After two weeks of negotiations between more than 50 countries, the Fifth Session of the Intergovernmental Conference (IGC) ended last Friday without establishing a High Seas Treaty — once again leaving more than two-thirds of the global ocean unprotected. But important progress was also made, which the Only One community of supporters has helped push for. World leaders are closer than ever before to finalizing the treaty, and there’s reason to be optimistic that the next negotiation will be the last step in the nearly two-decades–long process. We can’t let up the pressure now, and we need you with us! Can you help build momentum for the coalition to protect the High Seas by sharing our petition with your network? We’re just shy of our goal of 75,000 signatures.
Update: Only One and the Shell Accountability Coalition made our first petition delivery in Beaver County on June 8th, 2023. Combined with petitions from Friends of the Earth and Earthworks, we delivered more than 60,000 total signatures to the Beaver County Commissioners. Shell just turned on a massive industrial plastics complex in Western Pennsylvania that risks poisoning the local air and water. Add your name to urge Shell to implement basic health and safety measures to protect the surrounding communities from danger.
The decision to turn on the petrochemical facility — which converts fossil fuels into single-use plastic products — comes despite fierce opposition from local Beaver County residents to prevent the plant’s 24 hour pollution cycle from contaminating the Ohio River and surrounding community.
The Shell facility utilizes a similar process to create plastic as the facilities that line the banks of Cancer Alley — a corridor along the Mississippi river so toxic that the risk of cancer for residents is up to 50 times higher than the rest of the country.
