In Ha Tinh province, Vietnam, fishermen have already fought off one company which poisoned their coastline. Now they're fighting back against another: Mitsubishi Corporation.
Japan’s largest trading company is making a last ditch effort to secure finance for a big, dirty new coal plant called Vung Ang 2.
The site Mitsubishi has chosen is very same location as the infamous Formosa Steel Plant disaster in 2016, which wiped out the local fishing industry and poisoned 200km of pristine coastline with cyanide.
The local community has taken on powerful companies like Mitsubishi before and right now the company is keenly away of the controversy this project is causing. The future of the project hangs on negotiations over the next two months.
If we create enough outcry, we can force Mitsubishi to scrap this dirty coal plant for good.
Last year almost 20,000 SumOfUs members helped push British bank Standard Chartered to adopt a new policy that forced the bank to withdraw from the Vung Ang 2 plant.
Now four more companies which were originally backing the project have joined Standard Chartered and pulled out.
Which leaves Mitsubishi isolated and with only months left to secure a loan or it could be forced to abandon the project too.
We know that to avoid catastrophic climate change all countries must have phased out coal fired power by 2040. But economics don’t stack up either: by 2021 it will already be cheaper in Vietnam to invest in solar and win than coal -- and with significantly less dangers posed to community health and the climate.
Main image credit: Le Quynh
More information
Factsheet: Vung Ang 2
Market Forces. 1 February 2020.
Market Forces. 1 February 2020.
Vietnamese provinces say “no” to coal plants–government and industry still want more
Mekong Eye. 7 March 2019.
Mekong Eye. 7 March 2019.
Anger burns on Vientam's poisoned coast a year after spill
Reuters. 4 April 2017.
Reuters. 4 April 2017.
