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WHY THE SCOTTISH FOSSIL FUEL INDUSTRY?
World leaders consistently deny that the fossil fuel industry must come to an end through their actions, and Scotland is no different. The greenhouse gas emissions that come from Scotland’s oil and gas is not counted against the Scottish Government’s climate targets, allowing the Scottish Government to claim that continued exploration and extraction is compatible with acting on climate change. They have dodged the question about the industry’s future whilst issuing vague far-off statements about a transition.
Instead of spurring change the Scottish Government is actively pursuing “maximum economic recovery” of oil and gas in the North Sea, a policy which the First Minister says would lead to a further 20 billion barrels being extracted. They are supported by the UK Government and all major UK political parties.
Additionally, Scotland’s industry has been encouraged to export their expertise by helping drill for oil in frontier fields abroad, including along the Atlantic coast of Africa. This is a new wave of colonialism.
In this context Scotland’s oil and gas corporations continue to shore up their industry and even plan for future growth.
INEOS, owned by the UK’s richest man Jim Ratcliffe, has recently redeveloped parts of its Grangemouth refinery to process imported fracked gas from the United States, which now enters on supertankers travelling the River Forth. INEOS are seeking a major ‘renewal’ programme at the Grangemouth oil and gas refinery, Falkirk, and are expected to announce the next phase of developments in early 2020.
ExxonMobil and Shell continue to eke out the lifespan of their Mossmoran plants in Fife, which process ethane from the Grangemouth refinery into feedstocks for single-use plastics. Mossmoran regularly flouts pollution limits and illegal flaring is a bane on the local community. Its future is at a crossroads: to modernise or to be shut down.
To the West, Peel Ports in Hunterston are proposing to build a brand new gas-fired power station on the site of a former coal port, and facilities to import fracked gas to fuel it.Following the demolition of Cockenzie and Longannet coal fired power stations this would be Scotland’s first new fossil fuel power station in decades.
The world needs Scotland to end its greenhouse gas emissions. That means an end to INEOS’ oil refinery, and end to turning American fracked gas into plastics, and an end to fossil fuelled electricity.
WHY A TRANSITION TO JUSTICE?
Ending fossil fuels won’t protect local communities and workers by default—either in Scotland or around the world. Our economy is broken and rigged, and the new fossil free economy we build has to be different.
We live in a world defined by inequality. The 26 richest people in the world own the same as the 3.8 billion poorest and the wealth of the world’s billionaires is increasing by $2.5 billion a day. In Scotland the richest 1% own more wealth than the bottom 50% and land inequality is some of the worst in the world with just 1,125 land-owners owning 70% of Scotland’s rural land. In Scotland’s cities the poorest suffer most from urban air pollution, which contributes to 2,500 early deaths every year.
These inequalities are not an accident. Corporations and the super rich spend their time protecting their interests, profiting from them, and acquiring more and more. Our global neoliberal economic system advances the rights of the already wealthy, who control the economy—and our lives—to an extreme extent.
Climate change fans the flames of this inequality. Countries in the global south are disproportionately affected by rising sea levels, extreme weather, flooding, drought and the spread of disease. When the poor try to flee these conditions they face lethally dangerous border controls while the rich are granted global freedom of movement. The wealthy, who have disproportionately contributed to this crisis, are leaving the poorest to face the worst impacts.
Against this backdrop we see the advance of a fascistic prescription for tackling environmental chaos: blame the problem on the poor, insist on population controls, close our borders and build up the walls. The agenda of the right shows in clear view the way the world will be if climate justice does not prevail.
As we seek to protect our climate we must find ways to redistribute wealth and power. As citizens of the global north, acknowledging and remedying the impact of colonial and neoliberal policies on the global poor must be part of our struggle for climate justice.
In Scotland itself, a just transition must empower communities and workers, not big oil. During the oil industry downturn in 2015, Scottish oil companies laid off thousands of workers driving people into foodbanks. INEOS boss Jim Ratcliffe has squashed workers rights in Grangemouth. The UK and Scottish Governments back these actions, handing out tax breaks worth billions, protecting bosses not workers.
It doesn’t have to be this way. In many countries a swift transition away from fossil fuels is being managed by worker, government and community-owned companies, ensuring the new renewable economy is just and fair. If we fight for it we too can have a just transition away from fossil fuels and towards sustainability that protects workers across the global energy supply chain and delivers prosperity and justice to people and planet.
WHY A SCOTTISH CLIMATE CAMP?
In 2021 the world will come to Scotland to discuss this crisis at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Glasgow. World leaders and their representatives will talk for two weeks. Without intervention they will most likely continue to avoid the fundamental reality of the climate crisis: that the main driver of this catastrophe is the burning of fossil fuels. If we are to address the climate crisis, we must stop burning fossil fuels, stop extracting fossil fuels, and stop fossil fuel companies.
This makes 2021 the year to turn the tide.
We propose to take the fight to the places in Scotland sacrificed to the oil and gas industry.
There we will build spaces where people can learn, share and take action together. A climate camp can provide a national focus for Scotland’s climate justice struggle. Time and again mass protests at climate camps have preceded major victories. In 2009 the first Scottish Climate Camp brought people from across the UK to Lanarkshire to join a local and national struggle against coal that by 2016 had seen the end of coal in Scotland. Starting in 2012, anti-fracking camps in England brought national attention to local struggles that saw a halt to fracking across the UK in 2019. In Dakota, USA, rolling resistance by the Standing Rock Sioux tribe brought global attention to their struggle to defend their land from oil pipelines. Extinction Rebellion have captured people’s imaginations through the act of camping on the streets of central London and at the Scottish Parliament. Climate camps provide an effective base from which to take disruptive and attention grabbing action that disrupts polluting industry and builds campaigns that stop them permanently.
A climate camp can also create a visionary, welcoming space that allows people to join the movement, learn and share. Climate camps can host workshops, talks and practical demonstrations offering a vision of the just world we want to build. We can share food, music and fun. We can bring people together between movements and communities and enable collective discussion and planning, forming new platforms for change. Such a camp would be an end in of itself.
Whilst we would work to make Scotland’s climate camp welcoming it will not include everyone. We recognise that taking action in solidarity with others is not enough: we must also reach out by holding events and actions that meet others needs first, building connections and empowering workers and local front-line communities in Scotland. This is an integral part of our programme.
2021 is our year to envision a post-oil and gas economy.
As the United Nations prepares to come to Scotland we can use direct action, civil disobedience and community-movement building to move the climate spotlight away from self-congratulatory gesturing and towards real solutions: shutting down corporate polluters.
This is a vital moment for Scotland and the United Kingdom. Brexit is sending earthquakes across Britain that could see Scotland lean towards independence.
If we mass mobilise we will be ready for these opportunities, to forge a vision of systemic change that marks the end of this wasteful, unjust and lethal economy of ours to something that delivers prosperity and life to communities here and across the world.
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