As blackouts loom, Indonesia’s energy crisis highlights its addiction to coal
JAKARTA — An abrupt ban on coal exports by the Indonesian government for the whole month of January, on fears of a domestic supply shortage, should be a wake-up call…
China’s pivot from funding coal plants to gasification slammed as more of the same
When China announced, in late September, that it would stop financing the construction of new coal plants overseas, Indonesia looked to be one of the most impacted countries. The Southeast…
Indonesia’s new plan for coal: It pollutes land and air, so why not the sea too?
JAKARTA — Having already declared coal ash non-hazardous waste, the Indonesian government now wants to turn it into bricks that will be used for coral transplantation projects, prompting an outcry…
‘Standing with your feet in the water’: COP26 struggles to succeed
With vulnerable nations enraged as oil nations censor critical COP26 Glasgow accord language, the world is struggling mightily today to hammer out an agreement to truly curb climate change.
Legal challenge to South Africa mine expansion looks to set new landmark
Five years ago, one of South Africa's largest coal mines was given permission to grow even larger. In 2016, the Tendele mine was granted mining rights to an additional 212…
COP26: E.U. is committed to forest biomass burning to cut fossil fuel use
The E.U. continues to struggle with the irony of a commitment to conserving forests, while also burning forest biomass and ignoring the carbon emissions that causes — all in order to achieve a mandate to end burning oil, gas and coal.
COP26 cop-out? Indonesia’s clean energy pledge keeps coal front and center
JAKARTA — Indonesia has signed another seemingly landmark pledge at the COP26 climate summit underway in Glasgow, this time to phase out its use of coal, the dominant source in…
Indonesia’s ‘green’ electricity plan undermines its climate vows, activists say
JAKARTA — Indonesia’s new 10-year plan for electricity generation maintains the country’s heavy reliance on coal and will hinder stated efforts to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050, experts say. The…
Plastics set to overtake coal plants on U.S. carbon emissions, new study shows
Plastics will outpace coal plants in the U.S. by 2030 in terms of their contributions to climate change, according to a new report released Oct. 21 by Beyond Plastics, a…
Opposition to South Africa coal mine persists a year after murder of activist
On Oct. 22, 2020, three gunmen shot 63-year-old Fikile Ntshangase dead in her house in Ophondweni, in northeastern South Africa. One year since Ntshangase’s killing, the provincial police are still…
Build around the forest, not through it, study says of Sumatra trucking road
JAKARTA — A new study strengthens the case for redirecting a planned mining road around the largest surviving tract of lowland tropical rainforest on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, but the…
Links to coal mining add to Indonesian palm oil sector’s risk for buyers
JAKARTA — Consumer goods behemoths such as Unilever, PepsiCo and Nestlé that buy palm oil from Indonesia may be exposed to the environmental and social fallout from a seemingly unrelated…
Jakarta court finds president, governor liable for city’s air pollution woes
JAKARTA — A court in Jakarta has found the Indonesian government, including President Joko Widodo, negligent in a citizen lawsuit filed against the poor air quality in the capital. In…
Indonesia still clinging to coal despite phaseout pledge, new plan shows
JAKARTA — Experts have panned Indonesia’s vision for achieving net-zero carbon dioxide emissions, which consists of continuing to burn coal while hoping that untested carbon capture technology will stop the…
Indonesia’s coal phaseout is just more business as usual, report says
JAKARTA — Indonesia’s plan to phase out coal is a mere rebranding of an existing timeline to decommission aging plants, with no meaningful shift toward actually quitting the fossil fuel,…
Ethnic communities in Myanmar opposing a coal plant see their fight get harder
Almost two decades ago, Myanmar’s largest coal-fired power plant was built as a joint venture by a group of military-affiliated businessmen and the China National Heavy Machinery Corporation. Since then,…
Activists take Indonesia’s mining law to court, but don’t expect much
JAKARTA — Activists in Indonesia have filed a legal challenge to controversial mining legislation passed last year and widely seen as undermining environmental protections to the advantage of mining companies.…
Coal phase-out plan gets pushback in power-hungry Indonesia
JAKARTA — Officials have cast doubts on a government plan that would somehow see Indonesia phase out all its coal-fired power plants while at the same time build more than…
Indonesia to retire coal-fired power plants while also adding more
JAKARTA — Indonesia says it will begin retiring coal-fired power plants for good — while still continuing to build more than a hundred new ones, in the latest mixed message…
Mining linked yet again to another severe flood in Indonesian Borneo
JAKARTA — Massive deforestation for coal mines may have exacerbated floods that recently inundated the eastern part of Indonesian Borneo, the country’s coal heartland. Fourteen villages in Berau district, East…
Indonesian president slammed for ‘wait-and-see’ approach on climate action
JAKARTA — Experts have criticized Indonesian President Joko Widodo for not announcing a more ambitious climate target at last month’s leaders’ summit called by U.S. President Joe Biden. During the…
Indonesia says no new coal plants from 2023 (after the next 100 or so)
JAKARTA — Indonesia says it will stop building new coal-fired power plants after 2023 to meet its carbon-neutral goals — but the more than 100 plants to be built by…
ADB declares coal exit in Asia Pacific, but gas remains in play
MANILA — As the climate crisis bites, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) has unveiled its ambitious plan to scrap funding for coal mining and power plants, and ban support for…
Leaders make bold climate pledges, but is it ‘all just smoke and mirrors?’: Critics
The US, China, UK, EU, Japan, South Korea, Canada and others upped their climate ambitions at Joe Biden’s Earth Day Leaders Summit on Climate, but activists pointed to duplicitous policies on forest biomass, coal, and more.
Illegal coal mine tunnels threaten a Sumatran village
SAWAHLUNTO, Indonesia — Manap says he’s worried about his garden. What he thought would be a nice retirement project after years of working in coal mines is quickly turning into…
South Korea faces a public reckoning for financing coal plants in Indonesia
"Black particles of ash get carried in the wind all the way here," says Nurhasanah, a resident of the coastal town of Suralaya in Indonesia’s West Java province. "If I…
‘We’re at a tipping point with coal’: Q&A with Bloomberg’s Antha Williams
Shortly ahead of the 2020 U.S. presidential election, Mongabay spoke with Antha N. Williams, the head of the environment program at Bloomberg Philanthropies, the foundation launched by businessman and former…
Indonesia’s net-zero emissions goal not ambitious enough, activists say
JAKARTA — The Indonesian government has announced a plan that puts the country on a path toward carbon neutrality by 2070, but activists say the timeframe is too long to…
“Activism gives you hope”: Q&A with Wallace Global Fund’s Ellen Dorsey
The Wallace Global Fund’s Ellen Dorsey says philanthropic foundations need to do more, including divesting from fossil fuels and focusing less on building their own endowments.
Frustration over light penalties for coal mine that polluted Indonesian river
After a series of coal-slurry spills into the Malinau River in Indonesian Borneo, locals and environmental groups are calling for tougher sanctions, and for national banks to divest from the…
Special series
Forest Trackers
- Indigenous community in Peru losing forests to timber, drug, land trafficking
- Bolivian protected areas hit hard by forest fires
- The protected area that isn’t: Bolivia’s Ñembi Guasu beset by fires, farms, roads
- New oil refinery ‘a huge disaster’ for Nigerian forest reserve
Oceans
- As shark numbers plummet, nations seek ban on devastatingly effective gear
- Illegal bottom trawling widespread inside Mediterranean marine protected areas
- Will shipping noise nudge Africa’s only penguin toward extinction?
- A new tool to peer into fishing networks: Q&A with Austin Brush of C4ADS
Amazon Conservation
- U.N. report calls for the ban of mercury trade and its use in gold mining
- Following the impacts of palm oil alliance: Violated regulations and penalty proceedings
- Brazil’s new environmental future under Lula: Q&A with Marina Silva
- Growing soy on cattle pasture can eliminate Amazon deforestation in Brazil
Land rights and extractives
- ‘We go in and take Indigenous lands back from cattle ranchers’: Q&A with activist Pablo Sibar
- Delayed Indigenous ‘Man of the Hole’ burial reveals dispute over his land
- As gangs battle over Peru’s drug trafficking routes, communities and forest are at risk
- In Brazil’s soy belt, Indigenous people face attacks over land rights
Endangered Environmentalists
- Worries and whispers in Vietnam’s NGO community after activist’s sentencing
- Scientists call for end to violence against Amazon communities, environmental defenders
- Indigenous advocates sense a legal landmark as a guardian’s killing heads to trial
- In Brazil, an Indigenous land defender’s unsolved killing is the deadly norm
Indonesia's Forest Guardians
- Pioneer agroforester Ermi, 73, rolls back the years in Indonesia’s Gorontalo
- After 20 years and thousands of trees planted, Kalimantan’s veteran forester persists
- Aziil Anwar, Indonesian coral-based mangrove grower, dies at 64
- A utopia of clean air and wet peat amid Sumatra’s forest fire ‘hell’
Conservation Effectiveness
- Mangrove forest loss is slowing toward a halt, new report shows
- ‘South Asia needs its own tiger plan’: Q&A with Nepal’s Maheshwar Dhakal
- Nepal was supposed to double its tiger population since 2010. It tripled it
- In prioritizing conservation, animal culture should be a factor, study says
Southeast Asian infrastructure
- Tunnel collapse at dam project in orangutan habitat claims yet another life
- Sulawesi nickel plant coats nearby homes in toxic dust
- Indonesia’s grand EV plans hinge on a ‘green’ industrial park that likely isn’t
- Java communities rally as clock ticks on cleanup of ‘world’s dirtiest river’
