groundWork is a non-profit environmental justice service and developmental organization working primarily in Southern Africa in the areas of Climate & Energy Justice, Coal, Environmental Health, Global Green and Healthy Hospitals, and Waste. groundWork is the South African member of Health Care Without Harm and Friends of the Earth International.
Government's move to appeal parts of High Court win risks delaying action on air pollution
12 April 2022
Environmental justice group groundWork and Mpumalanga community organisation Vukani Environmental Justice Movement in Action (Vukani), represented by the Centre for Environmental Rights (CER), note with disappointment Minister for the Environment, Barbara Creecy's decision to apply for leave to appeal some parts of the #DeadlyAir judgment.
The judgment, handed down on 18 March 2022 in the Pretoria High Court, was a resounding victory for environmental justice in South Africa. In the judgment, Judge Colleen Collis recognised the poor air quality in South Africa’s Mpumalanga Highveld region as a breach of residents’ Constitutional right to an environment that is not harmful to their health and well-being. The judgment also directed government to prepare and implement regulations to reduce air pollution - according to section 20 of the National Environmental Management: Air Quality Act (AQA) - within 12 months of the order.
Minister Creecy is not appealing the first part of the order that relates to the immediate realisation of Section 24 of the Constitution, but rather those that relate to the interpretation of Section 20 of the AQA. Importantly, the declaration of residents’ guaranteed right to a healthy environment still stands, and groundWork and Vukani will proceed to take action on this basis through their various community-based activities.
Community-led socially-owned renewable energy solutions - A learning process
The just transition is gaining significant political momentum but what does this mean for our communities? How can communities access clean energy? Is it realistic for communities to contract with independent power producers to access clean energy?
Workers installing rooftop solar PV demonstration units at the SDCEA house in Durban. Image: Chris Louw
08 April 2022
After a series of workshops and dialogues with communities, the Urban Movement Incubator Energy Democracy (UMI ED) learning process, coordinated by groundWork, has reached its pinnacle with the installation of rooftop solar PV demonstration units. The demonstration units will be installed at the South Durban Community Environmental Alliance (SDCEA) located in Austerville and is intended for communities to learn and understand how community owned clean energy works.
The UMI ED project is key in enabling communities to change the dominant narrative around the current energy system and to give them the opportunity to voice their energy needs and map out the solutions they desire for their communities. With the clean energy transition well underway, technologies like rooftop solar PV mean that energy can be generated within our local communities. Communities can now meaningfully directly engage with the government towards making this transition just.
The UMI Energy Democracy project is the first of its kind in South Africa and is conducted in a partnership with leading community-based and non-governmental organizations, namely SDCEA (South Durban Community Environmental Alliance), Vukani Environmental Movement (VEM), Abahlali baseMjondolo (AbM), Sustainable Energy Africa (SEA). The project aims to empower communities to engage effectively in the Just Transition process with key stakeholders, and to access clean, safe, reliable, and affordable energy through pursuing community-led socially owned renewable energy solutions.
Renewable experts “Energy Capital Solutions” have installed the first rooftop solar PV system at the SDCEA office in Austerville. The system will serve as a demonstration unit for the community to see, learn and get a better understanding of how electricity is generated from the sun (solar energy). The community will have full access to the demonstration unit as it is a learning tool of how clean energy works. From this solar PV system, people will get to witness first-hand the benefits of renewable energy.
The installation of the rooftop solar PV system will be complemented by a training workshop and will focus on an in-depth explanation of the solar PV system (the solar panels, the inverters, and the battery), the system’s capacity (what it can power such as, phone chargers, laptops etc.), as well as the concept of a grid-tied system versus an off-grid system. The workshop will also cover aspects of maintenance and how the system operates. Above all, the information shared at the workshop will be conveyed in a simple and easy to understand format and translated to IsiZulu.
South Africa: Killing of land rights defender Ayanda Ngila and targeting of Abahlali baseMjondolo
25 March 2022
On 8 March 2022, land rights defender and member of the grass-roots movement Abahlali baseMjondolo, Ayanda Ngila, was shot and killed by four armed men. At the time of the shooting, the human rights defender had been working on repairing an irrigation pipe in the eKhenana community garden. The gunmen fled the scene through the river. A suspect has been detained for questioning by the Cato police.
Ayanda Ngila was the deputy chairperson of Abahlali baseMjondolo in eKhenana community, an informal settlement near Durban. Abahlali baseMjondolo is a well established grass-roots movement that has been operating across South Africa for more than 20 years. The objective of the movement is to defend and protect the rights of people living in shacks including access to decent housing, services and education. The movement works to advance and promote the interests of the poor and marginalized. Due to their peaceful work in defence of human rights Abahlali baseMjondolo and its members have long been targeted by the local leaders of the political party ANC.
groundWork has worked with Abahlali BaseMjondolo since the early days as the Movement emerged from Kennedy Road, next to the eThekwini toxic waste dumpsite in Clare Estate. A real people-led democracy has always been the foundation of the Movement. This demand for a true democracy has resulted in movement members being targeted as they have sought to defend the human rights of the poor in South Africa.
You can read the media release and call to action by Front Line Defenders here.
Presidential Climate Commission: Durban communities speak of petrochemical toxic legacy
Desmond D’Sa speaking during Presidential Climate Commission public consultations in Durban. Image: Lunga Bhengu
23 March 2022
The corporations that have polluted south Durban cannot be allowed to just cut and run. In its first meeting with a community affected by the petrochemical industries, the Presidential Climate Commission (PCC) was told that the big refineries, Engen owned by Petronas and SAPREF owned by BP and Shell, have both shut down. So south Durban is in transition but it is not a just transition.
The refinery shut down has cut the air pollution, but there remains a legacy of health impacts on the people of the community that stretches across four generations. These impacts start with the unborn child. Professor Rajen Naidoo at Occupational and Environmental Health at the University of KwaZulu Natal told the commission that when mothers are polluted, their unborn child is already affected as genetic changes take place in uterus. That child is then vulnerable for life and many do not develop as they should. And once they are born, they are immediately affected by the direct impact of the pollution. Children are frequently sick, frequently miss school and then cannot get work. So the cycle of poverty is reproduced.
Apartheid divided the people, said Des D’Sa of the South Durban Community Environmental Alliance (SDCEA). But pollution knows no boundaries and the struggle for a clean environment has brought them together. They are now calling for justice in the transition.
Presidential Climate Commission Public Consultations: Just Transition Framework - Durban
22 March 2022
As part of the ongoing stakeholder engagements under the Just Transition Framework, the Presidential Climate Commission will hold its public consultation session in Durban as follows:
Date: 23 March 2021
Times: 09h00 – 15h00
Venue: Austerville Civic Centre, 6 Percy Johnson Road, Austerville, Durban, 4052
The official invitation letter to stakeholders, as well as the draft agenda and Consultation Framework can be downloaded/viewed using the links below. The venues and dates for other regional PCC Consultation sessions can also be found below.
Major court victory for communities fighting air pollution in Mpumalanga Highveld
Dirty Air protest. Image by Daylin Paul
18 March 2022
Today environmental justice groups celebrate a landmark judgment in the #DeadlyAir case as a victory for environmental justice in South Africa with far-reaching consequences. In the judgment, the High Court has recognised the poor air quality in South Africa's Mpumalanga Highveld region as a breach of residents’ Constitutional right to an environment that is not harmful to their health and well-being.
The judgment, which recognises air pollution as a violation of Constitutional rights, is a major victory for environmental justice groups groundWork and Mpumalanga community organisation Vukani Environmental Justice Movement in Action (Vukani). The groups, represented by the Centre for Environmental Rights (CER) as attorneys, first launched the landmark #DeadlyAir litigation in 2019, demanding that government clean up the toxic air in the Mpumalanga Highveld.
Renewable Energy Study Released
14 March 2022
Just Transitions in the Renewable Energy Sector: An Environmental Lifecycle Perspective Study
On 9th March 2022, The Green House (TGH) released and presented a research study document, The Policy and Legal Elements for a Life Cycle Perspective to Support a Just Transition of the Energy Sector to Renewables, with programme partners groundWork and Earth Life Africa as the final part of a five year Just Energy Transition Exchange Programme funded by the Swedish Society for Nature Conservation (SSNC).
Global warming and fossil fuel depletion, as well as the goal to provide universal energy access, increasingly place the development of sustainable just energy systems at the top of political agendas around the world. The future will most likely mainly be powered by renewable energy sources. However, in order for the energy transition to be economically, socially, and environmentally sustainable and just, it calls for a rethinking of how the energy sector should be organised, financed, and which materials and technologies should be promoted. These considerations entail how the raw materials for the energy producing devices are acquired and processed, associated environmental impacts, working conditions, maintenance of the technologies, and how the waste from the energy producing devices is handled.
You can read the full media release and download relevant documents here.
For earlier news and our news archives click here, or here to access our collection of media items.
