditated and coordinated crime.
In a sensible society, all this should have ended decades ago. Namely:
• Public “just transition” funds to be directed to fossil companies;
• Annual indirect subsidies to Galp and other energy companies;
• Tax exemptions for air, land and sea transport;
• Benefits in the use of fossil fuels in industrial processes;
• Subsidies for energy production from fossil gas;
• Support for agriculture, livestock and fishing practiced in an unsustainable manner;
• Public-Private Partnerships on motorways which, in addition to receiving state revenue, compromise plans for the mobility we need.
Additionally, we need to cut financial support to NATO in order to dismantle the weapons industry – one of the most polluting, in addition to being responsible for attacks against Humanity.
This money must be at the service of peace: at the service of the energy transition, energy democracy and public services.
Recommended Readings:
Fossil Fuel Subsidies Surged to Record $7 Trillion – International Monetary Fund - https://www.imf.org/en/Blogs/Articles/2023/08/24/fossil-fuel-subsidies-surged-to-record-7-trillion
Eliminating Tax Exemption [on Aviation] – Stay Grounded - https://stay-grounded.org/eliminating-tax-exemptions/
Banking on Climate Chaos – Fossil Fuel Finance Report 2023: https://www.bankingonclimatechaos.org/
An end to luxury emissions
Stop the use of private jets, luxury cars, and yachts. All the luxury present in high-emission activities constitutes an attempt to accentuate the inequality at the root of the climate crisis.
Billionaires emit a million times more than the average person. This doesn't happen because they eat a million cream puffs a day and don't recycle the aluminum; it happens because they have a luxury economy built exclusively around them, completely disconnected from the overwhelming majority of the population: 90% of the entire world versus 125 individuals.
The UN points out that the ultra-rich need to cut more than 97% of their emissions, yet luxury consumption has never been higher. They know what they are doing: a private jet trip between London and New York emits more CO2eq than a Portuguese family in an entire year.
In the historical moment we find ourselves in, every jet or super-yacht trip can easily be classified as a missile fired at random poor people all over the world. The use of ultra-luxury products should be criminalized, according to criminologists. However, it is in fact increasing and breaking new records.
It's simple: abolish the use of private jets, luxury cars and yachts.
Recommended Readings:
Ban Private Jets. End Luxury Emissions. – Stay Grounded - https://stay-grounded.org/ban-private-jets/
A billionaire emits a million times more greenhouse gases than the average person – Oxfam report – https://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/billionaire-emits-million-times-more-greenhouse-gases-average-person
Lynch, M. J., Long, M. A., Stretesky, P. B., & Barrett, K. L. (2019). Measuring the Ecological Impact of the Wealthy: Excessive Consumption, Ecological Disorganization, Green Crime, and Justice. Social Currents, 6(4), 377-395. https://doi.org/10.1177/2329496519847491
End unnecessary consumption
Immediately halt consumption bearing no social utility and carrying a major impact on emissions, waste of fresh water and the destruction of territories and ecosystems – such as cruises, useless “gifts”, golf courses and Lisbon-Porto flights.
The affluent middle-class lifestyle in the Global North was created in the image of the ultra-rich: happiness-seeking consumerism. As a result, the richest 10% produce half of CO2 emissions, globally and also within each country.
The encouragement and maintenance of unnecessary high-emission consumption constitutes an active attempt to establish a society addicted to its destruction.
We must end:
Short-haul flights (e.g. Lisbon-Oporto) which now have multiple railway connections.
Cruise trips, that emit as much as 1 million cars.
Golf courses, which today threaten access to drinking water and access to water for agriculture.
Luxury tourist developments with high water and energy consumption, or associated with the destruction of ecosystems and protected areas (e.g. destruction of dunes in the northern Alentejo coast).
Production of non-essential single-use plastics;
SUV cars, which emit 700 megatonnes of CO2 every year, approximately the total production of the United Kingdom and the Netherlands combined. If all SUV drivers got together to form their own country, it would be the sixth largest emitter in the world.
Recommended Readings:
“Bullshit Flights”: A debate on legitimate air traffic – Stay Grounded - https://stay-grounded.org/bullshit-flights-a-debate-on-legitimate-air-travel/
SOS quinta dos ingleses: https://www.sosquintadosingleses.com/
Dunas Livres: https://dunaslivres.pt/
Stop evictions and deportations
All people have an unalienable right to housing and land – they are a basic condition for survival. Removing people from where they live, whether through eviction or deportation, is an act against life.
Living in climate crisis is living in environmental, political and social upheaval. Expelling people from their homes, their communities or place of living is dropping them in the midst of floods, heatwaves, social conflict and precariousness.
We need to put an end to evictions, clearances and demolitions without offering alternative, decent housing, which keeps the household in its area of residence. (See Stop Despejos for more information about the fight to stop evictions in Portugal.)
Likewise, at a time when tens of millions of climate refugees exist, and knowing that this number will have increased to one billion by 2050, we need to stop deportations. Deporting people means condemning them to the very social, economic, political or climate conditions from which they are trying to escape, it means condemning them to homelessness, hunger, thirst, rape, separation from their families, and, in many cases, death.
One priority line in adaptation to the climate crisis is to guarantee housing and legal papers for everyone.
Fossil-free policy
Immediate exclusion of companies, CEOs and shareholders who profit from fossil fuels, from participating in political processes and public policies.
Fossil fuel companies have known for decades the impact of their activities. Their choice has been to spread counterinformation and block crucial alternatives. They are everyday directing political processes and interfering with public policies.
The fossil fuel oligarchy must not be allowed a seat at the table when designing public policies, as in the case of Jamila Madeira.
Political decision-makers must not hold a history of complicity with the fossil fuel industry – as was the case with the Minister of Economy, António Costa Silva.
Lobbying – formal and informal – must be transparent in Portugal and lobbying by industries and companies responsible for the climate crisis must not be allowed.
Recommended Readings:
Fossil Free Politics - https://www.fossilfreepolitics.org/
Stop the revolving door: fossil fuel policy influencers – https://corporateeurope.org/en/stop-revolving-door
Telling the truth: Honesty about the state of the climate crisis
All institutions must go into climate-emergency mode, with a central focus on stopping the climate crisis.
There is a scientific and social consensus that stopping the climate crisis is the current priority. However, the education system, judicial, legislative and social institutions and the media continue to act as if we were not facing Humanity's greatest challenge. People need to be told the truth so that we can make informed and realistic decisions. All decisions, debates and news must have the climate crisis as their main framework.
Recommended Readings:
Sociedade civil: Declaração de Estado de Emergência Climática – Climáximo - https://www.climaximo.pt/declaracao-de-emergencia-climatica/
Advogados: Lawyers are Responsible - https://www.lar.earth/
Ciêntistas: World Scientists’ Warning of a Climate Emergency - https://climateemergencydeclaration.org/climate-emergency-declaration-from-thousands-of-scientists-goes-around-the-world-again/
Jornalismo: Statement on the Climate Emergency - https://coveringclimatenow.org/projects/covering-climate-now-statement-on-the-climate-emergency/
Cultura: Culture Declares Emergency - https://www.culturedeclares.org
Fossil-free public space
Stop all advertising and sponsorships which legitimize the fossil fuel market in all public spaces, such as television, radio, social networks, schools and colleges, streets and roads, at concerts, theaters, museums and football stadiums.
Would we allow management of a concentration camp to advertize its “brand” in public space? So why do we accept advertising from companies that put 90% of their investment into fossil fuels?
We cannot allow fossil energy, aviation, automobile, agricultural or tourism companies any social legitimacy when they have known about and fed the current context of climate collapse. Therefore, all their advertising must be removed and banned, and these companies removed from social, cultural, educational and scientific spheres – both in sponsorships and partnerships.
Any public presentation designed by polluting companies means image washing: misleading the public about the impact of their products or services (green-washing), normalizing their public presence (their logos on events or projects) or trivializing the use of their products (cars, flights, fuel, meat).
Advertising exists solely to spend much needed resources, to commodify creative and artistic potential and to encourage useless consumptions, which make no sense in the climate crisis. These same spaces can instead be used to warn about the dangers of fossil fuels and raise awareness about climate justice.
Additionally, sponsorships on culture and education lead to the fossil industry directly influencing what is talked about, taught, researched, and what are the normalized responses by media, schools and culture on the climate crisis. These spaces need to be independent from the criminal industry that spends millions per year on counterinformation about the climate crisis.
Recommended Readings:
- Advertising and its Discontents – Subvertisers International - https://subvertisers-international.net/ , https://subvertisers-international.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Advertising-and-its-Discontents-S.I.-2022.pdf
