When it comes to socialist and communist dictatorships, environmental groups fall silent. There is an unwillingness to criticise these oil-heavy nations for profiting off the black gold of fossil fuel, even when things go horribly wrong.
This moral double standard makes a mockery of UN-affiliated green groups who routinely heap praise on their ideological bedfellows while demonising Western nations for their rolling green fields of family farms or the horror of reliable energy grids.
The ethical dilemma was on full display when a Cuban oil storage facility at the Matanzas supertanker port went up in flames on August 5 after it was struck by lightning. The resulting blaze spread across four fuel tanks over the following week, injuring over a hundred. It was later discovered that 16 firefighters were missing and eventually confirmed dead. The ferocity of the blaze sent thick, black smoke laden with chemicals churning into the sky like a volcanic eruption.
The Big one…
Raging fire in Cuban oil depot leaves 80 injured and 17 firefighters missing: 800 people evacuated as smoke billows towards Havana after lightning strikes oil tank#cuba
— Kyle.Taylor (@livingbyyyz) August 6, 2022
Experts were rushed in from ‘friendly’ nations such as Venezuela and Mexico during the initial panic. They created a fleet of planes and helicopters that buzzed around the fire like bugs at night, dousing it in foam. Their efforts could not stop the original half-tank fire spreading, but did eventually bring the worst fire disaster in Cuban history under control.
In the aftermath, Cuba has called on the US Environmental Protection Agency for help wanting access to ‘innovative US techniques and procedures’ for the cleanup operation. The amount of help offered by the Biden administration is likely to be limited.
The destroyed fuel tanks formed part of an eight-tank facility that stores part of Cuba’s vast supply of crude oil ready for transport. Some is sent off to the nation’s thermoelectric plants – one of which had to be shut down. At the time, locals were ‘warned to wear face masks and avoid acid rain’ as water mixed with toxic fumes. They later saw evidence of black filth appearing all over their residences.
🔴CUBA :#VIDEO MATANZAS OIL DEPOT FIRE UNDER CONTROL!
Firefighters finally overcame the worst blaze in Cuba’s History that destroyed 40% of Island’s main fuel storage facility & caused massive outages in 5 days#BreakingNews #Matanzas #Fire #Incendio #Incendie pic.twitter.com/Nt1XXo0uSq
— loveworld (@LoveWorld_Peopl) August 10, 2022
While our politicians bicker about whether or not they’ll have to destroy Australia’s agriculture industry to cut ‘emissions’, huge tanks full of oil were burned and released directly into the atmosphere.
What’s the carbon footprint for this mess?
Is the United Nations going to punish Cuba for endangering the entire planet by bringing on the climate apocalypse?
Why didn’t we see climate-panicked school children from Western nations pour onto the streets, crying, screaming, and clutching banners about ‘Cuban climate criminals destroying the world!’?
You’d be hard-pressed to find an Australian school that mentioned the disaster that occurred near Havana, let alone a teacher brave enough to criticise their Left-wing regime.
📹| Another Blast in Cuba Oil Warehouse.
▪️Friday’s thunderstorm caused a giant fire at a crude oil warehouse in #Matanzas, #Cuba. 1 dead, 147 wounded and 14 missing.pic.twitter.com/8Z2NG2T9FY
— EHA News (@eha_news) August 9, 2022
Cuba distanced itself from the world in the 1950s under Fidel Castro and created a communist dictatorship. Their story since then has followed the typical communist collapse of terrible living conditions, blackouts, food shortages, crime, civil unrest, and pitiful healthcare.
But don’t worry, the World Wildlife Fund’s Living Planet Report 2006 listed Cuba as the ‘most sustainable model of development on the planet’. It is, apparently, ‘environmentally sustainable’ with a ‘high quality of life’.
Why all the praise? They installed a few solar panels… That was enough to tip the virtue scales in their favour. It is a game of green shadows and disingenuous ‘science’. As world burns, Cuba number 1 for sustainable development: WWF, went the slightly awkward headline in 2016.
Despite the obvious enormous environmental damage caused by this disaster, the propaganda machine that protects everyone except Western companies seems hesitant to criticise Cuba for the mishap.
Delegate for the Ministry of Science, Technology and the Environment, Oscar García Martínez, notes that ‘air quality’ is the main problem, but that it does not ‘compromise human health’.
‘Everything indicates that what happened in the fire doesn’t seem to have compromised any aspect for the future,’ they said.
But what about the imminent climate apocalypse, I hear you say? No one mentioned it. Experts can tell you the carbon footprint of your salad wrap, but not the Cuban fire crisis because – uh – reasons?
Citizen reports were more honest than official propaganda. According to World Nation News:
‘In the days leading up to the fire, it was common to read independent media descriptions of residents in high-risk areas who reported “a black spot or powder that stains clothes and hands and leaves an unusual appearance in the water”. While he warned that in the Yumuri Valley, a few kilometers from the town of Matanjas, “the animals don’t want to eat the yerba. They chew it and throw it away. We have nowhere to water the animals. Rivers get polluted after the rains.”’
Despite the glowing reviews of ‘sustainability’, 80 per cent of Cuba’s energy comes from oil and natural gas with almost all of the rest drawn from biofuels. The loss of these four tanks has spread fears of sustained and regular power outages in the months to come.
The French announced that they would help build the now notorious supertanker hub in 1989 in an agreement between the Bouygues Offshore Group, a Soviet company, and the Cuban oil ministry. While the original base was largely constructed with money from the Soviets, the destroyed tankers were new and built with help from Venezuela. It is no surprise to hear that after the destruction, President of Venezuela Nicolás Maduro has put his hand up to say that he will instruct the Ministry of Petroleum to invest in the rebuilding of the Cuban supertanker hub.
Unsurprisingly, instead of worrying about the massive oil fire, Cuba is more concerned about the environmental impact of … Covid.
‘It is not difficult to predict then that the disease will cause new and greater damage to biodiversity, aggravating the already existing deterioration of ecosystems,’ said Cuba’s Minister for Science, Technology and the Environment, Elba Rosa Pérez Montoya.
It was part of a ploy to get wealthy countries to re-invest in developing countries to save their biodiversity.
So, while the communist tyrannies of the world burn fossil fuels and complain about their new Climate Change money-making demon of Covid, the rest of us face a future of Veganism and blackouts.
