The leaked environment chapter of the Trans-Pacfic Partnerships agreement confirms our worst fears - a sellout to fossil fuels and no enforcement ability, write Matthew Rimmer and Charlotte Wood

The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a highly secretive and expansive free trade agreement being negotiated between the US and eleven Pacific Rim countries, including Australia and New Zealand, has been promoted as a boon to the environment. But the text of the Environment Chapter of the agreement, which has been negotiated in secret until it was was released this week by WikiLeaks, appears to be little more than an exercise in greenwashing.

The US trade representative maintains that the US has pushed for "a robust, fully enforceable environment chapter in the TPP", and Andrew Robb, the Australian Trade and Investment Minister, has vowed that the TPP will contain safeguards for the protection of the environment.

But on 15 January 2013, WikiLeaks released the draft Environment Chapter of the TPP — along with a report by the Chairs of the Environmental Working Group. Julian Assange, WikiLeaks' publisher, said the leak showed "The fabled TPP environmental chapter turns out to be a toothless public relations exercise with no enforcement mechanism."

Far from being an ambitious 21st century agreement, the TPP provides little in the way of environmental protection of land, water, air, or the climate. New Zealand Sustainability Council executive director Simon Terry said the agreement showed "minimal real gains for nature".