Europe's news in English

COPY LINK

AIRCRAFT

Activist tries to block plane at Paris airport

A French environmental activist has been arrested after sneaking on to the tarmac at Paris's Charles de Gaulle airport and trying to block an Airbus A319 from taking off, officials said Tuesday.

Published: 7 August 2012 18:14 CEST

Pierre-Emmanuel Neurohr, 44, a jobless former Greenpeace employee, is to appear in court on September 18, following two other convictions last month for similar stunts, judicial sources said.

Neurohr was freed on bail and forbidden from going to any French airport pending his trial.

He was arrested during his latest attempt around 10:00 am (0800 GMT) Monday while trying to prevent the Air France plane taking off from Charles de
Gaulle, airport sources said.

The airport is Europe's second busiest and the seventh busiest in the world.

Neurohr was twice convicted last month of trespassing and interference with aviation charges for attempting to block planes on the airport's tarmac on
June 6 and June 8. He was given three-month suspended sentences and fined.

During his last court appearance, Neurohr said he was acting to prevent aviation from damaging the environment.

"I have been working with environmental protection groups for 25 years, for 25 years I have seen things get worse. I think we must act," he had said.

Member comments

Log in here to leave a comment.

Become a Member to leave a comment.

Sweden's SSAB to build €4.5bn green steel plant in Luleå

“The transformation of Luleå is a major step on our journey to fossil-free steel production,” the company’s chief executive, Martin Lindqvist, said in a press release. “We will remove seven percent of Sweden’s carbon dioxide emissions, strengthen our competitiveness and secure jobs with the most cost-effective and sustainable sheet metal production in Europe.”

The new mini-mill, which is expected to start production at the end of 2028 and to hit full capacity in 2029, will include two electric arc furnaces, advanced secondary metallurgy, a direct strip rolling mill to produce SSABs specialty products, and a cold rolling complex to develop premium products for the transport industry.

It will be fed partly from hydrogen reduced iron ore produced at the HYBRIT joint venture in Gälliväre and partly with scrap steel. The company hopes to receive its environemntal permits by the end of 2024.

READ ALSO:

The announcement comes just one week after SSAB revealed that it was seeking $500m in funding from the US government to develop a second HYBRIT manufacturing facility, using green hydrogen instead of fossil fuels to produce direct reduced iron and steel.

The company said it also hoped to expand capacity at SSAB’s steel mill in Montpelier, Iowa.

The two new investment announcements strengthen the company’s claim to be the global pioneer in fossil-free steel.

It produced the world’s first sponge iron made with hydrogen instead of coke at its Hybrit pilot plant in Luleå in 2021. Gälliväre was chosen that same year as the site for the world’s first industrial scale plant using the technology.

In 2023, SSAB announced it would transform its steel mill in Oxelösund to fossil-free production.

The company’s Raahe mill in Finland, which currently has new most advanced equipment, will be the last of the company’s big plants to shift away from blast furnaces.

The steel industry currently produces 7 percent of the world’s carbon dioxide emissions, and shifting to hydrogen reduced steel and closing blast furnaces will reduce Sweden’s carbon emissions by 10 per cent and Finland’s by 7 per cent.

Url copied to clipboard!