1.Trade Unions for Energy Democracy (TUED)

2.TUED and Global Labor’s Climate Politics

A global, multi-sector, initiative to advance democratic direction and control of energyGLI International Summer SchoolJuly 2014

Sean Sweeney, Ph.D. and Lara Skinner, Ph.D.

Why TUED?

1. “Business as Usual” = Civilizational Crisis 2. The Energy Transition is NOT happening

3. Solutions Exist – And Unions Can Play a Crucial Role

BAU – Emissions Set to Rise by 4-6 Degrees Celsius

Fossil Fuels are NOT Running Out

Extreme Energy on the Rise

Tar Sands Oil Shale gas “fracking” Mountaintop removal

and surface coal mining Deep sea / Artic oil

drilling

Energy Expansion, Not Transition

Investment in Clean Energy v Conventional Capacity, 2004- 2011, $BN

Fossil fuel investment is calculated from EIA and IEA data. Renewable energy investment includes asset finance and small-scale projects, but excludes large hydro.Sources: EIA, IEA, Bloomberg New Energy Finance

Renewable Energy is Below 5% of Electricity Production Nearly Everywhere

More Fossil Fuels, More Emissions ≠ Energy Equity

Share of people without electricity access for developing countries, 2008

Under Attack- Workers and Communities

• Many workers lack rights & union representation

• Health & safety issues• Production up, • employment down• Companies closing union

operations, reopening non-union.

The Great Inaction Failure to agree is a cover for ‘business as usual’

The U.S. supports a voluntary ‘pledge and review’ approach – the ‘Copenhagen Accord’

“Our view in the U.S. is that it (a binding climate agreement) is not a necessary thing to happen right now .”

Todd Stern, U.S. Special Envoy for Climate Change, Bankok, April 7, 2011

November 2013: The Collapse of the Talks in Warsaw

Unions and environmental groups walk out of the Warsaw talks….

Commit to build a ‘peoples-led climate movement’

The Path Forward for Unions

Unions Need a Climate Program that can:

Effectively address the climate crisis and the ecological emergencyBuild trade union and working class power Challenge capitalist political economy and the ‘growth imperative’ Assert social ownership and democratic control over key sectors

Time for a class-based and independent trade union approach

“Rio+20 is about scaling-up and accelerating the Green Economy transformation already manifest in most if not all countries across the globe.”

-- Remarks by Achim Steiner to the Second Trade Union Assembly on Labour and the Environment, “Rio+20”, June 12, 2012

What stands in the way?

Energy: Developing a Framework for Action

• Resist – Business as usual, “carbon lock in” and the extreme energy agenda

• Reclaim – Take back what’s been privatized, de-marketize public companies

• Restructure – Deploy renewable energy to scale under social ownership and democratic control

Immediate Goals of TUED: connect the struggles, build a global community, develop strategies and alternatives

Energy Democracy – Power to the People

www.energydemocracyinitiative.org