The Environment Chronicle

On 2 February 2011 NOAA reopend 4,213 square miles of Gulf of Mexico federal waters off Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama to royal red shrimping. The area was closed to this type of deep water fishing on Nov. 24 as a precautionary measure after a commercial shrimper discovered tar balls in his net. The "fingerprint" analysis to determine whether the source of the tar balls was the Deepwater Horizon/BP oil was inconclusive. Further fish and shrimp sampling and testing from the area showed no oil or dispersant contamination. This reopening was announced after consultation with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. All commercial and recreational fishing is allowed within this area.

On 2 February 2011 the global community celebrated the 40th anniversary of the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands.

On 28 January 2011 the Berne Declaration (BD) and Greenpeace Suisse denounced the particularly flagrant human rights abuses and environmental sins committed by corporations. With the 2011 Public Eye Awards, BD and Greenpeace “reward” two corporations that exemplify those WEF members and enterprises whose social and environmental offences expose the flip side of purely profit-oriented globalization. For the contamination of land and poisoning of people from gold mining in Ghana, the South African mining corporation AngloGold/Ashanti receives the jury-selected Public Eye Global Award. For the Web-based Public Eye People’s Award, mobilizing more than twice as many voters this year as in 2010, Neste Oil cleaned up with 17'385 votes, thus relegating BP (13'000) and Philip Morris (8'052) to runners-up. The Finnish biofuel producer – and soon the world’s largest palm oil purchaser – sells bio-diesel Europe-wide under the shameless name “Green Diesel.” The huge jump in demand for palm oil fuels rain forest destruction in Indonesia and Malaysia, threatening the remaining refuges of the already endangered orangutan.

A 28 month long pilot scheme initiated by WWF Germany/TRAFFIC using sniffer dogs to detect wildlife products smuggled through Frankfurt airport has proved so successful, it is to be extended Europe-wide. WWF Germany presented information on the project, which is funded by the European Commission Directorate-General for Home Affairs (DG Home Affairs), at a three day global forum on the use of detector dogs and handler teams in enforcement operations taking place this week in celebration of World Customs Organization Day on 26th January 2011.

ON 26 January 2011 the Chair of the German Advisory Council on the Environment (SRU), Prof. Dr Faulstich, presented Federal Environment Minister Norbert Röttgen with the special report "Pathways towards a 100% renewable electricity system (Wege zur 100% erneuerbaren Stromversorgung)." The study comes to the conclusion that a 100% renewable electricity supply is possible in Germany by 2050. The report shows various scenarios illustrating how a 100% renewable electricity supply in Germany can be achieved. The main scenarios analysed are a purely national expansion strategy, collaboration with Denmark and Norway and a European solution incorporating North Africa. In addition to the significant expansion of renewable energies, increased energy efficiency and the expansion of grid and storage capacities are crucial to the successful implementation of the development illustrated in the scenarios.

On 26 January the European Commission set out its views on a strategic framework that should deliver a more sustainable use of natural resources and the shift towards resource-efficient, low-carbon growth in Europe. This strategy is the seventh and last of the Europe 2020 flagship initiatives which aim at building smart, sustainable and inclusive growth for Europe. It establishes resource efficiency as the guiding principle for EU policies on energy, transport, climate change, industry, commodities, agriculture, fisheries, biodiversity and regional development. By using synergies across these policy-areas, the strategy will be instrumental in reaching a variety of EU objectives, from reducing European greenhouse gas emissions by 80 to 95% by 2050 to reforming the agricultural and fisheries sectors, from reducing food insecurity in developing countries to making the Union more resilient to future rises in global energy and commodity prices.

The French government has announced plans to seek investors for a €10 billion project to build the country’s first offshore wind-power facilities. The project calls for the installation of 600 wind turbines at a number of sites along France’s lengthy Atlantic coastline. The turbines will have a total capacity of 3 GW.

On 21 January 2011, EU Member State representatives adopted the European Commission’s draft Regulation banning the use of credits from industrial gas projects in the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS) post-2012.

Greenhouse gas emissions are dropping further despite the decommissioning of eight nuclear power plants in 2011. When compared with emissions from 2010, emissions in 2011 fell by 2.9 percent, mainly due to weather conditions. This amounts to 27 million tonnes less carbon dioxide equivalent. The greatest reductions were recorded in combustion plants for the generation of space heating and as a result private household emissions fell. Over the past few years most sectors have recorded a weaker rate of reduction. However, by contrast, emissions were reduced by almost 27 percent in 1990.

The 2011 German Environmental Award of the Deutsche Bundesstiftung Umwelt (DBU) has been given to two prize-winners who have demonstrated the potential for environmental relief in the German small-firm sector: the prize, worth altogether 500,000 euros, is shared by the associate, co-founder and board spokesman of memo AG (Greussenheim), Jürgen Schmidt (48), and the managing directors of the company WS Wärmeprozesstechnik (Renningen), Dr Joachim Alfred Wünning (81) and Dr Joachim Georg Wünning (48). Schmidt is receiving the award for the way his climate-neutral mail order company contributes to sustainable consumption in the office, school, home and leisure time with its ecological products. The Wünning father-and-son team is being presented with the prize for their efforts in making possible a more efficient use of energy and considerable reductions of emissions in energy-intensive key technologies, and for setting international standards in innovative environmental technology. Christian Wulff presented the prizes in Stuttgart on 30 October 2012.

At 450 million tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, 1,640 power generation and industrial facilities required to participate in emissions trading in Germany emitted approximately one percent less climate-damaging CO2 in 2011 than in 2010. Despite a very strong economy and nuclear phase-out, the reduction of CO2 emissions has continued since 2008. According to preliminary calculations, CO2 emissions were especially reduced in the energy sector compared to 2010. In this sector, emission reductions are between two percent in large combustion facilities and six percent in smaller combustion facilities.

Stephen R. Carpenter, Professor of Zoology and Limnology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA, will receive the 2011 Stockholm Water Prize. This announcement was made on 22 March 2011 in connection with the UN World Water Day. Professor Carpenter's groundbreaking research has shown how lake ecosystems are affected by the surrounding landscape and by human activities. His findings have formed the basis for concrete solutions on how to manage lakes.

The competition “German Capital of Biodiversity” was organised by Deutsche Umwelthilfe and started in July 2010. All municipalities were invited to participate. To ensure a fair competition, all towns and cities were grouped according to their size: Towns below 10,000 inhabitants, between 10,000 and 30,000, 30,000 to 100,000 as well as cities above 100,000 inhabitants. 124 municipalities, over one third of which were large cities of over 100,000 inhabitants, filled out the comprehensive questionnaire and submitted altogether nearly 900 biodiversity projects. The award ceremony took place on 6 April 2011 in Cologne. The city of Hannover, capital of the federal state of Lower Saxony, was the clear winner of the competition „German Capital of Biodiversity 2010/2011“ and received a prize money of 25.000 Euros donated by the Vibrant Cities Foundation.

The Nature and Biodiversity Conservation Union (NABU) has announced their 2011 Dinosaur of the Year award. 2011’s dinosaurs are the cruise ship industry. The German-based NABU singled out cruise lines AIDA and TUI, based in Germany, as the representatives of their branch. NABU President Olaf Tschimpke states that cruise ships emit particle pollution equivalent to 5 million cars driving the same distance as a cruise ship travels.

The European Commission awarded Hamburg the title of European Green Capital 2011 in Brussels, February 23, 2009. Hamburg, a city of 1.8 million people, is a city that matches environmental policy commitment with appropriate funding. Air quality is very good, numerous awareness raising programmes are in place, and the city has introduced extremely ambitious climate protection goals such as reducing its CO2 emissions by 40% by 2020 and by 80% by the year 2050. Measures introduced include a cost-efficiency benchmark for energy-saving measures in public buildings, with programmes for lighting, boilers and refrigerator replacement. Over 200,000 conventional lamps in more than 400 public buildings have been replaced, and in recent years €18 million has been spent replacing more than 600 boiler systems with modern condensing boilers. CO2 emissions per person have been reduced by about 15% compared to 1990, with annual energy savings of some 46,000 MWh. Almost 100% of Hamburg's citizens have public transport within 300 meters. There is also a systematic structure of green spaces which are easily accessible to citizens. Hamburg was also commended for its communication strategy, and its proposal to launch a 'train of ideas' where other cities ‘own’ a wagon and promote their green ideas, achievements and future plans.