Petition to human rights commission says Canada must reduce soot emissions

Soot particles from ships’ exhaust, such as those in the plume shown here, fall to the ground in the Arctic where they draw in heat. (FILE PHOTO)

This map, which shows the area covered by the Arctic Athabaskan Council, accompanies the group’s petition to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.

The Arctic Athabaskan Council, one of the Arctic Council’s permanent indigenous participants, has filed a 120-page petition to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.

In its petition, the council asks the commission to declare that Canada is undermining the human rights of Athabaskan peoples by poorly regulating emissions of black carbon, or soot, which contributes to Arctic warming and melting.

“As a signatory to the Charter of the Organization of American States, Canada is bound to protect and defend the rights set out in the American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man,” says the petition filed April 23 with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, an arms-length body that operates under the Organization of American States.

The petition says Canadian government action on reducing black carbon emissions could “substantially remedy the rapid Arctic warming and melting.”

The petition asks the commission, which, since 1965, has processed about 12,000 human rights cases, many of them involving allegations of mass murder, torture and arbitrary imprisonment made by victims of state terror in countries like Argentina, El Salvador and Guatemala, to:

• investigate and confirm the harms suffered by Arctic Athabaskans affected by Arctic warming and melting;

• prepare a report, setting forth all the facts and applicable law, declaring that Canada’s failure to implement adequate measures to substantially reduce its black carbon emissions violates rights affirmed in the American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man; and,

• recommend that Canada take steps to limit black carbon emissions and protect Arctic Athabaskan culture and resources from the effects of accelerated Arctic warming and melting.

“Our homelands are warming. We have experienced rain in December which never happened when I was a child,” said Grand Chief Ruth Massie of the Arctic Athabaskan Council, which represents Athabaskan peoples in Canada and Alaska, including the Gwich’in, Dene, Dogrib, Sahtu, Den Cho, Tanana, Kaska and many others, in a news release on the petition.

“The rain is causing flooding and eroding our river banks. Our glaciers are melting. Permafrost is melting everywhere. It is no longer safe for our people to travel on the land in winter because the ice doesn’t freeze solid. We have more trees dying off, and I notice the depletion of animals more and more.”

Dealing with black carbon emissions is already on the radar of the Arctic Council’s eight-member nations, whose ministers are scheduled to meet May 15 in Kiruna, Sweden.

At the end of their meeting, they’ll release the “Kiruna Declaration,” which is expected to be about the Arctic as a homeland, “a vulnerable environment in need of protection.”

The Kiruna Declaration is also expected to focus on the rights of indigenous peoples and the interests of all Arctic residents, launch a project on traditional knowledge, and set up a task force on the reduction of black carbon emissions.

Diesel engines are a major source of black carbon emissions which accounts for at least 30 per cent of the warming in the Arctic.

A report released in 2011 by the United Nations Environment Program and the World Meteorological Organization suggested measures such as mandatory filters on diesel vehicles could reduce warming in the Arctic by around 0.7 C in 2040, preventing as much as two-thirds of the estimated warming from taking place.

Previous research has shown that the impact of black carbon or soot is magnified from 10 to 100 times in the Arctic because the dark particles are magnets for heat on ice and snow.

Soot particles become suspended in the atmosphere and absorb sunlight, just like a black t-shirt on a sunny day. The particles then radiate that heat back into the air around it.

Soot also can absorb light reflected from Earth’s surface, which helps make it such a potent warming agent.

The good news is that decreasing soot could have a rapid effect, say scientists.

Reducing this soot over 22 years by rerouting flights away from the Arctic would lead to decreased Arctic and global temperatures and increased Arctic sea ice, one study found.

Scientists believe that reducing emissions of short-lived climate pollutants like black carbon or soot emissions is “the best, and perhaps only, way to slow Arctic warming and melting in the next few decades,” states the news release on the Arctic Athabaskan petition.

“The petition puts a human face to the crisis of Arctic warming and melting, demonstrating the significant impacts on the lives, culture and health of Canadian families,” said Hugh Wilkins of Ecojustice, the national charitable organization that uses the law to defend Canadians’ right to a healthy environment, in the news release.

Ecojustice, along with Earthjustice, a non-profit law group in the U.S., helped with the petition.

“The Canadian government should take swift, immediate action to slow warming and melting in the Arctic North, starting with stronger regulations that require reductions in black carbon emissions, before the extent of this human tragedy worsens,” Wilkins said.

It’s not the first time that a petition to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights has been tried as a way of forcing governments to deal with climate change.

In 2006, the commission decided it wouldn’t consider a petition that alleged that the United States government was violating the human rights of Inuit by refusing to limit its greenhouse gas emissions.

That detailed 175-page petition said climate change threatened the rights of Inuit to use and enjoy their traditional lands and personal property, their rights to health and life, to residence and movement and to their livelihood.

The petition asked for “relief from human rights violations resulting from the impacts of global warming and climate change caused by acts and omission of the U.S.,” which had not supported any mandatory reduction agreements designed to cut greenhouse gas emissions and curb global warming.

The petition also asked commission to visit the Arctic, conduct a hearing, and issue a report recommending the U.S. adopt mandatory measures to cut greenhouse gas emissions and cooperate on other international efforts.

The petition wanted the commission to produce plans to protect Inuit culture and resources, which would outline assistance options for adaptation and “any other relief that the commission considers appropriate and just.”