"15 Arrested in Land Rover Protest"

Newspaper article

By: Anonymous

Date: May 16, 2005

Source: British Broadcasting Corporation. "15 arrested in Land Rover protest." May 16, 2005. 〈http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/4550593.stm〉 (accessed March 8, 2006).

About the Author: This article was published without a byline, and was written by a staff writer for the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC). The BBC is Britain's public media broadcaster, and has evolved since its founding into a widely recognized global news resource.

INTRODUCTION

Climate change is considered among the greatest threats faced by the planet today, one that is compounded by increased presence of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

The developed world is a significant contributor of greenhouse gases into the environment. One of the chief contributors of greenhouse gases is vehicular emissions. There is a trend to manufacture low-emission vehicles, which pose a lesser risk to the environment, and controversy brews about the fuel consumption capacity of Sport Utility Vehicles (SUVs), a class of automobiles designed for non-urban use.

The environmental action group Greenpeace has held demonstrations since the beginning of 2000 against American vehicle giant Ford Motor Company. Ford is the parent company of Land Rover, the British manufacturer of Range Rover SUVs, which Greenpeace claims are posing a serious threat to the environment.

Greenpeace is a non-political environmental watchdog with a presence in many countries worldwide. Its members use mass awareness tactics to bring pressure on governments on various environmental issues and hotspots around the globe. One such issue is the high levels of vehicle emissions.

In May 2005, thirty-five members of Greenpeace evaded security at Land Rover's United Kingdom plant at Solihull and chained themselves to the chassis of unfinished vehicles as part of their protest against the manufacturer.

The article "15 arrested in Land Rover Action" is a BBC news report covering the demonstration. Greenpeace publicly stated that this event was to protest against excessive emissions from the Range Rover. This action by Greenpeace triggered a heated environmental argument—while Greenpeace maintained that excessively high emissions from the vehicles were polluting the environment, Ford argued that the production of Land Rover in the United Kingdom was constituted of around 70 percent of Ford's exports from the country—something that contributed greatly to the region's economy.

PRIMARY SOURCE

15 ARRESTED IN LAND ROVER PROTEST

A protest that disrupted production at a Land Rover factory in the West Midlands has ended with the arrest of 15 Greenpeace activists. Some 30 members of the environmental action group breached security at the plant in Solihull on Monday morning.

Greenpeace said that the action was in protest at what it claims are the "climate-wrecking" emissions from Range Rovers, Land Rover's premium model.

Land Rover said only a "small part" of the plant had been affected

The protest came to an end at 1500 GMT after campaigners who had handcuffed themselves to unfinished vehicles on an assembly line at the factory were cut free by police.

West Midlands police said on Monday evening that they were questioning 15 people in relation to the incident.

A number of senior Greenpeace members are understood to have been among those arrested.

"We have arrested some men and women on suspicion of aggravated trespass," a police spokesman told the Press Association.

Environmental argument "The action taken by Greenpeace … is both regrettable and damaging—Land Rover is a leading British business and exports over 70% of it's production, and contributes significantly to the country's wealth creation," a company spokesman said.

He said Land Rover, which is owned by US giant Ford, employed 11,000 staff and supported another 50,000 jobs in the supply chain.

According to a Greenpeace statement, its members "used safety shut-down buttons to cut off power to the assembly line" before chaining themselves to the production line at 0600 GMT on Monday.

Greenpeace said that although "climate change is the greatest threat the planet is facing" Land Rover "continues to make gas-guzzling vehicles, most of which will tackle nothing steeper than a speed bump".

Misleading "Making cars like this for urban use is crazy when 150,000 people are dying every year from climate change," said Greenpeace's Ben Stewart.

Range Rover do less miles to the gallon than the model T Ford.

However, Land Rover said it took its responsibilities to the environment "very seriously".

"We find many of the claims made by Greenpeace both misleading and inaccurate," the Land Rover spokesman said.

He said most of the factory was "generally running as normal", with one production line affected.

The Transport and General Workers' Union (T&G) criticised Greenpeace's action at the Land Rover plant, describing it as "insensitive and potentially dangerous".

"They [Greenpeace] ought to think through the consequences of hitting production at a difficult time for the industry and for the people of the West Midlands, who only recently have seen the closures at Jaguar's Browns Lane plant and mass redundancies at MG Rover," said T&G regional secretary Gerard Coyne.

SIGNIFICANCE

SUVs are four-wheel-drive vehicles that have become popular in across the world, due to their non-urban appeal and rugged comfortable looks. The Range Rover (Land Rover's premium model), marketed by Ford, is one of the most popular SUVs in the United States and United Kingdom.

Since the early 2000s, SUVs have come under the scanner not just for their climate-wrecking emissions but also for their high gas consumption. According to CNN, the Range Rover SUVs recorded a mileage of 12 miles per gallon (20 liters per 100 kilometers) in the city, and 15 miles to the gallon (16 liters per 100 kilometers) on the highway. This is less fuel-efficient than even the Model T Ford, which Henry Ford originally built in the early 1900s. Some reports note that the Toyota Prius, an electric hybrid family car, does more than 55 miles per gallon (4 liters per 100 kilometers) in urban areas.

According to Greenpeace, instead of producing more fuel-efficient cars and helping the United States reduce its dependence on oil, Ford is continuing its production of fuel-inefficient models. The Deputy Administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) noted that, although America is home to less that five percent of the world's population, it consumes around twenty six percent of the world's energy. Greenpeace is of the opinion that manufacturers like Ford are increasing the dependence of the United States on foreign oil as well. Higher oil consumption can give rise to serious environmental issues in the long run.

Members of Greenpeace argue that federal regulations in the United States such as the Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) have not helped either. CAFE regulations allow for 27 miles per gallon (9 liters per 100 kilometers) for passenger cars. However, for SUVs this limit is set to only 12 miles per gallon—allowing them to consume more fuel. The reason for this is that SUVs are classified as light trucks and not passenger cars. Greenpeace states that SUVs are used mainly as family cars in the United States and Britain. Also, Ford has marketed the Range Rover to an urban audience, making it more of a city car rather than a light truck.

Subsequently, since the early 2000s, Greenpeace has demonstrated against Ford. A Greenpeace news release stated that in April 2003, Ford broke its promise of trying to improve the efficiency of its SUV fleet despite having acknowledged in July 2000 that the fuel efficiency of the SUVs it produced was poor.

Also, in August 2004, instead of promoting cleaner transport, Ford planned to send its entire range of electric cars to be crushed to scrap. Under pressure from Greenpeace and other environmental action groups, this decision was ultimately reversed.

Greenpeace further alleged that on behalf of the vehicle manufacturing lobby in the United States and Britain, Ford had pressured various governments on national and regional levels to prevent various legislative changes like cutting vehicular emissions, giving informed choice to citizens to assist their buying decisions, and opposing measures to introduce more fuel-efficient and non-fuel-dependent transportation in the United States. These events achieve greater significance given that the United States and Australia are the only countries in the world not to have signed the Kyoto Protocol, an agreement that obliges countries to conform to gas emission norms.

Greenpeace and other environmental action groups maintain that by cutting down on vehicle emissions and limiting the use of SUVs, Americans can also contribute to the reduction in vehicular emissions that pose a significant threat to the environment. The group states that the incident mentioned in the news article was part of their campaign to create awareness for this issue.

Since the incident, the issue of vehicular fuel consumption has reached the limelight. Various agencies maintain fuel efficiency guides for vehicles on their Web sites to educate vehicle owners about fuel efficiency. Environmental action groups continue to demonstrate against cars they deem to be dangerous to the environment.

FURTHER RESOURCES

Web sites

"The Case Against Land Rover." Greenpeace.org.uk. 〈http://www.greenpeace.org.uk/climate/climatecriminals/landrover/case.cfm〉 (accessed March 8, 2006).

"Environmental Double Standards for Sport Utility Vehicles." SUV.org. 〈http://www.suv.org/environ.html〉 (accessed March 8, 2006).

"Fuel Efficient Vehicles Outnumbered by Gas Guzzlers in U.S. Showrooms." CNN.com, October 2, 2000. 〈http://archives.cnn.com/2000/US/10/02/epa.mileage.ap〉 (accessed March 8, 2006).

"Land Rover." Greenpeace.org.uk. 〈http://www.greenpeace.org.uk/climate/climatecriminals/landrover/index.cfm〉 (accessed March 8, 2006).