environmental

Lula approved the controversial bill easing environmental licensing rules, but struck down or altered 63 articles.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has signed into law a bill easing environmental licensing rules, but bowed to pressure from activist groups as he vetoed key provisions that would have made it easier for companies to secure environmental permits.

Lula approved on Friday what detractors have dubbed the “devastation bill”, but struck down or altered 63 of its nearly 400 articles, his office’s executive secretary, Miriam Belchior, told reporters.

The president had faced mounting pressure from environmental groups to intervene in the bill, which was backed by Brazil’s powerful agribusiness sector and focused on rolling back strict licensing rules that had kept the destruction of the Amazon rainforest in check.

A previous version of the bill adopted by lawmakers last month would have meant that for some permits, all that would have been required is a simple declaration of the company’s environmental commitment.

Lula’s revisions, however, reinstated the current strict licensing rules for strategic projects.

Belchior said the new proposal sought to preserve the integrity of the licensing process, ensure legal certainty, and protect the rights of Indigenous and Quilombola communities.

She added that Lula will introduce a “Special Environmental Licence” designed to fast-track strategic projects while filling the legal gaps created by the vetoes.

“We maintained what we consider to be significant advances in streamlining the environmental licensing process,” she said.

Nongovernmental organisation SOS Atlantic Forest, which garnered more than a million signatures calling for a veto of the law, hailed Lula’s move as “a victory” for environmental protection.

Lula’s environmental vetoes

Of the provisions struck down by Lula, 26 were vetoed outright, while another 37 will either be replaced with alternative text or modified in a new bill that will be sent to Congress for ratification under a constitutional urgency procedure.

Securing support for the amendments is far from guaranteed for the leftist leader. Brazil’s conservative-dominated Congress has repeatedly defeated key government proposals, including overturning previous presidential vetoes.

Lawmakers aligned with embattled ex-president Jair Bolsonaro are also blocking legislative activity amid an escalating political standoff, as they call for the former president’s charges around an alleged failed coup attempt in 2022 to be dropped.

Speaking at a Friday news conference in the capital, Brasilia, Environment Minister Marina Silva maintained a positive tone, telling reporters that Lula’s vetoes would ensure that “the economy does not compete with ecology, but rather they are part of the same equation”.

“We hope to be able to streamline licensing processes without compromising their quality, which is essential for environmental protection at a time of climate crisis, biodiversity loss and desertification,” said Silva.

Silva said a previous version of the bill, approved by Congress last month, threatened the country’s pledge to eliminate deforestation by 2030 and described it as a “death blow” to Brazil’s licensing framework.

But, she said, Lula’s revised version meant Brazil’s “targets to reach zero deforestation” and its goal to “cut CO2 emissions by between 59 percent and 67 percent remain fully on track”.

Lula’s environmental credentials are under close scrutiny in advance of the annual UN climate summit in November in the Amazon city of Belem.

The California Supreme Court sided with environmental groups in a Thursday ruling, saying that state lawyers were wrong in their claim that the Public Utilities Commission’s decision to slash rooftop solar incentives could not be challenged.

The unanimous decision sends the case brought by the three groups back to the appeals court.

The groups argue the utilities commission violated state law in 2022 when it cut the value of the credits that panel owners receive for sending their unused power to the electric grid by as much as 80%. The rules apply to Californians installing the panels after April 14, 2023.

The Supreme Court justices said the appeals court erred in January 2024 when it ruled against the environmental groups. In that decision, the appeals court said that courts must defer to how the commission interpreted the law because it had more expertise in utility matters.

“This deferential standard of review leaves no basis for faulting the Commission’s work,” the appeals court had concluded then in its opinion.

The environmental groups argued the appeals court ignored a 1998 law that said the commission’s decisions should be held to the same standard of court review as those by other state agencies.

“The California Supreme Court has ruled in our favor that the CPUC is not above the law,” said Bernadette Del Chiaro, senior vice president at the Environmental Working Group, after Thursday’s decision was published. The other groups filing the case are the Center for Biological Diversity and The Protect Our Communities Foundation.

The utilities commission did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the ruling.

More than 2 million solar systems sit on the roofs of homes, businesses and schools in California — more than any other state. Environmentalists say that number must increase if the state is to meet its goal, set by a 2018 law, of using only carbon-free energy by 2045.

The utilities commission has said that the credits given to the rooftop panel owners on their electric bill have become so valuable that they were resulting in “a cost shift” of billions of dollars to those who do not own the panels. This has raised electric bills, especially hurting low-income electric customers, the commission says.

The credits for energy sent by the rooftop systems to the grid had been valued at the retail rate for electricity, which has risen fast as the commission has voted in recent years to approve rate increases the utilities have requested.

The state’s three big for-profit electric utilities — Southern California Edison, Pacific Gas & Electric and San Diego Gas & Electric — have sided with commission in the case.

The utilities have long complained that electric bills have been rising because owners of the rooftop solar panels are not paying their fair share of the fixed costs required to maintain the electric grid.

For decades, the utilities have worked to reduce the energy credits aimed at incentivizing Californians to invest in the solar panel systems. The rooftop systems have cut into the utilities’ sale of electricity.

Aug. 6 (UPI) — A federal judge in Florida on Wednesday heard arguments from two groups seeking an injunction to halt the operation and further construction of an immigration detention center in the Everglades called “Alligator Alcrataz.”

District Judge Kathleen Williams conducted a hearing in Miami on a lawsuit by environmental groups and the Miccosukee Tribe, claiming the state and federal government bypassed mandatory ecological reviews required under the National Environmental Policy Act during construction.

They also said the detention facility, which now houses 1,000 detainees with plans for up to 5,000, was built in less than two weeks without public notice or comment, and didn’t comply with other statutes, including the Endangered Species Act.

The detention center, which is about 75 miles west of Miami and 44 miles southwest of Naple, is amid swampland that includes alligators, pythons, snakes and other predators.

Randy Kautz, an expert in Florida wildlife, said 120 to 230 endangered panthers are in the “core area” and increased human activity will harm reproduction.

“There has been a stable reproducing population of panthers in this area in this range at least over the last 30 years,” he said in court. “Panthers have succeeded and resided here.”

Panthers were tracked in the 1,000 acres near the detention facility, which was built on a rarely used airstrip off U.S. 41 in Ochopee in Miami-Dade County near Collier County. The so-called Alligator Alley, which is part of Interstate 75, runs 80 miles across the state through the Everglades.

Attorneys say the work is exempt from the National Environmental Policy Act because it was initially funded, constructed and managed by the state. But Florida state Rep. Anna Eskamani testified the Department of Homeland Security wants the facility.

More than 40,000 people opposed the detention center in a petition on the website of the Friends of the Everglades, a nonprofit, which is one of the parties in the lawsuit.

“We are very concerned about potential impacts of runoff” and “large, new industrial-style lights that are visible from 15 miles away, even though having a dark sky designation,” Eve Samples, the executive director of the group, told the court.

“Driving out there myself many times, the increased traffic is visible. I saw two dead gators last time I visited, so definitely a difference in the area.”

The detention facility neighbors land leased to the Miccosukee Indian Tribe with villages, a school, hunting areas and sacred sites.

Civil rights groups filed a second lawsuit alleging that detainees’ constitutional rights are being violated. A hearing in that case is scheduled for Aug. 18.

WTVJ-TV reported limited access to showers, spoiled food, extreme heat and mosquitoes. They also allege they are being barred from meeting lawyers with some held without any charges.

President Donald Trump toured the facility on July 1 with Gov. Ron DeSantis and Homeland Security Secretry Kristi Noem before the opening two days later.

The first deportation flights departed from the airstrip on July 25.

Legislators in Congress and the state, who initially were denied access, were allowed to visit on July 12 but couldn’t speak to the detainees and access to the property was limited.

“Rural immigrant detention camps — 750 people in cages like animals — is un-American, and it should be shut down,” state Sen. Carlo Guillermo Smith said.

State and federal officials defend the conditions.

“All detainees are provided with proper meals, medical treatment, and have opportunities to communicate with their family members and lawyers,” Homeland Security spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin told NBC News last month. “Ensuring the safety, security, and well-being of individuals in our custody is a top priority.”

DeSantis has said the airport site, called the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Facility, won’t have any effect on the surrounding environment.

DeSantis and Noem have touted the location because it is in a relatively remote area and surrounded by swampland.

DeSantis utilized an emergency order in 2023 in response to Cuban and Haitian migrants arriving in the Florida Keys by boat, with the state offering to pay $20 million for the land.

Florida will seek reimbursement from the federal government for the $450 million yearly cost of running the facility, a senior Department of Homeland Security official told the Miami Herald.

County officials approve the use of the airstrip for immigrants.

The airstrip was envisioned to become an airport with construction to begin in 1968. Work was halted in 1970 because of environmental concerns, but not before one runway was finished. The runway was used for training flights.

The land later became Big Cyprus National Preserve, which encompasses 1,139 square miles. The preserve is north of Everglades National Park, which covers 2,356 square miles.