Human Rights
The entire nuclear fuel chain involves the release of radioactivity, contamination of the environment and damage to human health. Most often, communities of color, indigenous peoples or those of low-income are targeted to bear the brunt of these impacts, particularly the damaging health and environmental effects of uranium mining. The nuclear power industry inevitably violates human rights. While some of our human rights news can be found here, we also focus specifically on this area on out new platform, Beyond Nuclear International.
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Opponents hope stalling the project could hurt Energy Transfer Partner's bottom line enough to cancel the pipeline's construction, as reported at CommonDreams.
As reported at Democracy Now!:
In North Dakota, water protectors fighting the Dakota Access pipeline say police arrested four people on Tuesday near a construction site where workers with Energy Transfer Partners hope to drill under the Missouri River. Water protectors say the four were taking part in a peaceful prayer walk and encountered police armed with a water cannon, riot gear and armored vehicles.
Meanwhile, the company building the Dakota Access pipeline suffered another setback this week, after a pair of major investors held off on a purchase of a $2 billion stake in the project. A filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission shows Enbridge Energy Partners and Marathon Petroleum Corporation won’t meet a previous deadline of December 31 to complete a sale. The companies will now have until March 31 to consider whether to walk away from an investment in the pipeline. Energy analyst Antonia Juhasz called the filing very bad news for Energy Transfer Partners, writing, "If Enbridge and Marathon thought that completion of the pipeline was a done deal, the money would have been a done deal too. This means they are worried and are not feeling secure enough to turn over their cash, putting even more financial pressure on Energy Transfer Partners."
Keystone XL may have been a prelude, but the success of the Standing Rock 'water protectors' was more about environmental justice than just another pipeline. As reported by Phil McKenna at Inside Climate News.
Actress Jane Fonda spent her 79th birthday protesting the Dakota Access Pipeline, and her birthday gift to herself was taking her money out of Wells Fargo bank.
"As a customer of your bank, I reject the notion of my money helping to support your investment in the Dakota Access Pipeline," Fonda announced as a surrounding crowd cheered.
Actress Susan Sarandon helped launch the divestment campaign against DAPL supporting banks.
And several months ago, musician Neil Young's birthday gift to himself was to travel to the water protectors' encampment at Standing Rock Sioux to express solidarity, with his partner, actress Daryl Hannah, at his side.
Sarandon is a Beyond Nuclear Launch Partner, and Young -- along with Crosby, Stills, and Nash -- has invited Beyond Nuclear and other anti-nuke groups to info. table at CSNY concerts for many years, via the Guacamole Fund and Musicians United for Safe Energy (MUSE) network.
Two more MUSE artists associated with the Guacamole Fund, Bonnie Raitt (another Beyond Nuclear Launch Partner) and Jackson Browne, who have invited Beyond Nuclear to info. table at their concerts on many occassions, have also travelled to Standing Rock Sioux. In fact, they played a benefit and morale boosting concert there on Nov. 27, 2016, Thanksgiving Day weekend, just a week after the most violent police riot to date, in which 300 water protectors were injured, some critically.
December 29, 2016