Circular Economy

In the first article of this series, you discovered the fossil fuel industry’s secret weapon which prevents us from making the energy transition. In the second article, you understood how we came to sign such a Treaty and in the third article, the mechanisms preventing this Dirty Treaty to become green were explained. Well done, you’ve reached the last article of the series – of which will discuss the way forward.

In the previous articles, we discussed how the ECT was the fossil fuel’s industry secret weapon to prevent States from undertaking an energy transition. Subsequently, we also discussed why it was obsolete.
Today, we are going to see how they also managed to lock in states in an excessively hard to change Treaty.

If you have read the previous article, you now understand that the ECT acts as a burden to the tax-payer, a barrier to climate neutrality and a blockade for the Energy Transition.. Currently, it only benefits a few: fossil fuels industries, and investment funds.

You may ask yourself – ‘There must be something good about the ECT?’. There was, maybe once.

Never heard of this International Agreement? No one can blame you – even most European Parliament Ministers haven’t. However, the ECT has far-reaching consequences for us all, and we plan to tell you why.

This year, the Energy Charter Conference will take place on 16-17 December 2020 under the Chairmanship of Azerbaijan. All States or Regional Economic Integration Organisations who have signed or acceded to the Energy Charter Treaty (‘ECT’) are members of the Conference, which meets regularly to discuss issues affecting energy cooperation among the ECT’s signatories. The Conference’s aim is to review the implementation of the provisions of the ECT and the Protocol on Energy Efficiency and Related Environmental Aspects, and to consider possible new instruments and joint activities within the Energy Charter framework. As mentioned in our article entitled “The ECT, an obstacle to the energy transition: how did we get here?”, the ECT is a problematic and outdated treaty which has to be modernised. In this article, we will discuss the modernisation process of the ECT, including the objectives and challenges that the process is facing.

The above quote refers to amendment 143, which introduced Article 8a, to the European Climate Law adopted by the European Parliament on 8 October 2020, , establishing the framework for achieving climate neutrality. The objective of the amendment is to transform political promises, made by Member States to become climate neutral by 2050, into binding obligations and thus give European citizens legal certainty and reliability in relation to this transition. Actually, the Energy Charter Treaty (‘ECT’) has become a major obstacle to reach this target. In this article, we will have a closer look at the ECT and talk about its negative impact on the European climate objectives.

So what is 5G exactly? Is it a digital revolution that will allow us to live better (connected) lives? Or is it just a convenient tool to watch pornography in elevators? And most of all, what does it mean for our planet?

In this episode: why being cautious about 5G does not mean that you’re an Amish

So what is 5G exactly? Is it a digital revolution that will allow us to live better (connected) lives? Or is it just a convenient tool to watch pornography in elevators? And most of all, what does it mean for our planet?

In this episode: there must be something good about 5G, or else why would the EU be racing to set it up?

So what is 5G exactly? Is it a digital revolution that will allow us to live better (connected) lives? Or is it just a convenient tool to watch pornography in elevators? And most of all, what does it mean for our planet?

In this episode – what is 5G anyway?