Greenpeace’s Rainbow Warrior blocks palm oil tanker in Indonesian port

In Indonesia, the Greenpeace ship Rainbow Warrior blocked a 33,000 tonne load of palm oil from leaving the port of Dumai. The Rainbow Warrior was positioned by its crew so close to the oil tanker that the tug boats can’t move it from the dock area.

The cargo of palm oil is headed for India, and Greenpeace is using the exercise to highlight the impact of deforestation on the peat lands of Riau province in Indonesia. Greenpeace believes that the peatland forest store 14.6 billion tonnes of carbon that would be released to the atmosphere if the forest are cleared for oil palm.

Last week, Greenpeace released its “Cooking the Climate” report which concluded that forest clearance in Indonesia for palm plantations has made the country the third largest producer of greenhouse gas emissions, behind the United States and China.

The study found that Indonesia is losing 2 percent of its tropical forest each year to deforestation, and that the resultant emissions more than offset the gain from switching from fossil fuels to biofuels. Indonesia has six million hectares of palm under cultivation and plans to expand this to 10 million hectares by 2015.

Indonesia has announced plans to reserve 13.5 million acres for biofuels by 2010, of which 3.7 million acres will be palm oil plantations. Thailand has indicated that palm oil plantation will increase from 79,000 to 200,000 acres this year, with the potential to add another 1 million acres. The Philippines have reserved 1.1 million acres for palm oil plantation.

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