By Godela von Kirchbach and Eva Riemer, Co-chairs
Dear President Ursula von der Leyen, Commissioner Costas Kadis, Commissioner Joseph Síkela, Commissioner Dan Jørgensen, Commissioner Wopke Hoekstra, and Executive Vice-President Teresa Ribera,
The European Grandparents for Climate have noticed that, on the background of the Hormuz Strait crisis and facing an oil and gas supply disruption for an unknown time, the EU is being encouraged by the Norwegian state and the Norwegian offshore industry to rethink its Arctic strategy and receive oil and gas from new fields in the Barents Sea.
These days, citizens all over Europe suffer from the highest average temperatures ever measured during a heat wave and experts unanimously agree that this extreme heat is due to man-made climate change.
The Arctic is warming nearly four times faster than the global average, triggering cascading consequences that reach far beyond its shores — disrupting global weather patterns, accelerating sea level rise, and threatening one of the world’s most irreplaceable ecosystems.
The offshore industry maintains that supplies from the Norwegian part of the Arctic that is open for petroleum activities would make the EU less exposed to unpredictable energy deliverances and shortages and thus provide energy security in an unstable world. However, this would mean continuation of a non-sustainable, environmentally damaging fossil fuel dependency.
As senior citizens who have witnessed several oil crises and oil leak catastrophes as well as the havoc already caused by the climate crisis, we urge you to stand firm and hold on to the moratorium on new oil and gas. The EU, as a global actor with significant Arctic interests and responsibilities, must insist on complete renunciation of new oil and gas drilling in the Arctic, for the sake of future generations.
Instead of fossil fuel imports, the EU must speed up the development and installation of domestic renewables and electrification to become more resilient than reliant. That and the protection of vulnerable eco systems is the legacy that we as Europeans owe to the future generations.
Yours sincerely,
Godela von Kirchbach and Eva Riemer, Co-chairs
European Grandparents for Climate