EU’s Obsession With Climate Change Driving Orang-Utans To Brink Of Destruction
By Paul Homewood
From Breitbart:
The orang-utan population of Indonesia is being driven to the brink of extinction thanks to the massive deforestation underway to satisfy the rapidly growing demand for palm oil as a biofuel. Some scientists estimate that as many as 95 percent of the orang-utans native to Sumatra have already been wiped out.
A report in the Telegraph has detailed the level of devastation wrought on the orang-utan population by deforestation. The creatures not only face extermination thanks to loss of habitat directly; forest felling increasingly puts them in conflict with the local human population. Farmers will kill orang-utans caught raiding crops for food, despite it being illegal.
Dr Ian Singleton, a world authority on orang-utans and the director of Sumatran Orang-utan Conservation Programme told the Telegraph that the population toll on organ-utans and other indigenous animals is being fuelled by the alarming pace of clear-felling taking place across much of northern Sumatra.
“After they’ve cleared the forest I go into some of these places, looking for signs of life. Every living thing, everything that crawls or slithers, even mosses and insects, are obliterated in this process. Everything that lived and breathed is dead!” Singleton said.
“These orphans [in his conservation centre] are the by-product of forest loss. These are the lucky ones, the survivors of this whole process. We don’t see the mothers and fathers that are killed. And even if you’re not killed, or attacked by villagers in plantations, you’ll still die of malnutrition and starvation.”………
But although the Telegraph reports that much of the forest has been cleared to satisfy the west’s growing demand for palm oil, they don’t mention that one of the key drivers for the increase in palm oil use is the EU’s insistence on using biofuels – including biodiesel made from palm oil – to fulfill it’s climate change targets.
Between 2006 and 2012, demand for palm oil as a biofuel increase nearly five fold. The International Institute for Sustainable Development looked at the role of EU biofuels subsidies in driving palm oil production, and found that “the additional demand can be linked primarily to the growth of biodiesel production, which has been stimulated by government policies. IISD estimates the value of the government support to biodiesel in the EU was in the range of €4.6 billion to €5.6 billion in 2011.”
“If no policy change occurs, by 2020 the EU biodiesel sector will consume around 2.6 – 2.7 million tonnes of palm oil, or 40 percent more than in 2012.”
The EU has set itself the target of reducing energy consumption across the member states by 20 percent by 2020 (and, bizarrely, of “decoupling [energy] from economic growth”). Mindful that the transport sector is the most energy hungry, using more than either households or businesses, it set itself the additional target of ensuring that renewables account for at least 10 percent of transport energy consumption by 2020.
Not only is this a problem for the orang-utans, it’s also a massive own-goal in terms of cutting carbon emissions as deforestation and the destruction of peat habitats adds greatly to carbon emissions. Indonesia is now said to be the world’s third largest emitter of carbon after China and the USA.
Ivetta Gerasimchuk, one of the reports authors said “If the EU doesn’t cut its current subsidies to biodiesel, it may, in an indirect way, lead to the cutting down of more rainforests, the conversion of more forest and peat land for palm oil plantations, and the emission of more carbon into the atmosphere.”
Full story here.
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NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT 
Sadly this isn’t the beginning of unintended consequences for the misguided eco movement. The denuding of forests for cooking and heating fuel will accelerate and the pace will be horrifying. No scare tactic but the logical progression of removing fossil fuels from these life requirements. Typical ready, shoot, aim process of the environmentalists. The next logical progression of their tactics in response will be “not our fault, there’s too many people”.
BTW I am in Borneo where there are still some wild orang utans ..they are been seen to migrate to new areas recently.
– Furthermore I have been out to the native forest over in Banda Aceh on the tip of Sumatra in 2006n and spotted O U 100m from the road.. and last year I did did speak to the British scientist who worked there recently
I mean last year in UK I attended a meeting by the British ..orangutan scientist who had recently worked in the reserve there I would be surprised if there has been logging on that side of the river..The other side of the river is different, when I was there I met local politicians who had recently been guerrilla fighters and had seen their brothers killed so they might have different priorities to us.
There is real world and there are fantasy green worlds.
Do you get accurate info on orangutans in UK newspapers ?
By coincidence there was this TODAY in a certain paper famed for it’s environmental accuracy ..
Speaking about Gaya Island here in Sabah the reporter said “The afternoons are the hottest times on Gaya .. we set off with a guide on a jungle walk, climbing high above the property. ..We’re looking out for orangutans – famed in these parts. ”
No you weren’t ..there aren’t any orangutans on Gaya. It’s like a tourist going to the Isle of Wight expecting to spot a Scottish Bobcat.
There is another mistake in the text as well.
– Bet you guys can’t guess what newspaper it is !
This insanity was started by the Club of Rome in 1990, and the resulting devastation is an intended consequence.
On page 75 of their 1990 publication entitled The First Global Revolution, the organization outlined how they would manufacture ecological scares in order to manipulate the public into accepting the imposition of a dictatorial world government run by them.
“In searching for a common enemy against whom we can unite, we came up with the idea that pollution, the threat of global warming, water shortages, famine and the like would fit the bill…. All these dangers are caused by human intervention… The real enemy, then, is humanity itself,” states the report…
The passage appears under a sub headline entitled, “The common enemy of humanity is Man.”
Please, God, if we can keep the apes and lose the environmentalists I promise to be a good boy and do what Mummy and Daddy tell me.
In addition to the drive for ‘modern’ biofuels using palm oil, in the UK there have also been instances of Planning Inspectors dismissing objections to the simple burning of palm oil in planned electricity generating developments because palm oil is “a renewable source of energy”. Such a stance has been taken even when it has been specifically pointed out that, for example, 33 tonnes of palm oil are emitted for every 1 tonne of palm oil produced in Indonesia (three references were quoted), and is accompanied by deforestation, habitat and species (Orang-utans specified) loss. Among the ‘culprits’, Planning Inspector Alan D. Robinson in 2009 (Chelveston Renewable Energy Park case, referred to in: R. Fouquet: “Handbook on Energy & Climate Change”, 2013.
My apologies, I meant to type 33 tonnes of carbon dioxide emitted for every 1 tonne of palm oil produced in Indonesia, on average.
Michael Jefferson
Additional info : It may not really be about palm oil ..the scenario can be like this
– ‘You are not going to cut down all the big trees make a big profit, and then burn the land and sell it off cheaply, and run away are you, ?’
– ‘ No no no we are going to clear the land and use it for long term sustainable Palm Oil production’ …’oh well that’s OK’… ie palm oil is just an excuse, next time it could be another.
– It can be quite like the wild west here, so I don’t really know what is really happening, but UK based sources will know even less cos there is a lot of disinformation.. as a rule you can’t believe many stats out of Asia.
e.g on a side topic there is something fishy about Rhino Extinction here “There no more Sumatran Rhinos in the wild in Sabah and only 100 now in the whole world” hang on only 6 years ago, it was said there was 40, then 30 then 15, no you say zero.. how the hell do you misplace a protected species so easily ? and where are the bodies ?..I could be that one of the stories is false that there weren’t really 40 before etc.
How many palm trees does it take to produce a “tonne” of Palm oil.
And what do thy use it for ?
Why do I instantly picture model airplanes when I see “palm oil ” ?
And they send it to the UK.
This seems even more ridiculous than our corn/gas program.
And of course…the monkeys…damn !
Reblogged this on Climate Collections and commented:
Unintended consequences: Fossil fuel aversion prompts affinity for palm oil destroying orangutan habitat.