December, 14 2021, 10:13am EDT
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For Immediate Release
Contact:
Gabby Brown (Sierra Club), gabby.brown@sierraclub.org
Julia Cusick (CAP), jcusick@americanprogress.org
Jason Schwartz (Sunrise Project), jason.schwartz@sunriseproject.
US Banks and Investors Responsible for Roughly the Emissions of Russia, Report Finds
Center for American Progress and the Sierra Club look at "financed emissions" to offer novel view of the large carbon footprint of US banks and asset managers.
WASHINGTON
A new report published today by Center for American Progress and the Sierra Club finds that the 18 largest US banks and asset managers alone were responsible for financing the equivalent of 1.968 billion tons of CO2 in 2020. This would make the US financial sector the 5th biggest emitter of CO2 in the world if it were a country - ranked just below Russia and ahead of Indonesia.1 The new research offers a novel picture of the enormous carbon footprint of American finance and calls for a suite of regulations to be introduced across the sector to bring US banks in line with the Paris Agreement target of 1.5 degrees Celsius of global warming.
The analysis, carried out by leading climate solutions and project developer South Pole, used a market-leading carbon accounting methodology to calculate, for the first time, the aggregate carbon emissions associated with the lending and investment activities of the US financial sector, based on an indicative sample.2 While the analysis clearly demonstrates the scale of impact from financial institutions in driving climate change, it likely represents a gross underestimate, as it relies on public disclosures that exclude crucial data, including emissions related to advisory services and underwriting and estimations of Scope 3 emissions for bank clients. Scope 3 emissions account for 88% of emissions for oil and gas companies.
The timing of the report is meaningful because it demonstrates how the financial industry takes advantage of weak disclosure rules to obscure understanding of its contributions to global emissions. Narrow public disclosures by banks do not include transaction-level data in their estimations of credit exposure. In the coming weeks and months, both the OCC and SEC will be considering rules that can--and should--directly address this shortcoming. This report should inform their decision-making.
Ben Cushing, Campaign Manager for the Sierra Club's Fossil-Free Finance campaign: "Regulators can no longer ignore Wall Street's staggering contribution to the climate crisis. Wall Street's toxic fossil fuel investments threaten the future of our planet and the stability of our financial system and put all of us, especially our most vulnerable communities, at risk. Financial regulators have the authority to rein in this risky behavior, and this report makes it clear that there is no time to waste."
Andres Vinelli, Vice President of Economic Policy at the Center for American Progress: "Climate change poses a large systemic risk to the world economy. If left unaddressed, climate change could lead to a financial crisis larger than any in living memory," said "The U.S. banking sector is endangering itself and the planet by continuing to finance the fossil fuel sector. Because the industry has proven itself to be unwilling to govern itself, regulators including the SEC and the OCC must urgently develop a framework to reduce banks' contributions to climate change."
According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), in order to limit global warming to 1.5degC, global emissions need to fall by 45% from 2010 levels before 2030. This year, the International Energy Agency stated that for the world to reach net zero emissions by 2050, there must be no new oil and gas development. However, pledges from the finance sector at COP26 in Glasgow this November have been widely criticized for a lack of concrete targets or timelines, a failure to directly address banks' support of fossil fuel companies, and a reliance on watered down "intensity" targets on emissions, instead of absolute targets. Banks continue to pour money into the fossil fuel industry. In fact, since the signing of the Paris Agreement in 2015, the world's largest 60 banks alone have provided $3.8 trillion to the fossil fuel industry.
President Biden has set ambitious targets for emission reductions in the US, but so far his administration has fallen short of utilizing its regulatory and policymaking powers to address the role of corporations in driving climate change. The report recommends numerous immediate and specific steps federal financial regulators can take to account for the imminent systemic threat of climate change, including reforms to capital markets regulation and regulations regarding capital requirements and supervision of banks.
Fossil fuel investments represent a large systemic financial risk in and of themselves. As the climate changes and as the world moves towards cleaner and cheaper renewable energy, fossil fuel assets are increasingly at risk of being "stranded," whether because the world is forced to move to cleaner energy or because of the impacts of climate change itself. As the report notes: "According to insurance provider Swiss Re, climate change could reduce global GDP by 11 percent to 14 percent by 2050 as compared with a world without climate change. That amounts to a $23 trillion loss, causing damage that would far surpass the scale of the 2008 financial crisis."
The report replicates a similar approach to one by Greenpeace UK and WWF that found that the UK financial sector was responsible for over 800 million tons of CO2 equivalent, nearly double the UK's total emissions.
- New report finds that if US financial institutions were a country, they would be the fifth worst carbon emitter in the world, or just below Russia, in annual net emissions of CO2;
- The finance sector is driving greenhouse gas emissions, yet there is currently no requirement for it to reduce emissions in line with government targets - unlike other industries;
- CAP and the Sierra Club call for rules and regulations that would align the US finance sector with the Paris Agreement, including impending rulemaking at the SEC and OCC.
The Sierra Club is the most enduring and influential grassroots environmental organization in the United States. We amplify the power of our 3.8 million members and supporters to defend everyone's right to a healthy world.
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Video Game Actors Strike for AI Protections
"The video game industry generates billions of dollars in profit annually," said one union leader. "The driving force behind that success is the creative people who design and create those games."
Jul 25, 2024
After nearly two years of negotiations with video game giants and no deal that would protect performers from artificial intelligence, unionized voice and motion capture actors who work in video game development announced Thursday that they will go on strike starting at 12:01 am on Friday, July 26.
The performers are represented by Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA), which last year won a contract for TV and film actors that included "unprecedented provisions for consent and compensation that will protect members from the threat of AI," after the union went on strike for four months.
The union has been negotiating on behalf of video game actors with major production companies including Disney Character Voices Inc., Activision Productions Inc., and WB Games Inc., and has won concessions over wages and job safety—but "AI protections remain the sticking point," said SAG-AFTRA on Thursday as the impending strike was announced.
Unionized actors want protections that would stop video game companies from training AI to replicate actors' voices or likeness without their consent and without compensating them.
"The video game industry generates billions of dollars in profit annually," said Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, national executive director and chief negotiator for SAG-AFTRA. "The driving force behind that success is the creative people who design and create those games. That includes the SAG-AFTRA members who bring memorable and beloved game characters to life, and they deserve and demand the same fundamental protections as performers in film, television, streaming, and music: fair compensation and the right of informed consent for the AI use of their faces, voices, and bodies."
"Frankly, it's stunning that these video game studios haven't learned anything from the lessons of last year—that our members can and will stand up and demand fair and equitable treatment with respect to AI, and the public supports us in that," he added.
Sarah Elmaleh, negotiating committee chair for the union's interactive media agreement, said the negotiations have shown the companies "are not interested in fair, reasonable AI protections, but rather flagrant exploitation."
"We look forward to collaborating with teams on our interim and independent contracts, which provide AI transparency, consent, and compensation to all performers, and to continuing to negotiate in good faith with this bargaining group when they are ready to join us in the world we all deserve," said Elmaleh.
The unionized actors voted in favor of the strike authorization with a 98.32% yes vote, said SAG-AFTRA.
The strike was announced as more than 500 workers who help develop the popular World of Warcraft video game franchise voted to join the Communications Workers of America (CWA), with the games publisher, Blizzard Entertainment, recognizing the bargaining unit.
CWA noted that the workers' journey to union representation began with a walkout in 2021 at Activision Blizzard, which was later bought by Microsoft, over sexual harassment and discrimination.
"What we've accomplished at World of Warcraft is just the beginning," Eric Lanham, a World of Warcraft test analyst, said in a statement. "We know that when workers have a protected voice, it's a win-win for employee standards, the studio, and World of Warcraft fans looking for the best gaming experience."
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'Cowardice': Homeless Advocates Condemn Newsom Order to Remove Encampments
"The only way to end homeless encampments in California is to end the need for homeless encampments," an expert said.
Jul 25, 2024
Civil rights advocates and progressive commentators on Thursday condemned California Gov. Gavin Newsom after the Democrat issued an executive order to shut down homeless encampments on state property and to incentivize local authorities to do the same.
The order marks the first notable state policy shift to result from a momentous U.S. Supreme Court ruling on June 28, decided 6-3 on ideological lines, that the liberal dissenting justices argued criminalized homelessness.
Eric Tars, a policy director at the National Homelessness Law Center, toldThe New York Times that the executive order effectively blamed the victims of a systemic problem.
"The only way to end homeless encampments in California is to end the need for homeless encampments," he said. "California has an affordable housing crisis, and unless Newsom's executive order is coming with sufficient resources to address that, this new push isn't going to work."
In a direct response to Newsom on social media, Diane Yentel, president of the National Low Income Housing Coalition, said that the governor hadn't provided the fundamental ingredient needed to solve the homelessness problem.
"You didn't provide the needed affordable housing," she wrote. "You're choosing political expediency over real solutions. That's not leadership, it's cowardice. This will only worsen homelessness."
Echoing the need for more housing, Nina Turner, a senior fellow at the Institute on Race, Power and Political Economy, called the Newsom decision "shameful," while Jordan Chariton, a journalist at Status Coup, a progressive media outlet, called it "disgusting," saying Newsom's solution was to "sweep them all up like it's taking out the trash."
Mel Buer, a reporter for The Real News Network, indicated on social media that the decision was in keeping with the political approach of the governor, who is widely believed to have presidential ambitions.
"Saw this one coming from a mile off," Buer wrote of Thursday's executive order. "Newsom's a fucking heartless dipshit who would rather court billionaire donors to his 2028 presidential run than be a real human being."
You didn’t provide the needed affordable housing.
You’re choosing political expediency over real solutions. That’s not leadership, it’s cowardice.
This will only worsen homelessness. https://t.co/2tHk5awTo8
— Diane Yentel (@dianeyentel) July 25, 2024
Critics of last month's Supreme Court ruling in City of Grants Pass, Oregon v. Johnson argued that it would lead to a crackdown on homelessness throughout the country. The conservative justices ruled that the Oregon city could ban sleeping in public places—sidewalks, streets, parks—overturning a 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decision that the local law was unconstitutional.
The San Francisco-based 9th Circuit is one of the most liberal courts in the country and had issued a number of rulings in favor of the rights of homeless people in recent years, frustrating Republicans and some Democrats including Newsom.
California is home to roughly one-third of the nation's homeless population and the reasons for the problem are the subject of fierce ideological debate, as are the solutions. This was evident in the response to the Supreme Court ruling, which led one Republican mayor in California to declare that he was "warming up the bulldozer."
Newsom welcomed the ruling but other Democrats, such as Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass, expressed dismay and concern.
"This ruling must not be used as an excuse for cities across the country to attempt to arrest their way out of this problem or hide the homelessness crisis in neighboring cities or in jail," Bass said a statement at the time.
Newsom doesn't have the power to force local authorities such as Bass to remove homeless encampments but could wield influence at the municipal level because of his control over billions in funding to address homelessness, The New York Timesreported.
Newsom's administration has spent $24 billion in responding to the homelessness crisis since he took office in 2019, including $1 billion to help municipalities remove encampments and $3.3 billion to expand housing for homeless people, the executive order says.
Homeless people still have civil rights, advocacy groups say, warning that they will sue local governments that mistreat the unsheltered. They also point to research showing that sweeping encampments is ineffective, as it doesn't address the root problems of homelessness. A Rand Corporation survey last year showed that sweeps affect homeless populations in an area only temporarily.
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Israeli Snipers Firing at 'Anyone Who Is Moving' in Khan Younis
The southern Gaza city is the latest region where Israeli forces have issued an evacuation order, displacing hundreds of thousands of people.
Jul 25, 2024
At least 129 people have been killed in the last five days of Israeli shelling and artillery fire in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis, where the Israel Defense Forces earlier this week gave people "a couple of minutes only" to evacuate earlier this week, according to Al Jazeera reporter Hind Khoudary, before the bombardment began.
Al Jazeera reported on Thursday that "the vast majority of dead and injured are women and children," as Israeli snipers have also been deployed in the city and are firing at Palestinians indiscriminately.
The snipers "are shooting anyone who is moving," wrote Tareq Abu Azzoum in a dispatch, reporting that the eastern part of Khan Younis is the main target of Israel's current assault.
The Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) noted that the latest evacuation order reduced the area that Israel has claimed is a "humanitarian zone," as the order covered about 15% of al-Mawasi, where people from cities including Rafah and Gaza City have fled in recent months as the IDF has launched assaults in those cities.
The group told Al Jazeera that "there is no more space, even for a single tent, in the so-called 'humanitarian area' of al-Mawasi because of the overwhelming number of people displaced there."
Israel's reported indiscriminate assault on the city has included medical workers, said PRCS, which posted a video on social media Thursday of an ambulance that had been hit by live bullets fired by the IDF while medics were transporting an injured person.
The Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor noted on Monday that the true death toll in Khan Younis—as with the rest of Gaza—may not be known for months, "with many victims remaining trapped under the rubble and in the streets, where rescue workers have not been able to retrieve their bodies."
The group also said the IDF had perpetrated "a kind of deception of the residents" of Khan Younis and villages in the area, including Bali Suhaila, where soldiers entered "amid very violent bombardment, even though the Israeli army had said in its orders that the displacement was going to be temporary."
The forced evacuation, false information about the order, and shrinking of the humanitarian zone were "all part of Israel's media disinformation campaign and psychological warfare tactics, since military assaults on forcibly displaced people and their tents have occurred continually in this area for several weeks now, resulting in hundreds of deaths and injuries," the Euro-Med Monitor.
The reports of indiscriminate shooting by snipers also bolster an account given by Dr. Mark Perlmutter, who volunteered at European Hospital in Khan Younis in April, to CBS News earlier this week.
"I had sniper bullets," said Perlmutter. "I have children that were shot twice... I have two children that I have photographs of, that were shot so perfectly in the chest... and directly on the side of the head on the same child. No toddler gets shot twice by mistake by the world's best sniper. And they're dead-center shots."
Perlmutter is among nearly four dozen doctors and nurses who wrote to President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, and First Lady Jill Biden on Thursday, describing what they saw while volunteering at hospitals across Gaza since Israel began bombarding the enclave and blocking nearly all humanitarian aid, including medications and medical supplies, nearly 10 months ago.
"Children are universally considered innocents in armed conflict," wrote the medical workers. "However, every single signatory to this letter treated children in Gaza who suffered violence that must have been deliberately directed at them. Specifically, every one of us on a daily basis treated pre-teen children who were shot in the head and chest."
"We wish you could hear the cries and screams our consciences will not let us forget," they added. "We cannot believe that anyone would continue arming the country that is deliberately killing these children after seeing what we have seen."
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