Tag: climate change

San Francisco: Climate Shenanigans Target California Democratic Convention

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photo courtesy of Diablo Rising Tide.

via Diablo Rising Tide

This weekend, as California’s Democrats, the next generation’s “real climate leader” Gov. Gavin Newsom and a dozen or so presidential candidates gathered in San Francisco, guerrilla climate advertisers with Diablo Rising Tide pasted, projected and otherwise displayed messages to the liberal masses about fossil fuels and climate change.

One of California’s biggest secrets is that the oil lobby has captured the  state government and dominates the public and political discourse around fossil fuels and climate change.

California writer Dan Bacher recently outlined a must-read of the power, influence and methods that the oil lobby uses around the state:

photo courtesy of Diablo Rising Tide.

“The Western States Petroleum Association (WSPA) is not a household name in California, but it should be. It’s the trade association for the oil industry and the largest and most powerful corporate lobbying organization in the state. If  you want to know the industries, organizations and people that control California, WSPA and Big Oil are right at the top of the list.

WSPA represents a who’s who of oil and pipeline companies, including AERA, BP, California Resources Corporation, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, Exxon, Plains All American Pipeline Company, Valero and many others. The companies that WSPA represents account for the bulk of petroleum exploration, production, refining, transportation and marketing in Arizona, California, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington, according to the WSPA website, www.wspa.org.

WSPA and Big Oil wield their power and influence over public discourse in 6 major ways: through (1) lobbying; (2) campaign spending; (3) serving on and putting shills on regulatory panels; (4) creating Astroturf groups: (5) working in collaboration with media; and (6) contributing to non profit organizations.”

photo courtesy of Diablo Rising Tide.

In San Francisco this weekend, WSPA remained behind the scenes, but disruptions, bird-dogs and protest were peppered through the weekend targeting Newsom and presidential candidates.

  • At one point 11 year Charlie asked Newsom why California wasn’t adopting a Green New Deal. Newsom, doing his best impression of Dianne Feinstein, told Charlie that “California is doing enough on climate.” Clearly, in a state where hundreds of oil drilling permits were issued in Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties, a million acres of federal land are being opened to fracking and an entire city burned to the ground during wildfires, the state of California and its governor is not doing enough.
  • A group of Porter Ranch residents found Governor Newsom to ask him when the infamous Aliso Canyon methane storage facility was going to be closed. He re-committed to closing the facility, but forgot to include what his timeline. Maybe he should have just done it the first time and he’d not have to re-commit.
  • Climate youth also converged outside and inside the convention calling for stronger climate action.
  • And then the “conservative voice” of the Democratic presidential candidates, former Colorado Gov. John “Frackenlooper” Hickenlooper was booed during most of his speech after attacking climate action, healthcare for all and socialism. We should have disrupted that shithead.

More shenanigans await as we aim to continue fucking with Big Oil and its lacky politicians.

Germany’s biggest CO2-Polluter RWE Claims 2 Million Euros from climate activists

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Europe’s largest CO2 emitter, the German energy company RWE, sues
climate activists for 2.07 million Euros for compensation.

Cologne, 05/29/2019:
The German power company RWE sues climate activists for 2.07 million
Euros for compensation. At the time of the 23rd UN Climate Conference in
Bonn in on 15 November 2017, the activist group “WeShutDown” blocked
conveyor belts and diggers in the Weisweiler coal power plant. With the
blockade, the activists achieved an almost complete shutdown of
Germany’s fourth biggest power plant.

Now, RWE is apparently trying to deter the anti-coal movement, demanding
large scale damages from activists for the first time. But the affected
activists will not let RWE intimidate them: “The claims by RWE cannot
stop our movement. Climate change is not waiting. Coal-fired power
plants must be shut down immediately and for good. As long as that is
not achieved, there will be blockades and other actions.” says activist
Cornelia.
The activists have filed an objection against the lawsuit.

The activist also face a criminal court case. It has been scheduled now
for july 10th, 15th and 17th. The process will take place in Eschweiler,
and deals with legal accusations such as disturbance of public supply
and trespassing. The activists announce that they will use the attention
raised by the lawsuit to accuse RWE of the worldwide destruction of
livelihoods and to spread their demand for an immediate coal phase-out.

A journalist, who accompanied the action in Weisweiler, is also being
sued. RWE even tries to deny his status as a Journalist.
The activists reject the plans of the German government to run
coal-fired power plants until 2038: “Burning coal for another twenty
years is madness. The capitalist economic system is based on the
illusion of perpetual growth. That’s why we have to overcome it”, says
Moritz.

RWE, whose three large lignite-fired power plants Weisweiler,
Niederaussem and Neurath alone emit about ten percent of German CO2
emissions, is increasingly targeted by climate activists and
initiatives. The activists declare themselves to stand in solidarity
with the internationally known occupation in the nearby Hambach Forest,
which protects the ancient forest from the biggest RWE lignite mine.

**The activists can be contacted for interviews or further questions.

Contact: +491779037423 e-mail: wedontshutup@riseup.net twitter: @we_shut

Press review of the action and the campaign against the lawsuit (german
only):http://wedontshutup.org/pressespiegel/

fotographs: https://www.flickr.com/photos/147051632@N03/

http://wedontshutup.org/en/press-releases/

Appalachia: Police and MVP Security Attempt Eviction of Yellow Finch Tree-Sit

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via Appalachians Against Pipelines

via Appalachians Against Pipelines.

“The tree sitters are holding strong. We are still here. Today is day 267.

At the Yellow Finch tree sits in the path of the Mountain Valley Pipeline, cops have left the scene (for now). MVP is still lurking down the road. We are still asking for local support — if you are available and can come out today during the day, we’d love to see you. If not, donate.

Here is a note from one of the sitters:

“Not all tree sitters enjoy the heights. Some impressive souls brave their worst fear. But for me, it is a perk, and before I climbed trees I climbed rocks.

Nothing is quite like the odd sensation of dangling in free space. Hundreds of feet up, trusting the ropes but without your weight in them, dangling above them only by your hands on tiny rock ledges. Sensing that your life is very much in your own hands.

We like to call our brief spaces of liberation ‘autonomous zones’. This is a little tongue-in-cheek. The cops could come at any time. But it is also the reality of the space

that we are all autonomous
that we are all ungovernable

At 6 A.M., I was rudely awakened by MVP attempting to climb the neighboring white pine. 20 workers were sprawled out beneath the two sits, using increasingly sketchy tactics to try and enter the tree.

Here I am, dangling once more into the terrifying freedom of choice.

Photo via Appalachians Against Pipelines.

Toss down your rope. Ignore the bustle below. Hope your friend catches it. Hope security knows / believes that touching them is a crime. Up the rope, to the traverse. Get out your gear. Attach. Now sprint. You are faster than them, because you are freer. Into the danger. Into harm’s way. Into this tree they would have cut today. And they leave. Awkwardly, bashfully. Retreating back to law & order, where the courts are still ignoring them.

It is easy to feel helpless. But even in the worst of circumstances, you will always have yourself. And while the doctrine of politics might tell you that decisions are somewhere else, out in the world, intangible and out of reach, they are not. They are yours. Reach up the face of the cliff and grasp for rough granite. Move now, before your muscles give out. Before down is the only way forward. And I’ll meet you there. Up at the crest. Where the wind blows the rock smooth and the land stretches out beneath you for miles. Where you can see it. Something possible.

We are still here. And will continue to be. Bolstered by that miraculous thing which is freedom. Dangling on the precipice of another world.”

Donate to support ongoing resistance: bit.ly/supportmvpresistance

For an update on this morning’s visit from MVP & law enforcement, see our last post: https://www.facebook.com/appalachiansagainstpipelines/posts/2047531472025736″

Community Members Occupy Jordan Cove LNG Portland Office Lobby in Solidarity with Impacted Landowners

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Pics via NO LNG EXPORTS Oregon. ?

via Portland Rising Tide

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Wednesday, May 22nd, 2019

Contact: Dineen O’Rourke, dineen@350pdx.org, 631.830.7478

Community Members Occupy Jordan Cove LNG Portland Office Lobby in Solidarity with Impacted Landowners

[Portland, OR] On Wednesday, May 22nd, from 11AM-1PM Over seventy community members gathered inside the lobby of the Jordan Cove LNG Portland office (11 SW 5th Avenue) to demonstrate opposition to the the proposed fracked gas project in solidarity with impacted landowners in Southern Oregon.

The Jordan Cove LNG project is a proposed 229-mile pipeline and export terminal to transport fracked gas through Southern Oregon to markets in Asia. The pipeline threatens the private property rights of hundreds of landowners, tribal lands and cultural resources, and 400 rivers and streams. The highly volatile LNG export terminal is proposed in an earthquake and tsunami zone on the coast and places over 16,000 Coos Bay residents in an hazardous burn zone.

If built, the Jordan Cove LNG export terminal alone would become the largest source of climate pollution in the state of Oregon. The full annual climate emissions from this project would be equal to another 7.9 million passenger vehicles on the streets according to a report from Oil Change International.

Pics via NO LNG EXPORTS Oregon.

Inside the office lobby, video messages were screened from Southern Oregon landowners whose property would be subject to eminent domain for the proposed fracked gas pipeline. Community members also joyfully listened to anti-fossil fuel folk music, ate blueberry pie (symbolic of potentially impacted blueberry fields), and wrote comments to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). Large banners in the lobby read, “Protect What You Love”, “No LNG”, and “No Pipelines Anywhere”.

For 15 years, rural landowners, Tribal representatives, youth, environmental advocates, and other residents have mobilized to stop Jordan Cove LNG, which was originally denied by FERC in 2016. Just a few weeks ago, the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) denied a Clean Water Act permit that the project cannot move forward without. The company still has permit applications pending at the local, state, and federal levels.

“Jordan Cove has threatened us with eminent domain for over a decade,” said Francis Eatherington, landowner in Douglas County. “Though they recently moved the route off our property, it is now much closer to the house, and so we are still threatened with the effects of a gas explosion. And what will happen when a forest fire burns over the block valve that’s cited near us?”

“Jordan Cove and Pembina have been pressuring landowners to sell permanent access to our land for their dangerous export project,” said Stacey McLaughlin, a landowner impacted by the pipeline. “They have caused us years of stress about the fate of our home and livelihood. I want them to pull their permit applications and stop torturing us.”

At the rally, people called on Governor Kate Brown to deny all state permits for this unpopular and unnecessary project and expressed concerns about the impacts of recent Trump pro-pipeline executive orders.

“Jordan Cove LNG is not welcome in Southern Oregon and it’s not welcome here in Portland either.” said Audrey Caines with Portland Rising Tide. “We will continue to stand with communities in Southern Oregon to fight Jordan Cove LNG until this climate disaster is stopped for good.”

Portland Rising Tide, a local all volunteer grassroots group that takes direct action to confront the root causes of climate change, organized today’s rally. They were joined by community members with 350pdx, Sunrise Movement PDX, DSA Eco Socialists, and individuals representing their own demands to end this pipeline project.

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