Demand a just energy transition for all!
Cerro de Pasco mine, Peru. A source of transition materials used in "green" energy technologies.
Rising energy prices will leave millions in the UK worrying about heating their homes or putting food on the table this winter. Our broken energy system, which puts corporate profit above the needs, health and rights of people and the planet, has already left half the world's population trapped in poverty and denied access to clean and affordable energy.
The UK government claims to be a climate leader with plans to mobilise huge investments in ‘clean energy.’ However, their dirty secret is that they are still backing new fossil fuel projects and their vision for the transition to renewables is rooted in exploitation, extraction and injustice. Intensifying the unsustainable mining of so-called transition metals and minerals, which are used to produce technologies like solar panels, wind turbines and electric vehicle batteries, is devastating communities from Chile to China and causing untold environmental destruction.
Communities are being driven from their homes, the farmlands which they rely on made barren, water supplies made undrinkable, and the air made so polluted its unsafe to breathe. The pursuit of profit and the blinkered approach to CO2 reductions ignore the child labour, unsafe working conditions, repression and violence commonplace in securing ‘transition’ materials.
We need to send a clear message to the UK government. We can have a just energy transition, one that cuts carbon pollution but also respects the rights of affected communities and workers; by making UK energy corporations legally responsible for eliminating human rights abuses in their energy supply chains; by setting legally binding targets on reducing resource use and ending the wasteful use of energy.
The global energy transition must not leave billions around the world locked into energy poverty. We need a Global Green New Deal that sees energy as a public good, not a commodity for corporate profit, that is shared equally to ensure everyone can live with dignity, heat their homes and feed their families whilst protecting the planet.
Take action today by emailing your MP to demand Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero Claire Coutinho takes action for a just energy transition.
