Today an Amsterdam court judge turned the tables on Cairn Energy. Rather than granting an injunction against Greenpeace, he instead suggested that the oil company might actually like to consider releasing its secret Arctic Oil Spill Response Plan!

Cairn’s lawyers looked dumbfounded and stuttered about not knowing why their client won't release it.

The judge went on to say that BP's skimping on a second valve cost the world billions as a result of the Deepwater Horizon disaster.  He said BP must regret that they didn't have their plans scrutinized in the first place because someone would have noticed the lack of a second valve.  Safety is in everyone’s interest - by being transparent perhaps there is an opportunity to make the spill plan stronger.  In fact, he asked Cairn, why they won't...

Climbers working with the Danish navy have just broken into our pod suspended from the Cairn Energy oil rig here in the Arctic seas off Greenland and arrested the two Greenpeace climbers inside.

Hannah and Luke had been suspended beneath the belly of the gigantic Leiv Eiriksson in the Arctic survival pod 25 meters above the sea for almost a hundred hours.

Although they’ve now been arrested and their occupation ended, we’ve vowed to continue the campaign to kick the oil companies out of the Arctic.

You can see how the last minutes of their marathon protest unfolded in the live feed they maintained for the duration of their vigil.

Together they stopped that rig from drilling for four days, which is four days in which a Deepwater Horizon-style blow-out couldn’t happen and this beau... Read more >

So Sealord is changing its logo? It seems its brand identity is so important that it’s only concerned by what appears on the outside of its tuna cans and not what’s filling them. 

Sealord doesn’t go out and catch its own tuna in the Pacific - it buys it from other fishing companies. Sealord knows these companies use indiscriminate fishing methods – methods that are known to kill endangered sharks, turtles and baby tuna – but Sealord has chosen to do nothing to stop this shameful and needless waste of ocean life. 

Sealord has also chosen to ignore the call from more than 7500 concerned consumers in the last month urging it to start selling sustainably caught tuna. Sealord says the bycatch problem is complex and there’s no simple answer.

That’s where Sealord is wrong. If it is serious ab... Read more >

There's more bad news that's come out Christchurch today which could set back the city's recovery. It's disappointing to learn that Designline, the bus company that invented the gas turbine hybrid and various other innovative, clean transport technologies, has gone into liquidation, which could result in the loss of hundreds of jobs.

The Christchurch-based Kiwi company has built a global reputation for pioneering the development of cutting edge electric and hybrid buses that were transforming the public transport sectors in the US, Europe, the UAE, and Australia. Designline is the kind of company that could be part of New Zealand's transport solutions too. However, it seems that not only is it another business that’s fallen victim to the Christchurch earthquake, but that perhaps it’s failu... Read more >

Thato Matela is one of Greenpeace’s travelling street outreach campaigners. He’s just arrived in the country from Greenpeace’s South Africa office.  These are his impression of his first week at work in New Zealand.

It was the afternoon of the 24 May 2011, when I first headed out for my travel trip with a colleague of mine by the name of Duncan. I didn’t know what to expect but what I did know was that it was going to be one exciting experience.

We took off from Auckland - the big city - and headed off for Hamilton. We made a stop in Huntly - a small Waikato town where the main employer is the Huntly power station. It was so quiet and I remember asking myself “how on earth are we going to recruit supporters here?” Duncan was determined to sign everyone up and I was so inspired by that ... Read more >

As he left New Zealand, Jim Hansen wrote an open letter to prime minister John Key on behalf of the youth of New Zealand, and specifically 350.org. It’s worth a read because it outlines a strong case for taking action here, and now.

Dear Prime Minister Key,

Encouraged by youth of New Zealand, especially members of the organization 350.org, I write this open letter to inform you of recent advances in understanding of climate change, consequences for young people and nature, and implications for government policies.

I recognize that New Zealanders, blessed with a land of rare beauty, are deeply concerned about threats to their environment. Also New Zealand contributes relatively little to carbon emissions that drive climate change. Per capita fossil fuel emissions from New Zeal... Read more >

Two weeks ago we released preliminary results from our marine radiation monitoring work off the coast of Japan, near the melted-down and leaking Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. These results showed worrying levels of radioactive contamination in seaweed – a staple of the Japanese diet.

After having difficulties finding a lab in Japan to do detailed analysis, we sent samples of seaweed, fish, and shellfish collected by our radiation monitoring teams both onshore and on the Rainbow to professional labs in France and Belgium. The results of the details analysis are back – and we can say that the situation in the ocean along the Fukushima coast is worse than we originally thought.

The new data shows that some seaweed contamination levels are not only 50 times higher than safety limits – far ... Read more >