EarthJustice

In this issue: How the National Environmental Policy Act is the people’s environmental law, what a shorebird can teach us about the biodiversity crisis, the fossil fuel industry’s false climate solution, and more. ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌

SEPTEMBER NEWSLETTER

$Navajo community leader Daniel Tso speaks out against fracking at a Bureau of Land Management meeting that was required under the National Environmental Policy Act. The law gives communities a chance to speak out against projects that will impact them. (Steven St. John for Earthjustice)$

A ‘side-deal’ aimed at silencing community input

The National Environmental Policy Act provides an essential bridge to building projects in a sustainable, just, and equitable way because it ensures people have a voice in major projects built in their communities. But there are backroom negotiations in Congress underway involving oil and gas companies that don’t want community input. If allowed to go forward, the “dirty permitting side-deal” would let industry fast-track fossil fuel projects while sidelining communities, creating more pollution, and worsening the climate crisis.

The climate crisis harms everyone, but its burdens are not shared equally. Communities of color, low-income communities, tribal, and indigenous communities are on the frontlines of fossil fuel pollution and climate impacts. Join Earthjustice as we gather in conversation with environmental advocates and grassroots leaders working towards climate justice for two virtual events at this year’s Climate Week NYC 2022.

Smokestacks. (Chris Jordan-Bloch / Earthjustice)

How does carbon capture extend the life of fossil fuels and harm communities?

For one, carbon capture technologies are energy intensive and often powered by dirty energy, adding to an industrial facility’s overall carbon footprint. Subsidizing these technologies also diverts resources away from real climate solutions like clean energy and electrification, and it blocks progress towards environmental justice.

Red knots, ruddy turnstones, dunlin and semipalmated sandpipers coming through the Delaware Bay near Fortescue, New Jersey, on May 23, 2022. (Aristide Economopoulos for Earthjustice)

What a shorebird can teach us about the biodiversity crisis

Each year, red knot shorebirds make a crucial stop along the Atlantic coast in the middle of their 9,000-mile journey from South America to the Arctic Circle. But overharvesting of horseshoe crabs in the Atlantic by the fishing industry is disrupting their food supply.

A tension-leg oil production platform burns off unrecoverable gas and leaves a plume of smoke in the Gulf of Mexico. (Land By Sea / Getty Images)

How our public waters get leased for oil

Disastrous offshore oil spills, like the BP Deepwater Horizon explosion and spill in the Gulf, each began with an offshore federal lease sale. The Biden administration has a critical opportunity to determine the immediate future of offshore leasing with its five-year leasing plan. Here’s what you need to know about the plan, how you can engage, and why it’s crucial to demand that the Biden administration chooses the option for allowing no new offshore oil and gas development in the plan.

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Environmental justice advocate Dulce Altamirano in front of the Marathon Refinery in Los Angeles' Wilmington neighborhood on Sept. 1, 2020. (Tara Pixley for Earthjustice)

How Earthjustice — and you — are fighting for a fossil-free future

The culprit behind the climate crisis is also inextricably linked to every other major environmental hazard, from plastic waste to environmental racism — it’s the fossil fuel industry. We need informed advocates to play a critical role in the fight. But individual action alone can’t solve the climate crisis. The scale of this challenge requires collective action, something that groups like Earthjustice are fighting hard to coordinate.

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Photo Credits (top to bottom):
Steven St. John for Earthjustice, Chris Jordan-Bloch / Earthjustice, Aristide Economopoulos for Earthjustice, Land By Sea / Getty Images, Tara Pixley for Earthjustice