Den Selvejende Institution NOAH
NOAH
NOAH arbejder for det levende miljø, ved aktivt at bekæmpe miljøødelæggelsen og dens årsager - og anvise alternativer.
ID: 717157143269-11
Lobbying Activity
Meeting with Ditte Juul-Joergensen (Director-General Energy) and Ørsted A/S and
6 Oct 2023 · Energy Transition
Response to Carbon capture utilisation and storage deployment
31 Aug 2023
In 2009, NOAH Friends of the Earth Denmark analysed a wide range of issues related to CCS: timing (in the climate context), environmental impacts, climate impacts, economics, financing, liability, relationship to energy scenarios and CDM/JI, among others. These analyses led us to conclude that CCS could not be considered a viable climate tool, but rather a tool of interest to the coal, oil and gas industry and the energy companies - and countries - with large fossil fuel interests. See http://ccs-info.org/ In 2010, NOAH produced a report in which we assessed the impact CCS could have as a climate tool if implemented at the pace and scope from 2010 to 2050 that the IEA based their CCS Roadmap 2009 on. Our conclusion was that when looking at the entire period, 40 years, only around 10% of emissions would avoid ending up in the atmosphere, whereas CCS was 'sold' on the technology being able to store up to 90% of emissions. Since then, we have not seen anything that would make it likely that CCS will be applicable to a degree that justifies all the expectations for that particular technology (or technologies). It is still the case that only one power plant currently operates with carbon capture, on only one of three units at Boundary Dam in Canada. There is no net storage, as the CO2 that is actually captured is used to drive more oil out of the ground. According to the Wuppertal Institute, this results in a total of 3-4 times as many emissions as those captured in the plant. Boundary Dam has been plagued by operational disruptions, for example, the capture section was shut down in 2021 for such long periods that it only delivered 45 percent of its theoretical capacity. The pilot and demonstration projects for which the EU allocated large funds in 2008 failed one by one. The same has happened in the US. The long and short of it is that no one has succeeded with the capture part. Yet governments in countries such as Norway, Denmark and the EU are spending huge amounts of money on CCS, focusing on the storage part. BECCS Bioenergy has early on been labelled climate-neutral because photosynthesis does indeed remove as much CO2 from the air as is later emitted through oxygenation/combustion. But this chemical truth is distorted by ignoring the time factor: it takes much longer to absorb CO2 than it does to burn the biomass. So large-scale biomass is absolutely not climate neutral in any meaningful way. If BECCS were to play as big a role in climate action as proponents claim, exorbitantly large areas of land would be needed to grow the necessary biomass. Areas one to two times the size of India have been mentioned in the literature. This would only be possible by displacing those currently living on and off the same land and/or by continuing to overexploit boreal forests or rainforests. It won't be in the affluent communities north of Copenhagen or in Southern England. DACCS DAC is a science-fiction-like notion that has rich and influential supporters. E.g. Bill Gates. But aside from the fact that these advocates and investors have an easy time getting media attention, there are even less results to show. The idea of a huge infrastructure of transnational pipelines for supercritical CO2 is just another version of business as usual. It does not in any way take into consideration the enviromental and ecological overshoot that is so large that if the whole world followed affluent countries like Denmark four more planet Earths would be required. It is time to start respecting that there is only one Earth, And that we are rapidly depleting our own basis for existence. PS: As we have just today become aware of this possibility of feedback, we would like to announce that we support the contribution from PFPI - Partnership for for Policy Integrity - F3435283 We further attach our response to a consultation - Proposal for a Regulation on an EU certification - in December 2022 on the same matters.
Read full responseResponse to Sustainable food system – setting up an EU framework
26 Oct 2021
NOAH støtter i princippet EU-Kommissionens hensigt om at udvikle en juridisk ramme for bæredygtige fødevaresystemer. Vi vil dog gerne opfordre EU-Kommissionen til at basere dette på verificerbare videnskabelige kriterier og evalueringsskemaer. Systemiske tilgange er påkrævet, der tager hensyn til hele det økologiske og sociale fodaftryk. Der er behov for en omfattende teknologivurdering. Dette kan tjene som et videnskabeligt forsvarligt instrument til operationalisering af en bæredygtighedsanalyse og bevis på fordele (læs venligst positionspapir fra tyske Federal Agency for Nature Conservation: "New developments and regulatory issues in plant genetic engineering"; https://www.bfn.de/fileadmin/BfN/presse/2021/Dokumente/2021_10_15_Positionspapier_EN.pdf)
Der skal oprettes et uafhængigt verifikationsorgan til en sådan bæredygtighedsanalyse. Indsendte data skal være åbent tilgængelige. Uafhængige videnskabelige vurderinger skal indhentes og tages i betragtning.
I tilfælde af regulerede produkter, eksempelvis GMO'er, skal bæredygtighedsvurdering og risikovurdering være uafhængige testprocedurer. Produkter, der er klassificeret som bæredygtige, men som er forbundet med risici, må af forsigtighedsgrunde ikke godkendes til dyrkning eller import.
Risikoprodukter skal fortsat være underlagt streng risikokontrol og godkendelsesprocedure, og skal kunne spores og mærkes. Genom-redigerede produkter skal mærkes som GMO på alle produkterne, for at give forbrugerne mulighed for at træffe en velinformeret beslutning. Ved uheld og skader skal det være muligt at fjerne GMO-produkter fra fødekæden. I overensstemmelse med princippet om, at forureneren betaler, skal udviklerne / distributørerne tage omkostningerne fra følgeskaderne og omkostningerne til forebyggelse.
Bæredygtighedsmål og risikovurdering skal ikke have lov til at spille hinanden ud. Selv bæredygtige produkter må kun markedsføres, hvis de har været underkastet en omfattende risikotest og vurdering, og følgeskader så vidt muligt er udelukket i overensstemmelse med forsigtighedsprincippet. Ikke-irreversible risikoteknologier må ikke godkendes, for ikke at kunne trænge ind i miljøet og fødevaresystemerne. Begrænsningen af godkendelsen af risikoprodukter til fx 10 år (som ved GMO-teknologi) skal også bibeholdes og aktuelle videnskabelige undersøgelser analyseres med henblik på en revurdering, inden der gives nye godkendelser.
Ifølge FN har vi kun 60 år med frugtbar jord tilbage, hvis vi fortsætter med at bruge de konventionelle landbrugsmetoder, der dominerer i det industrielle landbrug dag. FN peger på, at det er nødvendigt at lave en overgang til landbrugsmetoder, der kan regenerere jordens organiske stof – altså stoppe med at bruge konventionelle landbrugsmetoder. Det er videnskabeligt dokumenteret, at smålandbrug forbedrer miljøet og sikrer mange arbejdspladser. Det sidste er vigtigt for de landdistrikter, der oplever faldende befolkning og udvandring til byerne. Ikke mindst er vi vidner til et fortsat fald i mængden af mindre landbrug samtidig med, at de store industrielle landbrug udvider sig. GMO-landbrug er en fortsættelse og udvidelse af det store industrielle landbrug. Vi anbefaler især, at EU opstiller ambitiøse reduktionsmål for animalsk produktion (som i europæisk målestok udgør næsten 75 procent af EU's fodaftryk), subsidierer overgangen til regenerative landbrugsmetoder - der regenererer i stedet for degenerere jorden – og støtter småskala landbrug.
Vi beder EU-Kommissionen om at tage vores perspektiver med i de efterfølgende forhandlinger.
Kontakt: Natalia Lehrmann og June Rebekka Bresson
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